This kind of thing is deeply unethical. Fortunately, in my experience, it's also quite rare.

Restaurants run out of stuff. It happens (see below). And a resourceful kitchen does know how to substitute - but it's incumbent on the cooks to let the waiters know, and for the waiters to let the guest know and approve of the change (or order something else) before the meal is fired.

It's one thing to run out of linguine and offer the guest fettucine as an alternative. It's okay to run out of chicken for chicken parm and offer veal parm as an alternative at the same price. There's no sin in that. But subbing, say, pork tenderloin for veal in a saltimbocca without letting the guest know is flat out wrong.

True story: the last full-time cooking job i had was as executive chef at an inn in Vermont. For a variety of reasons I won't go into, the place was a freaking nightmare - I gave my notice after two weeks and agreed to stay six more because foliage season was coming up, and I wasn't about to leave the owners in a lurch, no matter how richly they deserved it.

One of the things about this place when I hired on - before realizing what a Charlie Foxtrot I had walked into - was that its menu changed nightly. Okay, nothing wrong with that - in fact, I liked the idea when I signed on. There were only two constants on the menu: there always had to be smoked salmon in the app selection, and there always had to be calf's liver among the mains (largely because the woman who owned the place with her husband loved it).

One afternoon in the heart of foliage season - full house, plus a slew of walk-ins expected - my sous chef informed me that he'd neglected to pull more calf's liver from the freezer amd that there wasn't time to thaw any more.

"How many orders do we have?" I asked.

"Six."

This going into a 200-cover night with a lot of old people among the clientele. Obviously a problem.

Good chefs can either sell towards an item by making it sound incredibly appealing (this is a common tactic when you're trying to get rid of something) or sell away from an item if they're running low. That tactic was the one that made sense, and I thought back to a dish I'd seen in a demonstration at cooking school in Paris: sauteed calf's liver with raspberries and raspberry vinegar. Yes, that sounded nasty when it was announced. And one could tell the demonstration chef didn't like it either, and when samples were passed, all suspicions were confirmed. It positively sucked.

So for my dilemma, it seemed a perfect choice. I didn't have any fresh raspberries, but I did have some fresh blackberries and the dish hit the menu as "Sauteed Calf's Liver with Blackberries and Raspberry Vinegar."

Problem solved, I thought. Who in their right mind would EVER order THAT?

As it turned out, the first table that sat down - right near the entrance to the dining room - thought it sounded grand and ordered three of my six portions. And then proceeded to tell everyone arriving how good it was. It was 86ed less than 20 minutes into service. The owner was rip$#!+ (although I expect that was largely because it sounded good to her, too, and she was most assuredly not in her right mind). I probably would've been fired were it not for the fact that I had already quit.

I appreciate it when the waiter is honest. One time I ordered something (can't remember what it was), and the waiter said that most people don't like that item because the flavor is too strong. I ordered it anyway. The waiter said that if I didn't like it I could order something else with no charge on the first item. It was strong, but I kept it because I liked it.

This doesn't have anything to do with Mexican poop lettuce does it?

We actually only frequent a very few restaurants..
For many of the reasons posted on here..

Most restaurant food i can not physically tolerate ...
Has to be more of a home made type place..

Example... pizza place..they must make there own dough..

We are lucky here as we still have a few family run farm stores ..
N..then there are the (Meninights) spelling?
Kinda like the Amish folks that make real food from real stuff..

I hate restaurants as they are a disappointment most of the time, not to mention expensive. Very rare I walk away and think to myself…….l can’t wait to go  back.
We recently went to a restaurant we haven’t been to in years. Ordered the fish fry consisting of fish of your choice, tater of choice, coleslaw or salad. We were brought out our fish with a lemon wedge. Asking bout our sides, we were told they were out of fries, no salad because of the current “lettuce issue” and no coleslaw as there wasn’t a delivery that day.
Are you kidding me??? The manager never showed his head and the poor waitress was told by the “chef” not to say anything.
The fish was hideous and the lemon wedge was dried up old.
I left $20.00 on the table and tipped the waitress. Left our food there and walked out giving the waitress my name, and phone number and told her if the manager wants to call the cops, I would welcome that.
Never heard from them. I also used my big mouth on a local forum to bash the place and was NOT surprised at the number of people who chimed in with the same experience. How are places like this still open?
Slammer!!!

quote:

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Originally posted by STUD figmo Al

We actually only frequent a very few restaurants..
For many of the reasons posted on here..

Most restaurant food i can not physically tolerate ...
Has to be more of a home made type place..

Example... pizza place..they must make there own dough..

We are lucky here as we still have a few family run farm stores ..
N..then there are the (Meninights) spelling?
Kinda like the Amish folks that make real food from real stuff..

---

Mennonites. And yes, they are known for producing high-quality, simple fare that's well cooked.

quote:

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Originally posted by eagleisland

quote:

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Originally posted by STUD figmo Al

We actually only frequent a very few restaurants..
For many of the reasons posted on here..

Most restaurant food i can not physically tolerate ...
Has to be more of a home made type place..

Example... pizza place..they must make there own dough..

We are lucky here as we still have a few family run farm stores ..
N..then there are the (Meninights) spelling?
Kinda like the Amish folks that make real food from real stuff..

---

Mennonites. And yes, they are known for producing high-quality, simple fare that's well cooked.

---

Thanks Skip..I mean no disrespect..

The word changer..put up all kinds of words .....that would not have gone over ..well...at all... :0/

We were at a boutique "high-class" cafe in KC for lunch. My orders a small fussy salad, a combination of: arugula and four ingredients on it. The description and ingredients on the menu were very complete and specific. What she got, of the five ingredients, three were either substituted or missing.
At breakfast, again, in KC at a very intimate old small restaurant the features a variety of European cuisines. She ordered the steel cut oats. what was served was an instant rolled oatmeal that was cooked until mush. She called the server over, and explained. he took an alternate order. Marilyn order a croissant. What she got was what looked like a typical "roll" dough re-shaped into a crescent-zero flakiness, zero buttery flavor, soft and flacid. A Pilsbury rollup crecent roll would have been better!
brad

A big problem we have with Wichita restaurants are calling a menu item by a very traditional name, with no details. And what you get ain't that. It will be green beans, it may have almonds, along with butter and may have lemon juice, but often numerous other weird ingredients of spicing and seasonings of Asian and Middle East origins, added mushrooms, etc.
Or un-announced or un-described "heat" is added to everything. Even traditional dishes that never included jalapenos. Its in the aoli, in the salads, in the sauces, on the burgers, etc. not described. Its getting to the point that I expect the menus to start adding a symbol next to the few menu items that indicates "no heat". Hmmm, what symbol should that be?
Brad

For whatever it's worth, Brad, what passes for Chinese food in much of the United States has very little in common with the real thing, except for the name.

Could there be a direct relationship between boutique / $$ / intimate /  etc. and the problems you describe?   We pretty much only go to those closer to the other end of the spectrum and such problems are relatively rare.*

* fwiw, of those that do surface, my wife sees more of them, and gets more upset,  than I do.  Go figure.   

Having said that, we did encounter one... on a recurring basis.  My breakfast fried eggs are to be: "Broken .... over .... harder than hard."  They'll sometimes confirm: "Hard."  Me: "Harder than hard!!"

One one trip, and only the one trip .... a cross-Canada trek in 1975 ... there were as many screw-ups as getting them right the first time.  The funniest (?) was one instance when they came not broken, not turned over and with part of the yolk still runny [i.e. raw].   Just looking at them had me thinking of gagging, but I managed to say that they weren't turned over.  So she took them away, and after a minute or so brought 'em back .... turned over on the plate  [but without the benefit of the grill]. 

C'est la vie??

As a teenager I worked in the local diner. I was instructed to chop up the lunch meat ends and put them in the snapper soup. The boss asked if I ever tasted snapper and I said no. He said neither did the customers. It was a popular item on the menu.
The tuna salad was bonito. If we ran out of pastrami , we used corned beef. Left over bread was cut and fried, and served as croutons.
Monday was Yankee pot roast, Tuesday was beef stew, Wednesday was beef barley soup.

quote:

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Originally posted by RonR

 

Monday was Yankee pot roast, Tuesday was beef stew, Wednesday was beef barley soup.

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Any well-run restaurant will figure out ways to use up the leftovers. After all, they paid for the raw materials, even if it didn't all sell the first day.

And this, by the way, is the key to successful Sunday Brunch buffets! I used to work at a very busy and successful one. We'd certainly do a lot of fresh stuff, but a large part of the goal was to clean out the walk-in and get rid of all the stuff that didn't sell in the preceding week.You can move a lotta leftover rib roast if you cut it into skinny slices, mix it with slivered red and green peppers, douse it with a soy-ginger dressing and call it "Asian Beef Salad." Got some fish that's approaching the Long-Time-No-Sea stage? A Seafood Newburg with an extra hit of sherry will fly out of the warmers.

To the house, a successful Sunday Brunch was measured in dollars. To those of us on the line, a successful Sunday Brunch was declared if there was only enough food left in the walk-in to handle that night's dinner service.

This, in case anyone wonders, is why I never go to Sunday Brunch buffets. I know a little too much about how, and why, it's done.

On a good note, Mrs. Slammer and I have been watching our Grandsons in Minnesota for a week, and took two of our Grandsons (8 & 10) to Texas Roadhouse for dinner tonight. I’ve never been to one and neither have the boys and they were excited to go out to eat. Mrs. Slammer and I each had NYS steaks and the boys had fried chicken and burger. Had an onion blossom for an app and rolls, sides, salad, sodas and a big Modelo for gramps.

I have to say, for a chain restaurant, the food, service and experience was very good. Pretty damn good steaks surprisingly. Sides were good, salad was nice, food was hot, beer was cold and our waitress was just right. The boys loved it and ate everything up and enjoyed it. These boys can eat!!!
Oh, did I mention the price? Not bad IMO at all and I couldn’t find NOTHIN
to complain about. I wouldn’t hesitate to go back.
Slammer!!!