Alright?

Last weekend RWT and I walked to a local chain restaurant/”brewery” (although I highly doubt they actually brew any beer there) for a late lunch. We’d had a generous breakfast, so RWT wanted just appetizer-snack-type food and we figured what would be better for bar-food than a bar? Well, it ended up being one of the most unremarkable dining experiences of my life, which, ironically, made it remarkable.

As we were looking at the menu, the waitress brought a basket of soft pretzels and a little container of some type of mustard mixture. Now I’ve eaten enough ballpark pretzels not to get too excited about such things, but these pretzels defied even my paltry expectations. To use words normally only uttered by RWT in describing plain couscous: “it sucks the flavor right out of your mouth”. No discernable taste. None. I had not realized that it was possible to make flour have such little flavor. Heck, eating a spoonful of dry flour would have been a more pleasurable. And the mustard mixture tasted of nothing other than Dijon mustard. Whatever they’d mixed it with to lighten both the texture and color was obviously the same flavorless substance used in the pretzels.

From that inauspicious (and portentous) beginning, we decided to go with some artichoke & spinach dip and then split a fish & chips plate (RWT was hungrier than he thought once we got there). When they brought the dip to the table, RWT asked me if he had imagined reading on the menu that it was supposed to contain spinach or was it artichoke-only dip. The bowl of dip contained all of a half dozen pieces of spinach total and the artichokes were not any better represented. Okay, maybe it will be really garlicy…

No. The dip was amazingly devoid of flavor with just a hint of hot sour cream taste. Now RWT considers sour cream the perfect food (he says it goes with everything), but even he thought this dip lacking. It was so pitiful that the flavor of the stale corn chips threatened to drown out the few sub-atomic particles of taste present in the dip. Then our waitress stopped by the table and asked: “Does the dip taste alright?”

Aack. I never know how to answer in circumstances such as this. And what is the waitress going to do if I say “No, it is totally bereft of spinach, artichokes and flavor”? Should I offer to go back in the kitchen and fix it? Give them a better recipe? So without a better course of action I said: “Yes, it is alright.” “Alright” as in: okay, admissible, average, fair, indifferent, mediocre, not bad, ordinary, passable, so-so, sufficient, tolerable, unexceptional, unobjectionable…

Next was the fish & chips. Well, the fish had flavor and plenty of it. Unfortunately, the taste was merely testament to the days-past-its-prime, over-cooked fish abuse. The accompanying chips must have been basking under a heat lamp since the early lunch rush and the side of coleslaw was in the same category as the (non) spinach & (non) artichoke dip – deficient of any flavor other than a vague impression of dairy (oh, my kingdom for some celery seeds).

Not surprisingly, we passed on dessert since we just wanted to get home as soon as possible to brush our teeth and get the fishy flavor out of our mouths. But I highly doubt we missed anything other than cholesterol and calories since I suspect dessert would have tasted exactly like the pretzels, or the dip, or the chips, or the slaw…

I have had worse meals, with horrible tasting food, and better meals, with epiphanies of flavors, but never a meal that was just so... alright.

[For the grammarians out there (especially the venerable ones): Yes, I realize that “alright” is not an accepted standard usage (“all right” is preferred). But since “already” and “altogether” are acceptable, I don’t see why “alright” is not alright. Hence my mini-crusade in its use.]