Rude Vegans Ask For Custom Order And Whine That They Have To Pay For It
The story, from The Inquisitor, about how the guy brings, as my friend Joe Wahler put it, 12 cents worth of pasta, and expects a big discount for it:
Yet when Jack and Toby headed to Monticello with their 100% wholegrain pasta over the weekend, they were charged the full price of $24 and weren't allowed to use a $50 coupon.Cue vegan outrage. Jack immediately stormed to the New Jersey Star-Ledger, which promptly wrote a 1,300-word story about Litsky's experience, complete with a solemn-looking Jack clutching his pasta. Speaking to Star-Ledger reporter Karin Price Mueller, the out-of-pocket vegan said:
"[The owner] said, 'You come here on a Saturday night and order a custom meal. I have to charge you extra.' I said, 'But you've already set the precedent where you charged me a lot less than that on several occasions,' and she said that was the old manager's decision and this was the new price."
Here's the special instructions card they give the restaurant.
Restaurants are set up to make certain meals. If they have to stop and read a recipe for some new meal and cut up a bunch of ingredients they may not be using as part of the meals they make, this is not nothing.
I would ask for a substitution for fries when I used to get the happy hour flank steak at a restaurant near me. I'd pay a dollar or two extra for the caesar salad substitution -- without complaint.
If you don't want to pay the price of eating out, which includes the atmosphere and their way of doing things, or their charge for customization, easy solution: STAY HOME.
Oh, and if you want to be healthy, eat meat and cut out carbs. Veganism is wildly unhealthy, especially because you cannot get the B vitamins you need just from supplementation, and because meat is the perfect food for the human body, with the perfect proportions of nutrients.
HOLY CRAP.
This is utterly unreal.
They think that they can occupy a prime table at a prime time slot, bring 12 cents worth of crappy vegan pasta, ask for $10 of extra high quality vegetables, disrupt the kitchen staff's routine, and THEN get their meal for half price?
I run two small businesses and I ROUTINELY fire customers. Your rental DVD has a 2 second sound glitch...because that's how it was recorded? Here's your money back; never shop here again. 12 out of your 14 comic books look like someone stacked them with other comics books? Here's your money back; never shop here again.
1% of customers cause 99% of the problems.
The vast majority of customers do raise issues, and I'm more than happy to deal with those in the hope that they'll be back. A product is actually defective? My sincere apologies; here's a replacement AND a coupon....but utterly crazy customers are like utterly crazy women: stay far FAR away.
TJIC at April 5, 2013 6:05 AM
Vegan (ve.gan) noun. A person who exhibits arrogance and self-entitlement. See also "Narcissist".
a_random_guy at April 5, 2013 6:19 AM
Looking at the Star-Ledger story, it appears that once tempers cooled, they worked things out. But still, treating a restaurant crew like your own personal staff? There's something that bothers me about that. Does that mean I can walk into a Cracker Barrel with my own bag of flour and demand my biscuits and gravy be made to my peculiar tastes?
Old RPM Daddy (OldRPMDaddy at GMail dot com) at April 5, 2013 6:51 AM
Well, looks like the restaurant set the precedent and they have to live with the consequences. If they had refused to customize the first time and give a discount for it, they would not have had to deal with this situation. Ultimately, competition is good for the customer and the restaurant benefited the customer many times with its competitive practice. And the customer felt disgruntled when the practice was suddenly withdrawn which anybody would once they are used to something.
I really don't see what this has to do with vegans. Like we are all used to free credit cards. Can you imagine the hue and cry that would result the day banks start charging everyone for credit cards? Who knows, there might even be a congress committee set up for it with rules spelled out on how banks can issue credit cards and the rules for credit card charges. It is just part of the game, nothing more
Redrajesh at April 5, 2013 7:04 AM
If the restaurant managed regular customers properly, they would have probably told this couple even before they ordered their meal that their policy had changed and they can no longer get the customization and discount. That would have saved a lot of embarassment for the restaurant and customer. How on earth would the customer know beforehand that the policy has changed?
Redrajesh at April 5, 2013 7:10 AM
How about customers that claim to have allergies for foods they don't like?
EarlW at April 5, 2013 7:10 AM
If I owned or worked at that restaurant, I would have laughed the customer out the door the first time I saw that. You want vegan? Eat at a vegan restaurant or at home. A restaurant is not your personal chef.
momof4 at April 5, 2013 7:24 AM
God help us all. We are doomed.
Can we please, please get back to a society that rightfully judges and scorns vile, narcissistic, horrible people like this? How about simply teaching our children that they're not the center of the universe? It's our only hope.
Doomed, I say. A society that produces this type of personality is doomed.
AB at April 5, 2013 7:26 AM
So, if I bring a steak to a vegan restaurant....
Conan the Grammarian at April 5, 2013 8:55 AM
When scientists finally do find the center of the universe, a lot of people are going to be pissed off that they're not it.
Flynne at April 5, 2013 9:22 AM
Look, to each his own. If your a vegan, whatever. But I used to roll my eyes when dining a German/Barvarian restaurant here in SF and vegans would throw hissy fits that there wasn't anything on the menu they could eat except the plain green salad.
If you come into a restaurant of a cuisine that is predicated on sausage and butter don't be all butthurt that there isn't anything to eat. I don't go to vegan restaurants and demanded a rare steak because I have some brain between my ears.
Janet C at April 5, 2013 9:34 AM
Reminds me of my wedding party. We invited a vegan family of four. We arranged for vegan meals just for them that cost us an extra $400. Assholes RSVP'd yes and never showed up.
I'm glad we don't see them anymore.
MonicaP at April 5, 2013 9:53 AM
There used to be a word for this: finicky, and it was not up to a chef (or to Mommy) to cater to it.
I love the menu card instructing the chef how to cook the meal, what ingredients to use, and in what proportion (I guess "extra extra extra" is more than "extra extra").
The only other time I've ever heard of diners expecting a discount is if there's a child in tow (and I disagree with that, too), but childlike adults are worse.
Kevin at April 5, 2013 11:01 AM
And of course...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wtfNE4z6a8
Eric at April 5, 2013 12:28 PM
Q: What do you call a vegan with diarrhea?
A: A salad-shooter.
feebie at April 5, 2013 1:40 PM
no surprise really, that's soooo Red Bank - a smallish yuppie town in NJ filled with most of the state's selfish assholes.
Charles at April 5, 2013 2:40 PM
I read through all the comments at the Star Ledger and 99% thought this guy was a douche.
But I admit, in season, I often take a nice homegrown tomato out to eat with me. I ask only for a steak knife to cut it. And I always offer a few to the server. In Indiana, during tomato season, it is considered acceptable to bring your own.
bmused at April 5, 2013 4:15 PM
We all try to take out a nice hot tomato.
I'll be here all week, folks. Be sure and tip your barmaids and waitresses.
Conan the Grammarian at April 5, 2013 7:38 PM
I would never bring food to a restaurant, especially to them cook it. If I'm going to a restaurant, I'm expecting to eat their food.
This guy was an ass.
Jim P. at April 5, 2013 7:46 PM
I don't get why the guy thought he deserved a huge discount. He's bringing a few pennies' worth of dry pasta, but wanting extra, extra, extra veggies. You don't get a break on the cost of your dish if you're asking it to be beefed up with a ton of extras. Now if they had ordered a dish that contained steak and asked for the steak to be left out, then it would be nice if the restaurant offered a discount, but management is under no obligation to discount the meal. Although they would be fools if they didn't. Bunch of self-entitled assholes. Next time stay home and cook your own meal, or go to a vegan restaurant for crying out loud!
sara at April 6, 2013 6:10 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2013/04/05/rude_vegans_ask.html#comment-3669308">comment from saraAbsolutely, sara, on the extra, extra, extra veggies.
I was raised to think it was rude to impose on people.
I want to get what I pay for at a restaurant. (If I ask for my meat rare, and even add, "And I really mean that," it isn't because I want it medium-well.)
But the notion that I can go in and ask them to create a new recipe for me and cut up a bunch of stuff...what kind of jerk thinks that should be free?
It kind of reminds me of those people who write me for advice and tell me to write them back privately -- that they don't want the question printed in my column. Oh, because it would be good for me to do something with no possible benefit for me? (I answer numerous advice requests that will never make my column -- in fact, I answer all my advice requests -- but if people ask that I have no possible benefit from the word go, I'll tell them they have to put $25, $40 or $50 in my PayPal depending on how tough a month I'm having and how pissed off I am at carefully reading some long email they've written, only to find that at the bottom.)
Amy Alkon at April 6, 2013 7:02 AM
This whole exercise sounds like a lot more work than just staying at home, and cooking your own vegan pasta.
Maybe the whole point, to paraphrase Crid, was to put their "very own Vegan Disney specialness" on public display?
and the more hoop jumping they can create at the restaurant, the more "special" they feel?
Isab at April 6, 2013 2:07 PM
I remember years ago, ABC Channel 7's Eyewitness News restaurant reviewer, Elmer Dills, would always mention if a restaurant was okay with you "bringing your own steak" to be cooked there. Even when I was watching him, at 15 years old, I thought that was weird. Why bother going somewhere with your own steak when it was more than likely the eatery would have something of a much far higher grade? Not to mention the annoyance it probably caused among the prep crew.
Anyway, after a few years and to this day, I entertain myself imagining some of the "special ingredients and handling" that probably end(ed) up in/on those "custom steaks."
qdpsteve at April 6, 2013 4:04 PM
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