Leo's Birthday Dinner

Last night we went to our favorite restaurant, St. John, to celebrate Leo getting older. We thought it would be a no-hassle Birthday plan, with great food, good friends, and a pleasant atmosphere. Unfortunately, not everything went as planned and I ended up being doused with white wine and considered a thief by the end of the evening. We were seated in the private dining room, since we were a large party. Our server was very abrupt when telling us the specials and getting our wine order, but I just thought she was trying to be efficient. I watch Hell's Kitchen and Top Chef. I know that a party over 5 people is typically difficult to deal with, and we had 9. We got a few bottles of wine for the table, and Leo ordered a round of vodka shots (just to keep the conversation lively and flowing). I won't go into what everyone had, but we were all quite happy with our meals. St. John always delivers amazingly fresh and flavourful food. I started with the smoked sprats with horseradish sauce, followed by the ox tongue with horseradish and beets. I haven't had tongue since I was about 10 and my Grandmother forced me to try some of the grey, cold, horizontally sliced tongue (so each piece still looks like a tongue) she brought back from the supermarket. I've been frightened of it ever since. So I though that St. John would help me overcome this fear, and it did. The tongue was the consistency of pastrami, and tasted both of beef and organ meat. The juices from the beets mingled on the plate with the horseradish sauce, making an excellent sauce for the tongue.

The server had been coming in infrequently to check on us, and our bottles of wine ran dry. The time between our starters and main courses was close to half and hour, and we were all snacking hungrily on bread before our mains arrived. While our mains were being cleared, one of the busboys knocked the rest of my wine right into my lap...and he never apologized for it. Everyone at the table was buzzing (rather loudly, so as to be heard by the server) that they should bring us a complimentary bottle of wine, or some free desserts, but instead a napkin was thrown at me by our surly server, an apology was mumbled, and a half a glass of wine was placed in front of me. Everyone at the table told me to make a fuss about it, but I just wanted to carry on with the meal. Before our server came to take our dessert orders (she had been gone for a while at this point), two people from our party had to leave, since one was about to miss his last train home and the other had to bike home, which was going to take him some time. When our server finally turned up, we ordered desserts and Leo's came out with a candle in it...which was nice. When the bill arrived, there was the standard scrabbling to get the correct amount of money together (at this point our server was very attentive!). When we handed her the money, she counted it on the table in front of us, then handed me back a 20 pound note and informed me that it didn't feel right and she wasn't going to accept it. She held it up to the light and explained to us how it was probably counterfeit. I was appalled. We just spent a good deal of money, and a whole lot of time, on the meal. She had hundreds of our pounds in her hands, and she had the nerve to throw our money back at us and insinuate that we were trying to pull one over on her. The least she could have done was take the money to the register to count it and question it's authenticity in private. Perhaps she could have used one of those pens that every restaurant seems to have to check to see if a bill is counterfeit, rather than just denying our money. Luckily, I had another £20 note in my purse, we paid the bill, did not add any additional tip besides the service charge (which we probably would have if the service had been good), and left.

From now on, when we go to St. John, I'm eating in the bar.