Category: food

Tip of the Hat/Spear/Your Pun Here

I woke up this morning thinking about tipping.

No apparent reason, just where my brain went upon waking.

Waking early, I might add. 6:10 a.m. finds me at the keyboard with energy, so a brief treatise on tipping is what you get today.

(My brain interrupts me here to point out that a treatise is technically a longer and more formal work than what I am attempting here, and I should probably use the term spiel instead. Okay, brain, okay. Can we get to it now?)

I strive to be a good tipper. 

I have a solid floor of 20%.

That’s the bare minimum I can scribble my name to without feeling guilt. 

It’s also a minimum predicated on a couple of assumptions.

Assumption the first: I tip on the whole bill, not the pre-tax amount. I do this because it is more generous, and the math is easier.

Assumption the second: I tip on alcohol. Considering my drinking tendencies, this raises the floor considerably.

Now, I’ve read tipping guides that advise you to not do those things, to which I say: Fuck off. I’m trying to be a decent human here.

So, we’ve set a floor. Is that enough?

Sometimes it isn’t. If I am, for example, eating alone at a Waffle House, the tab can be a single-digit number. In such cases, I have a $5 minimum.

Why $5?

As My Friend Who Likes To Punch People For Recreation once so eloquently put it, giving someone a dollar today is like your grandpa giving you a quarter when you were a kid. It’s pat-on-the-head money, not a living wage. I won’t leave the equivalent of a small pile of change on the table, and I don’t believe a diner server should get stiffed just because they didn’t get a steakhouse job instead. Start at $5 and go up from there as if that were 20%.

Having set the floor, it’s pretty easy to raise it. Decent work merits 25%, and I’ll go 30% for someone who makes me laugh.

Wait, wait, I hear.

(And I pause at the unintended pun, then realize there is no such thing as an unintended pun once you acknowledge it. So, leave it, or make a different choice, writer-person.)

Wait, wait, I hear.

What if their service was bad?

Read the room. Is the waitstaff busy as hell, working multiple tables? Is the kitchen backed up? Are there complicated orders (from your table or others)?

These are all reasons to raise your tip, not lower it.

What if they were rude?

How rude we talking? Southern rude? Did she bless your heart? Northern rude? Was the word fuck uttered as a casual adjective? Northwestern rude? Indifference?

Again, read the room. Put yourself in those shoes.

(Geez, you should have good shoes to wait tables.)

Try to think of a reason to hold steady or raise the tip, rather than look for ways to lower it.

Maybe it’s a first day/bad day/last day. Maybe their dog died. Maybe their lover is leaving. Maybe they don’t have a lover, and they are confused about love in general, filled with despair at the existential loneliness that is life, waiting tables to pay the rent on a place they don’t like but is (barely) affordable, living without parents who can afford to offer financial assistance that, even if such were possible, they would turn down on principle, and the power bill is due …

You get the point.

(I people-watch and sometimes daydream lives for the mental exercise. No, wait — that’s not the point. The point is …)

You never truly know. Err on the side of giving someone a living wage.

Which brings me to geography.

This spiel is focused on life in the States, as our (wealthy, developed) nation nonetheless has basically no laws in place to provide a living wage to members of the service class.

Tipping isn’t a nicety; it’s a necessity.

If you feel that shouldn’t be the case, fine. Vote and advocate accordingly. I’m with you. Meanwhile, tip well.

Which brings me to the assholes.

Low tip? Change on the table? Always looking for reason to lower the tip?

Assholes, all.

Then there are the very special assholes, the ones who don’t tip on principle.

Buddy, get some better principles. I get it, you saw Reservoir Dogs at an impressionable age, and Mr. Pink’s anti-tipping tirade really moved you.

a) You’re an asshole.

b) Everyone in that movie is an asshole.

c) Tarantino is an asshole.

d) Joe, while still an asshole, was correct: “Never mind what you normally would do. Just cough in your goddamned buck like everyone else.”

e) You’re an asshole.

Notes on a New Year

Sick. It’s a lousy way to start the year. 

Well, except for the part where The Empress of Whisky keeps bringing me whisky-laced coffee. 

Mmm. 

I should probably eat something, though.  

Plenty of choices. Two days ago I made a large batch of dressing (using my mom’s recipe). I intended to take half to a New Year’s Eve party, but, well, sickness. 

Instead we stayed home and The Empress beat me at board games. At midnight we toasted each other and our kitty. 

For New Year’s Day, I made black-eyed peas, not because I am superstitious, but because they are delicious. Also: turkey breast, the aforementioned dressing, potatoes, several vegetables for The Empress … quite a holiday feast, most of which happily doubles as good comfort leftovers for sick people. 

I’d like to tell you I’ve been sittting here, planning my year, looking ahead … but mostly I’m just fighting the kitty’s advice to nap again. 

Outside, rain falls. 

All together, it’s a good enough day. A quiet place to start what promises to be a noisy year. 

We’ll see to tomorrow, tomorrow.  

2016 Whisky Wind-down, 29: You Might Like It

A whisky tumbler with a double measure of The Glenlivet 12-Year-Old sits on a desk before a half-size bottle of same and a stuffed Yoda keeps watch. Background: Bookcases.

Today’s dram: The Glenlivet, 12-Year-Old

Today’s tasting notes: Do not fear to drink this. Perhaps maybe try this if you’ve never had Scotch whisky before. It is the definition of approachable — an easy-to-enjoy whisky exemplifying the basics of a style, in this case a single malt from the Scottish Highlands.* Smell it, and it will take you to a warm happy place. Sip it, and feel that warmth flow into you. Hold it in your mouth briefly, savor the heat and subtle sweetness. Swallow, and feel smoothness with just enough of an edge to let you know it is actually Scotch whisky.

Today’s thoughts: Growing up I was a picky eater. That is a true statement, but it also rather understates both the past and present. When I was a kid, I hated eating almost everything. Ever heard a parent lament that their kid will only eat chicken nuggets and ketchup? Yeah, I hated those, too. Especially the ketchup. Bleh. And I still hate it. I hate nearly all condiments, in fact. And yes, hate is the right word. It’s not a word I ever really go for, but I will allow myself to be an absolutist and use that word in regard to those things. Ketchup? Hate. Mustard? Hate. Mayonnaise? Hatehatehate!

Send me food with any of that on it and tell me to just scrape it off? Fuck you. Scrape your face off.

My younger sister told me at Thanksgiving that her two-year-old son can’t stand mayonnaise, and she thinks he might be allergic because he throws up when he encounters it. When she said that, I wanted to run to him and hug him and tell him, “You are not alone! Uncle Jon also knows this pain!”

But he’s two years old, so I didn’t.

I will as soon as he gets a handle on this language thing, though.

What I will try not to say to him are things like “Try it, you might like it” and “Your tastes will change.”

How I loathed those phrases, which were thrown at me so often in my youth.

And yet … I now grudgingly admit they hold glimmers of truth.

I mean, I did finally learn to like pizza, a burger in a bun rather than separate, potatoes, pecan pie …

Oh, and whisky.

Contrary to appearances, I was never against trying things. I just wanted people to listen after I tried a thing and said, “No, this isn’t for me.” Usually, the gag reflex got the point across, but people are surprisingly persistent when you tell them you can’t stand a thing they love.

Here is where I nominate my mother for sainthood, because wow did I ever make her life difficult, what with the not eating most of what she ever put in front of me, which necessitated an awful lot of cooking something extra just for me, and so much special ordering at restaurants, and entirely too many patient conversations explaining my eating habits to other people, and … god, how is she not completely mad?

She is made of steel, that is why.

But under her steel beats the softest heart in the world, and she never let me go hungry or forced me to be miserable just because I was picky.

I am going to go call her as soon as I post this.

Today’s note on meeting the expectations of others: Fuck ’em. Yeah, me included, for telling you to try Scotch whisky. Don’t want to? Don’t. Grinning and bearing is overrated. Graciously decline where possible, threaten to stab as needed, repeat as necessary. And always, always, to thine own taste buds be true.

Today’s toast: To picky eaters everywhere: May the person who takes your order always listen carefully and get it right!


—–

* — Speyside. I know. But if you know enough about Scotch whisky to know Glenlivet’s sub-region, then that paragraph really isn’t for you, now is it?

Review: Chips and Cheese

The chips are Xochitl blue corn chips — organic, no preservatives, no cholesterol, no trans fats, no GMO. 
Not bad.

I picked up a bag on a recommendation that they are among the highest rated corn chips, but, honestly, for the price — about twice typical corn chips — they don’t impress. 

They are very thin, however, which means a one-pound bag contains a lot of chips, and, when you’re dipping them in cheese, the chip-to-cheese ratio nicely favors the cheese. 
Mmm … cheese. 

Speaking of, I used a Serious Eats cheese sauce recipe that’s pretty good. (Tip: If you’re careful, you can make that work in the microwave.)

Overall: Recommended; would eat again.