Restaurants - pet hates

I don't like any kind of carvery or buffet with strangers. Fair enough in your own home with your family but with other
bleurgh

I can't believe how popular pizza is here in France Welshwife so many pizzerias popping up. ( good alliteration there)
My husband was a chef and despairs of most of our local restaurants. There are a couple of high end ones which are excellent but we can only afford those on high days and holidays. You are more fortunate than we are it seems.

I have almost given up on eating out due to severe food allergies .I have ended up in hospital twice due to mistakes by staff and had a few near misses. It really shouldn't be hard to produce a meal which does not contain nuts,wheat or wine which I react badly to and need adrenaline. My usual opening line would be to ask a restraunt manager if he could talk to the chef to see if they were prepared to cook for me. I was never upset if they said no. But if it was yes then please try not to kill me with mistakes.
It really isn't worth the anxiety now for myself and family.

Sodapop I am surprised about some of your restaurants - we have 5 in the small town nearest to us - the two great ones I mentioned - 2 bars which do a tiny menu but it is passable ( one only just!) and one which has just changed hands but we have not yet been so I can’t comment! There is also a pizza take away which seems to do a good trade.

I'm another one who recommends a look at the We Want Plates website. If you think slates are bad imagine having your breakfast fry up delivered on a shovel. Or how about chips served in a slipper. Just no!
To be honest, I love food and I love eating out but there are limits to what is acceptable.
My pet hate is the word "eatery" it's just a lazy way to describe a restaurant, a cafe, a pub, a chippy etc etc.

I dislike carveries as well Welshwife all those vegetables sitting around getting soggy, people piling their plates with a mountain of food they won't eat - yuk.
I have also had some terrible plats du jour here in France. Rural French cuisine leaves a lot to be desired. My husband was once given a starter of 50 radishes on a plate, nothing with them. Anyone who thinks French food is always good would get a shock in some of our local restaurants.

I am not at all keen on the large carvery places where you queue up for the meat and serve yourself with vegetables. Also at these places you see people with plates piled so high you wonder how they are going to tackle the mountain.
Here in France there are lots of smaller family restaurants which serve very good nicely presented meals. We have a lovely place in our nearest town where the chef is cordon bleu trained. He produces the most delicious meals at a very reasonable price. He does not have chips on his menu! He does the shopping himself - have seen him out doing it. The place will only seat a maximum of 20 people and he will turn people away if it is late.
At the other end of the street is a great family restaurant with another lovely menu of well cooked food. The average sort of price for these places is about €30 pp. As a general rule the restaurants do not have more than one sitting.
There are now a couple of Chines buffet style places opened up - as much as you like for a fixed price. Some people were taking so much food and leaving it they have now started a surcharge for people who do not eat most of what they have taken!
If you find yourself in a French town you do not know and wonder where to eat watch where the locals go - most of the places do a good and cheaper menu at lunchtime.

I agree with practically every comment on here, with loud music probably at the top of my hate list.

Actually it’s certainly worth asking for it to be turned right down now as music played very quietly was a government covid stipulation when pubs and restaurants reopened, as the virus transmits more readily when people shout.

I think as a nation, we are generally somewhat reluctant to make a fuss but when we order a meal in a restaurant we have entered into a contract with them. We pay and expect the food and experience to be up to scratch.
After all if there was something wrong with our money they would be perfectly entitled to complain to us.

Serving staff who enquire whether everything is all right but don't want to hear the answer if everything isn't all right. Especially annoying is the response "no-one else has complained". If you don't want to hear the honest truth, don't ask.

Every item of the meal piled on top of each other.

Hell Growstuff if Savvy is protein intolerant she could have a condition called PKU which my little Niece has. It means following a very strict low protein diet and not eating high protein such as meat, eggs and dairy produce. This is a serious condition which could cause major problems if the sufferer does not follow a low protein diet. My Niece has learnt form a young age what her body can and cannot tolerate.

the slate things sets my teeth on edge. I can't be the only one

A little chrome basket on your plate with six chips in it. Why can’t they just put them on the plate with the rest of the food

I want a plate of food not an art installation. Please just put it on the plate and don’t poke it around.

ETON MESS!!!!!!

That’s a contrived abomination!

The clues in the name, never should ice cream be an ingredient.

There is a lovely cafe near me which has delicious cakes. But I don’t like going in as they allow dogs to go inside, sometimes there are five or six dogs sitting next to the tables - and it’s not very big.

Children and dogs.

Aaargh! Just noticed the missing s in poissons. Autocorrect has much to answer for.

We were out with another couple and the drinks arrived with one drink missing. It was ten minutes before it arrived.

Have also had the same with the main course. Everyone waiting for the missing meal to arrive (out of politeness) and their food going cold.

Also, wooden platters seem very unhygienic to me. Our local restaurant uses them but put a sheet of fancy greaseproof paper between the wood and the food. You almost end up with mouthfuls of paper along with your food, unless you slide the paper out and end up eating off the board anyway - yuck

I recommend the We Want Plates website. Slates are much harder for waiters to pick up from the table.

When told I must be finished by a certain time, I say it is up to them to serve me promptly.

As for the brioches question,*Espee*, I would only say the following:-

“There was an old fellow from Soissons,
Who insisted on being served croissants.
When someone said ‘Tosh,
What’s wrong with brioches?’,
He said “Croissants go better with poisons.”

Apologies to the French purists among you for rhyming ant with on, but it works in English.

I’ll take that Eton mess, thanks, looks lovely !
I don’t like it when they keep coming over and asking if everything is alright. I don’t mind just the once but some seem to ask every 10 minutes and interrupt your conversations.

Mollygo

Deconstructed anything! If I order e.g. Apple crumble I don’t expect 3 piles
apple, crumble and a scoop of icecream

This is Eton Mess served to a friend this week in a ‘posh pub’. Not sure if it was deconstructed or reconstructed but it came with a large dod of ice cream in the centre which was a bonus ?

My restaurant ‘hates’ are untrained staff, having to ask for glasses/plates to be cleared, being told to ‘enjoy’, being asked if everything is ok before managing the first mouthful and having a 15% service charge (or any charge) added to the bill. This happened recently and I asked for it to be removed as I preferred to add my own! Eyebrows were raised but they complied!

ZoeJory
Next time, I'm coming with YOU!! lol
You've made my day with your prawn cocktail! ??
Have a good day!

Hmmm. Let's start with steak. I want it dead. As dead as dead can be. No blood anywhere on my plate or in my food!
Plates, yes. I really prefer plates but I guess I don't mind slate but not wood - can't they afford proper crockery? If they'd said something I could've maybe brought a plate!
Ice cream on a slate, ohhhh noooo!! In a bowl or a glass, like a sundae, but never on a slate!
Staff standing round watching NO!! Uh-uh. I hate it. Go wash dishes or clean the kitchen, or twiddle your thumbs elsewhere, I'm a big girl and I can eat without an audience, thank you.
"Is your meal aright?" Don't worry, I'll soon let you know if it's not WHEN I've eaten some of it!!!
I don't like to be a bother, I know how hard it can be to work in restaurants etc, but if I see a dirty mark or lipstick on crockery or something on cutlery, I am sending it back. I want clean utensils and crockery!!
Tips....oh god, I think tips should be earned not expected, and you pay what you can afford/think they've deserved!
Have I missed anything?
Staff should be polite and the customer should know they are NOT always right, and do not always deserve a freebie!

Not a big fan of eating out really. I grew up thinking everyone went to restaurants 4 or 5 times a week so it's never been a treat for me.

I also hate slates and driftwood. And I am terribly boring with what I like to eat. Bland and dull.

We were in a hotel in the Lakes once. Very nice hotel. Menu was filled with goodness knows what.

I was muttering to my husband that I wished that, just once, I could see a prawn cocktail on a menu. I loved prawn cocktails.

A shore while later a waiter approached the table with the most beautiful prawn cocktail I've ever seen.

My voice is rather booming, even when I'm trying to be quiet, and he'd overheard me and got me my prawn cocktail

Next time I'll mutter about Black Forest Gateau

Savvy

Not stating whether the desserts are veggie friendly or not. I'm protein intolerant so I really need to know if they contain anything that's meat, fish or eggs, and that includes gelatine, food colourants of insect origin and non milk fats. I know I'm being picky, but I don't want to end up in hospital.

What can you eat if you're totally protein intolerant? Most dishes in a Western diet contain protein.