We studied the menu for about 10 minutes, shooing the waiter away several times because no decision had yet been made.
Had the waiter served us on other occasions, he wouldn’t have needed to linger. He could have told us our order. Because even as I was studying the meal choices on offer, I knew that mine was the chicken with cashews in satay sauce.
I know this because It’s always the chicken in satay sauce.
Just as I know my husband will order the sizzling Mongolian lamb and my mother the sweet and sour pork, I too always order the chicken, torn as I might be by the salt and pepper calamari.
I am uncertain when this became a tradition, but why not stick to a good thing when you know it’s worth sticking to? And yet we persist with this ritual reading, poring over the menu like it contains the key to world peace.
I am most certainly looking for something fresh, something to rival the chicken in satay sauce. There is an unheeded voice in my head (not those voices, the sensible ones that know about menus) that tells me to be adventurous, to try something different, to take a chance. But the voice never talks louder than the waiter who jots down my chicken order every time. Even if my lips mutter calamari, my finger points to the usual choice, guided like it’s hovering over a Ouija board.
If this was a Thai restaurant, the waiter would be writing down pad Thai (with chicken) for me and beef Masaman for my husband. Indian for me is chicken madras with my husband going the lamb korma or beef vindaloo and spinach naan bread (who wouldn’t?). Everyone waits for the order, has a bit of a dig, then does exactly the same.
It’s not to say that we don’t visit establishments where we haven’t yet clapped eyes on the menu, but we certainly have our favourite trio of casual international dining locations for those nights when you have used up your favourite recipes on the home front and need a last minute, quick dinner fix.
Perhaps I just don’t want to ask those questions that make me look like I don’t follow Masterchef. Perhaps it’s not worth the cash to risk something that may be below par. Or perhaps I just like chicken and satay sauce.
