From Bad to Great

This post is going to be a longer post as I try and explain my experiences yesterday.

Of course my thoughts were I figured tonight was going to be a bit of an experience but not what I ended up dealing with.


Restaurant #1
Of course going in to a new restaurant I have to ask all the standard questions and of course the first one is "What oil do you fry your fried food in, is it canola, or soy, or what is it?"

I thought that would be an easy question but this time I got an answer that I never have heard before. Here is the answer from the chef "It's vegetarian oil", that sure doesn't answer the question because of course that left a lot of choices.

So here I was feeling pretty nervous so we ordered drinks and an appetizer and that was it. Our server was very understanding and knew why we were not going to order dinner there. A manager finally appeared and went to check the oil because we said we could not trust them now that they said vegetarian oil. The manager came back saying it was vegetable oil and the chef would prepare my food separately and use butter to cook my food. After getting the first answer on the oil I wasn't going to trust this restaurant to good my dinner for me considering they didn't seem to have any understanding about allergies.

We finished our drinks and appetizer and headed off to another restaurant and hopes that it would be better.

Restaurant #2
Of course started out again with my standard question "what oil" and immediately got an answer of "Soy oil". Now there's a restaurant that I trust because of how quickly a server can give me that answer.

I ordered my dinner and something that I thought would be OK but now the stories starts. Of course I ordered and the serve takes the order with all the precautions about cottonseed and shellfish allergies.

Our server returns and says that a manager will be coming over to see us because they have some concerns. Gee that didn't surprise me.

The manager comes over to understand my allergies and that I appreciate because with the cottonseed a lot of people don't know what it is or where to find it. Off she goes to talk to the kitchen to talk to the staff to ensure that my meal is going to be prepared in a safe manner.

Oh, oh, back comes the manager and the kitchen has a few concerns about what I ordered so no problem I change some of my order to make sure that it's going to be safe for me. Back to the kitchen she goes.

Now this is where I start to laugh and really trust the restaurant as the manager returns due to a couple more concerns about the changes to the order. So I changed my order totally from the originally one but that was fine because I was getting something I liked.

My order is finally placed and the kitchen is fully aware of my allergies and understands them. Working with a manager and the kitchen is something that I have learned to deal with and it doesn't bother me anymore when I see a manager.

Once my order has been punched in our server comes over and repeats the entire order with all the modifications to me to ensure that it was correct. Another good thing and made me happy.

Finally dinner arrives as it was served by the manager and she checks to ensure that everything is fine. I think some of the customers were trying to figure out what was going on because of all the attention our table was getting. My dinner was really good and I enjoyed it and wasn't worried about possible reactions.

After finishing dinner I decided to order a specialty coffee for dessert and it was to come with whipped cream on top. Instead of the whipped cream coming on top of my coffee, we got tocheck the ingredients on the whipped cream container before it was added. Another postivie mark for caring people.


What a wonderful feeling having a restaurant that cares and understands allergies and how to deal with them. Here was a restaurant that didn't know my allergy to cottonseed but were willing to figure it out and accommodate it.

What I can say is a "Job WELL DONE!!!!"


Our server (John) enjoyed seeing me make notes. To him "Yes, you were a good looking server." Maybe now I need to have a server competition.


So this was my one day or should I say my dinner experience. Being able to deal with good and bad service is something that I have learned now to deal with. Knowing when to not trust a restaurant is something that I am learning and I know that if I don't feel good about answers I don't eat there.