by Nita Tyson

Created on: April 02, 2010

Are you cute, sweet, adorably sexy? Are you wearing a mini-skirt and a low cut top? Could you stand-in for a super model? Are your heels higher than your IQ? Well, if this describes you, you're probably okay sending food back in a restaurant. Shake your hair, lean over seductively and tell the waiter you like everything.........just..........purrrrrrrrrfect.... ........and send it back. The cook may even come out to greet you and apologize. But if you are an average person, in an average business suit or even more average jeans, think twice before sending food back. Whether you're in a nice restaurant or a beach-side stand, they really don't want to know that your steak isn't quite to your liking or that the salad has too much dressing. Truly, they don't.

The restaurant does want you to vote, with your cash. They want good tips, to keep their employees fairly satisfied and not out pounding the pavements looking for a better deal. They want you to order higher-end items. If you don't like the chicken breast, perhaps you would end a porterhouse - NEXT time. An expensive bottle of wine makes everything taste good......

A restaurant manager is judged on his or her ability to stay within certain bounds in their costing. How much food went to waste? How many meals had to be written off? Every meal that gets sent back and can't be, well, recycled becomes waste. By recycled, I am implying (actually, bolding stating) that if they can possibly figure out how to reuse the food you just sent back, they will do it. Case in point: I am allergic to, of all things, lettuce. You know, like the lettuce that comes on burgers, tacos, and so on. I always tell the staff, very adamantly, NO LETTUCE. Yet over half the time, I get great beautiful mounds of it, sometimes even more than my dining companions. What happens if I send it back? You guessed it; the lettuce gets scraped off and the food gets returned to me. I've learned to tell by looking for shreds under the burger, they always forget to do that part. Now, with lettuce, this might not be a crisis. But if they put nuts on someone's sundae and try to scrape them off, the customer could have a serious allergic reaction.

In the past, I managed a restaurant. Without naming the chain, it is related to one of those sit-down open-all-night restaurants that older clients like except on the weekends, when they are full of bar customers trying to eat to soak up the booze before hitting the road again. My head chef was very conscientious; if he made a mistake with the food, he would start over. But the other cooks, unless carefully watched, would stockpile returned burgers or steaks, to use again; they would rinse them off and throw them back on the grill. It didn't matter to them that I'd fire them if they got caught; it was easy enough to get another cook's job.

Think twice before complaining. Recently my other half and I went out and I ordered a steak. The menu clearly stated "all our steaks must be cooked to medium or well done to avoid food-borne illness". When I asked for a steak "as rare as you are allowed to make it", I got one all right. It mooed. Neither my partner nor I had ever seen food that raw served on a plate before. I did NOT send it back. I'm not dumb; I might have gotten back a steak that was cooked to shoe leather in retaliation,. Either way, the meal was basically ruined for me and next time, I'll say "rare",  and specify "NOT mooing." 

The next time you get the urge to send something back, nibble your bottom lip instead. Get out your little black book and write down the date, place, and time. Write to the company and complain, rather than sending the food back. Leave the offending food on your plate, it is infinitely safer.

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