Don't piss off the cook.

Last night I was part of a fairly large party dining out, at a midlevel chain eatery. It was Saturday night, in one of those suburban exo-scapes that litter the American landscape, conveniently close to the blasted heath of upscale townhome communities and prestige single-family homesites that has replaced small agriculture, and far from the eccentricities of older neighborhoods. Therefore, the midlevel chain eatery was doing a brisk business.

The particular road to which our dining experience was proximate was, 40 years ago, dairy farms at this latitude. The first levittowns in the area had established themselves about 2 miles south, and the creep of Burger Kings and diners was inching in this direction. They had (although probably few knew it) passed the height of the “cruising the drag” while the construction outfits were still busy enclosing carports and leveling yards for above-ground pools.

Today, however, progress had arrived. The difficulty was, supper wouldn’t.

Now, when I travel with a group that will need someone to move chairs, I expect difficulty. I don’t necessarily expect famine. Chain restaurants of this stripe are fairly well-run, and while you may not get the personal attention to detail of a family-owned eatery where the owners have college tuition to pay, you generally have the advantage of a corporate experience that realizes the connection between “volume of diners served” and “take for the evening.”. Particularly in these locations, where a sister restaurant is 20 feet away, they will not rest on their laurels from over-confidence.

So, when young Eric bustled over, full of smiles and good orthodontia, to take our appetizer and drink order, I felt secure. And indeed, the drinks arrived. Sadly, not so the appetizers.

Conversation at the table continued brisk and merry, and Eric took our order. Conversation continued and our drinks were finished. I departed to scrounge the snacks from the bar (which I’d already requested of everyone in uniform in the area, including Eric.) Conversation continued and still, our friend Eric did not return to us. One appetizer (somewhat cold) arrived, in the kind hands of a stranger. Conversation began to lapse.

Most of the people I have met strike me as extremely passive and rulebound. This indicates that I am an outlier, in this respect. It seemed to me that while the discussion was centered on recovering Eric, the lack we had was food. I had no idea where Eric was, but they keep the food in the kitchen. Therefore, off to the kitchen I went.

To visit the kitchen of a restaurant is to break the 4th wall utterly. You have defied the illusion that food springs full-blown from the head of Zeus, or that you can walk to a box on the wall and say “Earl Grey, hot” and it will materialize. From my position at the entrance of the kitchen, I could see two objects from our order, resting on the rail. I struggled with temptation…not the temptation of food, but the much stronger temptation one feels during a miserable production of Julius Caesar to grab the knife yourself and kill Caesar in the first act so that that whiny Brutus will shut up. Once you have fetched any of your actual order, however, the social contract between patron and waitstaff has been broken.

Fortunately, my hesitation was rewarded when Eric appeared, like the White Rabbit. “Eric. Is there any possibility we will be seeing some food soon?” I asked, while our salads floated behind him on the rail, a coronet of caloric possibility. “Absolutely!” he said cheerily. “The kitchen’s been a little backed up.” “And we all need drinks,” I pointed out. “Absolutely!” he agreed.

Now, it is one of my habits to observe the people around me in public places. In this case, I had observed them eating, and, if delayed, their waiters apologizing and bringing bread, etc. Not so, at Eric’s table. There was another delay before the salads I had seen arrived, and another before drinks (sans ice and, where appropriate, straws) made their appearance. Finally, food had arrived and been distributed, and a fellow with the aura of ‘management’ showed up with what he identified (after a glance at the cup) as ‘tasty kid’s beverage.' He enquired how we were doing.

It is in the little things, in fact in the way we behave around the acquisition of ‘our daily bread' that we are judged, if we are judged. I admired the success of his Saturday business and asked if my friend Eric had been newly hired. The manager looked alarmed, as well he might. No, was there a reason I might think so? I said that the slowness of our food’s arrival indicated to me either Eric’s unfamiliarity with the system, or that he’d picked a big fight with the cook. The manager’s expression was eloquent in the timeless style of Jeeves inspecting Bertie’s new cummerbund. Perhaps their moving Eric to help out in the banquet room had contributed. Perhaps Eric had picked a small fight with the cook. He and I parted on amicable terms, with complementary dessert.

My dinner companions wanted to know what all that business about picking a fight with the cook was. Perhaps you do, as well. But the thing about waiting tables is, you cannot use all your charm on the folks out front who pay the tip. Part of your sunshine must fall on the people you work with, particularly on the cook. Because if the cook doesn’t like you, your food does not arrive. It is similar, in some respects, to the problem of suburban sprawl itself. When we have finished paving all the dairy farms, no amount of orthodontia will get the queso sauce to the table.

Don’t piss off the cook.