Let’s be honest, trips to a restaurant are a real lottery. There are so many intricate factors involved in conjuring a memorable restaurant experience. The smallest, most miniscule deviation from the norm and the whole production shuts down. Disaster is never far away, always lingering in the air, sniffing out an opportunity to plant itself at your table and watch with glee as the meal unravels.
This is not meant to seem as if it is a pessimistic view of restaurants and the eating away from home culture so famously trumpeted in modern society. It is merely an observation that a great dining experience is more often than not sheer luck or the result of factors other than the restaurant, food and staff.
Some of the dingiest, least hygienic, potential death traps I have visited for a meal have provided the most magnificent dining experiences of my life. If a place looks like salmonella with curtains but is sardine-can full every night then there must be a reason. These people are either dying regularly and have cloned themselves to attend the next night or the food served is not only edible but enjoyable enough to warrant a repeat sitting.
The Sunshine Coast of Queensland is a beautiful part of world known for its postcard perfect coastline, temperate climate, friendly people and laid-back lifestyle. It is home to some fantastic restaurants – none of which I have visited – and hosts a famous food festival held annually. It also has the world’s first ‘Ikea restaurant’.
After a vigorous session of drinking beer and gazing at the waves rolling in onto golden sands, my sister Sally, her boyfriend Rob and I decided that it was time for me to be introduced to what my sister describes as “one of the craziest restaurants on earth”. I was not disappointed.
With pokie winnings and a BYO of Oyster Bay’s finest Merlot, we strode into the local Vietnamese restaurant where we had a table booked, or so we thought. It seems that making a reservation and taking a reservation are two very different concepts. We were directed to a table which still had people sitting at it and left alone to barter with the feeding hordes. Eventually the hungry hordes departed, leaving us to sit down and review the menu.
Much like shopping at Ikea, when dining at this restaurant you are left to your own devices and have to navigate through the experience alone. The first challenge was the lack of seating. We were three strong and had two chairs. Reluctant to have another person on my lap for the duration of dinner, I searched out another chair. OK, table. Check. Chairs. Check. Crockery and cutlery. Hmmmm. No. Rob became the hunter-gatherer and returned with three plates, all different sizes and designs, and three cups, all plastic, one still with coke in it (this was washed out with water we stole off another table). The cutlery was a crude selection of spoons, knives, forks and teaspoons.
The food ordering process was a hectic one involving one part tackling a waitress, one part repeating the order ten times and one part flipping a coin and praying for the best. Our food did arrive, eventually, and when it did the quality and quantity were commendable. We had so much food and so little table space, Rob had a dish on his lap, our wine was under the table and another dish sat on the floor next to my sister’s handbag.
There are two choices for the toilet. One involves a leisurely stroll out the back, behind the building to an outhouse. The second is only taken on by the seasoned veteran, fresh cadets need not apply. This involves a stealth mission through the madness of the kitchen and a step through, yes through, a hole in the wall. Not a neatly rendered hole like a doorway, more like a hole made by a wrecking ball. Bizarre.
Restaurants like this defy all conventional wisdom on what constitutes a great dining experience. The service was non-existent, the booking was not taken, our utensils were independently sourced and the trip to the loo resembled a scene from an Indiana Jones movie. It is however one of the most enjoyable meals I have ever had, rich in flavour and worth the trip for the entertainment alone. I almost choked with laughter on my fried rice more than once and was still chuckling on the plane home the following day.
Not content to have this typical experience as their highlight this particular restaurant is raising the stakes. On a recent trip there Sally and Rob were instructed to take a seat outside. They went outside and could only take ‘a seat’ as that was the only furniture available. They spotted a tabletop and four legs lying on the ground towards the rear of the outside dining area. Not inclined to shirk a challenge they proceeded to build a table with their bare hands and this became their banquet base for the remainder of the evening.
This was truly the pinnacle of self service.
The final evolution of this restaurant was complete.
It was now the Ikea of restaurants.
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