Introduction

I often drive my friends crazy when we go out to a "nice restaurant." I'm usually intent on pouring over the menu and wine list, engaging the servers or sommeliers in conversation about recommendations, and harping about the sequence of service as soon as something happens out of order. While I agree with them wholeheartedly that the point of eating out is to enjoy the meal and the company, I suppose I'm also hell-bent on seeing if I can enhance the experience.

I am a foodie as well as a restaurant professional. I am extremely demanding when spending more than $20 per person eating out, and am even more so with my own service staff. Hopefully, and luckily for servers everywhere, my own experience being the one serving makes me a less obnoxious diner than the thousands out there who are the subjects of countless waiter rants and movies like "Waiting."

At any rate, because I am both on both sides of the table, expect the following posts to go back and forth between my expectations as a diner and my irritations as a server.

Salud!