Food for thought

[ChrisGreaves]

https://www.theguardian.com/food/2025/f ... ve-food-on
Cheers, Chris

[PaulB]

An enjoyable read. Thanks for sharing, Chris.

[Rebel]

Excellent!

[Amelia43]

I enjoyed the writer's style. No punches pulled and wonderfully honest.Thank you for sharing the article, Chris.

[BobH]

Tipping is one reason I've nearly stopped dining out.

Prices charged by decent restaurants are high and rising. It used to be that tips of 10% were considered on par. Now, the expectation is 25% of the price of the meal. Inflate the price of the food and you inflate the amount of the tip.

It's an egregious practice that should be abolished. Judging by the number of chain and affiliated restaurants closing in the US, I think that increased prices and reduced discretionary funds sound an ominous toll for restaurants that if not corrected will result in society returning to sanity like that which existed in the middle of the last century.

[ChrisGreaves]

@ Y'All: I'm glad you enjoyed it, possibly as much as did I. Another benefit from Phil Gyford's excellent site.

I cannot write as succinctly as Jay Rayner (or anyone else for that natter), but I'd add a word about what to do after eating at a restaurant that has, say, poor service. If I can, I return after a week or two, reasoning that we all have down-days. Perhaps one of the three wait-staff woke up with a feverish small child that day so the places was understaffed. Or perhaps the six-wheeler blew a tyre and supplies were late arriving. Or ... and often enough a second shot at the place shows it to be really as good as a friend who had recommended it.
Cheers, Chris

[GeoffW]

Chris, do you comply with that bit about not sharing home produce around?

It's nice not to have to tip at a restaurant. But, without tipping, the servers still have to make a living. If tips weren't expected, the total cost of a meal would probably not change much, as servers would need to be paid a much better wage to compensate.

[ChrisGreaves]

Tipping should be abolished. It’s wrong that restaurant staff should be dependent on the mood of the customer for the size of their wage. They should be paid properly. It works in Japan, France and Australia. It can work in the UK

It's nice not to have to tip at a restaurant. But, without tipping, the servers still have to make a living.

I agree with this one hundred percent. “Business is the exchange of two pieces of paper, one of which MUST be a cheque”, and when I go into a crane supplier to buy cable, pulleys, snatch-blocks and the like, or go to the dentist for tooth work, I expect to be quoted the full price exactly so that I can decide whether I want to go into credit-card debt or not. When the dentist’s waiting-room has three or more certificates framed on the wall, the dentist is bragging about professionalism and does not expect to be tipped. Likewise for the restaurant “Best Burgers in the Burgh!”. The contract/bill should be full price, including the cost of buying and maintaining tables and chairs and paying serving staff, purchasing bottles of disinfectant etc.
I dislike Canada for its slapping on up to 15% in PST, GST, and HST. For those of you weak at math, think of a coat labelled as “sixty dollars” taking seventy dollars out of your wallet. I want to know what will come out of my wallet when I walk out of the store, not when I take the coat off the rack to examine its cut.
At one of my “broke” periods in life I drove a stretch-limo. Basically picking up business men from their home and driving them to the airport. I would arrive at 6:15 pm for a 6:30 pickup, but every now and then some aperture of excreta would rush out the door at 6:50 screaming “floor it”. I would drive at the speed limit for, after all, it is I who collects the demerit points. In these cases I was not tipped, because the guy was bloody poor at time-management.
I hate the need for tipping.
On my last three tips to a motel in Conception Bay South I left a hefty tip for the housekeeping staff because they observed the “Do Not Disturb” sign and did not enter and re-arrange anything in my room until after I had left at the end of four days. That makes it just like being at home.

Making chutney at home from your allotment glut is a lovely hobby, but you really don’t have to share what you’ve made with your neighbours.

do you comply with that bit about not sharing home produce around?

I suspect that we would all agree that bottling chutney, marmalade, pear chunks, soups, stews, pumpkin flesh and so on is a lovely and lovable hobby, because if you don’t think so, then it is none of your business how I pass my time at home.
I agree that I do not have to share what I bottle at home with my neighbours, nor with total strangers who, paying $200 per night a night at an AirBnB prick up their eyes when I give them a tour of The Landfall Garden House and announce “Now this is the guest room”, flinging open the door to reveal a set of six room-wide shelves sagging under the weight of bottled preserves.
That I am given the choice to share preserves with my neighbours I consider a privilege; strangers rarely take the offered jar of citrus jam, but they do take away in their big-city heads the ideas that preserving can be done by a simple villager like me. And isn’t education a fun pass-time?
I try to share my home-made bread with David and Kerry, but they are weight-conscious. Late yesterday afternoon Kerry sent David across with a brimming bowl of rich, sweet beef stew swimming around a large dumpling in a sea of gravy, with veggies. Also a plate with three slabs of blueberry cheesecake. I hate both David AND Kerry.
I shall slice the dumpling in half and fry it up for elevenses. I can’t face breakfast.
I do like the idea that David and Kerry share their home produce around. Excepting when she sends over not a plate of food, but a platter of cod fillets and chips which, I hate to say, lasts for four evening meals for me, as I am no longer a growing boy.

Cheers, Fatty

[ChrisGreaves]

... a crane supplier to buy cable, pulleys, snatch-blocks and the like, or go to the dentist for tooth work, ...

I hasten to add that I am NOT considering adding home-grown dentistry to my hobbies here. The pulleys and ropes are to set up a small business of yanking trees vertically from the ground. My repeated visits to dentists are because both sets of dentists have such a great sense of humour.
Cheers, Chris

[ChrisGreaves]

... It's an egregious practice that should be abolished. ...

Hi Bob. My .limited understanding of the middle of the last century in the USofA was that folks ate at diners, cafes, and local family restaurants. When did bean-counters⁽¹⁾ set up these chains?

I have never been a fan of Restaurants, feeling more at home in diners or local cafes. perhaps that's because Mum's home-cooked meals were the best.
Today I will buy a frozen entree from NoFrills and nuke it in my motel room in Conception Bay South, OR head off to the Dragon 88 if I am too lazy to push a button, but energetic enough to drive seven kilometres to be fed in a quiet place - no Musak, no sports TV, no noisy conversations, just good food served with a smile after I've loaded up with non-perishables across the street.
When I've come to the end of a chapter I pay and leave (and leave a tip as an extra thank you to the family).
The arrival at the side of my table of the beautiful five-year old granddaughter is a bonus!
Cheers, Chris

⁽¹⁾I mean, that they COUNT beans instead of weighing them tells you that they already don't have a clue about cooking, right?

[GeoffW]

... when I go into a crane supplier to buy cable, pulleys, snatch-blocks and the like, or go to the dentist for tooth work, I expect to be quoted the full price exactly so that I can decide whether I want to go into credit-card debt or not.

I agree. And not just for restaurants.

I remember the surprise I got, on my first shopping visit in the US, to find that the items which were marked at $10, were actually going to cost $10.47 or some such amount.

At the time, Australia didn't have a sales tax. When one was introduced, the prices on display were increased, rather than added as an extra when one paid for an item. As much as I didn't appreciate the cost going up, I still can see the full price I'm going to pay, up front.

[HansV]

Everyone who sells a product or service to consumers here must list the full price including sales tax, so the price you see is always the price you pay. Listing prices without sales tax is restricted to business-to-business transactions.

[GeoffW]

Everyone who sells a product or service to consumers here must list the full price including sales tax, so the price you see is always the price you pay. Listing prices without sales tax is restricted to business-to-business transactions.

The mention of service reminded me.

There appears to be no obligation for a person quoting for a service to include the sales tax - and not even the obligation to state if one is included. This puts the honest service provider at a disadvantage. I've been caught by that before when comparing quotes.

[ChrisGreaves]

Everyone who sells a product or service to consumers here must list the full price including sales tax, so the price you see is always the price you pay. Listing prices without sales tax is restricted to business-to-business transactions.

Interesting to note that in Canada there is an element of "gotcha!" which probably seems almost Criminal to visitors to Canada, whereas Australia, where convicts were sent after the US refused to accept any more convicts after 1776, seems from Geoff's post to have straightened them all up.

Except I see in Geoff's later post that perhaps a Bad Element has crept back in.
Cheers, Chris