Not Quite The Cream Of The Crop, Part 7

I have an uncle who used to work as a server in a kosher restaurant in the Jewish Ghetto, and he has told me this tale many times.

It’s important to know that, among kosher rules, there’s the prohibition of cooking dairy together with meat. And, while most places in the ghetto usually simply do not offer grated cheese and have separate cheese boards to save themselves the hassle, this restaurant my relative worked at, by virtue of being owned by a hardcore Italki couple, outright does not allow anything dairy on the menu, not even desserts.

Not that this stops people.

A party of three tourists gets a table and orders pasta. When it’s served, one of them pipes up:

Tourist #1: *In English* “This pasta looks a little… bare. Can I please have cheese?”

Uncle: “Sorry, sir, but as we are a meat-oriented kosher restaurant, we don’t have cheese. However, if you would like some more sauce, I can add some for you no problem.”

Tourist #1: “Meat-oriented kosher restaurant? Doesn’t that just mean you can’t eat pigs and have to slaughter other animals ritually? Why no cheese?”

Tourist #2: *To [Tourist #1], in German* “I mean, maybe they’re catering to the dairy-free crowd?”

Uncle: “Actually, no, it’s not kosher to have meat and cheese, or milk, served together, so we don’t have cheese. Sorry about that.”

Tourist #1: “I mean, my pasta doesn’t have meat. It’s just zucchini and egg.”

Uncle: “Sorry, sir, but we still don’t have cheese.”

Tourist #2: *In German* “If you’re going to do this because the owner doesn’t like dairy, you can just tell us. There’s no need to make stuff up.”

Uncle: *Ignoring the comment and speaking to [Tourist #1]* “Would you like some more sauce on your pasta?”

Tourist #1: *Dejected* “If you really don’t want to give me cheese… sure.”

My uncle takes the dish to the back, asks for the cook to add a little more sauce, and then serves it back to [Tourist #1], who apparently seems unimpressed by this but still eats it all.

Then, it’s dessert time… and [Tourist #3], who has not spoken a single word up to that point, tries to ask, in a heavily accented and uneasy Italian:

Tourist #3: “Can I… get… panna cotta?”

My uncle pauses, unsure whether to burst out laughing or not.

Uncle: *In English* “It means ‘cooked cream’ in Italian. As in… gekochte Sahne. You tell me. What we do have…”

And he listed the desserts they actually had. The group asked for the check and then left. My uncle found the receipt scribbled with a drawing of a middle finger and, “No cheese? No tip!” in German under it. He preserved it, for he has found it too ridiculous to throw away.

Related:
Not Quite The Cream Of The Crop, Part 6
Not Quite The Cream Of The Crop, Part 5
Not Quite The Cream Of The Crop, Part 4
Not Quite The Cream Of The Crop, Part 3
Not Quite The Cream Of The Crop, Part 2