This is a Chinese Restuarant!

I remember it like it was yesterday.  I was 15 years old and on my first trip to Europe with my parents.  We were enjoying a sunny day in London and decided to try out the city's Chinatown for lunch.  Since my dad is Chinese, he chose the restaurant based on menus posted outside. So far, so good...

I remember enjoying the meal, and having a nice time, until my father asked for a bowl of rice.  Rice, as you know, is a staple of Chinese food...but, I digress.  The waitress looked at him and said that rice was an additional two pounds per bowl.  Two pounds?  Per bowl?  Was she mad?  That was almost four dollars back then! 

What happened next was classic.  My dad, enraged, pounded his fist on the table and exclaimed "This is a Chinese restaurant!", "I should not have to pay extra money for my rice...what kind of Chinese restaurant charges for a bowl of rice?"  At this point I had crawled under the table in shame.

Well, fast foward 15 years and whatta you know, last night I became my father.  I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree...

A new Spanish small plates restaurant called Estadio recently opened in the Logan neighborhood and we decided to try it out and have an early dinner with Matt and Josh last night.  Overall, the place was cute and the food was pretty good.  Come to think of it, I would probably be singing a completely different tune if I didn't feel like we were nickel and dimed for little things.

For example, we asked for more bread with our cheese and meat course and our server said that bread was an additional two dollars.  Here we go again!  That's right, fifty cents per friggin slice for the four of us to have a piece each.  UNREAL!  Then, Mike ordered a Jack Daniels on the rocks and our server told us that a drink on the rocks costs an additional dollar.  When I, in a shocked state said, "you charge a dollar for ice?", our server shamefully nodded her head.

So Mike ordered his drink neat, and asked for a glass of ice water.  Moral of the story: restaurants shouldn't be asking patrons to pay extra for things like bread, or ice, or rice!  These things should be included in the cost of the meal and the additional dollar or two should be tacked onto the price of an appetizer or entree, or hell even a dessert.  Then we wouldn't know the difference, and everyone would be happy.

Needless to say, we won't be returning to Estadio anytime soon.  Would you?!