Do you think waiters know "us?" Those of us on diets looking like we are "doomed" as we look for hope of something to fit our diets on their menus?
Went out to lunch today to treat my little boy, and of course he had to choose a pizza restaurant. I eyed the kids menu thinking well that ought to be enough for both of us (and of course it was 4x what a 5 year old could possibly eat, this huge little kids pizza smothered in cheese and grease). Instead I started to order a salad, asked what type of low calorie low fat dressing they had. NONE, she looked at me like, "oh no - one of THOSE types." I flipped the page and went whew... a wrap.
Didn't notice it came with a half plate of fries until I received the big plate. Picked off the cheese (what's a hunk like THAT 200 extra calories?), pulled off about 1/2 of the white colored wrap, and dug into the roast beef, turkey, tomato and lettuce wrap, wondering what the dressing was, thinking next time I'll order it on the side and "dip..." She came back, looked at the bits and pieces on the plate and the fries left - and had an "ugh" look on her face.
In this clean eating mode I'm even terrified of bals. dressing on a salad. Lesson today, perhaps to always stick with a salad in a foreign locally owned restaurant especially with an Italian name - meaning cheese, grease and stuff... I'm wondering if the waitress though, hey, you came to a pizza place, what do you expect. But in this day an age doesn't every restaurant have fat free or just normal dressing? And wouldn't they ask, salad OR fries. And why on earth does a kid need a pizza to feed all of the hungry children in a village?
Yes, I think they know US. Are we the EXCEPTION to the rule in this country? Will Americans get thinner or fatter in a recession? It appears the fast food and pizza restaurants are busy, busy places. I don't see people there cutting back but eating more... and more... and more...
Horsey, I give you alot of credit for entering a Pizza WHATEVER! lol! You are right though, it's really hard to get what you want from certain places. When I do go out, I choose a diner for I know I can get the basics and everything on the side. I do believe that when most of america change their food habits so will the restaurants. Hope your son enjoyed his day!
It can also be difficult if you are in a group going out and don't have so much control about where to go. Have been caught too. I don't have much patience for places like that anymore. But you can't very well just drag your kid out of there. Maybe next time, ask what he wants to eat, and take him to a restaurant that has it, (like pizza) as well as good stuff. I went out to a pizza/italian place the other night, and was able to have salad with dressing on the side, and braised shortribs, they were happy to leave off the starch and give me double veggies. Excellent meal, will go back there. Everyone else had great pizza.
Good on you for being strong against all odds.
This is why my husband has pizza every Saturday night without fail. And on our way to pick up the pizza (his treat for the weekend), we stop at Whole Foods so I can get a salad bar (my treat for the weekend).
I don't think I've ever let a waitress affect what I've ordered though. I have had difficulty at times trying to explain that I just want a green salad with grilled chicken (dressing on the side), but I've spent years now trying to find ways to make eating out healthier (looking at online menus, sharing dishes, etc...). Sometimes this works, sometimes not. It is what it is.
It's sort of like Paula Deen's mantra, "I'm your cook, not your doctor" or something like that.
Honestly, as a former waitress (worked my way through college waiting tables) I didn't care anything about my tables as long as they weren't hugely annoying and left a decent tip. Dieting people are no more annoying than people that special order other stuff, I wouldn't have cared/noticed one bit.
I had an example of a waitress that obviously didn't pay any attention to my "health food freakout" at Claim Jumper's last week. I very carefully ordered a blackened salmon NO BUTTER with a side of grilled vegetables LIGHT ON THE OIL (mentioning that they were really greasy the last time) and a baked sweet potato. Baked sweet potato came covered with a ton of brown sugar and a ginormous ball of butter. I had to ask her for a plain one. You'd think if she had paid a bit of attention to my healthy order, she would have asked me if I wanted butter on my sweet potato - nope! She didn't care.
As far as dressing, I don't want to sound nuttier than I always do, but I carry around Kraft packets of low cal Italian (25 calories). Tastes pretty good (not super healthy or organic or anything crazy) but it's definitely been helpful. Worst case, I just get the regular dressing on the side and dip the tines of my fork into it.
My husband and I eat out quite a bit, and the staff of our favorite restaurants know us very well. We're a bit loud, very chatty, and often make specific requests that may not be on the menu. We also praise and compliment good service, good food, and good prices. My husband tends to be fairly generous with the tips (luckily there are a lot of good, cheap family restaurants, so that even with a generous tip, it's much cheaper than eating at say, Applebee's), and we tell the owners and staff that we tell everyone we know how much we like the restaurant.
Because we're friendly and complimentary, we've never had a problem with special requests. Even when there's a problem that needs to be fixed, for example a dirty spoon or a lukewarm entree or something on the plate is not as requested, we do it in a "we understand mistakes can happen, but please fix this." We don't get angry or demand "free" meals because a mistake was made, but we do ask and expect it to be corrected. If the mistake is corrected promptly, we compliment and praise that as well, and do not retaliate with little or no tip (though if we have repeated problems with a particular waiter or waitress, we speak to the manager).
At one restaurant, where we've become very friendly with the owners, the owner will bring us new dishes to try, and she understands, and is not offended if we taste it, and take it home mostly intact, because we're dieting (it either gets budgeted into the next day's calories, or donated to our neighbor down the hall, a single bachelor who's not all that fond of cooking). The first time she did this (at that point, we were still fairly new customers), people at the next table were whispering about us and one woman said fairly loudly "I wonder who THEY are" (the implication that we must be important people to warrant such treatment).
Nope - it was a new business and we told all our friends how great the food was and how happy they were to accomodate special requests, and we were telling the owners that we were spreading the word. The owner, knowing I'm trying to lose weight and am cutting back on carbs, suggested that I try the spring rolls (it's a thai/hmong restaurant) with bean sprouts substituting for the noodles inside the thin wrapper with veggies and thinly sliced lean pork and shrimp. She'll also make my papaya salad without the sugar/tamarind.
I think that being customers who are pleasant to deal with (even when mistakes are made) staff remember us, and go out of their way to get us what we want. We've had wait staff and even the managers and owners come out to tell us that they appreciate being allowed the opportunity to fix a problem rather than getting upset or angry, or worse, saying nothing and then just never coming back and telling everyone we know what a terrible experience we had (one side effect of being so free with the compliments and communication - ok, we're blabbermouths - they also know that we would talk about bad experiences, so they go out of their way not to let that happen).
Portion sizes ARE crazy, but that's one of the reasons we do eat out. We've learned we don't have to eat it all, so the family restaurants are actually a very good value in our area. You can get a very nice dinner for under $6 per person and have enough leftovers for at least one full meal, often two (sometimes more, which really IS ridiculous). My husband once ordered the "5 piece Walleye dinner" at a local family restaurant, and after eating his fill, there were still 5 pieces on the plate - he joked to the waitress that it must be "magic Walleye" or the cook couldn't count, because there were still 5 large pieces on his plate.
When asking for special requests, small, privately owned restaurants are a lot easier to deal with than chains (though there are exceptions). Small restaurants have more leeway to customize dishes and the wait and cook staff tend to have a lot more experience improvising.
You really can catch more flies with honey in most cases. The friendlier and more complimentary you are to the waiter or waitress, the better and more accurate service you get. If you're a decent tipper, they remember you and will go out of their way to impress you if they can. If the owners know you're spreading the word (word of mouth really is the best advertisement they can get), they will go out of their way to make sure you're happy.
I'm going to buy those kraft packets, I've seen them at the store and I travel a lot, I'm amazed that salad dressing can be 180 calories. I was out of town a few weeks ago at a fast food restaurant, they were "out" of the only lowfat dressing, I looked at the label of bals. dressing and it really was 180 calories. I was studying the Biggest Loser diet plan and they only allow 200 calories of what they call "extras" and just one salad would be the end of anything in a day! Whew.
I've never asked restaurants to do things like this - no starches, extra veggies, or salad dressing on the side really. I don't want to be annoying but you say they are used to some of this? Yes it's true, what this means today, a packed restaurant with no lowfat salad dressing feeding "kids meals" that are 4x the size of what a kid should eat - and since it was packed - means they'll keep doing this, feeding huge fatty meals because only every now and then would anyone come in and ask for lowfat dressing at a place like that anyways.
I remember traveling to England - anyone from there? At least I remember they ate their salads plain without dressing. They also didn't use ketchup for fries etc like we do (and of course I've since learned ketchup and bbq sauce at restaurants are full of sugar too). I guess going without dressing would work in an emergency too... one restaurant I did such tiny little dips in normal ranch that I barely used any and I was amazed. Dipping is best if you have to I guess. Or how about asking for olive oil with vinegar? Would a waitress have a fit about that? In Europe they'd have bottles of vinegar and olive oil at tables. To sprinkle on salads and fries and things...
As a former waitress (for many years) the only time I would get slightly irked was when many demands that required much time were requested in a demanding and thankless manner during rushes.
For instance, I'd happily accommodate anyone's request for dressing on the side, no cheese, extra veggies - but when someone would expect something entirely off the menu (risking the wrath of a coked up chef at dinner rush) and likely out of stock on a Saturday night at 7 p.m. I'd get a bit anxious. Particularly if the blame were to be placed on me, by the customer, the pissed chef, the angry salad girl, the annoyed line cook, the other servers who have more wait time for their order because of my order and the owner who is mad at the world in general.
It just depended on how I was asked, when and if I were properly tipped for all of that trouble. It involves more than the waitress if absolutely crazy requests are made, quadrupled if it's during dinner rush. I'm talking off the menu meals, not dressing on the side, no cheese, substitute salad for fries.
Waitresses shouldn't have a tizzy if reasonable requests are made, most probably don't think twice about it. I had a special request for nearly every meal I ever served (something ordered as is was unusual). Oil and vinegar? No big deal, seriously.
I've never had a problem with special requests. Occasionally, a waitress will say "we can't do that," or "I'm not sure, let me ask the cooks," but they've always been friendly about it. I really only have Midwestern and Southern experience with restaurants to go by (Illinois, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Georgia, and Florida), and mostly smaller town restaurants. Many restaurants do have oil and vinegar you can mix at the table, some don't, and most of the restaurants wouldn't have olive oil, but a vegetable oil, (unless they were italian restaurants or a little more upscale) and the vinegar is usually red or white wine vinegar (not sure about other regions though).
Tupperware and Rubbermaid carry some very small plastic containers that hold about 1/4 cup of dressing. I often take my own dressing to restaurants also, and the little containers fit perfectly in a purse.
In italian restaurants I always ask whether their italian or house dressing is creamy or a vinaigrette. I avoid it if it's creamy, but will order it on the side if it's a vinaigrette, since usually they're about half the calories of creamy dressings like creamy italian, ranch, blue cheese, or thousand island. I prefer a regular vinaigrette to a creamy low fat dressing (and they're often about the same calories).
Soups are often a good bet, except cream soups. Often even cream soups aren't too bad, but occasionally a cream soup can have tons of added fat.
I hadn't thought about it, but I do wonder if one of the reasons hubby and I have never had a problem with special requests is that we do try to avoid the meal rushes. We'll either arrive relatively early or late, so that the restaurant isn't crowded.
My family goes out to breakfast on Friday mornings and once when I was home we went to Bob Evans. I knew what I liked... crepes + whatnot... but I wasn't about to just dive into it not know what I was getting. I asked the waitress if she had any nutritional info and she brought a sheet right out. She was really great about it. I remember thinking, wow, why can't they all be this way?
Sometimes also if I am going to a restaurant I look up the menu and calories first and if I can't make a choice then I print it out and take it with me.
I've never asked restaurants to do things like this - no starches, extra veggies, or salad dressing on the side really. I don't want to be annoying but you say they are used to some of this?
I do normally allow myself one "treat" meal in a restaurant per week where I'm not as...stringent as normal. My typical meals out - I special order ALL THE TIME. Never had a problem with it. I do the "no potato/rice double veggie" thing all the time and I ALWAYS (even at my treat meal) get salad dressing on the side. Part of that is for health reasons and part of it is because I HATE limp soggy lettuce. Blech!
I would prefer a low fat/low cal option (and like I said, I'm frequently "armed" with my own) but I'll use regular dressing if it's on the side. A full serving might be 180 calories but I never use that much, rarely as much as half with my tine dip method.
As far as being annoying, one of the "rules" I made for myself when I started was "permission to be a *****." Now, I don't necessarily mean a screaming evil *****, I mean - the right to stand up for myself, to get what I want, to say no instead of "yes" nicely as so many of us women are socialized to do. This helps me turn down birthday cake at work and special order to my heart's content at restaurants.
I make all my restaurant special requests with a smile and I'm a good tipper - as a former waitress, I am NOT the kind of customer that used to piss me off. I really did reserve my waitress ire for bad tippers or parents that let their kids through food all over the floor (and then didn't tip me enough to make up for it!). I actually had a kid at one of my tables throw a french fry and what did the parent say? Not "we don't throw things at the table." No, that dumb dingbat said "wow, did you see how far that went." GRRR!
We went out to dinner with another couple tonight. It was our first "date" with them, and as we like them very much, we wanted to be as accomodating as possible. Oh, and these are not people we have known that long, so while they may have seen some of the end of our weight loss...not most of it. Anyway, we went to this amazing little Italian restaurant which is one of their favorites -- but all I could think before we went was.. uh oh...Italian...that and whether they were going to think we were crazy when we BOTH ordered our dressing on the side and then proceeded to look for things we could eat on the menu. While it was a special occasion, I had no interest in eating a 1/2 cup of cream over cheese stuffed noodles with grated cheese on top.
It turned out beautifully. The menu was not just the usual Italian restaurant fare. The chef/owner is actually Italian so the food was extremely authentic with lots of variety. I actually got fish with capers, grilled veggies and polenta. It would probably have even fit in my day's plan! The server was great about the dressing on the side for my salad, and actually asked ME if I wanted them to hold the sauce for the veggies or bring it in a bowl. Good man! And the other wife asked for her dressing on the side before my husband or I did -- turns out that they have been on a bit of a health kick recently as well. Which gave us a great conversation starter as we compared plans.
It was a really nice experience...and it made me wonder at my paranoia before we left. Why should I be worried about HOW I eat...especially since I'm being healthy about it? It is too weird.
Do you think waiters know "us?"
