Waiters Make Sacrifice for Honor of Serving 'Wine Spectator' Blowhard

783

Jessica

08/17/06 09:12AM

Filed to: Food & Restaurants

This image was lost some time after publication.

Wine Spectator editor, publisher and chairman Marvin Shanken recently wrote about going to dinner with three friends; the bill for the evening was $1500 ($300 on food, $1200 on wine). His tip? $150. Shanken's rationale was that he tipped $60 for the food (a decent 20%) and $90 for the wine (an indecent 7.5%). But from the perspective of us common folk, it still adds up to a nasty 10% tip for a waiter who spent the entire night gently licking the wealthy, wide asses of Shanken and his guests.

According to GQ epicurean Alan Richman, Shanken admitted his tipping cruelty in the latest issue of Wine Spectator:

The purpose of his declaration, ostensibly, was to encourage a lively discussion of tipping. Such a dialogue could have been useful, but what he really did was proclaim himself one of the most loathed of restaurant patrons, a rich guy who stiffs the help.

But for the sake of editorial! Are we to believe that his server cannot appreciate sacrifice for the sake of thought-provoking editorial content? What's the harm of collecting a few food stamps in the grand scheme of quality bon vivant literature?

Big Tipper [BlogGQ]

The following replies are approved. To see additional replies that are pending approval, click Show Pending. Warning: These may contain graphic material.

Felix Jessica 08/17/06 03:32PM

Let's say a party comes in, spends $300 on food and $450 on wine, and leaves a $150 tip — that's 20%, no one's complaining. Now $450 is a hell of a lot of money to spend on wine, so I should imagine that the server would actually be very happy with the tip. I really don't see why the tip should start heading into the stratosphere when the price of the wine does.

Or to put it another way: suppose that Shanken had arrived with two $600 bottles of wine from his personal cellar, and paid, I dunno, $50 in corkage. Should he tip on the $50 corkage, or on the $1200 value of the wine? Or on the $2500 that the wine would have cost if it had been on the wine list in the restaurant?

Clare Jessica 08/17/06 08:33AM

Marvin Shanken is an absolute dick, and bravo to Alan Richman for calling his ass out in print. True story: A few years ago, I saw Shanken in Michael Mina's restaurant in the Bellagio. I was sitting at the table next to his, and when my meal was done, I passed by his table and quietly said, "Pardon me for interrupting your meal, Mr. Shanken, but I wanted to tell you that I really like your magazine." Instead of saying "thank you," or "I'm glad," he looked at me as if I had just vomited on him, GRUNTED at me and turned back to his table.

Um, correct me if I'm wrong, but if a cute 21-year-old girl recognizes you as the editor of a snooty wine magazine and gives you a compliment, YOU DO NOT GRUNT AT HER.

pipharper Jessica 10/31/06 02:22AM

I'm commenting on this way late, but I came upon this while searching for Alan Richman here, the most horridly pompous, disturbingly egocentric blowhard I've ever read in my life. As a server at a fairly famous restaurant I could give two shits about the one guy that leaves $150 on an expensive meal. A lot of people, rudely, don't tip on the wine. It's really not that difficult to open, and in this case probably, decant a couple of expensive bottles of wine, I guess. No one ever has a guarantee on tips based on costly wine (unless the party is 5 or more), though it is expected; it's not incredibly crushing. Dissapointing, yes, but not nearly as dissapointing as Alan Richman's vile article in GQ this month painting a negative portrait of New Orleans dining scene. He completely tears apart respectable, decent, and even excellent restaurants and the people that work for them. In a situation like this, where a city has been destroyed, has neither the funding nor population to rebuild, or even the will to, especially considering the greatest task at hand is to make, you know, levees that work, and all this fucktard can do is come here during the slow and hot summer months, return to New York and bash the town in America that most needs tourism to return and publishes the article right as busy season starts for restaurants.

That guys a fucking asshole, whether he knows how to tip or not.

Also, if you can't afford to tip on the wine, buy a cheaper bottle of wine. I don't care what you edit you won't taste the difference between a $500 bottle and a $250 bottle.

JackieTreehorn Jessica 08/17/06 08:32AM

Wonder what Mel Gibson would have to say about this.

Perhaps even more odious than Marv stiffing the waiter is that he felt it necessary to tell us how much he spent. You spent how much, Marv? Well, that's downright scandalous! I always wondered if you were wealthy; now I know.

Thanks for clearing that up.