Several months ago a waitress wasn’t willing to adjust a dish, a steak entree, I wanted to make it with little or no garlic. I assumed it couldn’t be changed when she said no, which I found odd because it was an expensive restaurant and you would hope everything is cooked to order, but maybe a prepared marinade was used or something I didn’t understand that made it impossible to hold the garlic. Everything being a la carte we finally got to the veggies and I wanted to order green beans and I asked if they had gatlic, again yes (ugh, I am so sick of tons of gatlic in restaurants) and then as I looked back at the menu she asks, “are you allergic to garlic? If, you are allergic I take that very seriously, and I can ask the chef to cook them without garlic.” This place is $40 just for the entree! I looked at her in shock and said, “just it being my preference isn’t good enough? I’m not allergic, but a lot of it makes me a little queasy and I don’t like the taste.” I could have lied and just said yes, but I could not believe her. Her basic demeaner was tough shit we aren’t going to change things for you.
I do my best not to make a bunch of changes at a restaurant, but one simple request usually is met with no problem. It does still get screwed up sometimes. I once ordered a dish no garlic that wound up being served to me with tons of sliced garlic that for the first bite I mistook for mushrooms. Blech. I just slid all those pieces off to the side and ate the rest; still too garlicky even without the pieces. When the waiter visted the table to refill drinks and also picked up my plate to remove it he didn’t notice the pile of garlic leftover. I wish he had, his tip might not have gone down.