In a good eating place a few nights ago, where the chef knows his stuff – a little on the heavy side, perhaps , but worth the visit – and the young staff efficient and attentive, we were asked “Is your starter alright?”, “How are you Mains?”, “Is the dessert OK?” ,“Is everything alright?” – no less than six times during our time at the table. Finally, after we had paid up (a reasonable twenty five quid a head) and made our leave, the young head waiter topped it all off with “Was everything alright?”
Why should “everything“ not have been “alright”? To me the question denoted a lack of confidence. I took the young man aside from the hearing of my guests and said “Look – if anything wasn’t alright you or your colleagues would have heard about it. You have a good chef in the kitchen, in whom you can have confidence. Let the food and your service speak for themselves”.
In another pretty good place recently (I am talking spend-per-head of £30 up) several times plates were put in front of us with the immortal phrase “There you go”. There we go where? And, even worse, as a dessert was put before my wife she got a cheery: “ENJOY!”
These words and phrases are now bog standard it seems. Robot-minded mechanical responses. As bad as the awful “Have a Nice Day”, which one now gets all over the place. I encountered this on my first trip to America in the 1960s and hoped it would not cross the Atlantic. But it did, though it took a long time to do so.
Managements have to realise that the young staff they employ are, for much of the time, serving paying customers who are a generation or two older and who find youthful and matey chat and constant enquiries as to whether everything is alright rather unnecessary. OK, maybe it’s the Victor Meldrew syndrome, but there are a lot of us curmudgeons about, with disposable dosh for meals out.
The drawing above is from PUNCH Magazine, 1875 and bore the title “Englishmen dining abroad”.
BESPOKE
Time was when you only saw this word on the shop front of rather exclusive Tailors. Webster’s Dictionary defines it: “Made to Order, especially in the case of wearing apparel” Time changes word usage and it has certainly widened the application of ‘bespoke’.
In recent issues of glossy home and country magazines I have seen advertisements promoting Bespoke Tailoring, Headware, Shoes, Architects, Builders, Shepherds’ Hut constructors, Kitchens, Garden Furniture, Curtains, Picture Framing, Windows and Doors, and Weaving. On one page of small display ads. five out of nine contained the word Bespoke. In another magazine I counted the word fourteen times in advertisements.
In the Bespoke stakes, though my Wooden Spoon goes to Waitrose, who offer packages of Cod and Haddock Fillets covered in Bespoke Breadcrumbs. I’d love to know which customer places the order for these?
COMMENT – HAVE A NICE BESPOKE DAY – ENJOY !
Fashionable Words and Phrases
In a good eating place a few nights ago, where the chef knows his stuff – a little on the heavy side, perhaps , but worth the visit – and the young staff efficient and attentive, we were asked “Is your starter alright?”, “How are you Mains?”, “Is the dessert OK?” ,“Is everything alright?” – no less than six times during our time at the table. Finally, after we had paid up (a reasonable twenty five quid a head) and made our leave, the young head waiter topped it all off with “Was everything alright?”
Why should “everything“ not have been “alright”? To me the question denoted a lack of confidence. I took the young man aside from the hearing of my guests and said “Look – if anything wasn’t alright you or your colleagues would have heard about it. You have a good chef in the kitchen, in whom you can have confidence. Let the food and your service speak for themselves”.
In another pretty good place recently (I am talking spend-per-head of £30 up) several times plates were put in front of us with the immortal phrase “There you go”. There we go where? And, even worse, as a dessert was put before my wife she got a cheery: “ENJOY!”
These words and phrases are now bog standard it seems. Robot-minded mechanical responses. As bad as the awful “Have a Nice Day”, which one now gets all over the place. I encountered this on my first trip to America in the 1960s and hoped it would not cross the Atlantic. But it did, though it took a long time to do so.
Managements have to realise that the young staff they employ are, for much of the time, serving paying customers who are a generation or two older and who find youthful and matey chat and constant enquiries as to whether everything is alright rather unnecessary. OK, maybe it’s the Victor Meldrew syndrome, but there are a lot of us curmudgeons about, with disposable dosh for meals out.
The drawing above is from PUNCH Magazine, 1875 and bore the title “Englishmen dining abroad”.
BESPOKE
Time was when you only saw this word on the shop front of rather exclusive Tailors. Webster’s Dictionary defines it: “Made to Order, especially in the case of wearing apparel” Time changes word usage and it has certainly widened the application of ‘bespoke’.
In recent issues of glossy home and country magazines I have seen advertisements promoting Bespoke Tailoring, Headware, Shoes, Architects, Builders, Shepherds’ Hut constructors, Kitchens, Garden Furniture, Curtains, Picture Framing, Windows and Doors, and Weaving. On one page of small display ads. five out of nine contained the word Bespoke. In another magazine I counted the word fourteen times in advertisements.
In the Bespoke stakes, though my Wooden Spoon goes to Waitrose, who offer packages of Cod and Haddock Fillets covered in Bespoke Breadcrumbs. I’d love to know which customer places the order for these?