Waiter to the Rich and Shameless: Confessions of a Five-Star Beverly Hills Server (23 page)

Amuse
Bouche
(French
for “amusement for the mouth.”) –
Served on a small, white, square plate
with rounded raised lines around the edges:

An
open eggshell perches delicately on a cushion of black rock salt and is filled
with fluffy scrambled organic egg, flavored with a hint of wild truffle and
topped with a dab of black caviar.  The plate is sprinkled with shavings of
fresh black truffle, a dab of crème fraiché on the side garnished with fresh
wild chives, and a tiny silver spoon to scoop out the egg. An amuse bouche is
usually one bite, maybe two. If it doesn’t amuse the hell out of you to pay a
butt load of money for one bite, you’re not alone.

First
Course (Two Options)
–
Elegantly served on a medium-sized, oval, black glass plate with specks of gold
leaf:

1. 
A terrine of farm-raised duck,
organic brown lentils and chopped leafy winter greens. The terrine is
accompanied by a fresh fig, halved and spread apart into a delicate design with
squares of port and black pepper gelée.

2. 
Chilled Maine lobster tail served
in the shell, topped with sweet, tender Dungeness crab meat.  On the side is a
trio of white and purple, lightly buttered, roasted baby potatoes, as well as a
string of braised wild leeks and a small scoop of Hackleback sturgeon caviar.

Second
Course (Two Options) –
Served
in a medium-sized, white china pasta bowl with gracefully rounded, swirled
ridges:

1. 
A
sunchoke-stuffed homemade ravioli served with a light Compté cheese sauce,
salted pork belly and tiny Brussels sprouts.  (Sunchoke is the tuber of a type
of sunflower, with a flavor somewhere between an artichoke and a potato.)

2. 
A brothy saffron and Prince
Edward Island mussel soup drizzled with a garlic and spinach puree and topped
with a dusting of olive oil-roasted breadcrumbs.

Sorbet/Palate
Cleanser Course –
Served
in a fluted crystal cup atop a matching crystal saucer with a cloth doily:

Yuzu
citrus and lemongrass sorbet, meant to cleanse the palate of strong flavors and
prepare for the main course, which follows.

Entrée
Course (Three Options) –
On
an exquisite white china plate with a modern angular rim:

1. 
An aged prime beef ribeye cap,
the most tender cut available, accompanied by a caramelized onion mousse and a
mound of sautéed black trumpet mushrooms garnished with a touch of roasted
hazelnuts.

2. 
A European turbot fish cooked on
the bone, served with a green baby spinach and herb risotto, crispy frog legs
and lemon Marcona almonds.

3. 
A beautiful oven-braised veal
osso buco with flageolet bean cassoulet.  Prepared with prosciutto and a slight
trace of roasted fennel.  (“No, sir, you may not substitute a Kobe burger with
fries. No.”)

Dessert
Course (Two Options) –
On
a luminous jade square plate with speckled gold inner rim and an inch-thick
toasted dark brown rim:

1. 
A lemon pain de
genes, which is a
lemon
almond cake
layered
with vanilla
panna cotta
(Italian for “cooked cream”) and a thin layer of lemon curd, topped with baked
meringue and candied lemon zest.

2.
 A 40% Valrhona chocolate cake
with a layer of coffee cream and a scoop of caramel ice cream on the side,
garnished with a vanilla/dark chocolate wafer stick.  (“No, ma’am, we do not
have pumpkin pie with Cool-Whip topping.”)

After
this mouth-watering presentation, I had to admit maybe for the first time ever,
I was really impressed with the menu and the presentation of the courses.  I
mean, people were paying a pretty penny for this dinner but they were mostly
shelling out for the privilege of celebrating in the Cricket Room.  That’s how
I usually felt about the food there – that it was not the star performer you
would expect for the prices.  But that night our new chef had really stepped it
up more so than on any other holiday I’d worked in the past ten years.  Maybe
we wouldn’t be bombarded with stupid requests for substitutions. It has always
driven me crazy when some spoiled brat celebrity or just plain ignorant tourist
is not willing to try something they don’t eat at home.

Timing
a six-course meal was always tricky as hell, especially because most of the
tables were larger parties of six or more and people just couldn’t sit still on
New Year’s Eve. They were always moving around, switching seats, talking with guests
at other tables, stepping outside to do whatever. We also got incomplete
parties with people starting their six-course dinners at different times, which
really sucked.  Once a table’s order had been sent into the kitchen machine, it
created a lot of confusion if you added to it or changed it.  Plus, when you went
into the kitchen to explain, you quickly realized that all the chefs were
stressed out and didn’t want to even hear your voice or look you in the eyes,
because you might just have a guest request that’s gonna stress them out even
more.  A waiter has to take control of their table and keep changes to a
minimum or chaos in the kitchen will ensue. Unfortunately, taking control
didn’t mean we could just bitch-slap guests and tell them to sit the fuck down.
Wanted to, though.

Each
person’s course also had to be served with the correct cutlery.  I’m sure
you’ve been to restaurants where you had to ask for a soupspoon or a steak
knife because the server didn’t bring it, but that was out of the question at
the Cricket Room, where five-star service was our raison d’etre. 

I
pitied the sorry bastard who messed up his order that night when things were so
tightly choreographed, but there was bound to be someone, that was for sure.
You had to be on top of your game with your eyes on your tables at all times,
even when the guests were playing musical chairs and making cocaine runs to the
bathroom every thirty minutes. 

Miraculously,
my night went off without any problems.  All my guests were served on time,
every course was served correctly, and there were no complaints at all.  As a
matter of fact, I did have a couple of joiners who were two courses behind
their hosts but I let them catch up by stalling the other people’s courses just
a little bit at a time. I have always taken pride in being able to maneuver,
manipulate, and strategize like a battlefield general.  Most guests have no
idea of the timing, planning and logistics that my job requires.  Great service
is a thing of beauty and one of the few relics from a gentler past that we
should try to save for the sake of civilization.

Poor
Shakil – a sweet guy but he always had trouble. He managed to screw up the
table of Mr. Ealy Ortiz, the owner of Mexico’s biggest newspaper, and his nine
guests. Mr. Ortiz had brought his whole family in for the evening, no doubt to
show off his ability to pay for such an elite dining experience. They had
ordered special meals in advance and something had gone wrong because half of
their table was done eating when the other half got their food.  Not very
impressive.  Shakil got stiffed, no tip on a $20,000 ticket.  The manager
wouldn’t let him add the tip in even though it was a large party, because the
service got screwed up so badly.  That’s heartbreaking to a waiter. Fuckups
like Shakil have feelings too.

By
the time dessert rolled around at my tables, we were just starting to hand out
party favors and glasses of Piper Heidsieck.  The absolute best thing about New
Year’s Eve is that on this one night at around midnight the managers let us
have one glass of champagne each.  But to me and Jens, of course, that meant we
had free license to drink as much as we could possibly get our hands on.  Just
like the guests, we dressed up in party hats, with horns in our mouths and
noisemakers in our hands, and we joined in the fun.  I did keep my eye on the
prize long enough to set down the checks on all of my tables first; this was
the critical time when you had to keep an eye on people. They might think they
have already paid and decide to go dance in another room or simply just not
return. You usually don’t have scammers at this level, but I don’t trust anyone
with that much money at stake.  I actually ended up with an extra table – I
took one of Germaine’s ‘cause as usual, he was busy talking to someone –
running his mouth – and neglected the table.  I didn’t transfer it back to him
either, I kept it, and therefore kept the tip.  Maybe that would teach the fat
ass blowhard a lesson.

After
I’d collected all my checks and closed them out at around 1:00 am, Jens,
Ariella and her boobs and I hit the champagne.  Hard. We’d secretly stashed
several glasses in a side cupboard that we were actually supposed to give to
the guests.  It was easy to do since management over-poured by about twenty
glasses.  We entered the kitchen to hug the cooks and chefs – everyone was
getting drunk so there were no inhibitions or grudges in sight. Jens had
secretly dusted our glasses of champagne, God love him. Everybody loved
everybody on New Year’s Eve. Shakil the Muslim didn’t drink, though he really should
have.  His face was as long as a fiddle ‘cause he missed out on a $3,000 tip. 
What can I say, only the strong will thrive, baby! 

For
these few minutes of freedom, we all just hugged and danced. The chefs broke
out all the amazing leftovers we had barely tasted at the beginning of the
night.  We feasted on duck terrine, chilled Maine lobster, turbot, and plenty
of veal osso buco. The gays were all chatting, hugging, and kissing in their
own corner, tossing sparkly shit in the air.  I went over and gave them all a
big hug, getting sparkles all over my uniform.  Macho Matt had grown a big boy
mustache and looked like Freddy Mercury, and Daniel belted out “Happy Days Are
Here Again,” a Barbra Streisand tune, as I squeezed him. Stereotype much?

I
bumped into
Á
lvaro, the old wiry fucker with
the dyed hair who had made it back from the dead, so I hugged him very
carefully since I didn’t want to crack him in half.  His casket was probably
parked in the lot somewhere. Amy came in and I gave her a hug praying that she
would keep her breath to herself.  The truth was I loved them all – they were
like my family.  For the past ten years, I’d been spending almost forty hours a
week with them. Working teams become close in spite of differences that would
not normally be overcome, simply because we shared our life events, good and
bad; gay, straight, male, female, Muslims, Christians, we all had ups and downs
that bonded us together. We also shared the pride of working in a beautiful hellhole
that was the most iconic and historic restaurant, maybe in the whole world. We
were all proud of that, whether we admitted it or not.

Mr.
P walked in and we hugged.  I could tell he’s straight as an arrow.  “Good yob
tonight, Polli.  I was watching jew, jew had control, Güey,” he said.

“Hey,
in another ten years I’ll be as good as you – watch out,” I said, and we laughed.

I
gave Shakil a big hug – he seemed to be feeling okay by then even though he’d
only made about six hundred bucks.  He was undoubtedly disappointed but you
have to roll with the punches. That, as they say, is show biz.

I
ended up grossing thirteen hundred bucks. Not the best I’d ever done by any
means, but nothing to flinch at, that’s for sure.  Hookers, drug dealers, pole
dancers, strippers, and waiters like me could make that much cash money in one
night, but not many white-collar, college-educated, Volvo-driving,
loafer-wearing, cappuccino-drinking, organic food-eating dandies could.  But
unfortunately for me, every night isn’t New Year’s Eve.

Vino
walked in and presented me with a small glass of MX Beckstoffer To-Kalon Cabernet. 
It was leftover from my eight-top of Brazilian millionaires.  It paired
wonderfully with the veal and even the duck terrine.  But wait a minute – where
was Jens?  I had lost track of him and started to wonder if he was doing bumps
in the walk-in fridge, or maybe he was on the phone planning an after-party.  I
searched the dry storage room where the chef kept bags of onions, rice, oats,
pasta, and the like.  And there was my friend and mentor.

I
couldn’t fucking believe it!  Jessica Rabbit was on her knees with her pouty mouth
wrapped around his lollipop, giving him the Holy New Year’s Eve, Batman,
blowjob of the century.  Jens’s skinny, blindingly white butt was as naked as
the day he was born.  He turned around smiling uncomfortably; more of a grimace
than a grin, like “Great timing, buddy.”  I laughed awkwardly and shut the door
quickly.

Ahhh,
the bad old days. Little Pauli had no sense of loyalty; I looked down and
wondered,
is that a carrot in my pocket or are you just happy to see that? 
Even
though I had a steady girlfriend, a small part of me kind of felt left out.  I
silently toasted him:  
Here's to a new year, guy. Will we be standing here
this time next year?
I was beginning to hope not.

Every
waiter sees things he’d rather forget, but almost any night at the Cricket Room
could qualify for the Olympic Hall of Shame.  The great Shakespearean-level human
tragedy plays itself out daily on a grand scale.  Whenever and wherever you
gather the top tier of affluent society in one place – and it’s a place in
which they can have just about anything they want – you have to expect some
kind of circus to ensue.  Of course, awful things happen to regular people all
the time, but when they afflict the cultured, coiffed, and catered-to
celebrities and Jon Lovitz “Master Thespian” moguls we serve, somehow it becomes
more dramatic. Or maybe just funnier to an acerbic witness such as yours truly. 
In any case, they certainly do fall from spectacular heights and it’s amusing
to watch, not because the tragedy isn’t real – it often is – it’s just that most
of our rich and shameless guests take themselves so seriously it’s hard not to
mock them. Many of their best bloopers could be categorized as one or more of
the Seven Deadly Sins (Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy, and Pride). 
I’d have to say that lust topped the charts.

Amber
Lynn, the legendary porn actress, came in one evening accompanied by a couple
of guys dressed in business suits.  It all started innocently enough, but after
a few drinks things were getting rowdy on table 44 and they were yelling across
the dining room like they thought they were on the set of
Amber Fucks the
Third Fleet
. Mr. P decided to move them into the private dining room where
guests like Prince, Al Pacino, and others have preferred to dine in dignified
seclusion. They made perfect use of the long, beautiful oval oak table with
mahogany and ebony inlays.  Amber got butt-naked and the men who’d come in with
her were doing vodka shots out of her belly button and snorting lines off her Mega-breasts
by Monsanto
®
. Even though the doors were
closed and you could not see in from the dining room, several members of the
staff were peeking through the window from a hidden corner of the garden area
and it was fantastically sleazy.  Of course, we only watched to make sure they
were getting good service; we were concerned, as always, for the well-being of
our guests. I mean, she could put an eye out with one of those things. You
can’t be too careful. I don’t think Amy, our only female server, joined the
peeping Toms, though she was more or less shaking her head in disgust through
most of it. She just told us to make sure we disinfected the table. “Waiter!
Alcohol swabs, stat!”  By lunchtime the next day, our old sommelier was fired,
one of our hosts was let go, and two waiters were suspended -- their prize for
committing two Deadly Sins at once:  lust AND envy.

Speaking
of fantastic (we were, weren’t we?), Jenna Jameson, another famous porn star, was
in with her boyfriend of the month one night. Before dessert, they made a
detour through the hallway by the lobby and had steamy sex behind a
too-small-to-hide-anything fire extinguisher case. One of the cooks was smoking
a cigarette near a back passageway into the restaurant when he got to see the
action first hand. He said it was better than on film. She has even mentioned the
event in an interview so I know he wasn’t just projecting, so to speak. Why he
didn’t alert anyone else, or share his view, I couldn’t tell you.  Maybe he
couldn’t walk.  Jens was pissed.

Amber
and Jenna can make a man hungry for more, but a nicely dressed Bel Air woman in
her late 50s made everyone nauseous.  She was sitting at Don’s bar (which used
to also be mine) drinking her second Grey Goose martini, sucking on the olives,
when a strange look came over her face. We all knew this cougar because she’s
the same plastic surgery face that used to try to court me many years earlier
when I was behind the bar. A few more facelifts and she now looked like if you
touched her face, it would pop like a balloon. Kiss her and you’d get a
mouthful of collagen. Scary. She briskly paid her bill and got up to walk out,
wobbling a bit on her spike heels. Just a minute or so later Mr. P noticed a
trail of putrid brown stuff all the way from the bar through the lobby and out
to the women’s restroom. He was baffled and asked Ron if there was a service
dog at his bar that had left recently.  As he was asking, he noticed a nasty
smell and a small pile of what appeared to be feces on the bar stool. The
Hansel & Gretel crap trail was visible and plentiful all the way out to the
lobby and into the bathroom. Mr. P called security to wait in the lobby to see
if the poor woman was all right. I mean, don’t you shit yourself when you die
suddenly? When she came out, she was surprised to be greeted by security
officers, said she was fine as if nothing had happened, and called the valet to
get her car.  She just wanted out of there as soon as possible. If this one
isn’t the sin of pride, it’s the opposite and it’s still funny.  Later it was a
sorry sight – our poor cleaning crew on their hands and knees with surgical
masks scrubbing that long strip of carpet. The barstool was immediately removed
and carefully de-stooled.  We never saw her again after that, so at least she
had the good sense to be embarrassed. Who knows, maybe her plastic surgeon
pulled her face up so tight her asshole broke loose.

Since
we’re on the subject of talking shit, Kiefer Sutherland – a “Lost Boy” who used
to be a favorite of mine – came in with some friends, expressing his dismay
with the Hollywood executives who were contemplating the conversion of some of
his favorite old films to 3D. Kiefer was in a feisty but playful mood that
night, and asked our busboy, who went by the nickname of Anglo, if he liked
Communism.  Anglo said he thought it was good for some countries but not for
America.  Kiefer came back with, “How do we know if we don't try it first?” 

Anglo
replied, “I just don't think it would work here, that's all.”

By
the way, Anglo was the only Caucasian busboy I had ever worked with, which
explains his nickname. He was only about twenty-three at the time and he really
didn’t know who he was talking to.  Kiefer playfully taunted him: “Oh yeah, you
want to fight about it?”

Anglo,
trying to keep it light, jokingly replied, “Yeah, sure, I get off work in about
three hours, I’ll see you outside!”

As
Anglo proceeded to pour water for the other guests, Keifer suddenly reached
over and inexplicably swatted him in the balls. Anglo cringed, spilling water
on the table, and gave Sutherland a dirty look. Seemingly playfully, Kiefer
stood up and said, “Let’s go, now, come on, let’s go.”

Anglo
walked away, angry and bewildered at why a rich guy would be picking a fight  with
a busboy in a five-star restaurant. Once he got back to his station, and Germaine
told him that the person he was about to fight was movie star Kiefer Sutherland,
he decided to let it go.  Was Mr. Sutherland just buzzed and really didn’t mean
to swat the guy as hard as did, or was he being a jackass and picking a fight
for no reason? Whatever the reason, Anglo was almost ready to lose his job over
it. I kinda would have liked to see how it would have gone down. Lots of movie
stars who play tough guy parts think they’re actually tough. They quickly
forget that it’s usually stuntmen who do the hard stuff, while the stars sit in
makeup chairs drinking imported water like the pussies they are. Some movie
stars have huge, prideful egos; in other breaking news, the sun rose in the
east today.

Although
Hollywood is the most egocentric place on earth, its headlines are usually
ruled by celebrities’ Freudian ids running wild. Britney Spears was in one
night with her two assistants at the time. Where do you take your boss when
she’s the hottest news topic around but accidentally decided to shave her head
bald? To the safe haven of the Cricket Room in a hurry! I served the three of
them – including Britney in her Marilyn Monroe wig – some sodas at a table in
the garden where they were trying to hide her on a chilly night whilst trying
to figure out what to do with her. Before I knew it she was up roaming around,
glassy-eyed with a strange, blank stare. I watched her as she slinked out of
the restaurant and meandered around the lobby, gazing absently into the
distance. I went back to the table with the check and her assistants asked me
if I knew who they were with. I said yes but with a questioning look like:
Why
the hell is she wearing that wig? Halloween was four fucking months ago
.
They both looked exhausted and one of them said to me, “You’ve got to help us
keep an eye on her.”

I
had no idea at that time what was going on but I replied, “I’m your waiter. I
bring you drinks and food. You can chase her around; I can’t help you with that.”
She got up, shot me a dirty look and walked in Britney’s direction while the
other one paid the check. The next night Britney was in the lobby, wearing her
wig and had some shady looking dude by her side.  They were both smiling and
she shouted out a “Hey!” to Mr. P and me. I replied, “Hey!” but I could see
that her eyes were still looking totally crazy. I thought she was going to come
back in but she never did. Never saw her again, though I read plenty about that
incident later.  Perhaps she wasn’t being gluttonous, exactly, but she definitely
appeared to have overindulged in something.

At
the other end of the spectrum are those lucky souls who not only hit the
genetic lottery but have the talent and savviness to back it up.  One early
evening on table two I served
Don
Miami Vice
Johnson and Michael Krupin (an eccentric regular who drank
Belvedere over crushed ice, served in a large red wine goblet with Perrier),
who was Don’s good friend and insurance advisor. After Krupin convinced Don to
order one of his bizarre concoctions, Don started bragging about buying a
residence on Broadway in New York City for $6M and before he could even fully
move in, some geek with a Band-Aid on his glasses knocked on his door and
offered him $12M.  Don greedily sold it just like that. Wouldn’t you? I know
what you’re thinking: “Wow! That happens to me all the time!” Sure, me too. But
he’s always been a lucky dude; he’s the son of a farmer, starred in not one but
two popular TV shows, one of which he wrote. Plus he sued the studios and won a
$15 million copyright settlement.  He must be one of very few to beat the
studios.

One
of the few in that same fortunate category, George “Aren’t I Great Looking”
Clooney came in with his Italian girlfriend of the moment, Elizabetta Canalis,
whom I had the pleasure of escorting to the ladies room.  Her low-slung jeans
revealed a fancy tattoo at the top of her butt.
Nice tramp stamp, honey!
When she got back she nearly choked on her water because Clooney had switched
it out for vodka.  Vanity isn’t a Deadly Sin and neither is tomfoolery, but Clooney
scores high on both.  Known for being a practical joker, he and his guests were
laughing pretty hard at his little prank. Apparently Elizabetta doesn’t drink
and he was trying to liven her up a bit.  She was not all that amused and she
also seemed annoyed at all the people who kept coming up to their table all
night trying to talk to Clooney.  He was very gracious about it so the staff
didn’t interfere. Or maybe it was the trick that had pissed her off.

Unlike
Clooney’s ex, some people appreciate the many blessings of Bacchus.  Later that
evening out in the garden I had the pleasure of serving Mr. Khaledi, the owner
of Darioush wines. He is an older Persian gentleman, very refined. There were three
Persian couples all together and they were loud and lively and even though I
couldn’t understand much of their conversation, I could tell that these were
good people with good family values and certainly a decent taste in wine.  I
wouldn’t say outstanding wine taste though, since they had brought four bottles
from their own home cellar which, surprise, were all coincidentally by Darioush.
At the time, we carried his wines and served the merlot for $25 per glass. Some
might accuse him of the sin of greed, but who can blame the man for not wanting
to pay top dollar for his own wine.

With
the wine, they enjoyed several fruit and cheese assortments and a couple of
soufflés for dessert. Corkage fee was $35 a bottle unless we had your wine on
our list, then we charged the same price as on the wine list, but it had to be
the same vintage exactly. We didn’t have the vintages they were drinking so I
charged $140 to open the four bottles. In case you are thinking this is a
ridiculous practice, let me assure you that all good restaurants use this
method to discourage guests from bringing in their own wine, even if they own a
winery.

In
the midst of their casual enjoyment, little did they know that sitting in a
booth just thirty feet away was one of Mr. Khaledi’s good Persian friends and
fellow winemaker, one of the creators of Mithra wines. There he was, adulterously
smooching with a girl who looked nothing like Mrs. Mithra, when he was suddenly
struck with the fear of God in his eyes. I believe he almost crapped his pants
when he heard the Khaledis speaking Farsi nearby and laughing.  I’m sure they
all knew his wife. He could not exit the garden without passing them so he sat
there for hours longer than he had intended to, just praying to God they did
not get up to walk around or stretch their legs. Finally, he couldn’t stand it
any longer and made his date walk out ahead of him.  As he passed the Khaledis’
table he amicably greeted his friends and hurried out. Busted! Karma will get
you, as many philanderers will attest.  Whether he suffered wrath at home, I'll
never know.