I took my 80+ grandfather to your restaurant tonight. My first complaint has nothing to do with anything in your control. A fully licenced sit-down restaurant which specializes in gourmet burgers will only cook them medium-well or well-done? :dubious: If it was just myself I would’ve just payed for my lemonade and dined elsewhere. My grandfather however loves your restaurant and I’ll eat anywhere he want’s to go. So I just asked for a another minute to look at the menu and ordered something else. I didn’t complain because I know neither you or your mangment has any inpute/control over a corporate decision and you handled correctly (I’ve been places where they didn’t mention that until after they brought it out).
My second and third complaints do have to do with you (& #3 is why this is in the Pit & not CS). My grandfather, being an elderly man, is a slow eater. I tried to eat slow, but still finished before him. You could clearly see that he still had half his burger and most his fries left and was still eating. Yet you still brought out that little dessert menu with my bill inside. I realize it’s not hard to print another bill, but giving it out before you ask about dessert and while the other part hasn’t finished half his meal? :rolleyes: I thought that was a little rude. So I just asked for a refill. Later when my grandfather was still eating you came over, looked at him, and asked me if we wanted dessert. He was still eating. :mad: You looked at him and saw that he was still eating. I thought that was very rude. I’m sorry if I sounded annoyed when I responded “He’s still eating”, but that’s only because I was annoyed. It turns out he didn’t want dessert, but he didn’t finish his meal either. He didn’t want to bother you for a box.
I didn’t say anything to you (or your supervisor) because my grandfather was present and I didn’t want to embaress him further. To your credit you were very cheerful. I don’t think you actually intended to rush him. Maybe you’re new to waitressing and just need more training. Maybe you’ve been doing this for awhile and just had an off night. Maybe you’ve been doing this for awhile and are just a bad waitress. I still left you a tip, but I cut it in half (10% instead of 20%). Thank you for making my grandfather feel like he was a taking up too much of your time.
I was in a 1/8th full Cafe once with a couple of friends - we were catching up and chatting. The waiter not only kept coming over and demanding when we were going to order at one point he actually snapped his fingers and said ‘Come on ladies - this is a CAFE - in and out, in and out.’ My friends were dumbstruck. I’m rather bitchy and said ‘Why, is there a line up in the kitchen of people wanting this table?’ after pointedly looking at all the empty tables.
If I were you I would contact the restaraunt after the fact and tell the supervisor and the waitress why you were upset. If she was friendly she probably wasn’t trying to be a jerk - she was just clueless.
Don’t be an ass, Frank. Once a few people died from Escherichia Coli, it’s not surprising that a lot of of restaurants decided to cook all their ground beef at least medium well.
Though if it were my restaurant, I’d avoid the issue by grinding all my meat in the restaurant from clean cuts. Then you could have steak tartare if you wanted it.
So what is the required cooking temperature/duration to kill off all the bad beasties in beef? Does cooking hamburger at said temperature/duration always leave it medium-well or well-done?
IOW–can meat be cooked enough to kill off all the salmonella, etc., and still be rare? Might be obvious stuff to many folks here but I don’t cook, really, at all.
Red Robin is the restaurant that boasts of their bottomless french fries too. I feel like I’m asking for a free lunch when I ask for more fries.
I wouldn’t consider it a dining establishment, one where a person paces themselves through multiple courses. If it were busy, I understand the need for a quick table turnover and if they bring out the bill and ask if you want dessert, I don’t see the huge deal. It’s around the lines of a Perkins where they bring out the bill when they bring the entrees.
Sorry, I hate to see finer dining expectations being foisted upon lesser restaurants.
Here’s what my cooking fanatic wife says about this:
Bugs like e-coli tend to live on the surface of the meat. That’s why rare steaks, roast beef, lamb chops and so on are generally OK - the outside of the meat is cooked at a temperature that will kill the nasties, even though the centre is still cool and bloody.
Burgers are different, since they have much more “surface” - even the meat right in the centre has a surface. So it’s necessary to take more care with them, and there is an elevated risk with rare burgers.
You’re making me almost feel guilty. A couple weeks ago, I was waiting for a spot at the breakfast counter, and saw two friends of mine eating there, near the end of their meals. So I started calling out to them, “Could you slow down your chewing, please? I have LOTS of time.” And asked the waitress, who also knows me well, to bring them some more food so they could loaf comfortably.
My friends were trying to choke back their laughter, but the other people in line behind me, who weren’t in on the joke, were giving me those DEATH LOOKS. I was surely the biggest asshole they’d seen yet that day.
If your local RR is managed by the same regional people who manage ours, they’ll be receptive to your complaint. I got RR takeout one night, was treated rudely, got the wrong order and was told by the takeout hostess that I could keep the meal I’d received in lieu of a correct order. I called the regional manager to complain, got the entire meal comped and found much better service the next time we went.
Blow it out your ass, Bosda. First of all, you’ve got the wrong food-borne illness.
Secondly, a competent chef can cook steaks and ground beef rare with virtually no risk of poisoning. Restaurants that have “medium and higher only” policies are the kinds of generic chain joints that hire teenage cokeheads to run the grill, who can’t be trusted to cook rare meat properly.
(Not that I am against generic chain joints with cokeheads at the grill. I’m a frequent customer of Applebee’s. Sue me.)
Keep things clean from start to finish and you don’t have to worry about having to burn the hell out of a burger to make it safe. I eat at RR, and have never had a problem getting a medium burger. Maybe it’s a regional thing.
I thought Red Robin was at least a step or 2 down from Applebees.
I ate at Red Robins for the first time just a month or so ago – very disappointing. I tried their bacon cheeseburger because their ads made a big deal about “thick sliced bacon”, but it was the same sliced-with-a-microtome slices as most other places.
Your grandfather has my sincere sympathies, alphaboi. I am a slow eater by nature, and I’m even slower now that half my mouth is out of commission because of a couple of bad teeth. I’m eating as fast as I can, goddammit - quit hovering, quit trying to take my plate, quit rushing me. And for my husband’s family - serving dessert to everyone else while I’m still eating dinner is rude. I don’t know how many times I’ve stopped eating just like your grandfather because I felt like I was inconveniencing other people with my normal eating speed. I’ll even lose interest in eating a meal at home because it just takes too damned long.
This is where I lose all guilt for being assertive (pushy, aggresive, rude, blunt…take your pick) enough to say something to wait staff who appear to be rushing me or my party.
“Ma’am, my grandfather would like to enjoy his meal without feeling rushed. Please stop trying to push us out the door.”
You mean like the “personal responsibility” when a restaurant owner decides he doesn’t want to serve meat below MW, and takes the responsibility when some people decide not to dine there as a result?
Cause, you know, a lot of people took “personal responsibility” when they ordered their food, and then sued the restaurant out of business when they got sick.
Undercook your meat at home. That’s personal responsibility. Asking a restaurant owner to play russian roulette isn’t fair.
I was very pleasantly surprised last week when a friend and I went to IHOP - after the waitress cleared our plates, she came back with fresh drinks and said “I’m not rushing you; stay and visit!”
As for RR - I’ve been there once. With some friends who love the place. Haven’t been back. The food was mediocre and the service sucked.
