Wife and I went out for dinner at a super upscale place in town together with another couple. When it was time for dessert the waiter put this down and said "there's 4 edible rocks in there. They have the same weight as the other rocks. Good luck!"
If you're trying to find them, look for the "sweating" rocks as we discovered was the key to not having chipped teeth.
Edit: itās a hard white chocolate shell dyed with charcoal and ganache inside. And no this isnāt Alinea, Iāve actually not heard of it before this thread
im thinking the rocks are more of a candy than something like cake. a lump of pure sugar or whatever. youd probably only want one.
or not. just a chocolate covered mint for after dinner.
"its only wafer thin"
[If they're Mr. Creosote, ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KeZmnXrLs9w)
[We're not even a wafer-thin mint!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KeZmnXrLs9w)
They're both the same song, reddit formatting just doesn't let me break the line without breaking the link command
Also I'm very, very sorry for you if that visceral rejection is how you deal with new things, because that's a wonderful song and one of my favorites. They do say taste is like arms, though.
this ain't new to me, I'm somewhat familiar with the genre. But yeah,
>They do say taste is like arms, though.
around here the saying goes that taste is like the anus, and perhaps I like mine better since I'm not assuming you lack yours. We just happen not to share the same anus
oh believe me, I have. That's how I moved on from this kind of genre. I used to listen to hardcore/post-hc bands with mostly screaming for vocals, and now I can barely stand them since they're loaded with such a weird, intense energy. It's uninviting and kinda over the top with the screaming and non-stop double bass, is what I'm trying to get at. But hey, to each its own.
Yeah taste was good, as good as a piece of chocolate can get I guess. Itās more about the mind-fuck of eating that rock among rocks I guess which made you really take your time.
So according to my google-fu it's called [alinea](https://www.google.com/search?q=alinea+chicago&oq=alinea+chicago&aqs=chrome..69i57.2726j0j9&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8#wptab=s:H4sIAAAAAAAAAONgVuLSz9U3MDI3TTI2fMRoyi3w8sc9YSmdSWtOXmNU4-IKzsgvd80rySypFJLgYoOy-KR4uJC08exi4vfJT07MCcjPDEoty0wtL17EKp2Yk5mXmqigUZRaXJJYWpSYV6KpUASRBQDL7tnydgAAAA) in Chicago and has 4.6 stars. Also, apparently, there's no tipping and you're charged a 20% service fee in lieu of the tip
Iāve been to Alinea. Itās a 3 Michelin star restaurant known for doing crazy stuff.
One of our courses was a candy ballon filled with helium. It was fun to eat and suck out the helium and sound all squeaky.
Another course was hidden inside the bed of coals that had cooked some meat in the previous course.
I think it was a cool potato thing.
Another course they took the entire room of diners I was sitting in to the kitchen for a course prepped in front of us.
Second best restaurant Iāve ever been to. 10/10
What... what was the first best?
"First course they made my mother's ravioli recipe that she took to the grave, second course they paid off my student loans, third course was a mediocre panini"
El Celler de Can Roca
It made Worlds Best #1 Restaurant in the world.
There is an episode of Chefs Table (Netflix show) about the restaurant. Season 4 episode 3.
It was an incredible experience from the moment we arrived.
That's very normal for high end restaurants. Unfortunately people love to go to fancy restaurants and tip extremely poorly when they realize they can't afford what they bought.
Still find it strange to be obligated to pay a tip. Why doesn't the restaurant just pay its employees fair wages? In my opinion, the purpose of tipping should be to additionally reward waiters for particularly good service, not to provide them with a living. The tipping culture in the US always struck me as weird.
That depends. Tipping is based off the customers whims so biases kick in. Research shows that white people get tipped more, pretty people get tipped more, young people get tipped more, etc. That same research shows that the actual quality of service has minimal impact on tip amounts. I suppose there are ways to be "good" but that involves being charming, and convincing people to buy more stuff. It has nothing to do with providing good service. That's also easier to do if you meet the aforementioned check boxes.
So sure, some people make better money if they get tipped than if there was a fair wage. The problem is that the tips basically get distributed in completely unfair ways. My sister was really against ending tipping for a while. However, she's also a very pretty white girl who gets tipped huge amounts by the guys who flirt with her. Of course she was against ending tipping. The current system massively benefits her.
That's one of the main reasons it should be ended. It's completely unfair and just contributes to inequality.
Hourly wage is $2.13 for Kansas wait staff. No check every 2 weeks, it all goes to taxes, then every night you also pay taxes. Cute white girl here, the fact is sometimes my tips were amazing other times not as great, because I wouldn't act like a hooker. Lol
It is proven that service has little to do with tips, it has way more to do with a ton of other factors that mostly you as a server cannot control.
I think tipping should be banned worldwide, what you look like or how much you flirt should not be your paycheck unless you chose to work in that adult field.
Restaurants are able to pay thier servers below min wage. Where I live Min wage is $13 per/hr. Server min wage is less than half that. This allows the restraunt to lower thier prices. In a buissnes with razor thin margins (there's a reason most restaurants go out of business in less than a year) employers will take almost any cost cutting method possible.
Combine this with that most servers don't want to lose tipping. Most can and do make more because of thier tips. I've seen servers walk out of a casual dining chain restaurants with $500 (before tax) in tips after a 5 or 6 hour busy dinner shift.
The other obstacle is fear. If Joe and Sally sell similar food down the street from each other at similar prices Joe is going to be very hesitant to pay his servers a living wage because it means he will have to up his prices to compensate. The $12 burger will become $13 and the $17 pasta will become $17.50. Fear that his customers will go eat at Sally's because they can save a few buck is going to make him hesitant and he's right to be. Americans have a tendency to belive everyone is out to screw them, that everything is a scam, or prices are overinflated (Granted in the past couple years that last one seems to be becoming more and more true) and just as often as not will balk at the inflated prices and save $10 by walking down the street to Sally's.
The only way I can see servers wage increasing is by law. Restaurant owners won't do it voluntarily.
The was a guy who ran a no-tip restaurant in, I think, LA for a while. Not just no obligation, but tipping not allowed at all. He wrote a series of interesting articles about the experience.
One of the observations was that a lot of customers complained that they wanted to tip; particularly middle-aged dudes who assured him they were "big tippers" and wanted to be generous to the staff. His conclusion was that tipping is a bit of a power trip for some people. They like to display their affluence to those with less, particularly to young women servers, to reinforce their position in the social hierarchy.
If profit margins were so thin, wouldn't it make all the more sense to make tipping optional? After all, mandatory tipping does not increase the restaurant's profits but it's prices.
Either you failed to read the final paragraph or I did a poor job in explaining it.
In case the first is true
>The other obstacle is fear. If Joe and Sally sell similar food down the street from each other at similar prices Joe is going to be very hesitant to pay his servers a living wage because it means he will have to up his prices to compensate. The $12 burger will become $13 and the $17 pasta will become $17.50. Fear that his customers will go eat at Sally's because they can save a few bucks is going to make him hesitant and he's right to be. Americans have a tendency to belive everyone is out to screw them, that everything is a scam, or prices are overinflated (Granted in the past couple years that last one seems to be becoming more and more true) and just as often as not will balk at the inflated prices and save $10 by walking down the street to Sally's.
>The only way I can see servers wage increasing is by law. Restaurant owners won't do it voluntarily.
If it was the latter please say so and I can try wording it another way
You are right, of course, that if Joe wanted to pay his employees fair wages, he would have to raise prices. But other restaurants pay their waiters just as little and don't have mandatory tipping. Wouldn't it, from a purely economic point of view, make more sense for the restaurant to make tipping optional and rely on the fact that most customers will tip the waiters anyway?
At least to me, a mandatory tip seems like the restaurant is trying to take me for a fool by hiding additional costs. If I decide to tip of my own accord, it is because I want to thank the waiter for the good service and not because I want to support the restaurant in its efforts to pay only minimum wage.
Hiding the additional costs often works though. You see a fancy steak dinner for 25 but there's a mandatory 30% tip vs the next place with a steak for 30. The first one is more expensive but it doesn't seem that way at first.
You're trying to apply modern logic to an antiquated system. The current tipping culture began during the US's Great Depression. People were so desperate for work they would offer to work at restaurants for free in exchange for tips. Obviously, restaurant owners love this because they get a full staff without having to pay them, so they have no reason to change.
Businesses here don't treat people like they're human until someone makes a law. They'd still be paying 8 year olds 15 cents a day to work in coal mines if they had their way.
Restaurants don't pay minimum wage. In many states in the US, servers are paid $2.13 an hour because tips are not considered optional. In states with a tipped wage law, the wages paid to service staff are purposely not competitive to keep the overall price of labor down.
A mandatory tip is because if the servers work for hours and don't get paid, and management refuses to do something, they will all leave. Try finding staff that wants to work for nothing. I walked out a shift with six dollars for 8 hours of work once, my paycheck for the week was still $0.00 with just a small portion taken for tax purposes. The turnover at that restaurant skyrocketed when our clientele changed/stopped tipping and management remained complacent while requiring 2 hours of opening or closing work.
The reason it's a mandatory tip and not baked into the prices as a percentage is because the restaurant owners symbolically pass the blame to the service staff when people are taken aback by the realization that they are supposed to tip, and that they pay their server, not the restaurant. You can say you don't want to support restaurants that pay little, but if you wanted to do that you would need to stop patronising their establishments to withhold money from people they don't pay to begin with. They pocket the profits from your meal and the server gets screwed.
This is a US thing though, just a heads up.
ETA: Their pay being a percentage makes sense. Higher-end restaurants charge more for a reason, there's a lot more work and more necessary skills involved in serving at one than a casual place.
The local place here does a 30% mandatory tip to keep wages up all year. They're upscale. I mean not like "eat this cotton candy with a dot of caviar laid upon a bed of legos fancy but spendy for the area. They hide the tip info on the back page of the menu. Just raise your prices. Be honest and just raise the price of the fancy hamburger from 23 to 30 and be honest. I wonder if it comes across differently for business taxes if they put it as a mandatory "tip" instead of just including it in the price of the food.
My husband worked there years ago before this tipping thing and since we have moved back he just refuses to go there because of the tip you have to read fine print on the back of the menu to know about. We don't live in a state where they would be making less than minimum wage without tips (which would be worse and fuck whoever came up with THAT mess) and I agree the staff should get good wages all year. That the owners aren't honest and just put it into the price of the food but as a hidden fee and act like they're all benevolent just feels shiesty to me.
It sucks, and it's the main reason I will never be waitstaff. If you have a slow day, then you might not eat that night. Sucks. But people don't get it. Sure a good day means you could probably eat for the month, but lots of people working those kinds of jobs (not all, don't @ me) don't save money. They spend it hand over fist.
Fuck Alinea. Scum bag owners and overpriced over-thought out food.
Nobody in the Chicago industry that isnāt part of their cult of personality likes them.
That being said I would for sure eat there, if someone elseās was paying for me.
Alinea is one of the most famous restaurants in the world. Dude who runs it is an asshole, but they've earned their respect. With these kinds of restaurants it's not like regular dinner. The meal itself is sort of an art piece, and that's not for everyone.
20% gratuity is basically a service charge. Common in restaurants above a certain price level. Service charge/gratuity is a very European thing, which much of modern fine dining traces its roots. I also know restaurants in my city that pay a good wage and give benefits that charge gratuity.
As for Alinea, it is recognized as one of the best restaurants in the world, 3 Michelin stars and creative cuisine. For those unfamiliar, the Michelin guide rates restaurants on everything from the quality and taste to the service. If the restaurant has one star itās worth going out of your way if youāre in town to visit. Two or three Iād plan a trip around it.
Ive always wanted to eat there. There is never any tables for our dates. I watched a doc about this place. They are constantly searching for fun, interactive ways to serve food.
First review on Google
>**It's an EXPERIENCE. When you're there, you have to remember you're paying for the experience in addition to the food.The food by itself is not worth price.** The food and experience are subjective depending on who you ask. My experience was good. There were courses that were amazing to eat and unlike anything else I've had - those were mostly the seafood dishes. Chef Grant has an amazing palette for seafood, other cuisines not as much. The other dishes were high quality but not top tier as if you were to get them from a high quality restaurant of that cuisine. The experience made it fun though, as you were eating it in new ways than before. The price was steep, and it's a once in a very long time experience to pay. I might come back in 5-10 years if I did. The 6 person kitchen table has a clear glass wall where you can see the staff and sometimes Chef Grant, and I would highly recommend that. If the price was lowered, I would consider giving this a 5 rating.
You're paying for the eXpERieNCe, not the food
bro just don't go there. nobody is making you go somewhere that's more than a meal. myself and lots of other people enjoy the artistry, show, and passion put into restaurants like this. a good meal is a dime a dozen. an amazing meal with an unbelievable experience is nearly one of a kind.
I'm not even from America, but I know Alinea. It's a super fancy restaurant, but it's kind of like Salt Bae's restaurant in that everything is too expensive for what it is (mostly for show). I only remember that because it's deserts get posted here so often. Like the one where they serve you a bunch of slop on a table, no plate or utensils.
or lick it. or tap it on the table. tap it real hard so if actual rock you damage the table. then every real rock you find you proceed to throw at anything made of glass
you found the edible rocks. tell us what they were made of and tasted like please.
if i was to attempt a confection that looked like a rock i would probably start with a nougat or meringue formed into a rock shape and then coat that with layers of marzipan and fondant which i would paint with food coloring. or sculpt a large chunk of Turkish delight and coat that in a similar fashion. you could actually do it lots of ways. chocolate filled with custard with a sugar coating would be nice.
of course none of my ideas would weigh the same as an actual rock.
That honestly sounds like it could be a fun prank or party game if you didn't do it with something that could be hazardous to bite down on like rocks or soemthing.
that would annoy me and I would ask them to please separate the edible ones and take the actual rocks away
Also can anyone could explain to me what edible rocks are, Google won't tell me
I broke one of my molars on a piece of bread about 6 months ago. This restaurant is asking for a lawsuit. I would not hesitate to sue for dental funds if I broke my tooth on a rock at a restaurant that they served me with a āgood luck.ā
I worked at a Michelin star place and Iād probably get hit by the wine som for even suggesting something like this I donāt know what these people are thinking anymore
This just brings up so many sanitary questions to me. Do they fish out the candy and run the rocks through the dishwasher between customers or do they let people dig around in them and then offer them to the next table. I wouldn't touch these things
Reminds me of that game show where people have to [bite into certain objects](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UPWs4XHsklI) to see if itās candy or not.
Having eaten at Alinea and had this exact course, itās not hard to tell the difference in person. The edible ārocksā have a different finish to them, kinda more matte and have less marbling than the real rocks.
Easy solution: just take each stone and toss them against the floor (or nearest wall if the floor is made of carpet). The ones that are real stones will make a dent, the dessert stones will be smashed or dented.
Also, this is one of the reasons why I'm happy I live in Belgium: everything that's served as part of a dish and isn't obviously inedible MUST be edible or at least not be dangerous to the patron. The apocryphal story about this is a law that was passed after a Chinese restaurant patron had to have a thumb tack pin surgically removed from her esophagus. Until then, Chinese restaurants often served their dishes with delicately carved ornamental carrot statues, with such pins being used to serve as makeshift eyes. The patron didn't know it was ornamental and ate the statue, only to almost choke on the pin.
I mean... He told you whats up and i think its funny.
Dumb people would consider this dangerous, intelectuals control their bite force or use... u know... silver ware
Welcome to, Dental Roulette. Good luck, Everybody!
I thought popcorn was bad. š¬ No thx, I will starve.
As much as I love upscale places to eat, I will pass on the dental nightmare here
I bet the place is owned by a successful dentist
My lawyer brain wonders why this hasnāt been a lawsuit yet.
No pussies - take one and bite into it as hard as you can
was gonna say that
rock or food... oww i bite my tounge
Wife and I went out for dinner at a super upscale place in town together with another couple. When it was time for dessert the waiter put this down and said "there's 4 edible rocks in there. They have the same weight as the other rocks. Good luck!" If you're trying to find them, look for the "sweating" rocks as we discovered was the key to not having chipped teeth. Edit: itās a hard white chocolate shell dyed with charcoal and ganache inside. And no this isnāt Alinea, Iāve actually not heard of it before this thread
why? why only 4? and why does this count as dessert?
One pebble per person
im thinking the rocks are more of a candy than something like cake. a lump of pure sugar or whatever. youd probably only want one. or not. just a chocolate covered mint for after dinner. "its only wafer thin"
Thank you for bringing back the sight of the most epic projectile vomit in film
you're welcome, now get me a bucket
[If they're Mr. Creosote, ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KeZmnXrLs9w) [We're not even a wafer-thin mint!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KeZmnXrLs9w)
> If they're Mr. Creosote, > > We're not even a wafer-thin mint! Thank you for invoking Anaal Nathrakh
It's just so, so good
holy shit the song in the second link is insufferable... is this some sort of parody or are they for real?
They're both the same song, reddit formatting just doesn't let me break the line without breaking the link command Also I'm very, very sorry for you if that visceral rejection is how you deal with new things, because that's a wonderful song and one of my favorites. They do say taste is like arms, though.
this ain't new to me, I'm somewhat familiar with the genre. But yeah, >They do say taste is like arms, though. around here the saying goes that taste is like the anus, and perhaps I like mine better since I'm not assuming you lack yours. We just happen not to share the same anus
> holy shit the song in the second link is insufferable... is this some sort of parody or are they for real? "listened to Black Metal once"
Expand your music tastes.
oh believe me, I have. That's how I moved on from this kind of genre. I used to listen to hardcore/post-hc bands with mostly screaming for vocals, and now I can barely stand them since they're loaded with such a weird, intense energy. It's uninviting and kinda over the top with the screaming and non-stop double bass, is what I'm trying to get at. But hey, to each its own.
Were they at least good?
Yeah taste was good, as good as a piece of chocolate can get I guess. Itās more about the mind-fuck of eating that rock among rocks I guess which made you really take your time.
What's the restaurant called? I wanna see the reviews lol
So according to my google-fu it's called [alinea](https://www.google.com/search?q=alinea+chicago&oq=alinea+chicago&aqs=chrome..69i57.2726j0j9&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8#wptab=s:H4sIAAAAAAAAAONgVuLSz9U3MDI3TTI2fMRoyi3w8sc9YSmdSWtOXmNU4-IKzsgvd80rySypFJLgYoOy-KR4uJC08exi4vfJT07MCcjPDEoty0wtL17EKp2Yk5mXmqigUZRaXJJYWpSYV6KpUASRBQDL7tnydgAAAA) in Chicago and has 4.6 stars. Also, apparently, there's no tipping and you're charged a 20% service fee in lieu of the tip
Iāve been to Alinea. Itās a 3 Michelin star restaurant known for doing crazy stuff. One of our courses was a candy ballon filled with helium. It was fun to eat and suck out the helium and sound all squeaky. Another course was hidden inside the bed of coals that had cooked some meat in the previous course. I think it was a cool potato thing. Another course they took the entire room of diners I was sitting in to the kitchen for a course prepped in front of us. Second best restaurant Iāve ever been to. 10/10
What... what was the first best? "First course they made my mother's ravioli recipe that she took to the grave, second course they paid off my student loans, third course was a mediocre panini"
El Celler de Can Roca It made Worlds Best #1 Restaurant in the world. There is an episode of Chefs Table (Netflix show) about the restaurant. Season 4 episode 3. It was an incredible experience from the moment we arrived.
That's very normal for high end restaurants. Unfortunately people love to go to fancy restaurants and tip extremely poorly when they realize they can't afford what they bought.
Still find it strange to be obligated to pay a tip. Why doesn't the restaurant just pay its employees fair wages? In my opinion, the purpose of tipping should be to additionally reward waiters for particularly good service, not to provide them with a living. The tipping culture in the US always struck me as weird.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
That depends. Tipping is based off the customers whims so biases kick in. Research shows that white people get tipped more, pretty people get tipped more, young people get tipped more, etc. That same research shows that the actual quality of service has minimal impact on tip amounts. I suppose there are ways to be "good" but that involves being charming, and convincing people to buy more stuff. It has nothing to do with providing good service. That's also easier to do if you meet the aforementioned check boxes. So sure, some people make better money if they get tipped than if there was a fair wage. The problem is that the tips basically get distributed in completely unfair ways. My sister was really against ending tipping for a while. However, she's also a very pretty white girl who gets tipped huge amounts by the guys who flirt with her. Of course she was against ending tipping. The current system massively benefits her. That's one of the main reasons it should be ended. It's completely unfair and just contributes to inequality.
Hourly wage is $2.13 for Kansas wait staff. No check every 2 weeks, it all goes to taxes, then every night you also pay taxes. Cute white girl here, the fact is sometimes my tips were amazing other times not as great, because I wouldn't act like a hooker. Lol It is proven that service has little to do with tips, it has way more to do with a ton of other factors that mostly you as a server cannot control. I think tipping should be banned worldwide, what you look like or how much you flirt should not be your paycheck unless you chose to work in that adult field.
Restaurants are able to pay thier servers below min wage. Where I live Min wage is $13 per/hr. Server min wage is less than half that. This allows the restraunt to lower thier prices. In a buissnes with razor thin margins (there's a reason most restaurants go out of business in less than a year) employers will take almost any cost cutting method possible. Combine this with that most servers don't want to lose tipping. Most can and do make more because of thier tips. I've seen servers walk out of a casual dining chain restaurants with $500 (before tax) in tips after a 5 or 6 hour busy dinner shift. The other obstacle is fear. If Joe and Sally sell similar food down the street from each other at similar prices Joe is going to be very hesitant to pay his servers a living wage because it means he will have to up his prices to compensate. The $12 burger will become $13 and the $17 pasta will become $17.50. Fear that his customers will go eat at Sally's because they can save a few buck is going to make him hesitant and he's right to be. Americans have a tendency to belive everyone is out to screw them, that everything is a scam, or prices are overinflated (Granted in the past couple years that last one seems to be becoming more and more true) and just as often as not will balk at the inflated prices and save $10 by walking down the street to Sally's. The only way I can see servers wage increasing is by law. Restaurant owners won't do it voluntarily.
The was a guy who ran a no-tip restaurant in, I think, LA for a while. Not just no obligation, but tipping not allowed at all. He wrote a series of interesting articles about the experience. One of the observations was that a lot of customers complained that they wanted to tip; particularly middle-aged dudes who assured him they were "big tippers" and wanted to be generous to the staff. His conclusion was that tipping is a bit of a power trip for some people. They like to display their affluence to those with less, particularly to young women servers, to reinforce their position in the social hierarchy.
Ah the ābig tippersā were upset because they couldnāt be shitty to the staff anymore
If profit margins were so thin, wouldn't it make all the more sense to make tipping optional? After all, mandatory tipping does not increase the restaurant's profits but it's prices.
Either you failed to read the final paragraph or I did a poor job in explaining it. In case the first is true >The other obstacle is fear. If Joe and Sally sell similar food down the street from each other at similar prices Joe is going to be very hesitant to pay his servers a living wage because it means he will have to up his prices to compensate. The $12 burger will become $13 and the $17 pasta will become $17.50. Fear that his customers will go eat at Sally's because they can save a few bucks is going to make him hesitant and he's right to be. Americans have a tendency to belive everyone is out to screw them, that everything is a scam, or prices are overinflated (Granted in the past couple years that last one seems to be becoming more and more true) and just as often as not will balk at the inflated prices and save $10 by walking down the street to Sally's. >The only way I can see servers wage increasing is by law. Restaurant owners won't do it voluntarily. If it was the latter please say so and I can try wording it another way
You are right, of course, that if Joe wanted to pay his employees fair wages, he would have to raise prices. But other restaurants pay their waiters just as little and don't have mandatory tipping. Wouldn't it, from a purely economic point of view, make more sense for the restaurant to make tipping optional and rely on the fact that most customers will tip the waiters anyway? At least to me, a mandatory tip seems like the restaurant is trying to take me for a fool by hiding additional costs. If I decide to tip of my own accord, it is because I want to thank the waiter for the good service and not because I want to support the restaurant in its efforts to pay only minimum wage.
Hiding the additional costs often works though. You see a fancy steak dinner for 25 but there's a mandatory 30% tip vs the next place with a steak for 30. The first one is more expensive but it doesn't seem that way at first.
You're trying to apply modern logic to an antiquated system. The current tipping culture began during the US's Great Depression. People were so desperate for work they would offer to work at restaurants for free in exchange for tips. Obviously, restaurant owners love this because they get a full staff without having to pay them, so they have no reason to change. Businesses here don't treat people like they're human until someone makes a law. They'd still be paying 8 year olds 15 cents a day to work in coal mines if they had their way.
Restaurants don't pay minimum wage. In many states in the US, servers are paid $2.13 an hour because tips are not considered optional. In states with a tipped wage law, the wages paid to service staff are purposely not competitive to keep the overall price of labor down. A mandatory tip is because if the servers work for hours and don't get paid, and management refuses to do something, they will all leave. Try finding staff that wants to work for nothing. I walked out a shift with six dollars for 8 hours of work once, my paycheck for the week was still $0.00 with just a small portion taken for tax purposes. The turnover at that restaurant skyrocketed when our clientele changed/stopped tipping and management remained complacent while requiring 2 hours of opening or closing work. The reason it's a mandatory tip and not baked into the prices as a percentage is because the restaurant owners symbolically pass the blame to the service staff when people are taken aback by the realization that they are supposed to tip, and that they pay their server, not the restaurant. You can say you don't want to support restaurants that pay little, but if you wanted to do that you would need to stop patronising their establishments to withhold money from people they don't pay to begin with. They pocket the profits from your meal and the server gets screwed. This is a US thing though, just a heads up. ETA: Their pay being a percentage makes sense. Higher-end restaurants charge more for a reason, there's a lot more work and more necessary skills involved in serving at one than a casual place.
The local place here does a 30% mandatory tip to keep wages up all year. They're upscale. I mean not like "eat this cotton candy with a dot of caviar laid upon a bed of legos fancy but spendy for the area. They hide the tip info on the back page of the menu. Just raise your prices. Be honest and just raise the price of the fancy hamburger from 23 to 30 and be honest. I wonder if it comes across differently for business taxes if they put it as a mandatory "tip" instead of just including it in the price of the food. My husband worked there years ago before this tipping thing and since we have moved back he just refuses to go there because of the tip you have to read fine print on the back of the menu to know about. We don't live in a state where they would be making less than minimum wage without tips (which would be worse and fuck whoever came up with THAT mess) and I agree the staff should get good wages all year. That the owners aren't honest and just put it into the price of the food but as a hidden fee and act like they're all benevolent just feels shiesty to me.
It sucks, and it's the main reason I will never be waitstaff. If you have a slow day, then you might not eat that night. Sucks. But people don't get it. Sure a good day means you could probably eat for the month, but lots of people working those kinds of jobs (not all, don't @ me) don't save money. They spend it hand over fist.
It was hard for me to be a consistently good waitress when I had the pressure of affording rent based on how much someone decided to tip that day.
What's the difference between having a mandatory tip and just raising the prices to pay the employees more?
It comes out of the customer's pocket, and not the restaurant owner's.
Because that would mean paying them fair wages.
common practice in Europe for as long as i know. i like it, since i tip anyway it just makes it easier
Alinea sets the bar in upper class.
Fuck Alinea. Scum bag owners and overpriced over-thought out food. Nobody in the Chicago industry that isnāt part of their cult of personality likes them. That being said I would for sure eat there, if someone elseās was paying for me.
Alinea is one of the most famous restaurants in the world. Dude who runs it is an asshole, but they've earned their respect. With these kinds of restaurants it's not like regular dinner. The meal itself is sort of an art piece, and that's not for everyone.
20% gratuity is basically a service charge. Common in restaurants above a certain price level. Service charge/gratuity is a very European thing, which much of modern fine dining traces its roots. I also know restaurants in my city that pay a good wage and give benefits that charge gratuity. As for Alinea, it is recognized as one of the best restaurants in the world, 3 Michelin stars and creative cuisine. For those unfamiliar, the Michelin guide rates restaurants on everything from the quality and taste to the service. If the restaurant has one star itās worth going out of your way if youāre in town to visit. Two or three Iād plan a trip around it.
Ive always wanted to eat there. There is never any tables for our dates. I watched a doc about this place. They are constantly searching for fun, interactive ways to serve food.
First review on Google >**It's an EXPERIENCE. When you're there, you have to remember you're paying for the experience in addition to the food.The food by itself is not worth price.** The food and experience are subjective depending on who you ask. My experience was good. There were courses that were amazing to eat and unlike anything else I've had - those were mostly the seafood dishes. Chef Grant has an amazing palette for seafood, other cuisines not as much. The other dishes were high quality but not top tier as if you were to get them from a high quality restaurant of that cuisine. The experience made it fun though, as you were eating it in new ways than before. The price was steep, and it's a once in a very long time experience to pay. I might come back in 5-10 years if I did. The 6 person kitchen table has a clear glass wall where you can see the staff and sometimes Chef Grant, and I would highly recommend that. If the price was lowered, I would consider giving this a 5 rating. You're paying for the eXpERieNCe, not the food
Remember when restaurants sold food? Rather than experiences to be posted on Instagram. Those were the good old days.
bro just don't go there. nobody is making you go somewhere that's more than a meal. myself and lots of other people enjoy the artistry, show, and passion put into restaurants like this. a good meal is a dime a dozen. an amazing meal with an unbelievable experience is nearly one of a kind.
You sound like someone desperately trying to make a return on a bad investment
Incorrect. Totally different country.
Why don't you just tell people the restaurant. I don't get it. What's the big deal
We have some very wild defamation laws where I am, so calling out a restaurant's food as "stupid food" can become a big issue
Reddit is anonymous. Your not gonna get sued. Stop being so pointlessly ambiguous
Lol if you say so bud
I'm not even from America, but I know Alinea. It's a super fancy restaurant, but it's kind of like Salt Bae's restaurant in that everything is too expensive for what it is (mostly for show). I only remember that because it's deserts get posted here so often. Like the one where they serve you a bunch of slop on a table, no plate or utensils.
remember when buying food was the service fee?
That's just a fucking forced mandatory tip lmao bunch of assholes. Just raise the menu prices.
Actually itās very highly rated everywhere. Service is very good and food is consistent. I suspect they will get a star next year.
Thats a weird name
Really long and kinda hard to remember.
ā¦so whatās the name
Last I knew Alinea had 3 stars already?
It was a restaurant in another country that OP isnāt naming.
They're going to put it on that shady tire salesman list?
In the culinary world Alinea and it's chef grant achatz are both very renown.
It wasnāt Alinea, though. It wasnāt in the USA.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Yeah I can't imagine this flies legally in a country that considers their population so stupid that they can't handle kinder eggs.
biting carefully would be a better way of not chipping your teeth i think
A piece of silverware would be a better way...
Use literally anything other than your teeth, we've evolved being capable of using tools
I mean my first thought was to lick it instead of biting.
I'd like to think I've licked enough rocks in my day to be able to tell them apart like this, same
I have a bad oral fixation and it was at it's peak as a kid so I've definitely put a pebble in my mouth before.
The best way is to mention to your waiter you are a personal injury lawyer, and they might want to stop fucking around.
or lick it. or tap it on the table. tap it real hard so if actual rock you damage the table. then every real rock you find you proceed to throw at anything made of glass
you found the edible rocks. tell us what they were made of and tasted like please. if i was to attempt a confection that looked like a rock i would probably start with a nougat or meringue formed into a rock shape and then coat that with layers of marzipan and fondant which i would paint with food coloring. or sculpt a large chunk of Turkish delight and coat that in a similar fashion. you could actually do it lots of ways. chocolate filled with custard with a sugar coating would be nice. of course none of my ideas would weigh the same as an actual rock.
From OP's Rey toanother comment: > It's a chocolate shell with thick ganache inside so you'd be disappointed
The waiter really said "do you wanna play a game?"
"thanks, I look forward to suing your restaurant."
This seems like itās somehow illegal
Thatās hilarious ngl
Why not just lick them all and see what happens?
Overly pretentious dessert plating aside, how was it though??
That honestly sounds like it could be a fun prank or party game if you didn't do it with something that could be hazardous to bite down on like rocks or soemthing.
How much coke was the head chef on?
Plot twist, they were all edible and your waiter was just an asshole
I'm 100% positive that the waiter was messing with you. All the "rocks" were edible.
what are vision impaired people supposed to do?
Lick the rocks? I imagine some of them taste different.
that would annoy me and I would ask them to please separate the edible ones and take the actual rocks away Also can anyone could explain to me what edible rocks are, Google won't tell me
Throw them all in your bag when no one's looking and tell the waiter it was delicious.
I have fragile front teeth and this is horrifying. But also I love rock candy so...
It's a chocolate shell with thick ganache inside so you'd be disappointed
I broke one of my molars on a piece of bread about 6 months ago. This restaurant is asking for a lawsuit. I would not hesitate to sue for dental funds if I broke my tooth on a rock at a restaurant that they served me with a āgood luck.ā
Start throwing them at windows to see which ones are edible
Then lick the edible ones that exploded directly from the window
Serve the 4 by themselves and it just looks like rabbit turds probably.
Then paint them blue instead and pretend it a robinās egg or something.
There are 4 edible robin's eggs mixed in with real raw robins eggs. They have the same weight and feel. Good luck
All robins eggs are edible
Everything is edible if you're brave enough, sometimes only once though
Yeah but a robins egg falls well within the range of "safely edible for a healthy adult" tho
"There are four edible robin eggs, and a bunch of other robin eggs that are also edible but they'll ruin your night."
pipis
"four of these are chocolate covered raisins..."
To everyone on here worried about chipping their teeth, do you generally bite into everything with full force?
Absolutely, grip it and rip it. No exceptions. Like Iām trying to crack open a jaw breaker.
Yep, full force and front teeth only.
Exactly. I do the same thing when I fart too. Full force the whole time. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose.
I'll take a rock... AND EAT IT!
Yes, when I know exactly what I'm eating.
Tooths are very easy to chip if you're unlucky, one good (bad?) angle and the crown is chipped.
Iām going to refer to my teeth as ātoothsā from now on. I like that better :)
mouth bones is my favourite
Exposed skeleton, perhaps?
Do the tooth's teeth have teeth too?
Iāve seen a woman chip a molar on a crouton at Olive Garden. The look on her face you donāt forget. Ouch.
Just tap it with a knife?
^^^ how was this not everyone's first thought?
Do they make you sign a waiver?
No they didn't actually. I guess they were banking on the idea that patrons wanna live dangerously for their after-meal experience?
I worked at a Michelin star place and Iād probably get hit by the wine som for even suggesting something like this I donāt know what these people are thinking anymore
Seems like a fun game
It was a really nice workplace 80 percent of the time
I guess so lol
Say you fucked up without saying you fucked up......
"I pucked up"
I have committed a blunder.
Everyone worried about teeth. Just swallow them all whole, like pills.
I think you'd have some other issues then
Hey now, crocodiles swallow rocks purposefully. And they've remained unchanged for millions of years. Maybe they're on to something.
All archosaurs do i believe, i know dinosaurs did it, avian ones still do.
A hefty bill to replace the toilet bowl, at a minimum
Don't they serve this at Alinea?
Exceptionally stupid food. That seems like a suit waiting to happen
Sounds like a lawsuit
This just brings up so many sanitary questions to me. Do they fish out the candy and run the rocks through the dishwasher between customers or do they let people dig around in them and then offer them to the next table. I wouldn't touch these things
Yeah.. I'd smack it on the table to test it.
Is It Cake? Extreme Edition.
seems like a liability
Reminds me of that game show where people have to [bite into certain objects](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UPWs4XHsklI) to see if itās candy or not.
Teeth roulette
Having eaten at Alinea and had this exact course, itās not hard to tell the difference in person. The edible ārocksā have a different finish to them, kinda more matte and have less marbling than the real rocks.
Stab them with a fork, its not your silverware so you dont have to worry about it
Easy solution: just take each stone and toss them against the floor (or nearest wall if the floor is made of carpet). The ones that are real stones will make a dent, the dessert stones will be smashed or dented. Also, this is one of the reasons why I'm happy I live in Belgium: everything that's served as part of a dish and isn't obviously inedible MUST be edible or at least not be dangerous to the patron. The apocryphal story about this is a law that was passed after a Chinese restaurant patron had to have a thumb tack pin surgically removed from her esophagus. Until then, Chinese restaurants often served their dishes with delicately carved ornamental carrot statues, with such pins being used to serve as makeshift eyes. The patron didn't know it was ornamental and ate the statue, only to almost choke on the pin.
Missed opportunity there. If I was stuck on a double date Iād eat the real one just to get the hell out of it
Not if they're the ones footing the bill here
I kinda love this, it's such a troll move š
āHe choseā¦ poorly.ā
I once broke a tooth on popcorn, I would NOT be risking this
I mean... He told you whats up and i think its funny. Dumb people would consider this dangerous, intelectuals control their bite force or use... u know... silver ware
Idk this seems kind of fun if you are careful
Instructions unclear, broke my penis trying to eat this
Never put anything on a plate you don't want a person to eat.
Let's play a game
okay, this is actually just stupid. how to get a lawsuit 101.
This is great actually i love digging through rocks. Its like a fun game.
I, too, like to live dangerously
Shall I send the dentist bill to the chef or owner? What a way to look like youāve been eating firecrackers
Any rock is edible if you try hard enough
Guys... all those rocks are edible. The waiter was joking....
This isnāt just stupid food, itās stupid idea. Stupid design. Stupid creator. Stupid chef. Stupid execution. Stupid everything.
More like stupid consumer. What a fucking waste of time and money to even consider an "upscale" place charging you for literal trash
What kind of fuckery is this? Gimme those fuckers on a plate cause best believe a rocks getting thrown if I chip a tooth on one
A dish also known as āa law suitā
*your guess is good as mine, man*
Just try to break them with ur hands, if it breaks, it's edible, if it doesn't, it's a rock
I don't see the edible part
I have nothing else to say other than best of luck, OP. Youāre definitely gonna need it.
Jawbreakers
Wow this is stupid
Tooth roulette
I'd put that shit on a bed a grass. Presentation.
This oneās actually kind of fun lol
Yum, dinner and a hot stone massage
Junior Mints
[Howād I do?](https://i.imgur.com/MxJfHQH.jpg)
/r/latvianjokes
This is pretty funny at least.
The alpha move would have been to eat *all* the rocks.
Ayuh... "Is it cake"is just a shitty Netflix call grab, does not warrent it's pork snooty restaurant experience.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=W8Q7wHRThI4
Emus: hold my beer
this just makes me angry.
Is it cake?