vedette

Just came back from a couple of weeks in areas in which there are lots of American tourists and lots of waiters who speak a fair amount of English. We discovered that when they ask you how you want your meat cooked, they may interpret your answer according to where they think you are from. So, "a point" was frequently far more cooked than in the past, far beyond American "medium rare." In one restaurant, we got into a discussion with the waiter. He in effect said "well, there is French 'a point' and there is American/English 'a point.' Personally, I don't care what they call it (could just as well use numbers), but they problem now is there is no standard to rely on. "A point" or "saignant" or whatever will vary from place to place, waiter to waiter. If the waiter speaks very good English, or the client speaks very good French, I suppose it can be hashed out in advance, but a lot of people may get both confused and frustrated.

FainaAgain

Are you saying they don't just flirt, they cook too?

Nora_S

"Bleu" still worked fine for me.

Neopolitan

Add me to those who say "bleu" and always end up happy with it. But I still often get the phrase, "that's uncooked beef" whenever I order steak tartare.

But I understand your frustration. This trip I've finally discovered that the kind of coffee I want in the morning is a "noisette", an espresso with just a bit of milk. So I was shocked one morning when I ordered that and the waiter brought me a big cup of coffee (a grand creme, I suppose). When I said I didn't think that's what I had ordered, he responded something like, "you're American aren't you? That's how Americans like their coffee."

FainaAgain

Do you think anti-American sentiments turned into spoiling food?