No Soup For You!

Dear Homo:
 
If your soup is cold, are you stuck with it, or do you ask the waiter to heat it up and trust no monkey business? Or am I being paranoid? Also, if the waiter disappears for most of the service so you never had a chance to order another drink or get more rolls, etc., is ten percent generous?

Signed,
Soup's On

Dear SO:

The issues you raise here are near and dear to my heart because I myself have worked as a waiter and bartender over the years. If you've never done it, I'm here to tell you that food service is one of the hardest jobs in the world. Truly. Any C-student jackass party-boy can advance to the White House (see Bush, George W.) but it takes a truly smart cookie to make a good waiter.

With those biases in mind, here's my take on your cold soup conundrum:

There is absolutely nothing wrong with sending back food when it's not prepared to your liking. You're paying good money for that soup; it should arrive nice and hot. (Unless it's vichyssoise or gazpacho, in which case sending it back will make you look dumber than W.)

But the key here is attitude. The waiter didn't prepare the soup, so it's almost never his fault when it arrives cold. Given that, when you send the soup back, show some respect and civility: "Excuse me, Sir? I hate to trouble you, but my soup is really cold. Do you think you could have the chef heat it up for me?"

I guarantee you that unless he's a total psycho, the waiter will do nothing more than apologize profusely and bring you new soup, without any kind of monkey business. (And honestly, even when customers were hideous toward me, I never fouled anyone's food or beverage. It's a really sick thing to do, and I valued my job too much in any case.)

As for the second part of your query, whether a ten percent tip is "generous" for inattentive service: No. Ten percent is never generous. But such a meager tip (or no tip at all) may be justified in certain circumstances.

Always ask yourself this: Did the waiter make a sincere effort to provide you with good service? Because maybe he did, and maybe the problem was that the restaurant was severely understaffed, and your waiter was forced to juggle too many tables. Try to assess the situation fairly, and tip accordingly.

My own rule of thumb is as follows: Good service gets a 20 percent tip. Adequate service gets 15 percent. Shitty service gets 10. And if the waiter was downright hostile, or if my soup arrived garnished with a giant loogey, no tip for you.

I hope this helps.

Just put the tip in,
Homo