This is hilarious!<BR><BR>Smothered &<BR>On a Bed of<BR>sounds like foul (or fowl) play is involved<BR><BR>"done to perfection", don't know why but it grates on my nerves.<BR><BR>I also can't stand it when the butter is too hard to spread - like they didn't know we were coming tonight and forgot to take it out of the fridge.

Madre - Your question prompted me to do what I should have done some time ago, namely to resort to my bookshelf and find out once-and-for-all exactly what those terms mean. So, according to Larousse Gastronomique:<BR><BR>Nage derives from cooking shellfish in a court bouillon, e.g., Crayfish (Ecrivesses?) a la Nage. (So you were pretty much correct - "swimming" in broth.) I've most often seen the term used apparently incorrectly to refer to a broth or soup of some kind, as in "Nage of Spring Vegetables".<BR><BR>Tuile refers to a thin cookie-like pastry formed around a rolling-pin while still warm so as to take the shape of a curved tile (tuile).<BR><BR>I can only assume they must pay someone to stay up all night scouring old books to find this stuff.

What about the newest fad of giving restaurants a one-word name: "Balance," "Fins," "Fork," etc. Next it will be "Untitled" or "Nude Descending the Staircase" or some other theft from modern art.

I hate it when they ask, "Do you want fries with that?"<BR><BR>If I wanted fries with my Big Mac I woulda asked!

It's not a term but a practice. There is a popular restaurant that now requires your credit card information when you make a reservation. This way if you don't show up they will charge your credit card $ 100. Like they wouldn't fill the table anyway?

Hey "waiter ([email protected])" <BR><BR>That's not it. But thanks for being condescending. I was a maitre d' once, and we never greeted people like that. We always greeted them, by well, saying "Hello, how are you doing this evening?". That always prompted them to say, "Pretty good. We have reservations for 2 at 7:30pm."<BR><BR>Worked every time. In fact, the boss taught us this technique and sure enough, it worked flawlessly.<BR><BR>Greeting people with "Hello". Gee, what a concept.

Cranberry-infused.<BR>

Gee,<BR>It's a toss-up for me between<BR>"Hottle of Coffee" OR<BR>I actually saw this on a menu in Lake Tahoe coffee shop, "Fruit salad on a bed of (something) COMPLEMENTED with <BR>date nut bread? Complemented?<BR>Also, another term that I've seen<BR>in some of those nouveux type restaurants was:<BR>"Purses" of pasta or purses of veal or<BR>purses of something. I thought a purse was something that one carried.<BR><BR>But the most hysterical evening was when the waiter rattled off like five specials, and we ordered fish or something and his question was, "Can I GET a temperature recommendation from you for the chef?" Literally translated I guess he meant how would I like it cooked.<BR>Yep, those restaurant experiences are indelibly etched in my brain.

"Enjoy!"

Oh, thank you so much, people! This is all wonderful. <BR><BR>I've got another -- "my pleasure." Maybe it's just here in the South, but it's a variation on "no problem." It's actually not a bad thing for a server, maitre d', hostess, concierge, etc. to say IF said sincerely. But it tends to be said rapidly with very perfunctory intonation and sometimes even a scowl: "mahplayzhr."<BR><BR>(Re: "gently grilled" -- I just didn't have enough French to translate. Of course it's silly. How would one "roughly" grill something?)