Service is a dance that requires partnership. A diner orders a meal from a waiter. A customer asks a salesperson for a pair of shoes in their size. A passenger requests a seat assignment from an airline booking agent. The sequence of service is the required steps of giving and receiving in business transactions. Unlike any ballet, however, plenty of participants are unaware they contribute to the outcome of the service dance. When one half of the partnership is belligerent, demanding, and unmindful of their contributions to the equation beyond the financial, often times the dance becomes contentious.

Customers may have a very clear opinion of the responsibilities of the service giver–complaining about customer service is de rigueur on sites like Yelp–but its rare for the patron to see past their financial role in the dance. The Red Door Cafe is a small restaurant in the Pacific Heights neighborhood of San Francisco where each and every potential diner is made aware of their role in their service experience and the owner challenges every diner to take responsibility for their part in the service exchange.

Wake up and smell the coffee

My good friend and fellow service provider, Michael Procopio suggested I check out the small restaurant when I recently visited San Francisco.  “The lines will be insane,” Michael said. “But you have to go. Really. You must.”

Upon reading up on the Red Door Cafe on Yelp, you’ll see 5 star reviews from diners who rave about incredible food, great service, and an untraditional setting for breakfast. But it isn’t until you arrive at the restaurant and take a good look through the big glass windows that you start to really understand that you are regarding a very unique establishment.

The 12-seat restaurant opens at 10 am, but you’ll more than likely find a line has formed outside on the sidewalk by 10:15. Unlike a typical queue for breakfast, however, the diners-to-be aren’t reading newspapers while they wait. Customers giggle and laugh as they cuddle tattered, plastic baby dolls and sip coffee from Easter egg colored bowls.

A sign in the window spells things out for the curious diner right away: This isn’t a restaurant, it’s an experience. Look around and you’ll quickly start to get an inkling that this place is different. Inside, you’ll see diners cavorting with plastic trolls and headless dolls. If you look close enough you’ll note the risqué, plastic items sold at most sex shops next to the salt and pepper shakers on every table.

Ahmed–known to his regulars as A.D. or Absolutely Delicious–is the gregarious owner/bouncer/server/host of The Red Door Cafe. He’s the man to speak to if you want to put your name on the clipboard wait list.

“I don’t let everyone into my restaurant,” A.D. says as he sashays outside to eyeball you and other potential diners. “You have to prove why I should let you in, honey.”

You should know that in order to even consider dining at The Red Door, you’ll need to keep an open mind. You’ll be interviewed, required to read the rules of the restaurant, and maybe even hazed. If you ask for egg whites, sauce on the side, act like “a Barbie”, or give off “bad vibes” you will be asked to leave the tiny 12-seat restaurant. You might even be kicked out.

A.D. may do any number of things to figure out if you are worthy of his attention and care. He may hand you a doll and tell you to care for it (“I can’t take care of you if you can’t care for this doll”), ask you a personal question (“Why should I let you in? Tell me something interesting about yourself”), or body scan you. What AD said to my husband about his sweat pants made us both blush.

A.D. is an entertaining–if not intimidating–host. He is beautiful and fierce with his curly brown hair–reminiscent of a pin curl wig from your best-friend’s drag box–and tight jean shorts, cowboy boots, and a plaid cowboy shirt that could pop open on cue if you pulled hard enough. He flirts with couples, gets cozy with neighbors, and pushes the boundaries of customer service standards with every potential diner he meets.

From the minute AD meets you, you are (painfully) aware that not everyone is Red Door patron material. “Honey,” he says. “I can’t give love to people who can’t love me.”

Passing the test

Once you get past the interview process with A.D. (I haven’t felt that excited to make it through an up-close examination of character since my college application process) you are given one of the six small tables in the restaurant.

Savor your seat at a table, because the line outside gets longer by the minute. Scan the menu, enjoy the puns, and select an item you won’t be embarrassed to order (some of the tastiest dishes have racy names). Once you’ve placed your order, sit back and enjoy the show.

A.D. is one of the most talented–albeit naughty–professionals I’ve ever seen work in the restaurant business. To witness this lithe man in action is to understand the joy of service. Everything A.D. does in his playhouse is done with grace and an economy of motion. He sees everything: the approaching first time guests on the sidewalk, the empty coffee cup, the gesturing cook in the kitchen as an order comes up. He showers returning guests with affection, purrs flirtatiously with men and women, and coaxes the anxious out of their shell. He is like a prima-ballerina performing in a small, local theater. His moves are professional despite the rough-around-the-edges atmosphere.

AD flings one-liners as he greets guests (“I think the secret to the success of my restaurant is fear”), interviews diners, takes orders, serves stacks of plates, refills coffee, and explains the steps to getting the most out of every dish without breaking a sweat.

“Guests suck the life out of you,” AD says as he refills my coffee with a wink. “That’s why I have to interview everyone who comes in here. If you’re going to suck my titties dry all day I can’t give you anything. ”

A.D.’s message of service may be delivered in an off-color way, but his missive on service is clear. Great service is a two way street. What customers bring to a restaurant is just as important as what the restaurant brings to its diners. “Friends always ask me how it is I’m so happy all day,” A.D. says. He leans over a table to adjust a burrito that stands erect on a plate. “It’s because I don’t let bad vibes in my restaurant. I don’t have time for it.”

After the long wait on the sidewalk and the robust coffee you sipped from bowls, you will be equal parts hungry and grateful for the towering carnival that arrives on a plate that’s set before you. You’ll savor the twist of fruit, the bunch of fresh  mint tossed over your tortilla-wrapped scrambled eggs. The flavors will be as bright, playful and exciting as the man serving the food.

When it’s time to pay, you are mindful of the service and how much effort it took to have a meal at this tiny place. You are mindful because you were part of something extraordinary. You were a willing participant.

The Red Door Cafe in the Pacific Heights neighborhood in San Francisco, is just the place for customers to become conscious–and sometimes painfully self-conscious–of the part they play in their dining experience. The Red Door Cafe is a 12 seat restaurant that charges by the dish but its really more of a performance art piece that challenges participants to understand the dance of service.

Red Door Cafe

1608 Bush St
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 441-1564

A Glowing Yelp Review for Red Door Cafe

I went and saw the documentary film “Jiro Dreams of Sushi” this week. If you haven’t been to the movies lately, I recommend you skip the big flicks and go check this one out. Grab a cup of coffee, make a reservation for sushi after the film, and slip into an hour and a half meditation on the passion and tireless commitment it takes to dedicate yourself to a life in the food business.

The filmmakers dive into the simple–yet vibrant–world of one of the world’s oldest and most respected sushi chefs in the world. If you haven’t heard of Jiro Ono, it’s probably because his perfect-star Michelin restaurant is tucked into an in an elbow of a corridor the Ginza train station. The space is the size of a walk-in refrigerator. A seat at Jiro’s will take you at least one month to get a reservation and will cost you about 300,000 yen.

Jiro will make you every piece of sushi. He will watch you eat every bite. The 85 year-old chef will not smile. He will measure you up. You will think he is judging you as he presses every glittering morsel of fish with his fluid hands.

Jiro is, without question, a man obsessed. Rather than retire, the chef works seven days a week. He holds himself to incredibly high standards and when he meets those impossibly high standards, he elevates them again.  He is always striving to become better. As the documentary’s title suggests, the man eats, lives for, and dreams of sushi.

Jiro’s introduction to the audience comes with a deadpan monologue to the camera about his vocation:

“You have to love your job. You must work hard. You must work long days. You must not complain. You should be grateful for the work. You must enjoy dedicating yourself to doing what you do every day.”

Chef Jiro is a craftsman with simple ingredients. Every item is hand-picked and hand-crafted by true artisans of the food world. Jiro Ono may not be famous, but he is one of the most respected sushi chefs in the world by people who know good food.

A still from "Jiro Dreams of Sushi"

Vocation, Not Career

Watching Jiro Dreams of Sushi reminds me about the importance of putting my time and energy into my vocation, not my career. Whenever I wake up with my mind spinning with to-do lists, restaurant priorities, and frustrations with situations beyond my control, I know I’m obsessing over my career. When my sleep is interrupted by an overwhelming feeling of excitement and anticipation for what the day may bring, I know I am working towards my vocation.

A career is something you do in hopes of achieving something. A vocation is a path you painstakingly carve for the love of creating beauty in the world.

Dedicating my life to my vocation isn’t always easy. There are plenty of reasons that come up every day that make me want to wrestle back my ego, start a spread chart on all the hours I work, and create slideshows dedicated to all the things that aren’t fair in the world.

A vocation requires surrender. In order to pursue a vocation, I must give up on the notion of success, prestige, and recognition. I have to submit to the idea that my work should be simple and beautiful. As the Quakers say, “Tis a gift to be simple tis a gift to be free.” In short, there’s a lot less pain and anxiety in a vocation. The challenge is wrestling one’s ego and pinning it to the mat.

So today, I remind myself to push back the drooping ivy of impossible deadlines and negative thoughts that block out all the light. Today, I dedicate myself to creating beauty in everything I do. Starting now.

I am overwhelmed with gratitude. Today I say thank you for being alive, for the love of my husband, the support of my friends, the sun in the sky, the challenges in life that give me a chance to grow, the glorious stuff I pile up on spoons and forks, and every breath I take.  Lastly, I say thank you the Big and Great inspiration that fills me with the hope to be a better person and create something beautiful in everything I do. Being nominated for Best Piece of Culinary Writing is the sweetest frosting on my birthday cake and something I am incredibly thankful for.

I may have started working in restaurants when I was 16 years old, but it wasn’t until much later that I began to learn culinary techniques I could use at home.  I can’t blame my lack of development on anything more than circumstance. I started in a small town in Massachusetts where the best seafood was fried or boiled, every restaurant kitchen had a microwave, hamburgers were unpacked as frozen beef patties, and iceburg was the only lettuce we knew.

Graduating from country club catering and seafood shacks, I began working in restaurants where the people in the kitchen weren’t summer help, the stainless steel counters were clean, knives were sharp, and saute pans and gas ranges cooked every dish to order.

The greatest lessons I’ve learned from the men and women of Los Angeles’ best restaurants is to pay attention to the little things. Simple fundamentals—cooking techniques, tools, and ingredients–create memorable food and extraordinary dining experiences.

One recent discovery came from my restaurant’s former chef, Evan Funke. I was inquiring about the minestrone soup we were serving. The flavors of the broth were so round and full of flavor, I was having a hard time believing the soup was vegetarian.

Chef Evan assured me that the minestrone was one hundred percent vegetarian. “The trick to the flavor,” he said, “is from sweating down onion and garlic, and adding Parmesan rinds to the stock.”

Soon after I decided to try out chef Evan’s trick. Rather than staying with a fully vegetarian stock I used left over vegetable scraps, a chicken carcass, and a tupperware filled with handful of leftover Parmesan ends. What resulted was the most flavorful, golden broth I have ever had the pleasure of making in my kitchen.

What kinds of tricks have you learned along the way that have made all the difference?

No one can control how a diner responds to customer service

News flash: I’m not the boss of the world.

I know you know that. Most of the time I know that, too. The problem is, sometimes a tiny little piece of me really wants to believe I can control the way things go.

When a guest comes into our restaurant, I want them to love what we do and feel taken care of. To be honest, there’s a tiny piece of me that cross-my-fingers hopes that all the hard work everyone puts into our food and service will somehow change someone’s life.

But every day, I have to remind myself that how things work out in this world is not up to me.

How people perceive the things is entirely up to them. No matter how hard I try, I can’t sway the perceptions of others with my passion, commitment, and East coast willpower. I’m an Aries (read: ram mentality) and the first born of a Massachusetts family, so believe me when I tell you I’ve been trying to exert my will on everyone and everything for years.

The problem with my earnest, heart-felt customer service is that sometimes it backspins. It can hit customers the wrong way. In my earnestness to help I may come across as annoying, or worse, bossy. I may tell a guest something that looks and feels like a YES–but it may come across as a giant NO to them. There are days when my desire to get things right goes awry and the people I work with end up feeling more stomped on then helped.

Being the boss of me

It wasn’t until rather recently that I began to understand that my desire to help and my need to control outcomes was making me–and sometimes the people around me–very unhappy. When people didn’t understand what I was doing for them or to them, I got hurt, defensive, and overbearing. I tried harder to make people understand that my way was the best way rather than try to understand where they were coming from.

There were days when I felt like I was losing the battle in giving great service. I knew something was off. I knew I needed to change the way I did things.

For me, the first step in giving up control is having faith that everything will work out, as it should. I’m learning that if I want to be happy in my life and in my work, I have to accept the results as they come. And boy, is that a hard one.

Luckily, I have a lot of great people around me who are helping me get to a place of acceptance and surrender. These people–my committee, I like to call them–coach me to look at how I can work on myself and leave all the people, places, and things around me alone.

I have to stop making my will to get the things I want the largest factor in the equation of service. In order to be of service to others, my will can’t be bigger than other peoples’.  I have to turn the greater than symbol towards love and compassion and put myself on the small side.

So I may or may not be able to make you happy when you come into my restaurant or you come to this website to read what I have to say.  The thing I have to keep reminding myself is that As It Should doesn’t always look like How I Want. Everybody hates bad customer service. But customer service isn’t as pretty when it’s delivered like a sledge hammer.

“We should realize that this event [of eating and being fed, is a ritual]…The whole thing of compassion comes in there. What helped me was waking up and thinking of my penny catechism: “to know, to love, to serve God.” I don’t think of God as up there. I think of God as right here in whatever I’m knowing and loving and serving…”

—Joseph Campbell

Walk into the 24-seat restaurant I work in and within just seconds you’ll have the entire place sized up: cement walls, high ceilings, a pastry counter, an open kitchen, two tables that hold eight people, and one counter that seats another eight guests. That’s it.  Often, we have a line of people that spills out onto the sidewalk of Wilshire Boulevard.

“Where’s the rest of the place?” is a common refrain I hear several times a day. Confused diners scan the room for a side dining area with a hidden cache of tables with extra seating. But our tiny foot print with two tables is all we have. So we have to get creative–which is why every seat in the restaurant is part of the communal seating plan.

Every once in a while, there’s a lull in service and there are plenty of seats to be had. During those quiet times guests seat themselves. Men and women leisurely toss jackets and bags over empty chairs, splay their newspapers across the marble tabletops, and order their meal without any idea that soon—when the glittering-white daylight of Santa Monica fades—a swarm of hungry customers will arrive hungry for food and a piece of what was once their personal space.

The transition between the quiet and busy times is where things tend to get a little sticky. When the number of guests waiting to be seated reach more than four people, the energy in the room shifts.  You can feel the tension, as the people waiting begin to covet the single, empty chairs that separate the seated diners. It’s during these moments when the guests who are waiting for a spot need a special kind of assistance. The diners need my help in asking people to share some available space with them.

This isn’t the easiest of challenges a restaurant manager can face. Asking guests to do something for you requires a lot of diplomacy and humility, and even if you bring a lot of kindness to the table it still might not go well. It’s in these awkward moments outside the realm of our comfort zone, however, that magic sometimes happens.

Heroes and Saints

“Would you mind terribly if I moved you over one seat so that I may put two people here next to you?” I ask.

For some people, the question of giving up their warmed seat for a perfect stranger is a no-brainer.  Without even looking up from their meal, some guests respond to my request for help with a giant YES! Which way do you want me to go? They practically jump up and scoot over a seat before I can tell them which way to go. After they’ve moved, they smile at me and say, is there anything else I can do for you?

Other diners agree to the request but need to pause before responding. They scan the faces of the people waiting and check the dining room to confirm the lack of seating. With a clear understanding of the circumstances and the need of others, the customer obliges and is happy to help. Which way do you want me to go, they ask, and switch seats with an understanding smile.

I’m happy to report that more often than not, most diners will agree to the request. When a customer says yes to an appeal like this they create space for someone else, help a perfect strangers eat sooner, and assist in making the restaurant run smoother. It’s a wonderful thing to see a moment of kindness devoid of calculation, especially in a city known for power plays and big egos.  Though not everyone in the world may notice the diner who is willing to move over, I see an elegant gesture of kindness and compassion in action.

Once in a while, however, a diner will bristle at a request to move over. They become recalcitrant and offended at the mention of them needing to relocate. How dare you ask me to move, they say. I quickly apologize for interrupting their meal, thank them for considering my request, and make a quick retreat. I am careful not to offer any judgement in these moments. It’s my job to do my best to empathize with all my guests, even the challenging ones.

Love and Service

We all struggle with unexpected moments in life that require extraordinary kindness. Cars speed to get in front of us. People cut us in line. Co-workers demand things from us we don’t want to give. Every day is a chance to grow as a human. We can act in kindness for others or decide that today we will serve only our own needs. We get to decide what moves we want to make in life. Sometimes we may choose to avoid any movement entirely. It’s up to us.

This may not make much sense to most people, but whenever you’re out to eat you can bet that the men and women taking care of you are probably pretty hungry themselves. Why? Because when you work in restaurants there’s really no time to eat*.

There are plenty of restaurants who make family meals. Just about everyone in the business gives their employees meal breaks. The fact remains that sometimes we restaurant folk get really, really, busy and we just can’t take the time to eat even a bite of food. The more I work in restaurants, the more I realize that staying away from the red-zone of hunger is all about self-maintenance. I have to be thoughtful about what I eat and make sure I’m careful to monitor myself, my mood, and if I’m nearing a “hangry” (hungry/angry) state.

Because when I go red-zone, no one’s gonna get great service.

Many restaurant professionals have go-to meals that get them through the 8-12 hour shifts. Bowls of pasta and meat-stuffed tacos are a favorite at family meal. I’ve seen co-workers eat fast food straight out of a bag so they don’t leave a drop of grease or ketchup on their uniform whites. A few survive on energy drinks and protein bars. Others skip pre-shift meal all together and binge at the local late night joint or food truck after work. And for the desperate–and believe me, I’ve been one of them–there’s always a slab of bread with a bit of butter and a large cup of coffee to make the hunger go away.

Since I started working at my new job at the bakery and pizzeria, though, bread has taken center stage in my diet. I’ve been making it through my 10-12 hour shifts by drinking lots of coffee and snacking on tons of bread, pizza, and pastries.  Though eating a gluten-free chocolate chip, walnut, banana muffin for lunch may seem fun at the time, subsisting on bread and pizza is definitely not something that I want to get into the habit of. A girl has to look good and feel good, right?

So when it came time to give something up for Lent, I decided I to stop eating wheat and force myself into being more mindful about the food I’m putting in my body. Being smart about what I eat when I’m at work is definitely going to be a challenge.

My food requirements are pretty straight forward: my food has to be fast, easy, and doesn’t require refrigeration. I don’t have time to ask for someone to cook it, there are health code rules about bringing outside food into restaurants (so it’s not going in our refrigerators), and it can’t be so fancy it can’t be eaten in a few fast bites. The food also has to be light enough I don’t feel weighed down. I need balanced food that has plenty of good carbohydrates, sugars, and proteins that will give me sustained energy throughout my shift.

My first step? Snacks.

I’ve stocked up on my favorite dried fruit and nuts so I can make my own fruit and nut mix. Sweet dates, creamy cashews, peppy pepitas, and tart cranberries make for a perfect in-between-moments bite. With a bar of chocolate stashed in the office for emergency energy and a plastic baggy filled with fruit and nuts, I’ll have plenty to keep me going during the shift.  The best part about my little grab-bag snacks? They’re easy to make, small enough to stash anywhere, and don’t require any refrigeration!

What are your go-to meals and snacks for on-the-go eating??

Take a moment to be present. Where are you? What are you doing? What are you eating?

Right this second, I’m sitting in a chair at my computer. I have a cup of mint tea in a warm, clay mug.  I have socks on my feet, a big sweater on over my shoulders, and a stick of Morning Star incense burns down to a long, broken comma of ash. My fingers hit the computer keys with confidence. An itch on my back stops me mid-sentence—

What was it I was thinking? What is my intention?

If I’m not careful, I’ll get ahead of myself and think three paragraphs into the future. I’ll edit and hyperlink text in my mind that I haven’t even written down yet. I’ll gulp down an entire cup of tea without paying attention to the flavors of the herbs.

Instead, I choose to stay present.  I practice mindfulness of the activity of writing because I know that my best work happens when I am open to The Big Ideas that come. It seems that the more I’m aware, the more I’m clued into something else going on; inspiration comes from a source outside of myself.

Tech and spirituality

More and more people are looking for something bigger than themselves to help get them through their work. For many, the thing that most people reach out to is technology.  Reuters recently reported that Americans are willing to go longer without friends and sex than the Internet. But if we continue to reach out for inspiration from electronic sources and don’t take the time to nurture some inner peace and mental awareness, we may very well find ourselves on the other side of an energy crisis of the personal kind. We may miss out on the next great idea because we’re just too busy checking Twitter/Facebook/email/Google reader/pintrest/insert favorite website here.

A story in the Wall Street Journal today suggests that many tech-savvy executives seek spiritually-based practices to give them balance in their fast-paced lives and find inspiration. Spiritual practices stripped of religious ties–acupuncture, yoga and meditation classes, for example–are not only covered by many tech companies’ health benefits, but encouraged in the workplace. The Wisdom 2.0 conference in Silicon Valley has participants and speakers gather together for two days to share ideas on the balance of technology and spirituality in the workplace. Sneaker-clad tech executives from Twitter, Facebook, Paypal and Google are headliners alongside Buddhist teachers, leaders from Giving 2.0 and Project Compassion, and spiritual author Eckhart Tolle of “The Power of Now”. Clearly, some of us want to find the sweet spot between technology and staying human and nurture creativity in a technology-saturated universe.

Mindful Eating

Staying mentally aware and present doesn’t stop at the computer desk.  Dr. Jan Bays, a physician and meditation teacher, brings mindfulness to the dining room table.  Mindful eating is a way of eating that involves bringing your full attention to the process of eating—to all the tastes, smells, thoughts, and feelings that arise during a meal. Bays suggests that by staying present in the moment, we can minimize overeating, stay healthier, and make better food choices. Mindful Eating–and its accompanying CD of guided exercises–offers research and practical experience  of what mindfulness is and how it can help with food issues.

As online food writers and photographers we may be great a creating meals that are camera ready, but are we present for the eating, smelling and tasting of the food itself? How often are we caught up with thinking about the Next Great Meal or the Next Blog Post? Can we stay present as we create, while also staying on point with our Twitter feed, blog posts, and Facebook updates? If we maintain a strong mindfulness practice, will our desire to stay ahead of the technology wave decrease? Or stay strong?

Restaurant people like me need to know who our customers are and what they want and must ensure that our restaurant delivers a high quality product (great tasting food, wonderful atmosphere, and generous service) in a timely fashion. But what makes some restaurants more successful than others is the ability to define and deliver on the unspoken (or hinted at) expectations of customers. A lot of restaurant leaders call this part of our job managing expectations, but really what that means is that we are in the business of reading customers’ minds.

Customers may say they want a salad, but what they really desire is something much more complicated.

When I hear, “Don’t you have a simple salad with chicken?” I quickly run an internal algorythm (based on years of waiting tables and managing) that tells me what customers who typically ask this question want but don’t ask for.  perhaps the customer really wants a simple green salad with the dressing on the side and a large portion of inexpensive, poached chicken put on top. The customer expects this salad to cost less than $12-14.  The customer may like a smile from the waiter but may be opposed to any chit-chat. The customer may also be of the mindset that any white wine will do, so long as it comes in a big glass and costs less than $10. A customer who asks this question tends not to be adventurous and likes to stay in their comfort zone. Avoid selling specials to the guest, especially if there is an item on the dish that the customer has never heard of before (they will most likely hate the dish).

If you’re a simple salad with chicken person, just know that not everyone insists that every restaurant have chickens poaching in the back kitchen for moments such as this.  I don’t mean this in an offensive way, I just mean to say that what your expectation is of a restaurant is much different than the I want a basket of bread and olive oil and balsamic vinegar customer, or the what’s the most popular thing on your menu person.

Expectations may seem like a clear goal that everyone should know, but the fact is, what we think most people should do is not a universal belief system. Expectations are just an individual’s strong personal belief that something specific will happen in the future. None of us know for sure what other people want, we just know what we expect and make guesses from there. Just ask any guy what women expect on a first and second date and you’ll get a whole range of answers. Because here’s the thing–unless the person holding the expectation speaks what they want aloud, no one will ever know for certain the exactitudes of their desires.

I like to joke that I’m honing my psychic powers while I work in restaurants, but honestly it’s true. That’s exactly what I’m doing. I’m constantly reading the energy and body language of my guests and gathering clues about what’s really going on below the surface.

What do you (really) want?

Let’s talk about general expectations people have of restaurants. For some people, hand picked heirloom tomatoes and small batch burrata mean more flavor. For other people, just the mention of the word heirloom sets their skin crawling and their BS meter on high alert. One guest may like hearing specials recited at their table while another customer may find that kind of thing obtrusive and verging on deceptive. Depending on the expectations, one restaurant could get a five star Yelp review for the same exact experience that garnered a one star review from another.

Getting clear on expectations

If you know what specifically makes you happy at a restaurant then it’s very easy to identify what rubs you the wrong way. Or what it looks like when something goes terribly wrong at your table.  “Waiter, there is a fly in my soup,” you may say. Or perhaps you are compelled to call over a manager because your waiter seems to have forgotten you and your order. Regardless of what specifically the restaurant did to fail your expectations, how clearly you can express those shortcomings to the person offering to make the situation better will get you so much closer to a resolution.

Sometimes restaurant managers know how to do the right thing and are empowered to go and get it done.  Sometimes they just don’t.  In all my years in restaurants, I have seen plenty of mistakes happen. I do my best to sincerely apologize, offer a solution, and go a little bit farther for the guest to ensure I can turn the guest’s experience around.

Sometimes dessert is enough to turn a bitter experience into something sweet

You wouldn’t believe half the stuff I’ve done trying to win guests back. I apologize, stay away from excuses, take items of the check, and then do whatever I can to connect to the guest. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. Along the way of managing expectations, I’ve seen miraculous things happen. In the process of being sincere and generous of spirit, I’ve seen smiles come from the unhappiest of people. I’ve gotten hugs of gratitude. I’ve even minted customers for life. But sometimes, no matter what I do or how much radical hospitality I give, I can not win back a guest. It’s as if that small mistake of a forgotten side dish or a loud song on the sound system were offensive acts perpetrated against these hurt individuals. It is as if I personally attacked them, when in reality all that happened was that someone pressed the wrong button in the computer or failed to get a dish to the table in a timely fashion.

But it doesn’t matter what happened when things go wrong. What matters most to you, the unhappy customer, is what is done to fix the situation. Right?

But what about you? What sort of responsibility does the customer hold? If you have high expectations but can not voice what it is you expect, or you can not accept any resolution that’s offered to you, do you hold any responsibility for your unhappiness?

How open are you to getting good service?

I do not, in any way, mean to lessen the responsibility of the restaurant in the equation of making customers happy. No way. But what I am supposing is that in every hundred customers who have their expectations met, there are a small percentage of people who will never be happy with any business (or personal) exchange, no matter how hard the business tries to make things better.  I mention this because I hope that I might some day one of these posts might help one person realize that if they can never find happiness in any business exchange, maybe it might be time to look at working on the one constant in the equation.

High Expectations of Service

But here’s the thing about expectations–we all have them. How we deal with our expectations and how willing we are to be flexible with what is given to us is an important piece in our long term happiness. If we don’t get exactly what we want, do we experience profound disappointment?  If we find people are consistently letting us down do we get angry, sad, resentful, or spring into action to make a change in our priorities? Just how far are we willing to go to be happy? Are we willing to be open to new experiences? Or do we only want things our way?

Have I told you I have a new job? I’m super excited about joining the team of Milo + Olive, a wonderful little pizzeria and bakery that’s just opened up in Santa Monica, as a General Manager. Getting to be part of a family of restaurants like Huckleberry, Rustic Canyon, and Sweet Rose Creamery is a dream come true. So I’ve put the freelance service coaching business on hold so I can help run a growing business that’s dedicated to beautiful, handmade food that’s served by people who really care.

Let me just tell you, I’m more than a little bit busy. Working at a brand new restaurant is like caring for an infant. It requires constant vigilance. The hours are long but the work is incredibly fulfilling. The challenges keep my heart, body, and mind constantly engaged and stretched to the limit. I survive on very little sleep and even less time for food. I power myself through the day with huge dose of excitement, a thick piece of toast slathered with almond butter and jelly, and tall cups of coffee.

Since I only have had one day off a week, the one thing I crave more than anything else is rest and a warm meal with my husband. We keep things simple. For breakfast we like to sauté kale in olive oil with a generous splash of fish sauce and top them with a couple of fried eggs. Or I’ll make soft-curd scrambled eggs with feta while he puts together a citrusy-yogurt vinaigrette for a butter lettuce salad. We brew a big pot of coffee, sit at our tucked-in-the-corner dining room table, and fortify ourselves with food and stories of our week.

Exhaustion dictates the menu at dinner time. Sometimes we go out for a comforting bowl of soup and noodles at our favorite Thai restaurant (Pa Ord) or other nights I muster up the power to roast a chicken and some vegetables. Those meals together refuel so much more than my belly. Since I’ve written here before about my favorite method of roasting a chicken (a la Zuni Café), I thought I would share with you my favorite new comfort food that doesn’t take much time or effort to make.