An Im-pasta-ble Demand, Part 2

My cousins and their father, my uncle, were visiting us. It was the last day before they left to go back home, and the plan was to choose a restaurant to eat at.

There was one problem: my uncle. Or, more specifically, my uncle and his desire to go for the nth time to the same restaurant we had gone to all holiday, which we had gotten kind of tired of going to.

Cousin: “Dad, why can’t we go to another place? [Restaurant] isn’t going to change the menu until fall arrives, and we’ve tried every single item.”

Uncle: “Look, I’m not going to accept eating any of your Chinese s***.”

Cousin: “That’s why we’re trying to find a compromise. Why can’t we go to [Seaside Restaurant]?”

Uncle: “Are you crazy?! It’s too windy there!”

Cousin: “Or to Grandpa’s favourite place, [Old Restaurant]?”

Uncle: “It’s dirty and run by classless monkeys now. I’m not wasting my time there.”

Cousin: “Maybe we could go out for a pizza at [Neapolitan Pizzeria]? They say—”

Uncle: “Pizza?! Who do you think I am, a football hooligan? No.”

I tried to save the situation.

Me: “I know of a Sardinian restaurant nearby—”

Uncle: “That’s no better than Chinese. It’s all exotic crap. F*** that.”

Yup. He went there and claimed that Sardinian was too exotic for him, a Neapolitan.

Cousin: “Okay, Dad, what the h*** does [Restaurant] make that’s so good for you?”

Uncle: “If you can’t guess that, I’ve failed as a father to teach you anything. C’mon, use your brain!”

Me: “Okay, [Uncle], here’s the deal: since my parents are paying, not you, you either accept a choice, any choice, that’s not ‘go to [Restaurant] for the hundredth time’—”

Unce: “Who are you to say this?”

Me: “—or you stay home and cook yourself whatever ultra-rare and ultra-traditional thing that place makes.”

And I left. We ended up going to a place somewhere in the hills: my uncle whined all night that his pasta alla gricia didn’t have the same pork cheek that his favourite place used and that his tripe was too watered-down, blaming us for “dragging him somewhere stupid” in front of my parents, who could only roll their eyes.

Related:
An Im-pasta-ble Demand