I might bring back my restaurant critic for another visit....
A mask The restaurant was called Masks which surprised me faintly as I knew the owner from some of her other restaurants and pretentious isn't a pretentious enough word to describe her. I would have expected it to be in French at least, or written in 15th century Aramaic, or even perhaps Braille and set on the seats of all the chairs to make a mediocre dining experience all the more uncomfortable. As we approached the non-descript looking doors I glanced over at the Blonde -- who was being a redhead for professional reasons this week and had picked an outfit that might have made the patrons of the Ritz feel shabby and poor -- to see how she was reacting. There was a definite look on her face, one that I usually only see when I disagree with her in front of her mother, and I hoped that the decor inside would be more interesting.
Indeed, the facade of the restaurant proved to be something of a mask itself; the inside was as polished and golden and glitzy as Donald Trump's dreams and for a moment I thought I'd tripped and fallen into a glass vat of champagne and was falling through amber-hued bubbles. There were crystalline globes everywhere, each containing an incandescent lightbulb -- a fantastic expense in this economy and I almost patted my pockets to check that I'd brought my wallet. While this will be put on expenses, the paper doesn't pay up front and I was very certain that offering to do the dishes here would indenture both myself and the Blonde for two or even three lifetimes. The walls were dressed in cloth-of-gold swashes and the wallpaper seemed to be self-illuminating and the ceiling, so high above it might as well have been the heavens, was probably mirrored from the improbably amount of light that was coming down from it. As a moustachioed man, probably in his seventies from his slow gait, arthritic knuckles and rheumy eyes, took the Blonde's jacket she murmured, "I hope you remembered to put sunblock on." Of course I hadn't. I wasn't expecting to get sunburned over dinner.
We were escorted to table IX by a young woman with her hair up in barrettes and sensible shoes that clashed with her ridiculous skirt and handed a tiny square of paper that someone had spilled ink on. "It's a QR code," explained the young woman patronisingly slowly when the Blonde handed it back to her with the words "No thanks." "I know," I said before a shouting match could start. "It's not a menu, and I'm not squinting at a phone screen in a room where I'm more likely to get snow-blindness than on an actual ski-slope. We'll have a proper menu, please, and there'd better not be a surcharge for it." The young woman stomped off with her nose in the air and the Blonde nodded at me. "I bet they have to cross the surcharge out when they print the bill," she said. "By the way, my mother will be staying with us next week. For a couple of days."
We didn't get a menu; instead we got the manager, who I recognised as having been the Maitre'd at Beluga's and then the manager at Le Coteille d'Ache, and who recognised me, and with a face-fall of impressive proportions, the Blonde. He trembled, standing as far away from her as he could, explaining that in fact there was no menu and that the QR code would have taken us to a website with the SURPRISE! as the only content. I forced a smile; he forced a smile, and the Blonde idly played with her steak-knife. "It's the theme," he said. "Masks, hidden things. I'll bring you the starter and maybe that will help."
Finding live shrimp inside -- admittedly very well cooked -- tempura was certainly a surprise and I would commend them on the ingenuity it must have taken to keep the shrimp alive if people actually wanted to eat live, raw shrimp. Discovering that the 'fruit' brought to the table was made out of meat was less of a surprise -- I'm sure Heston did it first -- and then discovering that it was faux-meat made from pea-paste and tofu-rinds was even more surprising, but less delightful. And the Blonde discovering, when she got up to go to the ladies's room and inspect her make-up, that some other patron had discretely thrown up in her handbag -- probably the shrimp -- was enough surprises for us that evening.
And indeed, the itemised bill had a line for the surcharge of the 'real' menu crossed through when we received it.
3 comments:
I might bring back my restaurant critic for another visit....
A mask
The restaurant was called Masks which surprised me faintly as I knew the owner from some of her other restaurants and pretentious isn't a pretentious enough word to describe her. I would have expected it to be in French at least, or written in 15th century Aramaic, or even perhaps Braille and set on the seats of all the chairs to make a mediocre dining experience all the more uncomfortable. As we approached the non-descript looking doors I glanced over at the Blonde -- who was being a redhead for professional reasons this week and had picked an outfit that might have made the patrons of the Ritz feel shabby and poor -- to see how she was reacting. There was a definite look on her face, one that I usually only see when I disagree with her in front of her mother, and I hoped that the decor inside would be more interesting.
Indeed, the facade of the restaurant proved to be something of a mask itself; the inside was as polished and golden and glitzy as Donald Trump's dreams and for a moment I thought I'd tripped and fallen into a glass vat of champagne and was falling through amber-hued bubbles. There were crystalline globes everywhere, each containing an incandescent lightbulb -- a fantastic expense in this economy and I almost patted my pockets to check that I'd brought my wallet. While this will be put on expenses, the paper doesn't pay up front and I was very certain that offering to do the dishes here would indenture both myself and the Blonde for two or even three lifetimes. The walls were dressed in cloth-of-gold swashes and the wallpaper seemed to be self-illuminating and the ceiling, so high above it might as well have been the heavens, was probably mirrored from the improbably amount of light that was coming down from it. As a moustachioed man, probably in his seventies from his slow gait, arthritic knuckles and rheumy eyes, took the Blonde's jacket she murmured, "I hope you remembered to put sunblock on."
Of course I hadn't. I wasn't expecting to get sunburned over dinner.
We were escorted to table IX by a young woman with her hair up in barrettes and sensible shoes that clashed with her ridiculous skirt and handed a tiny square of paper that someone had spilled ink on.
"It's a QR code," explained the young woman patronisingly slowly when the Blonde handed it back to her with the words "No thanks."
"I know," I said before a shouting match could start. "It's not a menu, and I'm not squinting at a phone screen in a room where I'm more likely to get snow-blindness than on an actual ski-slope. We'll have a proper menu, please, and there'd better not be a surcharge for it."
The young woman stomped off with her nose in the air and the Blonde nodded at me. "I bet they have to cross the surcharge out when they print the bill," she said. "By the way, my mother will be staying with us next week. For a couple of days."
We didn't get a menu; instead we got the manager, who I recognised as having been the Maitre'd at Beluga's and then the manager at Le Coteille d'Ache, and who recognised me, and with a face-fall of impressive proportions, the Blonde. He trembled, standing as far away from her as he could, explaining that in fact there was no menu and that the QR code would have taken us to a website with the SURPRISE! as the only content. I forced a smile; he forced a smile, and the Blonde idly played with her steak-knife.
"It's the theme," he said. "Masks, hidden things. I'll bring you the starter and maybe that will help."
Finding live shrimp inside -- admittedly very well cooked -- tempura was certainly a surprise and I would commend them on the ingenuity it must have taken to keep the shrimp alive if people actually wanted to eat live, raw shrimp. Discovering that the 'fruit' brought to the table was made out of meat was less of a surprise -- I'm sure Heston did it first -- and then discovering that it was faux-meat made from pea-paste and tofu-rinds was even more surprising, but less delightful. And the Blonde discovering, when she got up to go to the ladies's room and inspect her make-up, that some other patron had discretely thrown up in her handbag -- probably the shrimp -- was enough surprises for us that evening.
And indeed, the itemised bill had a line for the surcharge of the 'real' menu crossed through when we received it.
Greg - always welcome, but of course :)
Your critic seems to live a rather difficult life, all things considered. I hope the pay makes it worth it, but I suspect it's a close run thing.
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