I am not a picky eater. I am not, but my mother thinks I am. Trust me, I am not. But…I do like what I like and if I am going to enjoy what I eat, just like the next person I want my food cooked a certain way. I don’t like my steak well done when I go to a steak house, I don’t like my yolks hard when I order eggs, and I don’t like my wing burned when I go to Swiss chalet. I don’t think that is too difficult, do you?

For some strange reason, when I go to What a bagel near my condo, there is almost always an issue with my food. I don’t know what it is, but it happens there all the time.

Bagel World (also near my condo) has ‘flagels’ which are flat bagels. They use their flagels to make bagelinis. It is basically like taking a bagel, putting tuna, cheese, onion and tomato and putting it in the panini press and pushing it down into a yummy gooey sandwich of goodness. They have three or four different options of bagelinis to choose from. If you haven’t tried one, the next time you are there, you should.

A few weeks ago, I made plans with friends to have lunch at Bagel World. Because the two bagel places are so close together, a mistake was made and we ended up at What a Bagel. I was VERY disappointed because I wanted my tuna bagelini from bagel world.

I look through the menu at What a bagel and see that they have a “tuna melt”. Here is how the conversation went down with the server:

Me: The tuna melt – how is it made?
Server: it is an open faced sandwich.
Me: Is it possible to have it in the sandwich press as a closed sandwich.
Server: sure, we can do that.
Me: Can you put red onion in it?
Server: sure, not a problem.
Me: Great. That is what I will have.

So, the runner brings the food for the table, and she brings my tuna melt – an OPEN FACE sandwich with the tuna and then the crispy melted cheese on top. I look at it and say, “this is not what I ordered”. She takes it away.

The server comes back with the same plate and I repeat, “this is not what I ordered, you said it wasn’t an issue to put it in the press. And as well, there is no onion.” She takes it away, and I look at my friends and say, “all they are going to do is close it and shove it in the press.

She brings it back and that is exactly what she did. and the raw onion in a bowl on the plate. I take one look at it and say, “that is not what I ordered and I don’t want it.” The reason why I didn’t want it is because when you make a sandwich in the panini press, the cheese gets soft and melted and if the onion was “in” the sandwich, it would have been cooked. This sandwich the cheese was crispy and hard from being stuffed in the broiler and the onion was raw.

I wasn’t trying to be difficult, but if I am going to pay $10.49 for a tuna sandwich, I want it the way I ordered it and the way you said it could be done. I hated sending it back, but I really didn’t want to eat it the way it was cooked.

In the end, I ended up with a rye bagel and creamed cheese. A far cry from the craving for a bagelini that I wanted. I still haven’t had my bagelini. If you want to meat for lunch and try it out, let me know, I would love it!

Have you sent back food at a restaurant, if so, let me know what is was and why, I am curious.