Can I get steak instead of fries?

Today's diner is all about choices. Maybe they're on the south beach diet, or the atkins diet, or weight watchers, or the zone diet, or whatever wildly restrictive plan that seemed most enticing to them. I understand the importance of regulating calories and watching your carbs, protein, etc. But there has to be some margin of error allowed when going out to eat. Some restaurants cater to these diets and that is great. Others, actually most, don't. It is not the restaurant's responsibility to list calories for you or other nutritional information. If you're that concerned about your diet you should already know the basic nutritional information regarding the foods you most commonly eat. And you should be able to make an educated guess toward the number of calories in a sauce or side dish - is it creamy? is based in animal fat? These are some of the very basic questions you can ask yourself to help determine just how unhealthy of a sauce you are eating. Or remember this easy gem - the better the food tastes, the worse it probably is for you. I try my best to answer my guests' questions about the food and to be as helpful as possible in assisting with diet friendly choices, but there eventually comes a limit. One or two modifications on a dish are fine. Perhaps you'd like the sauce on the side, or the vegetables to not be cooked in any oil. Okay, these are reasonable requests. Maybe you'd like all white meat or a vegetable in place of those starchy ole potatoes. Perfectly acceptable requests that clearly have a dietary purpose.

It is not okay, however, to begin drastically changing the menu because the exact dish you once cooked for yourself at home is not on it. Why can't we make you regular mashed potatoes instead of garlic mashed potatoes? Because they're not on the menu! Why can't we make you a breaded chicken breast with pasta? Because there is nothing breaded on the entire menu and we don't even carry pasta in the restaurant!! The audacity of such requests amazes me everytime I hear them. This might have something to do with the anger that usually accompanies these requests. People who want to invent their own dish usually feel very entitled to this dish, and as such will not hesitate to bark and spit at anyone who keeps them from it. I LOVE these people. Nothing at work gives me greater pleasure than forcing them to order an item off the menu. Usually there is a lengthy discussion involving many inuslts hurled toward the server and the telling of many lies. "The last time I was hear they did this," "I'm a regular they always do this for me," "They always do this at your other location." These guests also feel the need to explain our job to us - "It's really not that hard, just do it," "I don't see what the problem is and I want my salad," "The kitchen will understand, it's no big deal." Oh really? You personally know the chef and line cooks making your food? You've already spoken with them and explained that while cooking for three hundred other people they should set aside the time to prepare you a completely unique and special dish at the exspense of everyone else's dishes? In that case why don't you just go ahead and put the order in yourself and run it to the table. You seem to know your way around our restaurant very well.

I've gotten off into a very angry waiter rant and that is something I try to avoid here. So Ill try to bring it all back together for a point and a few basic reminders: 1)Do not ask for more than two changes to your food unless you have a legitimate food alergy. You are wasting the cooks' time and causing everyone's orders to take longer. 2)Be friendly and polite when asking for major changes to the menu. If a guest is cool about it I have no problem going out of my way to get them the exact dish they want. The minute they begin raising their voice is when I start saying no. 3)Be prepared to pay. Just accept that changes to the dish often involve a charge. You are asking for something extra, and as such are paying an extra charge. It's how restaurants work. It's how all commerce works - more services cost you more money. And finally, in response to may favorite request to date - No, you cannot have a side of steak in place of the french fries. And yes, there will be an upcharge - the price of a steak. And are you serious?