Dining in the capital city often means restaurant-goers are spoiled for choice, with a wide variety of restaurants offering cuisine from all corners of the wonderful world. Here’s a quick explanation of what seasoned diners say they look for when they go out to eat.
- Great customer service
It has little to do with juggling plates, although it may be a fun activity for waiters, and everything to do with getting wait service right.
- The best service is the right amount of attention, not too chatty or self-aware and decidedly uninteresting.
- It’s nice to grab a waiter’s attention when you need it, but when the staff is pacing around the dinner table, it’s annoying.
- Friendly service is fine, but most people don’t want to engage in too much conversation with staff.
- Timing is very important – there should be enough space between courses for people to digest their food without feeling like they are being rushed, or waiting a long time.
- positive mood
Most people are looking for a seamless dining experience and the fact is that we often only notice when something isn’t working – like poor service quality.
- It is best to eat in a restaurant that is busy enough to have a nice atmosphere. Most people don’t want a place that’s too quiet or so full of people and noise that you can’t have a civilized conversation with your friend.
- Feeling pressured and not being rushed is good.
- Wine list
The wine list should be imaginative and offer lots of choices, without being too expensive.
- Some thought and effort goes into the wine list so as to provide something for everyone – meaning whether you’re having oysters, steak or dessert, you have the right wine to go with it.
- Ripe quality wines are much more impressive than lower quality wines from famous names.
- Glassware is important. Even a relatively simple house wine tastes far more interesting when served in a suitably large glass.
- Food for thought
Is there something else? Oh yes, the food! Lovingly prepared food with quality ingredients is essential to any restaurant experience. With so many styles of food to choose from, British restaurants are often overlooked, but menus at many restaurants are perfect examples of simple, delicious cooking.
If you want to finish off your dinner with a good cigar and a good Scotch whiskey, the knowledgeable staff is at Boisdale of Bishopsgate“providing ‘really good’ service – especially when it comes to awesome whiskey and cigar pairing suggestions”, according to a recent review by online restaurant guide Square Food.
