The Grill Who Played With Fire

I am not one to complain without good cause but, when I had the restaurants, business always tended to take a plunge during the cold months. All eleven of them!

Prospective diners prefer to huddle up in a warm house, switch on Netflix or some other film site, -in the olden days, you would hire a video-, open a bottle of wine and order a takeaway. 

Imagine a young couple on Sunday night….

Do you have that app? Which one? 
There are so many of those, nowadays. 
I’ve heard that a few delivery services have set up shipping containers in car parks or industrial estates and turned them into kitchens where overworked chefs prepare food on order. 

In these cases, when customers order a takeaway from a reputable restaurant chain, they are unaware that it is being cooked somewhere remote, well away from the local branch.

It can take a quick phone call or a few clicks on the app and the food is ordered.

Plates out. Turn on the oven on low to warm them up.
Cutlery out. Don’t forget the napkins!
Food trays out. I love the ones with a cushion underneath.
Crack open a bottle of wine. Red with Italian. Rosé with Indian. White with Chinese.

And action!

The first half hour goes by.
The film starts to become interesting.
Getting a bit peckish. Not a morsel of food in sight!
Forty-five minutes.
Irate phone call to the restaurant.
Where’s our food? We’re starving!
“On its way right now, sir. The driver got a bit lost.”

Crack open another bottle of wine. A little cheaper than the first one.
Someone once told me that one must always drink the better wine first. Allegedly, after the first bottle, any wine will do.
Can’t resist a thin sliver of Camembert and a handful of nuts. Just to stave off our growing hunger. 
We should’ve prepared a few canapés. 
Just the other day, I explained to a friend of mine that “canapé” is also the French word for settee. Random bit of general knowledge. 
I’m so ravenous, I could eat the couch, right now, you know!

Sixty minutes after the order was placed. Knock on the door. 
Pause the film.
“That’ll be £25, sir.”
Here’s a tip for you: Get yourself a better SatNat, mate!
SLAM!

Pull. Tear. Bite.
Why do they have to wrap everything so blooming tight? 
Especially when you’re starving.

Hmmm. Do you remember what we ordered?
Er… Chinese, I think.
Enough for a family of four!

Two minutes later, settled back in front of the telly.
Munch, munch. Slurp, slurp…

Did you put the rest in the oven to keep warm?
Of course!

Some time later…

RING, RING,RING… The alarm goes off.

Blooming Heck! It’s Monday already!
No, you silly thing! It’s the smoke alarm.
Burnt offerings. We must’ve dozed off.

Missed half the film. 
It’s ok, we’ll finish watching it tomorrow night with the rest of the charred leftovers.