I realized that I was in trouble when it became evident that the waiter was not going to hand me a children’s menu for the kids. We had just spent a very full day exploring Washington D.C. and I just wanted to give them, and me, a decent meal at a decent restaurant. We had eaten a very quick and not very good breakfast on the run and ate our lunch at a museum cafeteria. So, at around 5 pm, we were back at our hotel. The kids were resting and I was flipping through our D.C. Guidebook looking for a restaurant near a metro stop, since I knew it would be dark by the time we were done and I wasn’t very familiar with the city. The guidebook categorized the restaurants by price, with a single little dollar sign next to the name of the most inexpensive places and 4 little dollar signs next to the name of the most expensive places. I found a nice sounding national chain restaurant with 2 (out of 4) little dollar signs next to its name and off we went.
After a long ride on the metro, we found ourselves downtown and just across the street from our restaurant, which itself was in a hotel. So, we went inside and then up the stairs and then through the door leading to the national chain restaurant with 2 (out of 4) little dollar signs next to its name and told the nice lady behind the desk that we were there for dinner. She smiled sweetly at the kids and without missing a beat, took my name and told me it would be just a few moments. Those few moments gave me the opportunity to look around, evaluate the situation and make the first of several bad decisions that I was to make that evening. I noticed that my three kids and I were the only ones in the room wearing shorts and t-shirts. I guess it is possible that the other patrons actually were wearing shorts and t-shirts under their suits and tuxedos, but I had no socially acceptable way to verify that. I asked the nice lady behind the desk if we were under dressed and she told me everything was fine, so we stayed. Bad decision #1 – not leaving. Soon enough, someone came over to lead us to our table and asked if we wanted to sit inside or out on the balcony. Cool, I though, everyone with kids would be out on the balcony.
“Balcony, please” I said.
“Very good, Sir”
And then he disappeared.
So we stood, and waited
And waited
And waited
We waited well past the point at which I began to think we should have followed him in the first place, but I couldn’t find him anywhere and I didn’t want to just wander around the restaurant like a lost tourist looking for him, so we waited some more. Eventually, our guide came back to fetch us. I asked him if we should have followed him and he said, “Yes” and then he apologized and I apologized and everyone was generally very sorry for the mix-up as he led us to our table. He kept looking back at us to make sure we hadn’t wandered off. I, on the other hand, was looking for any other children in the place and not finding any. I’m pretty sure that Sara, my 6 year old, was at least 5 times younger than anyone else at any other table. Combine that with the glaring lack of any children’s menus and we reach the point I previously mentioned at which I realized that I was in trouble. Bad decision #2 – not leaving (again).
Actually, I would have felt pretty silly leaving at that point because now we were sipping Coke and Sprite out of wine glasses and picking apart a giant loaf of roasted onion bread. Also, it had been a long time since I had the chance to have a meal at a place like this. Before my wife and I had kids, we really couldn’t afford it and now that we have kids, we stick to relatively inexpensive, kid-friendly joints. This time I was on a mini vacation with our 3 oldest children who are mature enough to handle a place with 2 –should be 3 or 4 (out of 4) little dollar signs next to its name. I decided (bad decision #3) that we would stay and have our dinner and enjoy it. I would just have to find less expensive things to feed the kids.
They all demanded steak.
It was a steakhouse, after all, and since we weren’t leaving anyway, I looked through the (one page) menu to find the best steak to order for them. When I say, “Steak”, I mean just steak. Not “Steak with two vegetables and a salad.” Just a steak. Individually priced. They were 1/5 the size of the little guidebook I had found this restaurant in and cost three times as much. So I told our frightened looking waiter, who had probably never seen children in his workplace before, that we wanted four of the most inexpensive (Ha!) steaks on the menu, a shrimp cocktail for an appetizer and two orders of potato skins for us to share. When he delivered the shrimp cocktail, I saw four of the largest shrimp I’d ever seen. They were so big that Sara held hers by the ends and ate it like an ear of corn. The kids enjoyed the shrimp and bread and then announced that they were full.
Well, too bad, because here came the steak and potato skins.
Potato
Skins
That’s it. They were empty potato skins. These were not twice-baked potatoes or potato skins stuffed with a bunch of other ingredients. What a rip-off! I had expected the “stuffed” part of it to be understood. Maybe high-class places like this didn’t like to use a word like “stuffed” on their menu. They had to be stuffed, right? Who would order empty potato skins? Well, me, apparently, ‘cause here they were. I was paying a small fortune for scraped out potatoes that the kids wouldn’t touch and I was determined to choke them down with a smile on my face. I would just pretend that it’s the way I like them. By that time, I had abandoned the idea of having a nice meal and decided to just try to get through this experience without looking like an idiot. And I didn’t look like an idiot right up until the waiter returned with a tray full of sour cream, cheese, bacon and chives to put in my now half eaten potato skins. I’m sure he saw the surprised look on my face as he waited for me to swallow my mouthful of potato skin and tell him to go ahead and fill up what was left. Hey, I was paying for that stuff, too.
The tiny steaks were very good and were so tender that the children could cut them up on their own, so they enjoyed doing that. The food was good, but the service was impeccable. Everything was done promptly and efficiently (well, maybe except for the potato skin thing) and they even gave us new wine glasses full of soda when our ice had melted too much. We had four different people come over to our table and ask how everything was. I think they just couldn’t believe we were still there. I guess they were expecting me to ask directions to Denny’s, and they must have noticed 8-year-old John putting pepper into his Sprite and 12-year-old Katie picking roasted onions out of the bread.
We enjoyed our meals and did NOT order dessert (first good decision of the night) and the frightened waiter brought me the check. I knew pretty much what to expect, but it was still shocking to see it written down and totaled up like that, with a big circle around the amount. By that time, my focus had shifted again and I no longer even cared if I looked like an idiot. I just wanted to make sure I had enough room on my credit card to pay for both the meal we just had and the hotel room we were going back to. Now I just wanted to get out of town without being accused of felony credit fraud. I paid our bill and we made our way out of the restaurant past the nice lady behind the desk who I now believed to be inherently evil for assuming that I knew what I was doing when I walked in there and not warning me about the complete lack of children’s menus. We walked across the street to the metro station where I almost had to be physically restrained when all three of the children asked if they could buy candy from the vending machine.
“But we’re hungry” they pleaded.
I knew I was losing my mind as a father when feeding them Hershey bars for dinner began sounding like a pretty good idea.
The next time I’m in Washington D.C., I may walk past the restaurant (walk past, not go in) and look up at the table in the corner of the balcony and remember that meal with my kids and wonder if the people up there knew what they were in for when they sat down. I’ll wonder if they like pepper in their Sprite, roasted onions in their bread and if they’ll eat their shrimp like corn on the cob. I’ll wonder if they have enough sense to wait for the potato stuffing to show up. I guess they probably do and to them the whole thing is just another line on their expense account. Looking back on it, maybe my decisions weren’t so bad after all. I got more than a meal. I got an unforgettable evening with my kids that was worth (almost) every penny.