Serivce a little too saucy at Sugo

Sugo Petaluma

5 Petaluma Blvd. South, Suite B

Petaluma, CA 94952

707 782.9298

sugotrattoria@gmail.com

The customer is always right or aren’t they?

About day one in my venture into cooking school in my attempt to become a chef we were taught, "The customer is always right ".  That was stressed if you where the owner, the chef or the dishwasher the customer is always right. This is a very service oriented business no matter if you have a Michelin Star or not. If the customer is not happy with the service then the likelihood of them coming back is highly unlikely. Well I guess Sugo missed that lesson. Customer service can make or break any business and bad service can destroy a business. In the food industry this is especially the case no matter how good the food is. This was the case with a local favorite Petaluma restaurant Sugo.

Sugo unfortunately had not learned this valuable lesson in customer services. There is plenty I am willing to overlook, especially after being in the food industry. Having poor service when the restaurant is not busy is pretty much a bad practice. This was the case while dining at Sugo.

Entering a near empty eating gallery during the beginning of diner rush is a blessing and a curse. A blessing if you are in a hurry because your meal can be prepared faster.  Usually you are able to have more attention from wait staff with out being rushed if you’re early. A curse because it could indicate pending disaster. My wife was not feeling especially hungry that night and had asked to order a smaller proportion from the children’s menu.  Our waitress issued a very negative response. “Absolutely not! You must be 12 and under.  The chef is adamant about that.”  Okay… that harsh response was a surprise. Undaunted and yet still shaken my wife asked, “ Then may I possibly order a different item.  Is it possible to order the risotto and half of risotto boxed because I am not very hungry?” Our waitress responded, “Our kitchen does not do that.” When our dinner arrived my wife’s meal was rudely slapped down on the table and an empty to go box dropped beside it.  The waitress did not box the ½ proportion nor did she offer to help or even provide a spoon with which my wife could accomplish the job.

Okay so restaurants run on a very slim profit margin.  Portions are highly monitored to help keep food cost down and in order to maintain profitability. That helps explain why an adult usually is not encouraged to order for the children’s menu. Usually the policies concerning this practice are expressed in writing on the menu. This helps prevent confusion.  This also clarifies to customers about policies and practices.  Fair enough, it is a tough business to keep running. 

This does not however excuse poor customer service. Every one has a bad day. We can all understand that. No matter how good the food is; how many special features such as showing movies on the wall while dining; no matter how good your flashy web site is; it does not matter how cool your blog is for your restaurant is. Not making the customer being felt wanted in a services oriented business is suicide.

To make things perfectly fair to Sugo. My wife and I were in a rush and we did not talk to a manger addressing our dissatisfaction with our waitress. Nor did we call later. We did not return the rudeness we were served up. We did not demand unreasonable request to rush our order.

So why put the time and effort into posting this at all? Is this a rant, a chance at free meal, a flame war, an axe to grind or to have any other alterative reason? No, no, no, no and no. I am posting this as a cautionary tail for poor practices with customer services. I wish no ill to Sugo but I will not be returning.

Memories of Irene's

Dave:

What can I say?  Memory is an odd thing. Sometimes you will say to yourself  "Oh, I'll remember that moment for the rest of my life".  While other times, it sounds closer to "Honey have you seen my car keys?"  I am going to reconstruct a dinner I had in New Orleans' French Quarter. 

My wife, brother-in-law, sister-in-law and I had a great dinner at  Irene's Cuisine.  Now, The French Quarter is no stranger to great places to eat but what I believe separates Irene's from the others is the menu.   Irene's serves Italian food.  Not French, not Creole, not Cajun nor Spanish but, Italian.  Why? I don't know. What I do know is what they do they do exceptionally well.

Arriving through The French Quarter I am enticed by the magical smells of garlic and tomatoes tempting me to enter a magical wonderland of the unknown. This was my first trip to Irene's and I wanted to see what was behind the door and into the unknown.  Irene's is a busy bustling hive of activities. This not a bad thing.  It's quite the opposite.  It means people are happily enjoying themselves. 

Here where my faulty memory comes into play. With no menu or web page to jar my memory my task has became Herculean effort. I will endeavor forward dear readers to reconstruct what was for diner. At this point I might start pulling my hair out. Fear and frustration now grips our hero “wannabe food blogger”.  Looking for a quick exit from this quagmire I do the only rational thing… “Honey!”

Dorothy:

This has now become a collaborative posting since Dave seems to have mislaid his “notes”.   That’s not to say that we’ve become such food geeks that we immediately journal about great food, but we do snap photos on occasion.  However, I am clever enough to Google “Irene’s Cuisine Menu” and get a quick refresher on what we enjoyed that evening.

First, I’d like to mention that the service at Irene’s Cuisine is outstanding.  As it turns out our server, Sonny is also the fiancé of our friend Tracey, with whom we enjoyed Jazz Fest a few short days later. 

I had been at Irene’s once before in 2011 when I went to Jazz Fest with Tracey’s family.  It was great then however, I never made the connection between Tracey and Sonny until much later.  Regardless, Sonny and his colleagues are terrific servers!  The atmosphere in Irene’s is frenetic, bustling and watching the service staff practically dance through with all the remarkable food to be had is almost like a floorshow.

Being back in New Orleans a year later, with my soon to be husband, it was even more fun to explore the terrific food at Irene’s and enjoy the ambiance.  Now, on to remembrances of the menu and the meal.   Irene’s is Italian food, but not your typical pasta, meatballs and marinara joint.   They have an eclectic, Tuscan style menu on which it’s not uncommon to find rabbit, quail or other game right alongside raviolis.

My brother-in-law, who is not an adventurous eater, went way out on a limb during this trip to NOLA.  I must say, I was really impressed with his open-minded culinary explorations.  He ordered a seafood dish called Sautéed fish with shrimp, roasted peppers and corn macquechoux.  My sister ordered Pompano Amandine.  They switched dishes.  Macquechoux was a little confusing for Jim.

Dave ordered ricotta and spinach ravioli; handmade, beautifully tender morsels filled with a farm fresh local ricotta.  They were like little clouds of heavenly manna.  I am a carnivore.  I ordered the duck St. Phillip.  This was a delightful, tender duck breast with a raspberry and pancetta demi-glace.  I was in heaven!  Rich, tender, tart, savory, sweet – this dish had it all.  My taste buds were dancing in glee.

For dessert, we enjoyed my second annual (and hopefully one in a long line of) their mini flourless chocolate cake with hazelnut glaze.  It is to die for, delicious!!!

We ate really, really well in New Orleans.  There are dozens, if not hundreds of restaurants there that I have on my list of places to try.  However, every trip I make to NOLA will have to include a trip to Irene’s just as a matter of principal.  It would be like going to Paris without enjoying a view of the Eiffel Tower.  Irene’s is my landmark choice in New Orleans.

DAVE:

I feel hostage by my faulty memory. Like any good writer who is willing to admit they’ve forgotten where they were going with a story, a good out in a bad situation is to kill off the hero and introduce a new one in their place. That doesn’t only happen in B-movies or pulp fiction. Life very seldom delivers us simple answers. In this case another tactic was used, instead of killing off the hero. In this story, the hero would have been me, so I deployed another tactic. I used a ghostwriter. Any good writer would have done the same. Thanks to my wife Dorothy who came to my rescue.

The meal at Irene’s was exceptional even though my memory is not.

Here’s to great eating!

Dave and Dorothy

Festing!

We've been remiss.  We spent a week in New Orleans in April, 2012.  We ate our brains out.  All conscious thought, with the exception of where we were going to find our next delicious meal, was cleared from our minds.  Oh yeah!  We also had a wedding while we were there - ours!  That was a little distracting and kept us from updating our posts promptly too.  More on that, later.

First, I want to talk about Festival Food.  New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival food, that is.  This is different from festival food anywhere else in the world.  New Orleans just simply does not screw around with their food, whether it's in a white linen restaurant or a portable food kiosk on the fair grounds.

Day one of Jazz Fest and I knew right away what I wanted to eat.  Morning - an affogato.  For those of you who do not speak Italian, that means drowned.  In this case, it's a scoop of handmade caramel gelato with a shot of espresso drowning it.  LOVE!!  With that little pick-me up under our belts, we were able to think seriously about music and lunch.

There are so many options at Jazz Fest in both that one just can't make up their mind sometimes.  Should I get the alligator picante?  How about the shrimp ettoufe?  Red beans and rice?  Blackberry cobbler?  Sweet potato pie?  Well, we've been told to keep our stress levels down, so we just ordered it all.  YUMMY.  Dave even tasted a bite or two of gator (he's a 20 year vegetarian).

Then on to the "reason" for going to Jazz Fest, the music.  Again, the choices are overwhelming.

 

We made our way to "base camp" a plot of fair grounds staunchly staked out by my friend Cynthia and her family every year and enjoyed an afternoon of new, nostalgic and surprising music.  Dave and I spent the entire Zebra set saying "Wow!  I loved that song way back when!"  The lead singer still has an amazing voice and it was great to be reminded of some of the fun music of our youth.  We also heard a mess of other super talented and imaginative performers.

One of the most amazing things about Jazz Fest, if you've never been, is the sense of community there.  People, even in shoulder to shoulder crowds brought in by performers like Bruce Springsteen, are generally really nice, friendly and conscientious.  Take the following photo for example:

People at Jazz Fest are just cool.  They share.  I'm sure there were even a few instances of us giving or receiving tastes of food from the plates of complete strangers.  It happens.  Open your mind!

Day two was another day of amazing food - including an oyster poor boy that nearly brought tears to my eyes it was so tender and delicious and the second love of Dave's life, a sweet potato fold-over pie.  He still waxes sentimental about its light nutmeg infusion.  Should I be jealous?

If anything, it's the broccoli cheese pie I should be worried about.  As they say in the south, it's so good it makes you want to slap your mama.  Spicy, savory, cheesy gooey and delicious.  I think Dave's mouth is watering just recalling the light pastry filled with green cheesy goodness.

By day three, we thought we had experienced it all.  That was when I discovered the guy making crab cakes.  Crab could very well be my Kryptonite.  I love it!  It makes me weak in the knees.  These crab cakes were light, delicious, loaded with lump crab meat and topped with a light remoulade.  Spiced with a creole spice blend, they had a touch of heat to catch your attention, but not so much as to overwhelm the sweetness of the crab.  Those babies and an ice cold can of champagne and I was in heaven.  

Uh, yeah.  I forgot to mention, when Festing, you drink canned champagne.  They're these cute little babies from Sofia Coppola's vineyard.  

Icy cold drinks are a must when you're hanging with 200,000 of your buddies in a treeless fairgrounds.  If it's not canned champagne, there's always a frozen hurricane, margarita or pina colada.  As you can see, I sometimes have a hard time making up my mind.

That's it for Fest 2012.  We're already planning our 2013 adventure in New Orleans for Jazz Fest.  I love this city, its people and its traditions.  They really do know how to show southern hospitality and laissez les bonnes temps roullez!

NCB

Faith Restored in San Rafael

I was about to write off San Rafael as a culinary wasteland and not worth my time to continue a search, in vain, for a decent meal.

Loving Sol Food in San Rafael, I needed more hope , more choices, just more of something .

Well, Vin Antico has given me a renewed faith good food can be found in San Rafael.  Zagat Rated, farm to table culinary delight can be done affordably without sacrificing quality of flavor.  Relaxed yet stylish eating gallery is flanked by an open kitchen help provide a view of creative mouthwatering food being prepared . 

This is no fly by night trendy hipster hang-out, but has been successfully operated for five years.  If they are doing this well now, they will become a long term favorite of mine when I go to San Rafael. Yes, it is veg friendly too.

Vin Antico is located at 881 4th Street San Rafael Ca 94901 (415) 454-4492.

Wishing them many many years of continued success bringing exciting creative farm to table delights.

NCB.

The Week In Review - in Food

Oh Taco Truck, Oh Taco Truck...

We sang to the woman working the window at the local taco truck last week.  I think she rushed our order ahead of others in line because she thought we were completely bonkers and wanted to get us out of there.  It's not as though we just randomly broke into song... well, maybe a little bit.

Here's how it all began.  Every time Dave and I drove by the corner the taco truck typically occupies, we check out the line, see how much traffic they're getting, and wistfully discuss stopping just for a little snack.  Generally we're en route somewhere or on the way home with a load of groceries from the market, so a stop is less than ideal.

One evening, just before Christmas, we drove by and the taco truck was not there.  Maybe it was the Christmas Music, but next thing you know, Dave and I were singing "O Taco Truck, O Taco Truck, where have your burritos gone to?" to the tune of "O Christmas Tree".  Gradually, this little ditty morphed into a full fledged jingle for the taco truck with several witty rhyming verses.

So, when we found ourselves at the taco truck - finally with a few minutes to stop for some of their amazing fare, we jokingly told the woman taking our order that we had missed coming there so much that we had written a taco truck song.  That, of course, led to her insisting we sing for our supper.

Aside from them now being a little bit afraid of us, the taco truck on the corner of Lakeville and E. Washington St. is terrific.  Super fresh and delicious food with a really wide variety of choices that include some of the more traditional Mexican dishes like beef tongue and my absolute favorite - fish tacos.  There are not many places where Dave and I can both get a fabulous meal, with fresh ingredients for less than $15 - but this place is the exception.

O Taco Truck, O Taco Truck
We really love your tacos
They're fresh and fast
with yummy beans
You dishes are so nice and lean
Oh Taco Truck, O Taco Truck...

You get the idea.

On Good vs. Evil

My definition of good and evil is a little more far reaching than a discussion on sustainability, but I can see the connection.

Good cares for the earth and its resources, practicing stewardship and working to obtain balance in all things. Good looks to a future and practices moderation. Sustainability.

Evil; well Drake's Cakes calls them Devil Dogs for a reason.  Mass produced, unhealthy, wasteful, full of chemicals whose production damage the earth and deplete our resources wrapped in plastic which further pollutes.  I can see Good and Evil on those terms.

Dave and I went to see Anthony Bourdain and Eric Ripert's show "Good vs. Evil" at the Wells Fargo Center (formerly the Luther Burbank Center for old timers) last night.  I'm not sure if the reference to "Good vs. Evil" was meant to refer to Tony vs. Eric - with Tony's acerbic and cynical wit paired against Eric's good manners and charm OR if they were referencing the Good vs. Evil in relation to food and the way it is prepared, distributed and consumed.

Believe me, I'm not a holier than thou locavore and I don't make myself crazy eating only organic.  Hang around long enough and you'll catch me with a bag of Cheetos.  I'm weak.  However, I try to respect what it is I'm eating and appreciate the resources that go into it.  I'm a big believer in balance and stewardship.

Wow - I'm on a tangent.  What I really wanted to talk about was how Dave and I prepared for our big night out with Anthony and Eric (and 2500 other people or so).

We obviously had good food on our minds all day.  How could you not when you know you're about to be immersed in the world of two of our finest culinary talents?

Lunch:  Andy's Sushi on Western Avenue in Petaluma for lunch.  Andy ROCKS!  We've been in four or five times now and the proprietors of this family run, locals favorite have come to recognize us.  They love Dave.  He speaks chef and when they see him, they immediately start thinking up new yummy vegetarian dishes for him.  They make something called a Sweetie Pie roll with sweet potato and pumpkin tempura!  It's the BOMB!  Their Udon is great too.  It's always nice to feel like you're a regular and have a little bit of a fuss made about you.

We followed lunch with a trip to our garden which is actually being grown on a friend's property on the other side of town since our postage stamp size backyard is barely large enough for the herbs and lemons we have growing in it now.  I love living in a place where we can garden year round and some of the winter vegetables are my favorites.  This particular day, we took home fresh broccoli, a lovely turnip and some delicious snap peas.  Sunday night dinner is almost all set with this bounty lined up in the fridge.

A few more errands and we found ourselves with about an hour and a half for a bite before the show.  Dave mentioned a new steak house that he'd been hearing good buzz about that's a little off the beaten track from the rest of downtown Santa Rosa.  I hesitated.  I always feel bad about making him go to places like this because occasionally we find that his menu choices are limited to french fries or mashed potatoes.  Not so at this joint.   This from Dave on dinner.  "Very rarely will you find me ranting about a meal for days on end, but Stark's has done it for me."  That's right.  Stark's Steakhouse has my vegetarian fiance ranting two days after the fact over how amazingly good the meal was.  Figure that one out.

First off, as you walk into Stark's you realize that this is not just some neighborhood joint struggling to get by.  They have worked really, really hard to create a terrific ambiance.  It is reminiscent of the old Stork Club or the famous 21 in New York.  A rich, clubby atmosphere with gorgeous wood, rich leather and a deep sensuality to the decor.  I half expected to see Frank Sinatra in the corner booth holding court.

Because of the hurry we were in and the fact that on a Friday night there was a 2 hour wait for the dining room, we ate in the very comfortable bar which serves their full menu.  This room carries the same terrific ambiance - channeling a bit of Rick's Cafe from Casablanca with it's piano in the corner and a fireplace lighting the room and chasing away the evening chill.  They got the setting right when creating Stark's.  There was no doubt in my mind.

But could they get the menu right too?  We started with a peak at the wine list.  Not a huge selection, maybe 8 - 10 choices each of red, white and sparkling but each was available not just by the bottle, but also by the glass.  And the choices - pretty impressive!  From a wonderful sparkling Muscato d'Asti which almost won my vote to my final choice, Orin Swift's "Saldi" Zinfandel; each of these wines was interesting, intriguing even.  Not the commonplace and it was unusual to see some of the choices available on a per glass basis because of their relative rarity.  The Zinfandel was terrific and the perfect choice to go with my dinner selections.

I ordered a pan seared foie gras appetizer which was served on a small slice of french toast with a cranberry compote on the side and garnished with arugula.  An amazing burst of flavors!  I was left weak kneed after the first bite and it got better with each taste.  I'm now seriously thinking of stocking up on foie gras before the ban on the stuff goes into effect here in California.  Sorry goose lovers.

For entree's we both had a wide variety of choices.  Although the menu is mostly steaks, chops and fish, they also feature a "noodles" menu which has several different types of macaroni and cheese, including a very tempting black truffle variety.  They also have some great side dishes.  Dave ordered a cauliflower gratin, sauteed baby spinach and a delicious dish of brussell sprouts roasted and tossed with blue cheese.  I ordered the chicken under a brick.  Simple, wholesome fare prepared with great care and skill.  My chicken was delicious.  Moist, tender, well seasoned.  Too bad I was already pretty full from the foie gras, but it was a great lunch the next day. 

Dave's meal... well let's just say he's still ranting.  Everything was spectacular.  The gratin was my particular favorite.  The cauliflower still a bit firm, the cheese smooth and creamy and not overpowering.  The baby spinach was delicious too.  I never even got a chance with the brussel sprouts as they vanished from Dave's plate pretty quickly.  Dave was left squirming in his chair about to burst into song.  He is still elated knowing that someone out there in restaurants can make each individual side dish so masterfully that though made to accompany main courses, they were able to come together into a meal with rich robust flavors that complemented rather than overwhelmed one another.  "There's a huge amount of understanding of the craft in the preparation of this food."

Only a well oiled, well trained and happy kitchen crew can pull this off.  The staff in general was excellent.  Our service was really great, the hostess welcoming and helpful, our server very understanding when we told her of our time limits.  Nothing at all to fault except ourselves for not planning well and allowing ourselves the time to sit and savor this meal instead of having to rush out.  Next time we'll know better.

BTW - once we arrived at the show, the question of the ban on foie gras was raised during the Q&A session.  I felt like jumping up and jubilantly declaring "You can still get it and it's marvelous!!"