I was immediately drawn to the menu at Seven Reasons - upscale Latino- because of the rice dishes. I love these kind of Spanish rice dishes (like paella but not called that), and Seven Reason has four of them on the menu, Four! Normally I consider myself lucky if there’s one.
I was only in the market for one dish, and I tried the Rice in the Woods, a play on Hen in the Woods mushrooms which are featured in this dish.
I adored everything about this dish, from the texture of the Bomba rice, the woodsiness of the mushrooms, the fresh greens, and the trio of potent sauces served only in dabs so they subtly enhanced the dish. Restraint and excess at the same time.
I was also gifted this amuse of cauliflower soup, which was very welcome. It can be very annoying when chefs feel obliged to add white truffle oil, a fate that was avoided here.
I’m intrigued by this, but I sure wish they didn’t have a 5% “service fee,” which is not a tip. I hate that. It seems inherently deceptive to me.
In one chat on Tom Sietsema’s page a while back, I saw one restaurant owner justify the “service fee” by saying if it was included in the price, then people wouldn’t pay it. To me, that seems like saying we have to keep our prices secret and trick the unwary customer.
Seven Reasons sounds really good and I might go anyway. But I do hate that charge.
I agree about the charge. Not sure this is mentioned anywhere, maybe it’s a complete surprise. Even people who can well afford it can get miffed at something like that.
However… they did give me an amuse, so maybe that’s the kitchen’s way of making up for it.
Isn’t that pretty much on every sit down restaurant menu ? At least here in California pretty much every sit down restaurant has some from of health/service fee ranging between 4-7%
Everyone’s decisions about how they want to spend their money are intensely personal and should always be respected. For me, whatever a valued restaurant needs to charge to stay in business is ok by me. Whether in increased menu prices or a service charge makes no difference to me. I am fortunate that I am able to afford to eat out, usually at modest places because that’s what I prefer. I just don’t want to lose restaurants beloved to me to bad economics.
It’s not the majority of restaurants here in the DC area, but there are more than a few. Interestingly, I spent the month of July in NYC and ate in 32 restaurants, mostly in various neighborhoods in Brooklyn, but also in Manhattan and Queens.
I can’t remember for 100% sure, but I’m fairly sure we didn’t see a single “service charge.” Certainly, such charges are much less common in NYC than they are in DC.
Oh, I agree that “whatever a restaurant needs to charge to stay in business is ok by me.”
I have no concerns about high prices, that is just the state of things right now. A $17 hamburger doesn’t seem so high when wages are also high (a good thing) and the cost of beef is high as well.
But I feel strongly that the price on the menu should be the real price, not a disguised price.
My objection is to the lack of transparency, not to the cost.
Sometimes they link it to a specific issue (minimum wage hike, rice of eggs, etc.) as indicated on their web sites. I don’t condone it, just pointing it out.
I could see that as a good reason for an annotation on the menu – these prices are X% higher due to the recent increase in minimum wage, because we provide health benefits, etc.
With a nod to Tom Waits, the Large Print giveth and the Small Print taketh away.
Just to be clear, from my limited personal experience, it is not common to have a surcharge in the DC area. And unless it is ubiquitous, I think it’s a bad business practice.
If the restaurant fears a drop off of business with a higher menu price, then evidently they are trying to slip this past the consumer whether it is printed somewhere on the menu or not. Personally I stopped reading the fine print after the alert that parties of 6 or more are automatically charged a gratuity. I figured the rest did not apply to me.
