I was a fine dining chef for 17 years. If you were in San Francisco during the 90s, I might have cooked for you. A simple way to increase demand is to remove or change the least popular menu item every week or every month. This technique has been so successful for me I wouldn't waste much time doing anything else. Once I made a Napoleon pastry for a desert special while at La Folie on Polk st. which sadly closed recently. I had extra pastry cream and made Paris-Brest because we never threw out food. One waitress sold Napoleon on every table and the other waitress sold nothing but Paris-Brest. The dishes were fundamentally the same so I made both anytime I did one or the other as a special because waitstaff for reasons not explained in the article will sell nothing but one and others the other. I made cheese dishes to sell before the desert and fruit soups in the summer. This is the mid 90s and we were tracking data. The chef pulled me aside and showed me the sales from the previous month because I sold 1.2 deserts per customer.
Nonetheless, for the last six years I cooked I was a private chef on a mega yacht. People ask me if the guests told me what they want to eat. I say never because I never asked what people want to eat. I cooked what I want to eat and then make enough for the guests and crew. It is the best menu strategy. In fine dining, the customers make decisions all day long and in the case of being a private yacht chef, the guests are making million and billion dollar decisions. The last thing they want to do is have to decide what to eat for dinner. The family I cooked for rarely ate off the boat. And when they did it was because I said something like, "I hear there is a very good restaurant in St. Barts named ....," which was code for "I want the night off."
I believe the reason one waitress would sell every last Paris-Brest and the other would sell every last Napoleon was because they told the guests in the restaurant what they wanted to eat for desert. They made the decision for the guests.
Reminds me of a diner where I grew up. Not fine dining but no real menu. The waitress brought you something and assured you “you’ll like it.” People went there when they were hungry and didn’t want to make any decisions. Maybe it reminded them of their mom’s kitchen at home. You get what she cooked.
On the SE side of El Camino/Lawrence Expy in the mid '90s in suburban strip mall hell was an Indian restaurant run by a superlative cook who would get very grumpy if you tried to direct her away from her fixed price "meal". So we would gather up 6 or so eaters and just have her serve us. It was always a surprise and insanely good. Couldn't tell you what it cost. Anyway, we were there to eat her food, and she let you know it.
We always brought our toddler and at the beginning the lady says assertively something like "I'll take her" and hauls our daughter around the corner. So after about 20 minutes of no sign of daughter I decide to go take a peek at the situation. Well it turns out she has a daughter of her own, Down's Syndrome, it appears to be, and our daughter and the cook's daughter were having a fine time hanging out at the end of the corridor around the corner. I went back to the table and finished our excellent meal.
We are always interested in these sorts of things and now we find them more commonly off the beaten track in Mexico.
When I worked as a welder in a shipyard, very often I would get a pre-chosen lunch set from one of the multitude of taco trucks that showed up. It ranged from regular, professional trucks where you could order from a menu, on down to the wives of the workers selling tamales or the like out of the trunk of their cars to make a little extra on the side.
Nine times out of ten I'd usually just get the meal of the day from one of the ladies. It was always good, and it was actually kind of fun to wonder what you were going to get! I definitely see the appeal of not having to think about it.
That reminds me one aspect of approximately every vaguely-popular diner I've ever been to:
The Special.
Just show up, sit down, turn the coffee-cup right-side up, and order exactly like this before anyone has a chance to put a menu in front of you: "I'll have the special."
If they're doing it right, there will be no questions about your order.
Coffee will show up. Soon after, food will show up.
It will be fast, hot, inexpensive, and of a general quality that is par or better compared to anything else they might be have on the menu at that particular diner.
There's a similarity in the simplicity of ordering, yes.
But that's where the similarity ends.
As an American, even I know that a Full English has a defined set of things included. Sausages, mushrooms, etc: It can't be a Full English without the things that constitute a Full English Breakfast.
But otherwise, the special (or maybe more properly, "the daily special" but nobody ever says it like that) isn't like ordering a Full English at all. The special isn't even a little bit predefined.
The Special could be a club sandwich and potato chips, or meatloaf and mashed potatos, or a burger and fries, or some tacos, or regional fish like Walleye or something. Or whatever.
And the main distinction is that The Special changes daily, and oftentimes there will be different Specials for lunch, breakfast, and dinner.
In American diners, the special is usually written on a sign on the wall and/or maybe outside by the door.
Whatever it is, at whatever time, it's just a reasonably-complete meal that they're selling at a special low price right now that requires minimum effort on everyone's part and that they're prepared to serve a ton of today.
And tomorrow, the special will be something completely different.
A person may or may not be able to order whatever items that comprised yesterday's special, but if they can then the price will be higher today than it was yesterday.
But that doesn't matter, see? Just walk in, order "The Special," and food will show up.
Perhaps the context matters: I am not a fussy eater, and I love street good and cheap eats. I much prefer it to fine dining. But there's a reason for the latter: I'm a lifelong vegetarian. So long as I can get something without flesh in it, I'll eat anything, preferably deep-fried.
But whereas across the British Isles I can ask for a veggie Full English and get something good, I can't imagine walking into a food place and ordering sight-unseen, unless it was a veggie place, and they are typically upmarket and expensive, not the sort of basic joint I happen to prefer.
We had a place sort of like this in my hometown. They were only open for lunch on weekdays and you could show up and get a takeout box of whatever they chose to cook that day for a fixed price.
I'm not sure how a business in the US can possibly survive like this these days, with so many Americans having dietary restrictions and food allergies. It's so bad that, here in Japan, some restaurants are now posting signs (in English) outside warning foreign tourists that they can't serve them if they have any dietary restrictions or allergies.
Apparently yes. They only started posting these signs because of foreigners. As far as I can tell, Japanese people are more like American people in the 1980s when I grew up. Back then, food allergies were extremely rare. Even among my age group, they seem to be very rare, but I saw it a lot among younger people while I was still in the states. Airplanes used to give out honey roasted peanuts, if you're not old enough to remember, and they were fantastic. But then sometime in the 2000s I think, they stopped because so many people suddenly had deathly peanut allergies. And it's only gotten worse.
I'm not sure why Americans have so many food allergies these days, but I can only guess it something to do with either food quality, or parents that don't make their kids eat various foods. Japan has long had a culture of eating whatever food your parents gave you, and absolutely never wasting food.
As for dietary restrictions, yes, that's absolutely a thing unique to foreigners here. Japanese people don't have silly religious restrictions about food like other cultures, and vegetarianism and veganism are not terribly popular, though they are slowly growing.
> I'm not sure why Americans have so many food allergies these days,
It is not only Americans, it is also Europe. My theory it is because of pesticides.
I never had Strawberry allergies, except when i bought some from a big producer.
yes, there's been a significant rise in prevalence of food allergies especially in the western world and nobody's really sure why. japanese people are about half as likely to have food allergies compared to americans, for example. it's weird. like, asian people in australia are the most likely demographic to have food allergies, but only if their parents grew up in australia. first-gen asian immigrants have way lower rates of food allergies
I’m European, but living in the US now. Imo seems like Americans are almost the only ones with lots of food allergies, while rest of the world seems fine. Before moving to the US I don’t think I’ve ever even heard of peanut allergies.
I worked in the Buffalo area, and went with friends once or twice a week to lunch. It was the same place. First few times I went, I got a menu, the two of them did not. I thought it was strange, but figured that since they went a lot they had the menu memorized. About the 12th time there, I didn’t get a menu. I thought it was weird, but then I kind knew the menu. Then lunch came and I hadn’t ordered it, but we were talking, so I ate it and it was fine.
But the second time I was WTF?!? I asked and got told by the server that they had remembered what I ate and went from there. The process was: if I wanted to order, when we sat, ask for a menu. They sometimes had specials that were different (not just a marked down chicken dish) then we got menus to see them. Otherwise lunch appeared. It was really kind of nice that they knew what we liked and brought it. We seldom had the same plates which was also interesting.
And here it is almost 35 years later and I still remember lunch there. Miss you Jenny and Dave.
Whenever I eat somewhere new I ask what the staff would have if they were me. It's almost always a very good decision. They tend to enjoy making recommendations, and I often try something I wouldn't have picked myself.
Unless it's a Thai restaurant staffed by native Thai or Korean staffed by Koreans. I can't keep up with that spice.
It's a good litmus test for a restaurant too, because I've found it tends to have an uncanny valley.
At less formal restaurants, the staff are chill enough to immediately tell you what they eat.
At high end restaurants, they can tell you because they've had tastings and ingredient drills.
In the middle? You run into the weird "just enough training to pretend to be formal, but not enough to actually have comprehensive menu knowledge." Hence a lot of refusal to make recommendations or braindead "Do you like steak? The steak's good." (And yes, I know all the ways that customers are assholes about recommendations)
>I believe the reason one waitress would sell every last Paris-Brest and the other would sell every last Napoleon was because they told the guests in the restaurant what they wanted to eat for desert. They made the decision for the guests.
This wouldn't surprise me at all, honestly. I've rarely gone to fancy restaraunts, but when I have, I generally explain to the wait staff what kind of thing I prefer, and then ask them for their advice and just trust it 100%. The way I see it, if they are competent enough to work at a high-end restaraunt, they know what to bring out to get a nice tip.
Side-note: I'm currently watching through the HBO Show "Succession". If you've seen it, (without revealing any personal details) any insight on whether or not the ultra-rich are in anyway similar to how they are portrayed on shows like that? I tend to think that there are probably a mix of good and bad out there, just like any other economic "class" of people, I've just never interacted with people who own literal mega-yachts before, so it's all assumption on my part. I'll also understand if you choose not to say. I'm just trying to get a general feel of what people in that economic group are like in-person. Are they difficult to deal with? Backstab-y? Petty and childish? Genuinely nice and pleasant to be around? Or just kind of chill, but very business minded and self-motivated?
Not OP, nor have I seen Succession. But I do work with many very wealthy folks. It's a completely different world in some ways, and utterly banal in most others. If I were to summarize, it'd be that the Hedonic Treadmill effect is real, and you get used to whatever level of anything is around very quickly. Adjust for that, and the problems people have are as relatable as any other person.
I haven't seen the show but the "rich enough that their boat purchases are limited by channel depth and not money" level of rich people are mostly just normal people, the entire spectrum of good and bad is represented. There's less petty drama and Karen behavior because they can pay those problems away.
Source: former employment had me dealing with them, mostly subsequent generations, not the actual people who struck it rich personally.
Edit: They've all had bajillion dollar educations so on some level they're not stupid which means they can be reasoned with but the catch is that they can reason back at you.
This has been my experience as well. The difference between a seriously wealthy person and a less-than-wealthy person is only the number of digits in their bank account. At the heart of it, everyone is just as human as everyone else.
As an ex chef can you explain the insane over-salting to me? is this by design to try and encourage more drinking, or because the chef's tastebuds are shot, or because of some pseudo-belief in what it does under the salamander or .. what?
On duck fat roasted potato with rosemary? drown it in salt. Salt crusted fish? it said it on the menu. Everything else, you'd slap them if they turned the salt grinder this many rotates at the table.
A lot of people are used to the extra salt in cheap food. If restaurant food isn't salty enough, they will complain. Chefs are just adjusting to what their most vocal customers complain about.
My co-workers are from the whole spectrum. We can sit at a dinner with identical dishes. Me and one more has troubles eating because it's so insanely salty. A couple think it's a bit over salted but very good. One is adding more salt. How are you to please everyone?
> Chefs are just adjusting to what their most vocal customers complain about.
I’d rather the chef use the least amount required for proper cooking and leave it to me if I want more (some things absolutely need salt to cook properly, and in general it’s better to have some). It’s easier to add more than remove any excess.
> I prefer to add salt myself
Exactly. On the other hand I might not be enough of an arsehole because I would never complain about something I could fix so trivially myself.
proper cooking is not really objective though, and the moment you have anything involving brining, marinading etc. the salt level is kind of out of your hands.
the two strategies to adjust this i've seen, are either
* a sauce boat for sauced dishes, since the sauce is the thing that contains more or less sodium and is controllable
* more so in Asian restaurants, but you can order sides of unseasoned carbs (e.g. rice) to balance it out
> proper cooking is not really objective though, and the moment you have anything involving brining, marinading etc. the salt level is kind of out of your hands.
Some things just need salt otherwise the result is very different from what is expected (things like pasta and bread, for example, similarly salt is important for some vegetables). Same thing for brined food, it is unreasonable to expect that to be unsalted. We just don’t have to be dogmatic about it.
> the two strategies to adjust this i've seen, are either
For European food, the easiest is just to put a salt pot on the table (and pepper, while we’re at it). It’s important to be able to adjust sauce and salt independently.
It's easier to add salt, than to remove it, so I'm always in favor of this strategy. Less salt is one of those things that are good for you and only takes some getting used to. I can't eat any fast food burgers nowadays, they are just too salty.
You must be a super-taster. Some percentage of the population is super sensitive to taste, and think everything is overseasoned. You must be one of those people. Other people need 2-3x the flavor to match what you taste.
Sample of n=1, but my partner always thinks everything is over-seasoned, but otherwise has 0 "taste" when cooking or can't detect when something is stinky.
I've encountered this problem a number of times. It's one of a short list of things that will ensure I won't eat there again. I can fix something being under-salted, I can't fix something being over-salted.
I think it depends where one is. I grew up in the Bay Area and our vegetarian family's go-to place for special events was Greens at Ft. Mason. Prix-fixe and enjoy. Tried to find an equivalent in the Los Angeles area and was told by food/wine pros to go into higher-end omnivore places and ask the chef to make something appropriate. I was told that chefs here liked such challenges.
Failed utterly. Paid high prices for meh pastas and the "grilled vegetable plate." Learned my painful lesson and told the food/wine pros I knew that they were full of it. Didn't hurt that one of them came with me one evening to a place he recommended and saw what came out of the kitchen!
One thing I've never understood about menu design is the use of "market price" for certain items like crab and lobster.
I understand that the prices of these items fluctuate due to various factors, but it discourages me from ordering them because I don't want to 1. ask the price (when you're with people you don't know well it brings attention to you possibly spending more than they would on the meal, and can make you come across as a bit overly focused on price/money - could be interpreted as rude or poor manners) 2. potentially say no based on the price and deal with related social vibes that might put off + come up with a backup on the menu 3. not ask for the price at all and be handed a surprisingly large bill. Some of the times I have asked, the waiter will have to physically leave to go check the price, which is also something I want to avoid.
You might say something like "if you have to ask, you can't afford it" but I genuinely don't mind, and can easily afford, paying $50-70 on good seafood when I'm in the mood for it. Crab and lobster are some of my favorite foods, and their market price often comes in around there. So in the course of my life restaurants have probably lost out on hundreds or maybe a couple thousand in sales because of "market price". I'm not sure if this simply something most restarateurs are unaware of, it not being worth it to reprint menus or even put the market price on a blackboard somewhere, or some other psychological phenomenon I'm unaware of - maybe putting a larger price on the menu discourages most other people from ordering it or, makes other diners think the restaurant is "too expensive" even if not ordering it, or pisses diners off when they pay $X one week and come back and see it's at $X+20. Is there a canonical reason?
> One thing I've never understood about menu design is the use of "market price" for certain items like crab and lobster.
This happens with restaurants that are buying their seafood fresh off the docks (in my part of the US, anyway) because the price the restaurant pays for it can vary by a lot from day to day. The restaurant effectively can't predict what the price will be, so they can't really put the price on the menu unless they set it very high.
Edited to add: That said, about half of the local restaurants that sell fresh seafood around here have a chalkboard visible from the street or lobby that says what the market prices currently are. If you know what you're getting, or have a good memory, you don't have to ask anyone.
It dissuades you, but it attracts other diners, who (reasonably) read it as "this is a premium offering, uncompromised by margin constraints". It's an "if you have to ask" situation. Just don't order the M.P. items!
(Troy: "It said market price. What market do you shop at!?")
I'm not entirely convinced by that explanation alone because plenty of other ultra-premium menu items (like fancy steak or vintage wines) tend to have their prices listed when seafood aren't, and oftentimes I find the market price is not wholly unreasonable. I suspect at least some of the reasoning has to be in managing consumers' expectations for stable prices/availability, and also for size, since serving a quarter will cost the restaurant much more than an entire deuce.
Also, how come you responded to my comment about lobsters and not my email about containers?? (kidding mostly... but do let me know if you want to chat containers)
I'm not saying M.P. is used primarily as a Veblen device to attract customers, only that it has that effect. Lobsters are M.P. in part because they're seasonal; they really do have variable prices. The kinds of restaurants that have M.P. menu items are generally working within pretty strict food cost percentage parameters.
I agree with all your points, and as someone still in the food industry I'd add that the use of Market Price on menus often comes down to something mundane: The Market Price items fluctuate too much between frequent purchases made by the restaurant and those establishments usually don't want the not-cheap expense of new copies of the menu printed that often.
>those establishments usually don't want the not-cheap expense of new copies of the menu printed that often.
It's nearly 2025 and qr codes are a thing.
"Scan this code for the current MP (market price)/ TOD (time of day price)/ HTBF (how the boss feels price)/ WBTYAP (we've been tracking your amazon purchases)/ WR (wrong race [...etc] price."
As it'll all be on your phone, it'll be up to you to hide, or show, your emotions as the $€££ (sell) price comes up.
I can only speak about my native United States. Indeed, QR codes are a thing, yet the high-end restaurants that are apt to list a menu item as Market Price are also places where there's an emphasis on service (along with the food/drink offerings and the atmosphere of the establishment). As of now, asking customers in such places to do that isn't considered appropriate. Certainly, that may change, as standards always shift over time.
Fine. So when the high-end server arrives to announce the high-end specials, he can tell you the market prices without prompting. Never have seen that, though.
I understand. But if they told you the price regardless of whether someone asks, it would address all the potential reasons weitendorf suggested about not wanting to ask. They're happy to tell me the specials. There aren't usually more than a couple of things that are "M.P.". They can go the extra mile and tell me those.
They almost always ask if you want to hear the specials.
They will however only tell you the price of the specials if you specifically ask, and if you don't ask they'll often not volunteer that information. I have on a few occasions 'screwed' myself by assuming that starter that was the special would be roughly the same price as all the other starters on the menu, only to get the bill and find out it was almost twice the price.
Yeah, I get it. They're not there to be happy. They're there to make the customers happy. Here is what weitendorf's concerns were:
weitendorf> but it discourages me from ordering them because I don't want to 1. ask the price (when you're with people you don't know well it brings attention to you possibly spending more than they would on the meal, and can make you come across as a bit overly focused on price/money - could be interpreted as rude or poor manners) 2. potentially say no based on the price and deal with related social vibes that might put off + come up with a backup on the menu 3. not ask for the price at all and be handed a surprisingly large bill. Some of the times I have asked, the waiter will have to physically leave to go check the price, which is also something I want to avoid.
Providing the specific Market Price when already there to inform diners of something like specials is a good idea, especially in higher-end places. Their service goals are typically focused on making guests comfortable and accommodating the obvious and less-obvious needs/wants. This seems like a complementary addition to those service ideas.
A nice restaurant is not going to use a QR code for anything. They are ugly and the last thing they want is for people sharing the dining room space to be looking at their phones.
This. Also, I know that if I see a QR code in a restaurant, I take it as a strong signal that it's not a particularly good restaurant. I am quite certain that I'm not the only one who sees them this way.
I went on a work trip one time with co-workers. I'm not generally someone who is embarrassed by social gaffs (gaffes?). But when a fellow college employee looked at the waiter in a SUPER high end seafood restaurant in Maine and said, "oh no, I don't like lobster. I had that once in silver dollar City and it was really rubbery." I wanted to crawl under the table.
This feels like one of those times where a really good restaurant host would smile graciously, nod some tacit agreement, check for allergies, and then bring out a little lobster amuse-bouche on the house just to blow the diners' minds.
That may be, but the host we had just sort of blank stared and politely smiled before going to the kitchen and I'm assuming screaming into the void or something.
Somewhat agree. Lobster/Crab are supposed to be kept alive until immediately before cooking them (in some cases lobster tails are kept frozen but those aren't as often MP, crab can be canned but again that's usually not sold at MP), and in both cases they're pretty simple to cook at least decently, so I don't worry much about food safety or them coming out awful. Regardless, even restaurants that sell a lot of lobster tend to use MP so the point stands.
The point is, a waiter at an establishment that will have good lobster will know the price of the lobster for the night, starting from the moment the restaurant opens.
An Americana classic styled sandwich made with grill style beef patty, melt grade American cheese, two pillow soft buns with organic sesame seeds, and a dash of our back of the house made ketchup.
If you want to eat an $8 cheeseburger, you will have no trouble finding one. If you don't want to try a restaurant's attempt to "elevate" a burger --- and I don't blame you --- don't order it. It's not all a scam. The $25 burger is its own genre, and there is a market for it.
We had a story a year or so back about the best cheeseburger in the country (according to one respected reviewer, whose reviews generated lines around the block for places). It was in the $8 genre, and people were upset!
I'm not sure it's trending so much as one the most prized ingredients in fine dining; a cliche, like a perigord truffle. The ducks and geese harvested for foie are better treated than any chicken you are going to buy at Whole Foods.
Too many adjectives. Fine dining restaurants usually avoid loading down the description like that.
The only adjective likely to make it onto the menu at a white-tablecloth restaurant is "house made", and even that would be on thin ice. The chef would prefer that you just know that of course he's making his own ketchup.
There's a great chapter on this in Dan Jurafsky's book:
I've long been fascinated by the wording on menus. One of my favorite little surprising factoids is that an adjective you'll almost never find in a high-end restaurant is "fresh", although you'll often find it at less pretentious restaurants.
The reason being that customers of high-end restaurants assume that everything being sold is fresh. If it has to be pointed out in a menu description, that implies that the other items are not fresh or that there's some reason why the place needs to point out a quality that is table stakes. It therefore raises doubt about the quality of the restaurant.
"Allen says artificial intelligence and machine learning could transform this even further – algorithms could look at your previous choices when you last visited a restaurant and suggest other items you might like.
“The restaurant industry has probably spent tens of billions of dollars over the years trying to understand menu design, menu engineering and psychology,” he says. “But the opportunities presented by the fourth industrial revolution are huge. Imagine being able to order a meal that has been designed to include your favourite foods with a single click.”
Well, no, as the article suggests, AI will instead be used to direct diners to the most profitable menu item.
If it's anything like the recommendation engines Amazon et al currently use, you'll order General Tso's chicken once and then for the next year every recommendation will be slight variations of General Tso's chicken from restaurants with weird names you've never heard of.
[Recommended for you] General Tso’s Chicken - Legendary Sweet & Spicy Juicy Tender Pre-Cooked Masterpiece, 24 oz Frozen Feast for Dinner Warriors - 5-Minute Meal Magic, Famous Chinese Food Delight
[Overall Pick] Orange Chicken - Famous Crispy Sweet Sour Flavor - 2024 New Improve Version - Special Gourmet Frozen Fast Cook Meal for Happy Eating Time
But restaurants in most places are in intense competition with each other on both taste and price, so this would only benefit the consumer? What model of the industry would indicate otherwise?
The single greatest restaurant trick is to give the table one wine list, so they're much more inclined to share several bottles instead of each drinking what they want.
This article is interesting, but the author seems more excited about tricking people into spending more money. You could easily use endpoints that are more in the direction of satisfaction and happiness than always using money as the goalpost.
I understand that the people he interviewed are likely in the business of profit making but as a journalist for the BBC I would have hoped for a more honest take.
"Put the most expensive item first so that the others seem more reasonable"
That's just messed up and not something to be celebrated IMHO
The whole BBC “news magazine” with multiple themed blogs operation is interesting - they’re toeing a fine line. I think it was spun off into the BBC Worldwide commercial arm from an obscure section from their online news operation.
Even at applebees that was sort of my response. I genuinely liked 90% of the menu. But I would also lead you along in a conversation to figure out what you would enjoy the most.
What if most of that is utter nonsense some psychologist, like their former failed high priests like Zimbardo, Ariel & Co-Quaks, tell them, because real work is hard?
Nonetheless, for the last six years I cooked I was a private chef on a mega yacht. People ask me if the guests told me what they want to eat. I say never because I never asked what people want to eat. I cooked what I want to eat and then make enough for the guests and crew. It is the best menu strategy. In fine dining, the customers make decisions all day long and in the case of being a private yacht chef, the guests are making million and billion dollar decisions. The last thing they want to do is have to decide what to eat for dinner. The family I cooked for rarely ate off the boat. And when they did it was because I said something like, "I hear there is a very good restaurant in St. Barts named ....," which was code for "I want the night off."
I believe the reason one waitress would sell every last Paris-Brest and the other would sell every last Napoleon was because they told the guests in the restaurant what they wanted to eat for desert. They made the decision for the guests.