Undeniably I cannot deny my tastes have changed as I have grown old. Gone are the days of excitement meeting friends in the Wimpy Bar in Muswell Hill, all yellow and red. The damp thin bread buns and squashed anaemic burgers. The plastic tomatoes sitting on every table holding the thin ketchup. As you fought with them to release the red stuff there was a distinctive noise as it squirted onto your chips.
Rabbit 🐇 warren alert.
I wanted a picture of the Wimpy Bar but came across this article from Time Out…oooooh I feel old. You know you grew up in Muswell Hill when. Yes Martyn’s Coffee Shop and The John Baird were there but the height of sophistication in eating out was the Wimpy Bar and St James Cafe, then a greasy spoon.
I moved onto Do Wimpy’s still exist? Yes they do! Do they have the same atmosphere? I have one near me. I am not convinced I want to go and see. You can check out your nearest Wimpy experience, in the UK, here - Wimpy UK.
Moving back onto my original topic. Have my eating out tastes changed? If I look at it from my childhood perspective v adulthood, there is no doubt my taste has changed. For example, I am more refined in how I wanted to be seated. I began to want to sit to impress not clambering over the fixed red plastic benches, to stuff my legs under the table. Now I couldn’t clamber if I wanted.
Design of Restaurants
Furnishings in restaurants dips my toe into the watery world of fads. Why do people want to get a nose bleed from sitting on high stools at high tables when eating? I could take the weight off my feet by resting my mahoosive floppy boobs on top of the stools. But there is absolutely no way my short legs could clamber up to sit down. It would be enough to put other diners off their food. I get vertigo as well. My heart sinks when I have booked a table to see these high monstrosities filling up the restaurant. Can someone please explain this fad to me?
Mahoosive boobs aside, furnishings and interior design are now an important element of the dining experience. The design, size and types of restaurant vary from the subtle to the abrasive depending on many aspects, but particularly the experience they want diners to have. Country and Town House have an article London’s Most Aesthetic Restaurant Interiors. Sansa, a Toronto based design company, go into the psychology of design on their website Designing Restaurants Mindfully, beautiful photographs. I will not repeat what they have written as there are no major surprises. I like the loss of corporate design in restaurants and the personal touches. Corporate design does have a place in chain restaurants, you feel you know what you are getting. But I like having a choice. Yippee, I don’t have to put up with neon strip lights glaring down on my anaemic burger. Yes, my taste in restaurants has changed.
Social Aspects
The design of the restaurants brings me onto the social tastes of eating out. No I wasn’t a cannibal, but couldn’t think of another way of putting it. I eat out to enjoy the company. I had a lovely lunch yesterday with a friend, the food and atmosphere matter but the company was the most important element of enjoying my lunch.
Although, I am now happy to eat alone. Something I would never have done thirty years ago. The shift eating alone from company to food changes. Obviously, I am not there for the company but the food and a bit of people watching. Seeing other people, particularly young people and families, enjoying each others’ company brings back happy memories. Ok, not rat 🐀 arsed hen or stag do’s. Last week in the Cotswolds I had the most beautiful lemon soul, I was my own, but took my time. It doesn’t feel strange any more. I sit waiting for my breakfast without any self consciousness. Yes, my social tastes have changed as I have grown older.
Cost
The prices of meals in restaurant’s has changed no doubt. Good and bad, some are so overpriced it is laughable. Gold leaf on a steak for example. WHY? But it is lovely to see very young couples, maybe in the local beefeater, able to enjoy each others company over a meal. But please talk, put your phone away. Yes, I am now able to afford more expensive restaurants. I will pay for a good dining experience, although I still lust over some that are way out of my price range, no gold leaf. Nonetheless, I don’t like being ripped off. No my taste in affordability hasn’t changed, prices have.
Food
When I was growing up Wimpy was a novelty, Pizza Express didn’t exist and the local takeaway was Fish & Chips. Food range has exploded. You can experiment with so many different tastes when you go out.
Living in London as I grew up was a bonus. I loved China Town, the smells, the tastes, the sounds, the bright colours and the ducks roasting slowly on the spits. Those experiences are now available across the country and with so many different foods and restaurants. Locally in Crouch End we had The Cresta Italian restaurant with Monty welcoming you. Then there was the Steak House in Highgate, where scampi Provençal was exoctic. All restaurants had prawn cocktail as a starter and steak as a main, with a few additions. It was not quite that bad but not much variation, unless you were a millionaire. Vegetarian food was only available as a side dish. No, my taste in food hasn’t changed but thankfully what has changed is that the range of foods is now endless and for me very welcome.
Have your tastes in eating our changed?
What are the most important aspects of eating out for you?
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Cresta Crouch End avocado prawn cocktail, steak xxxxxx, fads etc etc.
I read an article, a long time ago, about seating. Chairs are designed to be comfortable only for a certain length of time and restaurants buy accordingly, I think it is pretty common that most decent restaurants shoot for 2 turnovers per table per night. They hope for 3, but some diners like to linger. Hence the limited comfort chairs. The cane chairs are the worst or the wire ice cream/soda fountain type chairs. I think the comfort rating is 15 minutes. When I see those chairs in a restaurant all I can do is groan.
The other big factor for me is noise. Why, oh why, do high end restaurants favor open rooms with nothing to absorb the sound? We have quite a few cavernous brick-walled restaurants around here. On the other extreme, there are the pin drop silent restaurants. How very awkward.
In our area, the American food restaurants are going out of business and being replaced with various Asians restaurants. I don't get excited to try a new restaurant when I can't pronounce the name of the place. I feel insecure about ordering, let alone not knowing exactly what kind of food they have to offer. We have become absolutely inundated with Asian food: sushi on every corner, ramen or pho in every shopping strip, along with the steam-tray fast-food Chinese fair, and then the ubiquitous Mexican food and food trucks all over town. We only have 2 or 3 American diner restaurants, not counting a few chains.
To answer your question, Jo, yes my tastes have changed. I can eat up or down and be content. I'm no longer awkward in fancy restaurants. If I'm going it eat alone, it is usually fast food eaten in my car in the parking lot. Just don't want to get out and go in the restaurant! Just because the cost is so high, we don't eat out much. I have noticed, though, that while I was picky before, I absolutely refuse to eat some foods. Lima beans take a hike. Peas I tolerate better, but oh ho carrots, be gone with you! Other things I used to tolerate and big no-no's now, like stew. Just can't stomach it. Prepared foods taste more artificial than than they used to and I am preferring more wholesome and fresh fare.
And no more cane chairs if I can help it!
Loved this post, Jo! I love a nicely-presented restaurant, don't get me wrong, but two things which I prioritise over the appearance of the surroundings are 1) comfort and 2) cleanliness.
You've reminded me of a customer of the products I used to make in a previous life - glass beads. Most of my beads, being glass, were shiny, but I also had a range which I'd etched for a soft, very tactile and non-shiny finish. At one of my sales events the customer in question was drawn to them immediately, and I said 'those are new: they're extremely popular today'. Looking around at the attendees, mostly ladies of a certain age, she said 'Well, of course: they're 'menopausal matte'!!!
I've never forgotten it, and ever since then I have thought 'menopausal matte' whenever I am looking at anything that isn't shiny! 😊
In terms of shininess, then, tastes DO change as we age!