Chowhound is a bi-weekly column about what’s trending in Detroit food culture. Tips: [email protected].
Boob jobs: On the look-but-don’t-touchy subject of so-called “breastaurants,” how do you feel about places like Hooters, Twin Peaks, and such? Obviously, perspectives often hinge on whether or not one carries the Y chromosome. As for me, I ate at a Hooters once years ago, in my late 30s and in the company of my young son, who was maybe 7 at the time. While on family vacation in San Diego, he got tired during a long walk on the beach with me.
“I’m hungry and thirsty, dad,” he let me know, stopping us a few lifeguard towers short of our rental spot. Doing what any doting father might do in such circumstances, I sought sustenance and shelter from the sun for us in the first restaurant we spied over the seawall. At first blush, my decision seemed brilliant. Like walking a puppy in a park, bringing my blonde-haired, blue-eyed boy to this restaurant triggered an immediate rush of gorgeous young ladies in tight tops and short shorts to our table. These weren’t those obligatory table touches the company service manual requires, though. They were genuine fawnings over an apparently adorable innocence that proved a refreshing change of pace from the constant, prurient glare Hooters Girls graciously face in their workplace.
“These wings are bad, Dad,” Tim concluded quickly after our order arrived, frowning crestfallen, even as an entire crew of cuties continued to hound him. He couldn’t wait to leave, and his turning a blind eye to all that attention due to a flaccid food experience served as a perfect parable on what libidinous eyes see in breastaurants that others don’t.
Purely for the purposes of refreshing myself on this subject matter, mind you, I stopped into a Twin Peaks most recently, where the all-waitress review wears lumberjack flannel crop-tops and Daisy Dukes. Grabbing a barstool, I was immediately gutted by guilt over being there. It only got worse as I looked around at the crowd of company I was keeping: lots of loners, leering at the help. Next to no one was eating. Almost every guy just sat beady-eyed, nursing a huge mug of draft beer. Working girls walked in and out toting bags packed with costume changes, like dancers in gentlemen’s clubs do. My bartender’s genuine smile was big and beautiful. She didn’t seem to feel the same self-consciousness as me. Nor did any of her co-workers appear affected by the collective and constant stare they surely must feel.
In the end, after I paid my tab and over-tipped, I slipped a note to Ms. Barkeep, letting her know I was a food writer working on a piece about her corner of the industry. Honestly, I thought she’d welcome the chance to get a few work horror stories off her chest; testimonials to the hostile work environment I imagined her dealing with every day, infested with sexually-harassing superiors and lascivious, loser customers.
Truthfully, I haven’t heard a word from her.
At this point, I’m left torn on the topic of breastaurants. Yes, there’s something patently misogynistic to the business model. If the tables were turned, and someone opened a place called, say, The Purple Tube Steak, where male staff served footlongs in package-promoting Speedos, no, I wouldn’t go or even try to justify a visit to satisfy an appetite. Still, I’m stopping short of saying girls who make breastaurants work are being outright exploited. Perhaps there’s at least as much truth to the contrary. It’s men being exposed here again. We not only think with our dicks. We eat with them.
Tips turned tariffs: During a recent roundup review of nearly a dozen noteworthy restaurants, I was surprised by the number of them now attaching automatic, 20% gratuities to tabs. Like many, I’m beginning to bristle over the new-normal nonsense adopters of this practice are asking us to swallow. Consider: the group of restaurants recently surveyed are all long-tenured, established and thriving. The majority are currently serving large numbers of well-heeled customers at high prices. Their menus list entrees approaching C-Note pricing. Their wine lists boast a preponderance of three-digit labels. Server commissions in places like these are both considerable and consistent. Frankly, I find it insulting to have a tipping percentage set for and enforced upon me. And it’s fairly infuriating how a new “additional tip” line has found its way onto the standard credit card receipt, coaxing and coercing even more money from my pocket for fear of being perceived as stingy for leaving it blank. Seriously.
Sorry, restaurant industry, but this new order of finishing up our business is bullshit. As a former waiter, bartender, and restaurateur, I’ve always tipped way more than generously. To a fault, if truth be told. But that’s up to me, the customer, as it should always be. Now, if you’re going to blame COVID and say the pandemic somehow left consumers infected with cost-of-living-triggered stinginess, I’m going to call you out again. While, yes, we’re tired of getting screwed in the pocket by every business disguising pure profiteering behind a COVID mask, where our favorite restaurants are concerned, we dug deeper to support a struggling food service industry. Now, you show your gratitude by insisting we keep paying extra? Between those 20% auto-grats and the extra 5-10% we’re feeling obliged to ladle on in those damn “additional tip” lines, you’re raising a long-since-agreed-upon standard unreasonably.
For starters, any inflation-based arguments for a 25-30% revised gratuity standard are belied by the fact that, as menu prices have risen, so have tip commissions. Secondly, in guaranteeing a lofty service stipend, you take away the incentive to provide such duly rewarded levels of service. Remember, folks: think of the term “tips” as an acronym (“to ensure proper service”). Lastly, never insult anyone’s intelligence, and this is a slap in the face to a dining public that knows full well how to tip without being prodded or forced to. The last impression a restaurant leaves on a customer shouldn’t be a taxing one.
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