M A.
Yelp
We arrived today (three of us) at this establishment for lunch. The menu looked interesting. About third of the menu is based on eggs. Imagine yourself our surprise that when we ordered three egg dishes, the answer was: "sorry we have only enough eggs for two dishes". For the readers, this restaurant is in the heart of Amsterdam and supermarkets are available all over.
We took time to see what else we could order. Then we ordered three glasses of rosé wine. We were informed there are only two left, and that if we wanted, a bottle of rosé could be put in the freezer for us. The waiter didn't even try to offer us an alternative: a white wine, a red wine....
We saw in the mirror on the wall a special: asparagus! When we asked for that, we were informed that unfortunately, asparagus was available only in the evenings.
We reluctantly settled for two egg dishes and I went for the salmon, lentils and poached eggs (those are poached ahead of time, so luckily they could still offer those. Not an amazing dish to my taste, but this is personal).
I asked whether the owner was present, the waiter informed politely this was not the case.
We have shared our discontent with the waiter. When we went to pay the bill, nothing was offered by the house to compensate for the bad experience. We were surprised, as we had quite a good interaction with the waiter. "Quite arrogant", I thought to myself: why not try and keep us as a customer?
Seeing the above, I decided to write an informative email to the restaurant owner, asking for a reaction about the lack of proactiveness; please note it it was a Pentecost holiday falling in a weekend, and instead of stocking eggs and wine ensuring customers can be served, not a lot was done. This holiday wasn't a surprise to anybody. Doesn't take a lot to realize this is needed, and we are talking about...eggs...
What shocked me and made me decide to write this post, was the reply from the owner (I guess), Mrs. Odette Rigterink: I'll copy paste the email and will translate:
Quote
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Bedankt voor het uiten van u ongenoegen.
Ik wil graag even reageren op de klachten.
-Na een heel druk Pinksterweekend heb ik in samenwerking met de koks in de keuken de beslissing genomen de boodschappen bij de AH door de namiddagdienst mee te laten nemen zodat er goed voorbereid kon gaan worden op een drukke avond.
Dat wat betreft de eieren .
-Jammer dat u de zalm met linzen niet zo lekker vond, kwestie van smaak denk ik
-De rosé was op, daar bestellen we nooit zoveel meer van omdat wij heerlijke witte wijnen op de kaart hebben en rose niet meer in onze persoonlijke top 5 staat.
-Asperges is bij ons een avondgerecht en zijn net geschild.
Heel vervelend dat u zich in de maling genomen voelt, dat is van niemand hier de bedoeling geweest . Ik heb veel vertrouwen in het team dat vandaag aan het werk was en vind dat ze heel professioneel gewerkt hebben en bovenal bijzonder aardig zijn.
Het allerbelangrijkste in ons restaurant.
Hierbij onze reactie , ik hoop dat er andere restaurants zijn die wel aan u standaard kunnen voldoen.
Vriendelijke groet,
Odette Rigterink
BUFFET van Odette
UNQUOTE.
Translation:
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Thank you for expressing your dissatisfaction. I'd like to react on the complaints:
-After a very busy Pentecost weekend, I've decided together with the cooks in the kitchen to do the shopping at the AH (Albert Heijn Supermarket) by the afternoon shift, in order to prepare for a busy evening.
-Pity you didn't find the salmon an lentils tasty, a question of taste, I guess.
-The rosé was finished: we never order a lot of it, as we have wonderful white wines, and rosé isn't anymore within in our personal top 5.
Asparagus is for us an evening dish and we're not pilled.
Such a pity you don't feel taken seriously, nobody meant to cause that. I have a lot of confidence in the team working today, I found that they worked professionally today and above all they were very nice, the most important in our restaurant.
This is our reaction, I hope there are other restaurant which can satisfy your standards.
Kind regards,
Odette Rigterink
End of translation.
I invite you to judge for yourself whether this is a reply you'd write if it were your business.
I have drawn my conclusions about the way this restaurant is being managed.