Most of us learned to read left to right, top to bottom. It’s above and beyond second nature, really; it's just How We Do It. With menus, though, I have found that I tend to read in a spiral.
I first noticed this habit when I was tagging along on restaurant reviews on a regular basis, and even though that’s not my thang anymore, anytime I peruse the offerings at someplace new, this is how it goes:
First, I glance at the appetizers. If there is one meatless starter, I have a little bit of hope, because then there is hope for the app-as-an-entrée thing. It’s not ideal, but it will do. It’s my backup plan in case the rest of the menu fails me.
Then I look at the salads. It’s sometimes sadmaking, the salad choices – nowadays they all have chicken and bacon and here’s the thing… I’m a cheapskate, and I hate when menus list “add chicken… $3” to meatless salads but will not subtract $3 if I order a chickened-up salad without it. It's small and petty, I know, but so am I.
I should probably point out here that I really do try to keep things on-menu and keep my special ordering to a minimum. If there is something I can pick off the top or get on a separate plate so that I can share with my table companions, I’ll just do that rather than add on two or three or four special requests. There was a time when one of my brunching companions ultra-specified her entire order, from the doneness of her toast (“just a light golden brown, please, not darker than my hair”) to the green-onion-to-bacon ratio in her omelet (“I know the kitchen knows what they are doing, but I’d like a bit more on the chivey side. It tastes fresher”). I could almost taste the spit in her food with my eyes.
But I digress. After the salads, I’ll check out the kids menu, if there is one. When all else fails, there is usually a grilled cheese/cheese pizza/spaghetti with marinara option that I can ask for. Saying please and thank you and smiling nicely goes really quite far when you want a peanut butter sandwich and you are not 12.
Sometimes pasta will be a separate listing; this is an easy section in which to find a meatless entrée, albeit one with on beyond 20 grams of fat. I’m not sure why, this is another lazy chef thing, I think, but in pastavalia, meatless means cream sauce, and cream sauce means death. Delicious, velvety, succulent death. It could come in the form of fettucine alfredo, or macaroni and cheese. (I'll say more about the mac and cheese plague in another post.) Some places will try to fool you with a butternut squash ravioli, but be wary – that usually comes with a creamy sauce, too, and the filling is oft-augmented with lots of bleu cheese. And butter-fried sage. Oh, and don’t forget the garlic bread.
The buttery, buttery garlic bread.
This roundabout trip takes me pretty much all around the outside edges of the menu. If I can whip up a meal from the outskirts, that’s good enough. I sometimes allow myself to have high hopes, but I don’t ever expect to be able to find something for me in the center of the menu.
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