The Happy Restaurant

Chapter One

There was once a small town on a lake. The sun always shone and the people were happy. 

In the town there were several eating houses, but one, a restaurant named “Home,” was more popular than all the rest. And that was for good reason. Its central location was ideal. It was well-lit and very roomy. The restaurant was welcoming, and there were many chairs and tables – all very comfortable. The staff were happy and worked well together. They didn't always agree about everything, but they knew that they were better off than those who worked in the other restaurants.

 

Almost as soon as it opened, and as soon as it agreed to pay dues, Home was accepted into the restaurant guild. It was viewed as “a welcome addition to the restaurant scene.” It brought “a perspective on food that has been absent for too long.” And that perspective was popular, and one sought by many in that town and, even moreso, in surrounding towns. So even though there were many who were opposed – especially the other restaurants in the area – Home became the meeting place for diners from all over.

But the real reason that people flocked to that restaurant was that the food was good. Everyone loved Home cooking. It was delicious. In fact it was so good that the management of the eating house, which already shared many of its recipes with other restaurants, started to package its products and sell them in retail stores, both in the town and elsewhere.

Of course some people went to the other restaurants – and some even liked what was served there – but most of those who could, ate the majority of their meals at Home. They often wrote critical reviews of the restaurant – that's what critics do, and some of those who ate there were restaurant critics – but they kept coming back anyway. They might, from time to time, go to one of the other restaurants to taste the food, but even if they had to write about one of those other places they usually did so while sitting at a table in the happy restaurant, in which they preferred to be. Sometimes they even wrote about the other places without bothering to visit them. They had overheard the conversations of their friends – friends who occasionally visited the others because they liked the food there – and that was all the information they needed. After all, if their friends said they were good, what could be wrong? In fact, some of them believed that the other places were probably better than Home, where they themselves ate, but the light was better here.

Of all the dishes served at Home, one of the most popular was the Chef's Soup – a recipe that dated back as long as anyone in his family could remember. It contained a creamy blend of green garden vegetables spiced just right with just a hint of rice to thicken it. The vegetables gave it a beautiful pastel green color, the pureed rice added body, and the spices provided a delicate flavor. It was the specialty there, and almost everybody loved it.

Almost everybody.

Warned in advance that the place wasn't what they'd like, some of the customers didn't take to the cooking there as much as that of some of the other restaurants (or at least couldn't admit that they did), but they went to this one anyway. And the managers of the competing restaurants resented the happy restaurant's success and they coveted its location. But the only way that they could achieve their wish was to drive the happy restaurant out of business and take over the site. How could they do that?

Together they arrived at a plan. And by their plan they hoped to make the customers unhappy and cause them to write terrible things about the restaurant in which they had enjoyed so many tasty meals and in which they were so welcome. The plan was simple. They would make sure there was too much salt in the soup. It would be so salty that even the employees wouldn't eat it.

It wouldn't be that hard to do. Some of the restaurant's staff – especially the waiters – had friends in the other restaurants and they were happy to help them out. All they had to do was to slip in some extra salt when the chef wasn't looking. So that's what they did.

But the chef never let anything leave the kitchen unless he had tasted it first, and he knew immediately that there was something wrong. The soup was salty. But that could be fixed quickly, and without anyone knowing. All he had to do was to add some tomatoes and potatoes and a little brown sugar and water. It wouldn't taste quite the same but most of the customers wouldn't notice. Since the waiters were involved, however, and some were on the salt team, they managed to slip the additional flavoring into a few of the bowls after they had left the kitchen.

While there were some who did, most of the customers didn't notice. A few thought there might be a slight change, but they weren't sure. They kept the change in mind, but they kept quiet and kept coming back to the restaurant.

Chapter Two

The plan hadn't worked. That didn't mean that it wasn't a good idea, but it was clear that some changes would be necessary.

It was obvious what should be done. And it wouldn't require any great variation in what they had already decided. All that was needed was to increase the amount of salt. Surely that would make the soup so bad that no one would eat it and soon the restaurant would go out of business. When that happened the location would become available for one of them to move into it.

More salt.

Okay. If that was what was necessary, that's what they would do. Dissatisfied staff members were happy to help. It took a little more distraction of the chef to allow them to slip the salt into the soup, but they found ways to do it. Even so the chef managed to discover it before any of the customers was served. With all the salt, Home's cooking wasn't the same as before. Solution? More tomatoes, more potatoes, more brown sugar, more water. Not much more, but enough so that the beautiful pastel green color was starting to get murky and the flavor was beginning to change. And some of the customers were beginning to notice. Now it was not just a slight variation, but a greater one – one that deserved a response. For the critics the response was to fault the chef for altering the soup. They had heard rumors about the salt, but they laid the blame for the change on the chef and the restaurant. They said nothing about the assault on the restaurant's reputation because they were predisposed to find fault with Home, and this gave them the chance to do so. If there was too much salt in the soup it was up to the chef to remedy that in a more acceptable manner.

The chef, of course, knew about the salt, but he could not stop the sabotage. All he could do was to try to repair the damage as it occurred. The repairs, however, became an additional source of criticism from the patrons. The customers still came, but they were more vocal in their appraisals of the chef and the restaurant. They didn't like tomatoes and potatoes anyway, and this gave them the opportunity to criticize the restaurant without offending (at least not openly) those who did like them. They, and everyone who read their reviews, took great satisfaction in the opportunity to castigate the restaurant's management for ruining the food. And they chose to find fault with all the food since they had found a reason to criticize the soup. They may have been aware of the salting, but they chose to lambaste the chef rather than ascribe any responsibility to those who put in the salt. The chef, they claimed, should have found a way to repair the soup without making so many changes in it.

The sales of all of the restaurant's other products were affected as well. There was a great effort to prevent people from buying the packaged products – opponents of the chef urged people not to buy the ones sold in the retail stores – as well as to limit attendance at the restaurant itself. The people kept coming however. In fact even more came so they could personally confirm the trouble. And the word spread about bad job done that the chef had done. However unfortunate the salting may have been, the steps taken to repair it were deemed unwarranted. That's what everybody said.

The constant criticisms had their effect. Those who made them benefited from them, because the terrible reviews that they wrote sold a lot of newspapers. But there were many others affected by what had been written. There was a rising tide of disapproval offered by those who were already predisposed to find fault with anyone who could tolerate tomatoes and potatoes – while no one seemed at all interested in the salting that had necessitated the changes made in the recipe. That salting was something that should have been anticipated and tolerated, and even that was brought about by pride displayed by the happy restaurant as well as its arrogance in taking the best location in the town. It was the chef's fault.

Chapter Three

By now, almost all of the customers were convinced that there was something wrong. Everyone else said so, especially the staffs of the other restaurants. And they should know. They were in the same business and in the same town. It was time for action.

The first complaints were brought to the restaurant guild. The guild was only too happy to accede to the suggestions of so many dues-paying members, especially since it wondered, in retrospect, whether it hadn't been too hasty in accepting Home's application in the first place. Perhaps it seemed like a good idea at the time, but it was obvious now that it had been a mistake. They had been duped. Allowing a restaurant like this one to join them had been an unfortunate, and foolish, reaction to its closure in its original location where it had lost its lease, with justifications that were unclear. Considering everything though, it was probably closed for good reason then, and similar action should be considered now. The restaurant's management ignored the rules set for them by the guild, claiming that they should not be held to requirements that were not applicable to all the other members. They protested that the guild never looked at the performance of any of the other restaurants, only at theirs.

And in an attempt to cause further damage, guild members were cautioned against any actions in concert with Home. There would be no joint advertising, no neighborhood improvement, no cooperative programs. They maintained that in any event a restaurant of that sort was out of place in that vicinity. They agreed with the guild that it shouldn't have been opened there in the first place. They had been trying to discourage such a foolish act for years before it actually took place, and now it was clear that they had been right all along.

The other establishments educated their employees about all of the faults of the happy restaurant – not that they needed to be educated since they already knew that its management was only there to take advantage of everyone else and Home, itself, should never have existed. Members of their staffs were discouraged from purchasing any of products that the restaurant marketed. Even the cooking school that it sponsored was considered off-limits. As were all the people who had, in the past, supported it.

Home appealed to the restaurant guild. The guild had a committee that considered any problems related to the business – a committee that had never accepted Home to its membership (although the town's other eating places served on it) – but without discussing any of the complaints that Home made, it debated and substantiated the charges made by all of the other restaurants in the town. That was the committee's pattern, and one that it had been following for years. In fact, the guild had several committees whose sole purpose was to review the policies and actions of Home. After all, they were responsible for the bad food in the area.

The restaurant had some advocates, though. Most of them were located in other towns – some very far away. A few local organizations were also supportive, however they were very quiet about it. They recognized that opposition to one restaurant, even one where tomatoes and potatoes were tolerated, might later be turned into actions against themselves, and they realized that it was in their own interests to make sure that those who were threatening Home didn't later turn against them. Their position was not based on idealism, only on self-preservation. Advertising it would be too risky for them to even consider.

But even those who may have been sympathetic with Home's position began to have second thoughts. Not because they doubted what was happening in and to the restaurant, but because, from a realistic point of view, it made sense not to come down too hard on the majority of eating places which might, in the future, be the only ones available. It would be better to lose one good eating spot than gain a long list of places where they wouldn't be welcome. A complete turnabout might not be advisable, but it would be sensible to go to that restaurant less frequently and to start patronizing the others. The food might not be as good, but that was not the issue.

And the message was not wasted on other patrons of Home. They stopped coming. People were willing to sell materials to the restaurant, but not to buy from it. And members of the management were scorned by other restauranteurs and banned from other towns. It didn't take long for all hope of continued success to be lost.

Chapter Four

With all the opposition to the restaurant, it eventually went out of business. Those on the staff who had participated in the salting took over the site and established their own restaurant. They dismissed all of the other members of the staff, especially the chef. In addition, they destroyed all the equipment that had been used in the restaurant before that and which had been left there. And they appealed for support to the managers of the other restaurants, and to those beyond the town, who similarly questioned the worthiness of the happy restaurant and its products. They needed new equipment, and it was the responsibility of those others to satisfy their needs. They were doing a service for all of them.

Under the new management the food was too salty for most of the patrons, especially the critics, so they stopped coming and business declined rapidly. The fare in the other establishments was also too high in sodium to attract many customers, even though the printed reviews were favorable. (The same writers who had downgraded Home were generous to them in order to justify their previous reports.) But there was general satisfaction at the elimination of the happy restaurant.

Meanwhile, the food was too salty as well in restaurants in the surrounding towns. But no one noticed or cared. There was no longer a need for the critics to continue an assault on the senses. They had moved on. There were other things on their agendas. And, once there was no longer a Home, its managers were under less pressure. People still disapproved of tomatoes and potatoes, but they moderated the tone of their objections. And a new cause for the bad restaurants had to be found. (It was probably the management of Home, even though no direct connection could be found.)

Moral: Go with the flow even if you have to kill yourself to do so.