Kids and Fine Dining: More Thoughts
Dale Levitski advises Seattle chefs to “be confident;” Herbfarm owner Carrie Van Dyck says it “depends on the kid.”
Posted by: Jessica Voelker on May 05, 2011 at 01:40PM
3 Comments
For this month’s Seattle Met I wrote a story about Dale Levitski, chef at Chicago restaurant Sprout, and his policy of banning any child under 12 during weekend brunch (check out the article’s comments for a lively debate on the matter).
Here are two things that I couldn’t squeeze into the article but that I thought might interest you.
First, I asked Levitski what he would say to a Seattle chef who wanted to implement an adults-only brunch but was nervous about backlash. Here was his advice: “Be confident! The customer is not always right. This is your restaurant. You’ll take some bumps and bruises put people will come around.”
Secondly, I wasn’t able to include the conversation I had with Carrie Van Dyck. She owns fine-dining standard barer the Herbfarm with her husband Ron Zimmerman, and had some interesting insights to share.
“Depends on the kid,” was Van Dyck’s main message. Given the multi-hour meals at the restaurant, Van Dyck says that some children just can’t handle it. But, she says, she’s known (lucky) kids who have grown up eating at the Herbfarm and now bring their own families there. That said, Van Dyck admitted that kids between age 1 and 6 are always “questionable.” After age 6, “it depends on how they are raised.”
She wouldn’t tell me any dishy stories about young kids who tore up the Herbfarm while the parents sat idle, but Van Dyck did recall a time when a family brought a one-year-old baby who kept crying the whole evening. The Parents “had to keep getting up,” to sooth the baby, which distracted them from enjoying the meal.
And that, says Van Dyck, is the biggest problem that restaurateurs have with kids acting out of turn: it’s not the crying or the annoying other customers, it’s the fact that the behavior prevents their parents from enjoying the experience.
Oh and interesting factoid about the Herbfarm: the restaurant will actually make kid-friendly food—hamburgers, etc—upon request. Who knew?
Tags: Restaurant News, Brunch, Chefs, Family and Relationships
I posed the question “what’s your biggest pet peeve when dining out” in order to get some feedback for an article I wanted to write and was expecting feedback on service, presentation or something related to the food and instead I was bombarded with “keep kids at home if they can’t behave” and “you generally can’t expect them to behave under the age of 5 or 6”. I was amazed at the vehement response and the lively debate the ensued!
I don’t think there is anything wrong with requesting a kid-free dining experience. While I love taking my 3 yo to restaurants it is a completely different experience when it’s just me and my hubby. I feel that fine dining is a privilege, and kids should earn it. It starts by teaching them manners at the “kid-friendly” place, and slowly moving up. It helps build their confidence and future trips to a “fancy” dinner become a big deal.
Also, consider that kids palettes are not as sophisticated as an adult’s. If the menu has nothing for your little one you’ll be in trouble.
Great article!
COAC
chroniclesofaconfectionista.com
I am sure the customers WILL be right when they don’t go to restaurants with exclusionary policies, and I’ll bet Dale’s restaurant will be a ghost town this weekend on one of the biggest restaurant ‘cash cow’ days of the year. Where you going for Mother’s Day brunch? Not the place that won’t take kids. Kids CAN have a much more sophisticated palate than you think (after all, the young have more active taste buds than you do): at six years old, my daughter asks for the ‘pickled flowers’ (capers), says ‘this tastes like it has tarragon in it,’ and likes fiddlehead ferns, among many other culinary choices that never include fast food. Discerning palate, like self-controlled behavior, is a virtue and a value you can instill in your child BY HOW YOU RAISE THEM. I find blanket generalizations about “all children” to be grossly offensive, not too much different than any stereotype. Dale, from one businessperson to another, the only customer who is not right is one who does not pay. Seems to me that you are just trying to get the “right customer” instead, one that is just as much of a snob as you.