Restaurant Myths

 

1. How often do you eat out?

2. When choosing a restaurant, what criteria do you use? Is your choice based on the menu, the chef, the clientele of the establishment, the day of the week? How do you know if a restaurant is worth a visit? Do you read food reviews or rely on word-of-mouth recommendations from friends? Which is the most reliable?

3. If I were to visit the last restaurant you visited, what advice would you give me?

4. Do you agree with the following:

a) The customer is always right on how food should be served

b) Michelin stars are always an indicator of a restaurant's quality

c) Never order fish on a Monday

d) The service charge goes to the staff

e) Early sittings are best?

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5. Read article here: Restaurant Myth Reading

6. Do you have any questions on the language/cultural points used in the article?

7. Did your answers to question 4 (above) change after having read the article?

8. Are there any beliefs or misconceptions about restaurant dining in your country, such as the best time to book a table, the quality of the house wine, and the etiquette of tipping and complaining?

9. When is your preferred time to go to a restaurant and why? In your experience, are restaurants more relaxed earlier in the day, and more lively at night?

10. How do you choose a wine when you dine out? Do you have a favourite type or region? Do you ask the waiter/waitress for a recommendation?

11. How do you tip in restaurants? Do you follow a rule or a percentage? When you tip, are you tipping (in your mind) just the person who served you, or are you tipping everybody i.e. the cleaners, the marketing staff etc?

12. Have you ever complained in a restaurant? What was the reason and how did the staff handle it? Do you prefer to complain after leaving the restaurant (on social media etc.)?

13. Have you ever seen/heard of people complaining in order to get a discount or freebies? What effect can a loud complainer have on other diners/staff?

14. Have you ever seen/heard of staff complaining about customers' behaviour?

15. Is taking photos of your food in a restaurant acceptable behaviour?

16. Are there any restaurant critics in your country that have quite a lot of power/influence over eating establishments?

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Situation

You host a podcast on gastronomy/eating out. You've invited a London-based restaurant critic (your teacher) to your show to talk about restaurant 'myths'. Ask him any questions you or your listeners might have.

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Discuss quotes

"If I can't eat a meal in a restaurant, and the waiter asks, 'Is everything all right, Madam?', I tell them that I'm on a diet."

--- Cilla Black

"You can put the greatest seafood restaurant next to an average steak house in an urban area, and that steak house will do more business than the seafood place. If you go to the seaside, you can put an average seafood place next to the greatest steak house, people are going to eat seafood.

--- Tilman J. Fertitta

"Although a great restaurant experience must include great food, a bad restaurant experience can be achieved through bad service alone. Ideally, service is invisible.

 You notice it only when something goes wrong."

--- Dana Spiotta

A: "Do they allow tipping in this restaurant?

B: Yes, sir.

A: Have you got two fives?

B: Oh, yes, sir.

A: Then you won't need the ten cents I was going to give you."

--- Groucho Marx

“What you're supposed to do when you don't like a thing is change it. If you can't change it, change the way you think about it. Don't complain.”

― Maya Angelou

Student Handout PDF: Restaurant Myth

Photo: Mikkel Bendix

Vending Machines

1. Do you ever use vending machines? If so, what do you buy from them? If not, why not?

2. What do you think are the benefits of selling food items from vending machines? What are the drawbacks?

3. What do you do when the product you want gets stuck? Do you have a technique? Choose from the following:

a) I tilt the machine forwards and backwards.

b) I bang on the window.

c) I try to rebuy the product.

d) I try to buy an item higher up, and hope that it will knock my item free.

e) I call the number on the machine.

f) I seek assistance nearby.

Read article here: Vending Machine Reading

4. If food-vending machines of the type mentioned in the article appeared in your neighbourhood, what items should they stock? Which locations would be most suitable/unsuitable?

5. Some schools in the UK are banning vending machines as they are seen as part of the obesity problem. What is the situation in schools in your country? Do school vending machines usually sell unhealthy snacks?

6. Have you come across people selling food in other innovative ways?

7. Have your food shopping habits changed in the last five or ten years? If so, how? Do you go shopping more or less frequently? Do you shop more online? Do you buy more or less local or organic produce?

8. Do you grow any of your own food? Would you like to?

9. Have there been shortages of any particular items?

10. Have any of these changes during the pandemic encouraged you to try new foods, combinations or recipes? If so, how did they work out?

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Situation

You want to persuade your boss (your teacher) to install one of these machines at your workplace. Approach him and explain the possible benefits of having one of them.

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Discuss quotes

"My favorite machine at the gym is the vending machine."

- Caroline Rhea

"Anyone who says having a child is the best moment of their life has obviously never had two Kit-Kats fall out of a vending machine at once."

- Anon

"You don't truly know someone until you see how they react to their bag of chips getting stuck in a vending machine."

- Anon

"If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need."

-  Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Growing your own food is like printing your own money!

-  Urban Gardening Republic

Student Handout PDF: Vending Machine Outline

Meet Meat

1. Have you ever considered becoming a vegetarian, or drastically changing the type of food you eat?

2. These are some of the reasons people give for being vegetarian. What do you think of each reason? (And can you elaborate on each reason?)

- moral

- religious

- environmental

- health

3. Do you know many vegetarians or vegans?

4. How do people generally react to vegetarians or vegans in your country?

5. Have you ever visited a vegetarian restaurant? What was the food like?

6. Would you marry a vegetarian if it meant you could not cook meat at home?

7. What arguments can you think of against vegetarianism?

Read infographic here: Meet Meat Reading

8. What is your reaction? Of the meat alternatives in the infographic, which is the most/least appealing? Which will be the simplest to implement?

9. Do you accept that the benefits of these food types outweigh any psychological discomfort we might have? Do you think that recent events have weakened public trust in laboratory-led innovations?

10. In terms of flavour and protein, what are your current favourite foods?

11. Will these food types be difficult to sell in your country? Does your cuisine make use of vegetarian dishes?

12. How would you feel if you were told that you could no longer eat meat?

13. "So much of our culture and language is based on the food we eat and when we eat it - these meat alternatives are the first step in the end of society as we know it." Do you agree?

14."During February 2013 it was revealed that many supposedly "beef" dishes sold in Europe contained varying amounts of horse meat. The public should welcome scientific advances in food production because the present food industry doesn't give a damn about what it sells." Do you agree?

15. Are you worried about 'Frankenfoods' i.e. genetically modified crops etc?

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Situation

Bill Gates (your teacher) has been invited to speak at your local town hall. The topic of his talk is 'A world without meat.' You are an audience member - ask Bill about the concerns you have about meat replacements.

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Discuss quotes

"All the food we eat - every grain of rice and kernel of corn - has been genetically modified. None of it was here before mankind learned to cultivate crops. The question isn't whether our food has been modified, but how."

- Michael Specter

"Many of the genetically modified foods will be safe, I'm sure. Will most of them be safe? Nobody knows."

- Jeremy Rifkin

“If you have to wear a hazmat suit to grow crops, why would you ever eat them? If you’re afraid of getting that crap on your skin, how much more insane would it be to put it in your mouth! Seriously? 

- Steve Bivans

Student Handout PDF: Meet Meat