Tom's Food Gripes

As promised, below are Tom's ten strongest food gripes:

• Being dismissive of any sort of food – We all do it. One of the joys of food is having your eyes opened to something you previously dismissed/hated and being genuinely surprised by it
  


• Rudeness to staff – I once witnessed the most truly atrocious behaviour, in an unsavoury show of rudeness at a pizza chain restaurant: clapping, clicking fingers and even whistling to summon staff. Totally unacceptable behaviour from a child, never mind someone who’s rolling around in a hundred grand Porsche (as it was in this case)...
  


• Rudeness from staff – in direct contradiction to the above; sometimes you wonder how people who work in a service-based industry believe they can behave towards customers in the insolent, arrogant manor they do
  


• Bovril –the smell and taste alone is enough to put you over the edge, and whilst I accept people who consume it seem to have some sort of connection with it, I cannot stand the stuff
  


• Twiglets – in snack land there are two ways to go: if you are in a certain type of pub, then it's pork scratchings all the way; if you're at a party then it's Doritos or Kettle Chips-style crisps. Put these back with the fondue sets
  


• Pesto – you may love it. I don't
  


• Black pepper – I’m as much a fan of food as theatre as the next person, but why am I deemed as being incapable of putting my own measure of black pepper on my pasta, pizza etc..?
  


• Plastic pub grub – there’s absolutely no need for any pub to microwave some mash, gravy and sausages. We're here for the food, and this is totally inexcusable
  


• Cheap Butter – the ultimate false economy. Imagine what their Hygiene is like...
  


• The compulsory service charge – not so much a food gripe, as a society gripe. I have no problem with this in the US, where there is no minimum wage and staff have to work bloody hard for their living, but in the UK we have a minimum wage. It can also encourage woeful levels of service: they rely on the fact that most people don't make them take it off out of politeness