The Dish

I had to go into the city today to do some reconnaissance at the Abingdon Theater, the site of the second and third stage of this year's Del Close Marathon. By this I mean looking around to see where shit is at, but I like the word reconnaissance because it makes it sound much more exciting. After popping down to the UCB offices, I decided to grab some lunch before heading back to BK, and walked around Chelsea, peering into different restaurants, when I hit upon The Dish. This was my favorite diner back when I worked at the Atlantic Theater around the corner years ago. Good food, nice atmosphere as far as diners go.

So I sat down and looked at the menu and realized that nothing looked appetizing. Suddenly the waitress appeared and I felt that weird pressure to order immediately. I don't know why I gave into this feeling, but I did. I ordered an unappealing dish called a Chicken Kabob. I regretted it immediately and pondered changing the order when suddenly my salad appeared (part of the Chicken Kabob package, apparently), so I decided to just go with it. I sipped on my iced coffee and waited and waited and waited. And waited. Apparently they have to actually kill a chicken in order to make this culinary masterpiece.

No one else was in the diner so I couldn't figure out what was taking so long and was about to ask what was up when they brought a decidedly unpleasant looking dish with yellow rice and weird pieces of chicken that looked like they had been sitting out for way too long and some burned onions and green pepper. I took one bite and realized that something was terribly wrong. I actually spit the chicken into a napkin and called a waiter over. I told them that the chicken tasted bad. And when I say bad, I mean horrible. Horrendous. Like it had been marinated in gasoline.

They were profusely apologetic and asked if I wanted to order something else, but I said no and just asked for the check for the iced coffee. When I received it, it was a whopping $5.75. Since I had partaken of the salad I apparently had to pay for it. Douchebags.

I asked if they really expected me to pay for a salad that was ostensibly part of a meal that was inedible. They said yes. I pointed out that I hoped they thought the $4 they were gouging me for was worth me never entering their establishment again. They didn't seem to care, so, dejected, I paid $7 for a half hour of wasted time and soggy romaine lettuce.

I went to Better Burger and spent another $6 on a tasteless "healthy" burger.

Amount spent: $13
Food consumed: half of a small salad and a flavorless burger
Food enjoyed: none

I promise my next post will not be about food.