| rev:text
| - Summary: food okay, service appalling.
Went for a quick bite at 8:30 on a Saturday evening. Place was at half capacity. Waited, according to sign, for the Maitre D' to seat the party; after a couple of minutes and no Maitre D' anywhere to be seen and under the careless looks of the waitresses passing by, seated ourselves at the long table across from the kitchen.
Server approached and took the drinks order and the food order simultaneously, as we stated that we were really hungry, then came back with the drinks and disappeared. We waited patiently for the pizzas to bake. In the meantime, the, what we learned later, Maitre D entered the scene. It had been 10 minutes since we had set foot at the restaurant. No eye contact nor any acknowledgement of our presence. Didn't seem to care at all, as she would have probably noticed that there were four people sitting at the table with four napkins and no silverware. There was a bunch of knives at her station, along with what looked like a giant slab of Parmesan, just left there unattended on top of some napkins, well within my reach. I could have taken it and rubbed it all over my head, if I wanted to. Nobody would have noticed.
So after a short while finally the Maitre D' appeared, not with the silverware, but with the ready pizzas. We asked for silverware, as we were very hungry and wanted to eat. Right. Away. She asked if we wanted some Parmesan on the pizza. We said yes on the one and no on the other, but, above all, could we get some silverware, as we are, after all, civilized people. She grabbed the slab of Parmesan from above my head and started grating it over the pizza, obviously not being able to process the concept of silverware. I did not want to intimidate her, because I remembered the knives at her station, and she looked angry that someone was interfering with her critical act of grating cheese.
Finally our waitress appeared again and we begged for some silverware. She went somewhere and came back with two forks and one knife on a plate and threw them on the table. Two forks and one knife For four people. We started losing hope. I was only glad we ordered pizzas and not a salad. Salad is really difficult to eat with hands only. Finally at the fourth attempt, all was corrected, there were forks and knives for everyone, and joy and peace and pizza. Pizza was totally okay, but, again, it's pizza. My friends, who have been going to this place for 10+ years love it, though, and drove 30 miles to go there.
At some point a young man by the name of Henry Hanson, Manager, approached the table and asked if everything was okay. All of us said yes, we had just needed some forks and knives but now all was peachy. He left, only to come back in 10 minutes. Obviously he was bored or sad or lonely and needed to talk to someone. I actually wanted to eat pizza and was not really ready to make new friends. He again asked what happened and stated that his staff was feeling insulted by our demand to have knives and forks, suggested we would apologize. Well I refuse to apologize for not wanting to eat, what is being marketed as gourmet pizza, with my fingers and explained the basic concept of service business - when you satisfy your reasonable customer's needs properly, nobody would feel insulted. In fact, I felt insulted by Mr. Hanson, Manager, that I would have to accept to eat like a wild man, only to protect his staff's feelings.
We finished, paid, tipped 18% and left the restaurant. We were followed in the parking lot by Mr. Hanson, Manager, and asked not to come back to this restaurant, because of our interaction with the staff. Or else he'd put up a big beautiful wall around it. Ok, he didn't really say the last part.
Actually we would have never even thought of going back there, at least as long as this place employs inadequately trained service staff, who obviously have serious deficits in common sense and no clue of fundamental customer service principles.
So my advise to any future patrons:
One: bring your own silverware
Two: don't demand anything from the staff. In fact, just reach out for that Parmesan, it's been sitting there in the open for hours. Just nibble on it, you'll be fine.
Three: don't talk, laugh, breathe, move, or do anything that might insult the staff. They are very emotional human beings and are not there to cater to any of your needs, quite the contrary, you are there to cater to their emotional needs and pay them for that.
Four: actually try not to go there at all. Everyone will be happy!
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