These Are Our Most Disappointing Dining Experiences
No matter how often or how well we eat, it’s not all sunshine and roses—not for us either (do you still remember the most disgusting dishes we’ve ever eaten?). These dining experiences were, to put it mildly, rather disappointing too.
Lots of tableside preparations
Sharon: “Okay, expectations were extremely high, because it was a two-Michelin-star restaurant, and arguing with my husband the entire way there didn’t exactly improve the atmosphere either. But if the food had been good, it could have been a fun—and above all, delicious—evening. But the food wasn’t good. It was mostly very pretentious and complicated, and also so exhausting: the tableside preparations. Having someone finish and explain a dish from the kitchen at your table once or twice is fun, but eight times is really overdoing it, especially if you haven’t enjoyed a single dish yet. It becomes almost laughable when someone goes (yet again) to explain how special and unique the ingredients are and starts fiddling around with tweezers, ice cubes, and nitrogen. It didn’t exactly help settle our argument either—and the bill didn’t help. Eye-wateringly expensive + not tasty is a very big disappointment indeed. Incidentally, the restaurant in question has closed its doors for good.”
Spaghetti ice cream
Delilah: “When I was sixteen, on vacation in Rimini, I ordered spaghetti with red sauce, based on a photo in a laminated menu (one of those places, yes), and a plate of strings of vanilla ice cream with strawberry sauce arrived. Huh? Total confusion, and it was only years later that I discovered this is also a famous dish: spaghetti ice cream.”
With onions, please
Laura: “When I pick up a little herring during my lunch break and open the herring wrapped in foil at the office, only to discover that the lady from Volendam forgot the onions. It happens more often than you’d think and is a huge disappointment every time. Maybe I should look for a new fish stall. Or always keep an onion at the office..”
Couples therapy
Marcus: “That one time I had a marital quarrel with my loved one at a famous chef’s restaurant, where she stormed out of the dining room after the starter and I mumbled to the famous chef that I had to go after her. Very embarrassing. But I’m afraid this is more material for the couples therapist…”
Oh, I thought you said you wanted to tip
Sabina: “So there we were, dressed up in a fancy restaurant. I was even wearing earrings, so you can gauge how serious the occasion was. The woman serving us was trying very hard, and her husband in the kitchen probably was too. And yet everything kept going wrong. Water with that? Yes, still, please. Whoosh, open bottle of sparkling water. Would you like to join the wine pairing? Yes, please! No, actually, no wine for me. There was a menu where you could choose between two starters: one with some complicated pepper dish and one similarly elaborate scallop dish. I love scallops and am allergic to peppers, so you can guess what I chose. Starter is served: the pepper dish for madam. I said: no, I didn’t order that. She said: you definitely did (this is a literal quote). I said: well, I’m pretty definitely sure I didn’t. She said: people usually hesitate between the starters because they’re both fantastic, then choose one and forget which one. I said: I don’t think that’s what happened (I could still remember the itchy bumps from my previous pepper adventure, you see). She said: I’ll go ask what we can do in the kitchen. Never saw the waitress again. My plate sat untouched. It took quite a while, so my husband ate his plate (the pepper dish) all up. Plates are cleared. By the same waitress. Was everything to your liking, she asks. I’m practically spitting fire. Out of anger and frustration. The next courses were okay. And when paying, my starter was simply listed on the bill, and the bill was something like 215 or so, off the top of my head (I think that’s a lot of money), and the woman had turned it into 250 on the little cash register. I said: I don’t think that’s right. She said: oh, I thought you said you wanted to tip. Apparently I did something with my eyebrows, and it was deducted from the bill. According to Michelin, this restaurant has a ‘high-quality kitchen’ and is a restaurant ‘of good standing’. My experience was rather different.”
¿Hablas español?
Wieke: “I went out to dinner with a couple we’re friends with at a restaurant in Amsterdam that still had a star at the time. The concept was shared dining and we were looking forward to it! Our server was a broad-accented Amsterdam woman—which of course doesn’t matter at all; in fact, she seemed like she’d be fun. But the man in the couple is Spanish, and she thought it was a good idea to make fun of him in Dutch to us. Every time he ordered something, she explained in Dutch why he was ordering the worst things. First, why make fun of someone who’s part of our group, and second, why criticize every single wine AND dish in the restaurant where you work yourself? Quite a dampener on the evening.”
No, no milk
Steffi: “In Zanzibar, I was sitting in a cocktail bar with my (now ex-)boyfriend. Half the ingredients weren’t listed, so I asked whether the cocktail of my choice—I think it was something pina-colada-like—was without milk or cream. Because: lactose intolerant. Yes yes, the girl serving us said. Once it arrived, I had serious doubts that the cocktail was milk-free, but hey: I decided to trust the girl based on her beautiful brown eyes. One sip later, I knew better. So I said to her: I think there’s milk in this. She looks at me, takes my glass, has a sip, and says: no, no milk, then puts the glass back in front of me.”
“It wasn’t entirely a success either; once in New York I asked for the salad with the ‘sauce on the side’, and got a salad sprinkled with pieces of sausage. I think he heard ‘sausage on the salad’?”
Read also:
- 8x bizarre and disgusting behavior by restaurant guests
- These are restaurant staff’s favorite late-night snacks
- How to be a dream guest in any restaurant
