Take a Restaurant Field Trip
Walking into a restaurant, any restaurant, whether it's your own or is the pride and joy of someone else, is an enlightening experience. The ambiance changes within moments in every restaurant depending on who walks on and who walks off the stage.
The waiter carrying the large bowl of Chicken Curry, steaming with the aromas of Thailand transforms an area beautified by the blonde at table 17 to an entirely different setting while dining nights ago a sea Thai Bistro in Santa Rosa.
The black uniform was purposely chosen by Tony, the owner, to set the perfect backdrop for the oversized white ceramic bowls, plates and platters he uses to dress the table and the room.
At Sea Thai, everything flows and fits as Tony stands at the door to the semi-open kitchen and seamlessly pans the room methodically watching in order to observe missteps, kudos, smiles, winces and other emotions an owner absorbs just as any other performer on stage.
Developing that instinct is not easy, or impossible.
As a student of the John Cobb School of equally hanging white linen tablecloths and straight pictures, I learned early on that with every step into a restaurant, there is also a complimenting view and motion of the hand. Whether it be to straighten a picture on the wall, inspect a fork, line up the bar stools, straighten a chair, or remove a lipstick stained glass of coffee mug, no owner should ever walk through the backdoor without first going through the front.
Try this: Go out to dinner and when you walk through the dining room of the restaurant of choice, step slowly and try to find as many items out of place as you can.
Here's a list of what to look for:
Wrinkled uniforms.
Spotted floors.
Spotted walls.
Silverware not straight.
Barstools array at the bar as the Fighting Irish were kicking off down the street and its game time.
Waiters talking to each other at the wait station.
Staff drinking out of bottles while on the floor.
Confused hosts.
Bussers with empty hands while tables are full of dirty plates and glasses.
A wait for a table with a dining room half full.
Dirty windows.
Dirty bathroom.
Dead or wilted flowers.
If you have the opportunity to sit near the open kitchen, all the better. That list is too long for limited blog space, but you will see things you probably have never seen before.
Pay attention to what is transpiring around you.
When you're done, make some notes.
Enjoy your next staff meeting.
