Why is it that in some restaurants you want to eat everything they sell, and in others you can't find a single dish to order?
It's the menu, stupid. Too small, too long, too confused, too descriptive, not descriptive enough—these are but a few of the sins that can get between a hungry patron and her own little piece of dining nirvana. Goodness knows this restaurant critic has, on more than one occasion, been so blocked.
So restaurant owners, take heed: Here is one diner's list of what not to do on your menu, humbly offered with the help of a team of sage Seattle consultants and chefs.
Don't call a hamburger a "hamburger."
Better to call it a "quarter-pound of mesquite-grilled Idaho beef, smothered with grilled onions." "Use tantalizing words," advises Sharon Kramis, the longtime local foodie and menu consultant who currently works with Anthony's HomePort restaurants. The Brie might be "creamy Brie"; the bread "crusty French bread."
Canny restaurateurs know this as smart sales: Precise descriptors ("smoky," "buttery," "garlicky") make the saliva flow, just as certain words play up the atmospheric benefits of eating out. "I like to mention the romance part, like anything done in a wood-burning oven," offers Tom Douglas, chef/owner of the Dahlia Lounge, Etta's Seafood Grill, and the Palace Kitchen.
Sales aside, the diner can be vastly aided in her choices by descriptive precision on the menu. A "tart vinaigrette" is not just any vinaigrette; a "flourless chocolate cake" occupies an entirely different genus of dessert than chocolate cake. "I love the word 'savory,'" muses Douglas. "Food has gotten so confused. If you say you have lavender in something, like a lavender vinaigrette on quail, people might immediately think, 'lavender, dessert spice, sweet.' I'll use 'savory' for that."
Don't describe to death.
Too many words kill the romance. Here is the description of a dish I recently encountered in a Seattle restaurant: "Sweet peppers, garlic, Dungeness, and rock crab cakes lightly saut饤 and served over a sweet and sour beurre blanc partnered with a fresh pear, j�ma, and mint slaw briskly tossed in a fresh ginger and passion fruit vinaigrette."
Aside from the fact that any dish described in that much detail would sound awful, there's something almost pornographically literal about it. "I like to preserve an element of surprise by listing just the main components of a dish," says Tamara Murphy, the former Campagne chef who just opened her own Mediterranean place, Brasa, in Belltown.
According to Banger Smith, president of the Seattle consulting firm Menus for Profit, Murphy's right in fashion. "It's very cool now to offer less description," Smith says. "You can't take that too far—if you don't want to sell something, write no copy at all. But in general, the more succinct you are, the more you'll sell." Smith will even take out words like "with" and "and" in his efforts to streamline description.
Don't neglect variety.
Small neighborhood restaurants are among the most appealing this city has to offer. They also tend to offer the least variety. Last year I reviewed an otherwise sensational Italian place that was nearly all pasta, almost all of that vegetarian, and the few exceptions used cured meats. Small places driven by the tastes and idiosyncrasies of their owners, however charming, often appear to forget that other tastes exist. Let this be a reminder.
Contrary to prevailing opinion, size doesn't matter. Short menus are actually something of a relief (see below)—as long as they offer choices of significant difference. Seasoned restaurateurs and consultants admit to obsessing about these choices—about meeting demographic demand for both male food (steaks) and female food (salads, chicken)—but have to stay within reasonable cost parameters. So they've developed methods of creating the illusion of variety. Consultant Smith attests that when a restaurant divides up menu offerings under headings—Salads, Chicken, Specials, From the Grill, and so on—diners will perceive more variety than if the same items were undivided.
Avoid "delicious," "fresh," and "perfect."
By all means be delicious, fresh, and perfect—just don't go promising it on the menu. A quick browse through my personal menu collection reveals the following superlatives: "seasoned to perfection," "chargrilled to perfection!", "a study in perfection," "incredibly delicious," "incredible beef," "a perfect baked potato," and "you won't find a better meal on the planet."
Perhaps I'm the one devilish diner on the planet who is rendered cynical by such promises, but I doubt it. (All I could think about when dining on that last guarantee was how surpassingly wrong it was.) Such superlatives aren't description, they're advertising—and therefore utterly useless to the diner trying to choose a meal. I'll take one "smoky" or even "herby" over a dozen claims of "delicious."
As for "fresh"—wouldn't we like to think we could take that one on faith? "We're trying to eliminate the word 'fresh' from our menu," says Douglas. "It's used too often, and it's like . . . you know, duh. . . . If it's not fresh, you shouldn't be in business."
Don't go being all healthy.
