What makes a good restaurant, a "good restaurant"?

I am usually so underwhelmed and dissapointed, I am very reluctant to try new places...

I'm very picky, as some of you know, so when I get servers ignoring my requests, cold food, courses piling up at the table (I once had the salad, the appetizer, and the entree on the table at the same time at once place).

So I sniff a place out carefully these days before venturing in, and found a total gem of a place last month that we will be returning to frequently.

The wait staff was so attentive. We were going to the opera and I had carried in my bottle of water and put it on the floor in the corner beside my chair. The waitress wanted to know if I needed a glass or ice for the water I had brought when she brought water to the table. She was noticed and was prepared to serve the water I had brought.

This small inn does one seating for dinner and serves a different menu, from what's in season and looking good at the market, each weekend with a choice of three entrees and desserts. They ask that you call and select your entree after they post the menu.

Everything was so fresh, flavorful, correct temperature, no rush, courses were timed perfectly. All was housemade. It was art. There was literally nothing I would have changed about the experience from beginning to end, that's how perfect everything was.

It's my new favorite restaurant.

 
This reminds me of a friend of my daughter's..

She is an extremely picky eater, so one night when she came for dinner and brought her cousin with her, I kept things very plain. I served them roast chicken, plain ziti, unadorned yellow squash and salad. The cousin's eyes bugged out at the sight of her plate and she gasped, "What are you guys, gourmet or something?". Poor little scrap.

 
I don't need the bread hot, just a good quality. I hate the restaurant-supply stuff that tastes

like chemicals. There are good bakeries in every city now so every restaurant should have access to good bread.

Funny, my French inlaws visited here and sent the bread back because it was hot. To them it meant that it wasn't done yet.

 
The first thing I ask is to see after being seated is a dessert menu, & also if the restaurant

makes its own desserts on site. VERY disappointing to me to see cakes or cheesecakes sitting in a restaurant display case sporting those little pieces of parchment paper in between each slice--a dead giveaway that the items were made commercially and bought frozen by the restaurant.

Generally speaking, if a place takes the time and makes the effort to offer homemade desserts, the rest of the meal is typically stellar.

(I've been known to pay more for my dessert than for my lunch entree--one time my salad = $7.50 and dessert was 8 bucks for a slice of cheesecake. Worth it, though. That cheesecake was heavenly!)

 
I thought about it more and the main reason I didn't go back was the food concept.

They were going for a French/Korean style that was ultimately, unappealing to me. If the entire experience had been perfect, not sure I would have gone back anyway...

 
The Symphony Hotel on 14th St. across the street from Music Hall

Here's last weekend's menu:
5 courses and coffee or tea for $44.



JULY 22 - 24, 2009

PLEASE PRE-ORDER YOUR ENTREE SELECTIONS

APPETIZER

Pesto and Three Cheese Crepes with Cherry Tomatoes

SALAD

Summer Chop Chop

SORBET

Watermelon


ENTREES

Grilled Flank Steak with Peppers, Onions and Mushrooms

Roasted Salmon with Champagne, Honey and Mustard

Cold Entree of Pasta and Tarragon Chicken

Sauteed Corn Cakes, Red Pepper Sauce


DESSERTS

Chocolate Parfait

Strawberry Shortcake

Fresh Fruit

 
Not sure what "makes" a restaurant good, however I do know what I don't like

a smelly restaurant, when I walk in, I know if that smell is going to stick to my clothing and hair and gag me until I shower.

I hate old places that have not painted, cleaned up and fixed the torn and worn booths, chairs, and tables.

I hate loud music, and wait staff who bounce up and sit next to you in the booth like very old friends, using loud voices. then they come back and check on you every 5 minutes.

I hate when every dish is served with garlic mashed potatoes, the meat sitting on top and some unknown drizzle all over the edge of the plate. Of course it has either an undercooked or overcooked veggie alongside.

Have any of these restaurants never heard of grains, wheat berries, faro, Quinoa, Israeli couscous, etc.

They take forever to bring the check. I want it brought to us soon after we finish our dinner, with some one telling us, "Here is your check, so you can leave as soon or as late as you would like!" Of course, if they have reservations waiting, I'd like to know that too, so that we don't hog the table.

We live in a town that loves meat and potatoes, so restaurants which want to do more of the gourmet fare may have a difficult time unless they are very good. Frankly, I wish we did not have so many chains here. We rarely eat at chains. When we do go out, it is to a local eatery, and we have a few who are getting a good following, so we frequent those.

 
Actually, their bread is the best part. And the soup is great. We should've stopped there.

Now, the dinner salad is just lettuce, a cherry tomato, a couple of carrot curls, and 3 black olives. The salad bar used to have a wonderful things on it like homemade croutons, marinated mushrooms, red potato salad with vinaigrette, and fresh-cooked shrimp! Ahhh, the good 'ol days.

 
Wonderful, but will they ever stop calling the main courses "Entrees?" It means starter, debut,

or introduction. An "entree" starts the meal.

What's wrong with "Starter" and "Main Course," or if you've gotta be French, "Plat Principale" for the main dish

Drives me crazy. I swear I would give any restaurant who got the French right, or skipped it and got the English right, a second chance, even if the bread was bad.

 
So it is written, so it shall be done...

Joe, you should resign yourself to never seeing this used correctly. The US food industry long ago decided to use the word entree to mean "main course" and so it was decided.

However, I understand your pain.

It's like when I hear journalist, supposedly educated in English, elocution, and diction, saying things like "Feb-u-WARY" that I cringe as if Miss Havisham herself finally took a piece of the cake and ate it.

I was curious if I could find how this evolved, and found this bit from Wikipedia that explains how the evolution of calling the main course an entree evolved in N. America:

"An entrée (French, literally meaning entry or entrance) is one of several savoury courses in a Western-style formal meal service, specifically a smaller course that precedes the main course.(1) Usage may differ in North America where the disappearance in the early 20th century of a large communal main course such as a roast as a standard part of the meal has led to the term being used to describe the main course itself.(2) In that case what would otherwise be called the entrée is called the first course, appetizer or a starter."

In 1970, Richard Olney, an American living in Paris, gave the place of the entrée in a full menu: "A dinner that begins with a soup and runs through a fish course, an entrée, a sherbet, a roast, salad, cheese and dessert, and that may be accompanied by from three to six wines, presents a special problem of orchestration".(3) In 1967 Julia Child and her co-authors(4) outlined the character of such entrées, which— when they did not precede a roast— might serve as the main course of a luncheon, in a chapter of "Entrées and Luncheon Dishes" that included quiches, tarts and gratins, soufflés and timbales, gnocchi, quenelles and crepes.

 
You're right, Richard. I should say "I could care less" about entrees. It's not nucular war

 
When I think of entree, I think of it as an entry into one of the items I can

pick from the menu! Like an "entry" in a contest. I never even considered the cource of the word, as in "to begin". Wierd, I know!

 
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