Flat-Out Confused
I had a woman come in for breakfast with her American tour group. We had a hot buffet (sausages, fried or poached eggs, bacon, hash, etc.) and a cold (Continental) buffet. You can get cold boiled eggs on the Continental. We also have omelettes available, but these are an additional $5, which tour group members didn’t like to pay for (their hot buffet is included with their room usually).
Guest: “I want an omelette.”
Me: “That will be an extra $5 charge.”
Guest: “But I don’t want to pay extra!”
I explain I can’t give her a free omelette, and she walks back to the buffet, grabs a plate, and fills it with three or four boiled eggs.
About three minutes later, she’s waving me over angrily from her table. All her cold eggs have been smashed apart on the plate.
Guest: “These aren’t what I want! I want the flat eggs!”
Me: “Sorry, you want the flat eggs?”
I’m thinking maybe that’s a style of cooking eggs in the US.
Guest: “Yes, the flat eggs! Like that one!”
She points to the omelette on the next table, where there are also some empty eggshells.
Guest: “Mine came out round! I want flat!”
Me: “To clarify, when you say flat, you mean like that?” *Points to the omelette.*
Guest: “Yes!”
Me: “Omelettes need to be made at the omelette station. They don’t just come out of the egg like that.”
Guest: “Then why does that table have flat eggs and eggshells?!”
Me: “Because they had both an omelette and some boiled eggs, which are the same as the round eggs you have.”
Guest: “Well, how was I supposed to know that!?”
That’s right. She’s never seen an omelette MADE. She thought because there were empty eggshells on the other table, that omelettes came packed and cooked up inside an eggshell, and that when you crack one open… it folds down onto the plate, I suppose?
After I explained this:
Guest: *Holding up the plate of smashed eggs.* “Well then, what the h*** am I supposed to do with this?”
Me: “I can bring you some mayo and boom, you got yourself some egg salad.”
She did not take me up on my offer.
