To Eat or Not To Eat
That is the question. I’ll save you from an extended food-centric bastardization of Hamlet’s soliloquy.
Sending food back to the kitchen at a restaurant is a decision that is rarely made lightly. And in fact, I rarely do it. This is a subject that comes up a lot when I talk with restaurant owners. Most of them truly want their customers to speak up about a dish that was made incorrectly as soon as possible so that the restaurant has a chance to fix the problem. The goal is to always have customers leave happy.
Of course, you can’t make everyone happy. But that’s not going to stop the good places from trying. Unfortunately, there will be some consumers who try to take advantage of a restaurant’s good will, and try to get free meals for small infractions. I used to work with some advertising clients like that. It’s not fun.
I feel like we’ve covered in the past some of the reasons why customers are reluctant to send food back to the kitchen. Well, this past week, I had two unfortunate experiences. They each had different resolutions, and it reminded me of one other reason I hate sending food back.
Judging and Healing the World
Sometimes the world feels like an awful place. I’m not sure how many of you have been following the US bombing of a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan. Yes, it’s in the news, but hearing about the shelling from the perspective of hospital staff on the ground is truly horrifying.
My read on the situation is that 22 patients and staff of the hospital were killed. That’s twelve staff members, seven adult patients, and three juvenile patients. It does not look like an accident. The US Military was provided the GPS coordinates of the hospital from Doctors Without Borders to make sure it wasn’t inadvertently targeted.
But it would seem that the airstrike was called in by the Afghanistan military, who had an ongoing grudge against the hospital for healing people regardless of their side in the conflict. And it kills me that this is going on in our name. This is not okay.
Of course, this is just one of the many, many things that is broken in the world today. The good news is that there are people out there who are working hard to heal the world. Some of this takes place in our own backyard. And I’m thrilled to be working with a group of these folks on a benefit this week.
Duck. Soup. Scone.
Saturday, I was feeling a little judgy.
A long long time ago, I used to enjoy dressing up in costume. Mostly in my adolescence. And the reason that I liked to do it was because it was a chance to come up with some kind of outward expression of inner being.
So in high school, while I was struggling with my own identity and self esteem, I spent a lot of time putting together a couple of different costumes for a couple successive years. One year, I dressed up as Frankenstein’s monster. The next, I went as the Phantom of the Opera. In college I went a little darker, and got a bit more hedonistic, so I went through a vampire phase.
Eventually, I really became much more comfortable in my own skin, and the costume thing largely lost its appeal. But last Saturday, I had to dress up for The Enchanted City where I was the chief justice for the culinary competition. So really, there was only one thing I could do.
Enchanted, I’m Sure
There’s a first time for everything. Never did I think it would be part of my job to attend a Victorian steampunk and fairy street fair. But it turns out that I’m doing more than just attending it.
Perhaps you’ve heard that this Saturday The Enchanted City returns to River Street in Troy. Well, this year Yelp is a sponsor, and for better or for worse I’ve helped to shape the food part of the festival.
I’m going to encourage you to come for the food, and stay for the spectacle. You can see all the entertainment listed for the day on the website, but if you want the inside scoop on what and where to eat, you’re in the right place.
Soup Searching
First things first. Thank you to all of you who shared the heck out of the Tour de Cider Donut results post. As of this writing it has already gotten 376 shares on Facebook. That’s huge, and it’s brought a lot of new people into the blog.
So, maybe I can capture a bit of that new energy today. Because today I’m looking to pick your brain on the subject of soup. So close your eyes for a moment, and think cold thoughts.
Fast Food Ingredient Expectations
Man, it’s nasty outside today. Last night the Internet went out, and this morning Young Master Fussy’s bus was delayed. I saw a tree down completely blocking the road near my house. I also saw a nearby stream overflowing and washing out the road.
But now I’m back to the safety of my keyboard to draw some connections about the slowly improving state of food in America. All of this ties back to an article in Forbes earlier this month, and largely focusses around McDonald’s.
However, Chipotle also comes into the story, and that raises a more important point about expectations.
The Best of the West Cider Donuts
Who has the best cider donuts in the Capital Region? Indian Ladder Farm, Golden Harvest Farms, Hicks-Wilson Orchard, The Carrot Barn, and Cider Belly. How do I know? Because with the help of countless volunteers, we have pitted the cider donuts from twenty-five of the area’s most beloved orchards and bakeries against each other and these were the five that rose to the top.
However, this project is far from complete. Last Saturday eleven of us ate our way through five more versions of this regional specialty. This year we focused entirely on the westernmost edge of the Capital Region, starting up north in Mayfield and ending almost due south in Schoharie.
And you know what? This was by far the best Tour de Donut yet. There’s usually one place that just doesn’t quite measure up, and this tour had that. But all of the other stops were excellent. Each one was at least someone’s favorite of the day. And at each of those four orchards, we were able to procure hot cider donuts!
This year’s contest was closer than it might appear. But to tell you the story, I’ve got to run you through the numbers. Before I totally spill the beans, let me tell you how the day played out.
Frozen and Canned
Officially, this was the best Tour de Donut yet. If you missed it, you missed out. What made it so amazing? Well, never before have we gotten so many hot donuts. Four of the five places were selling these seasonal treats just as fast as they were coming off the robot. It was like a dream come true.
Of course, that made the judging even that much harder. The full results will be in by Wednesday at the latest. There’s a lot going on this week.
But instead of focusing on the future, let’s turn our attention to the recent past. Sometimes with my once-daily posting schedule, I miss out on commenting about some issues near and dear to my heart.
School lunches are right up there. So is teaching food insecure communities about healthier eating. There has been a big push to focus on eating fresh and eating local. But now there’s the inevitable backlash from the canned and frozen food lobby. Maybe this Yelp job is having an effect on my brain, because instead of doubling down on one side or the other, I’m finding a nice comfortable niche in the middle that makes a ton of sense. However, it would never work.
Coffee: Competition & Collaboration
It makes sense that the Capital Region would not have a strong culture of competition. As large as the area may be, we’re really a collection of small towns that every year suffer through bitter winters. People have to huddle together in order to survive.
Okay, that may be a bit overly dramatic. But everyone here knows everyone else. In a small town, everybody is interconnected. It makes it hard to put the business across town in your crosshairs when you sit on the same boards for the same charities. The lack of competition is one factor that I think artificially keeps restaurant prices high in the region.
Competition has other positive outcomes beyond economic ones. It also encourages people to perform at a higher level, and raises standards across the board.
One of the things that’s exciting about living here in the Capital Region today as the area is evolving is watching the interplay of competition and collaboration work out, when new and interesting businesses are opening up at a fantastic pace.
You don’t have to look any further than tonight’s coffee contest in Troy.
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