polls

Sunday Survey: Your most memorable 'famous person' restaurant encounter?

maki — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 09:46:10 +0100

I’m sitting here sorting through the giveaway entries, checking out the overnight Twitters, and doing laundry. Typical Sunday morning for me. @macratlove tweeted (twittered?) this, which is inspiring this question:

What’s the most memorable famous-person encounter you’ve ever had in a restaurant?

Here’s mine!

In my brief few months working the front desk at a restaurant in Manhattan, I had the chance to encounter quite a lot of famous, semi-famous, and they-think-they-are-famous customers. Most were quiet and courteous, but some were pretty rude. A select handful were downright obnoxious. (I’m thinking for instance of one particular Japanese ‘celebrity’ who thought she was Entitled to extra-special treatment. Or the famous domestic guru who showed up without a reservation on a Friday and expected to be seated right away, and got rather snippy when it wasn’t happening. Or a certain Best Supporting Actor Oscar winner who had to have his imminent arrival announced several times by his hotel concierge, with all kinds of instructions beforehand, and then ended up not showing up at all. And on and on…)

But, my most memorable Famous Person Encounter is not one of the bad ones. One summer’s night, as my colleague and I tried to deal with a packed restaurant and a growing line of waiting customers, one tall gentleman showed up with his blonde companion (his wife). He was wearing a sort of greyish jacket with a black t-shirt underneath. As my eyes traveled up the shirt to look at his bespectacled face, I realized that it was Steve Jobs.

Now, I’ve been a Mac user since the early ’90s. I was at first a reluctant convert from the PC, but my new workplace was Mac-based, and within a short time I had seen the light. I’ve stuck with Apple every since, even in the dark, dark days when it seemed as though it was either going to go out of business or become a PC clone maker of some sort. Anyway, to me Steve Jobs was a God.

Unfortunately, his [very expensive 5-star hotel]’s concierge had screwed up the time of his reservation by an hour. And, apparently he was used to sitting in front of his favorite itamae-san at the sushi counter whenever he came to New York. Panic! Panic! Fortunately, the guests who were sitting at his spot were ok with being shifted a bit to the left, so we somehow squeezed Steve, er Mr. Jobs, and his wife in, and all was well. Neither of them made any kind of fuss, and stood waiting patiently for some minutes while we figured things out. (None of the other restaurant staff were impressed in the least by him by the way; most didn’t even know, or care, that he was The Steve! To the itamae-san he was just one of his regular customers! Philistines, I tell you.)

So that’s my most memorable Famous Person Restaurant story! How about yours?

(My most recent Famous Person encounter was at JFK airport a couple of weeks ago. I saw Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the baggage claim area, leaning against the wall, waiting for his bags just like the rest of us! That dude is tall. He looked very young and spritely too.)

Reflections on the food prices poll results

maki — Mon, 05 May 2008 15:43:50 +0200

The food prices poll has just concluded, and the results show that 43% of the people who votes are ‘very concerned’ and 45% are ‘a little concerned’ about rising food prices. That is quite a lot indeed.

I’ve been thinking of ways in which our household food budget can go on a diet. Given that we are rather passionate about good food around here, there are compromises we are not willing to make. But there are lots we can do without feeling like we are depriving ourselves too.

Eat out less. This is an easy one really, because I feel that we can eat better food at home both taste wise and health wise. So no more eating out for eating out’s sake. We don’t want to give up going to really good restaurants, but we’ll put them in the “entertainment” column, not within the “food” column.
Stop impulse buying those tempting ‘gourmet’ treats. This is a bit more difficult for me - I find it hard to resist that jar of extra special preserves or mustard, not to mention all those delcious looking cheeses and hams and such that are on offer at speciality markets. I feel rather guilty when looking at all those barely opened jars in the fridge though.
Don’t buy prepackaged supermarket foods. This is also easy - most premade food is less than stellar.
Buy food that is as close to its original form as possible. The most food is processed, the more it costs. A box of cereal costs far more than plain oatmeal. Flavored rice mixes are way more expensive than plain rice.
Less meat and fish, more vegetarian proteins. I don’t want to compromise on the quality of the meat we get (for instance, we like to get Poulet de Bresse or at least a St. Sever quality chicken for roasting, which is about twice the price of a regular chicken), but I’m happy with eating less of it and using more vegetable proteins like beans.
Buy only what we really need. This is the most important thing - too often I buy too many vegetables or something, and some of it ends up going bad and getting thrown out.

What things can you think of doing, or are doing already, to painlessly cut down on food spending?

Should there be more restaurant authenticity verifiers?

maki — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 09:49:40 +0100