One of my favourite columnists in “The Australian” is demographer Bernard Salt.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Many of his articles are based on observations and analysis of Australian census data, and you can tell which section of the recent census he’s been analysing.\u00a0 Other articles are on his interesting observations of collective human behavior and social trends\u00a0in modern Australia; and a recent article on restaurant menus contends\u00a0that\u00a0the social aspirations of\u00a0its\u00a0clients are reflected in menu’s\u00a0style.\u00a0 Although published last month, somehow I missed it and only read\u00a0it just recently, as it happens just after\u00a0my first experience\u00a0with a restaurant menu on a digital tablet.\u00a0\u00a0 After being seated at a restaurant table, we were each handed a small iPad – a tablet I guess, I’m a bit behind in the technology department, a late adopter you might say.\u00a0 Anyway the whole menu was on it!\u00a0 Bernard would\u00a0have loved how\u00a0it took\u00a0social pretension to a rather more sophisticated level.\u00a0 You could select whatever language you wanted – and as Australians and Brasilians were present, and all speak at least some Spanish, we agreet to have the waiter give the nightly specials in that.<\/p>\n
As a late IT adopter, I had to be shown how to select a menu section of an item from a group, click twice and then scroll from side to side, but I got the hang of it easily enough.\u00a0\u00a0 Each menu item was photographed in colour with descriptions in Spanish and the chosen alternative language.\u00a0 I noticed the photos really matched up very well with what we each received on our plates.\u00a0 Great use of technology.\u00a0\u00a0 One thing I did find a little unsettling was that you couldn’t run your eye down the whole menu and get a feel for the total offering that night; there was no little ‘specials tonight’ slip tucked somewhere to let us know that the chef found particular foods either great quality of great value at that morning’s markets…<\/p>\n
The restaurant not being very close to where we live, we hadn’t been there in a year or more, despite the interesting blend of\u00a0European and Asian\u00a0cuisines with lots of herbs and spices,\u00a0 creative presentation\u00a0and good value.\u00a0 The owner-chef’s a creative man indeed – a Uruguayan returned home, bringing\u00a0 influences from his world travels with him.\u00a0 It’s a nice alternative to the most common menu of parilla, the marvelous bbq-d meat found everywhere in this part of the world.\u00a0 The Uruguayan national palette is very bland, so although the food is nearly always\u00a0tender and\u00a0 wholesome, it’s never spicy, hot or creatively assembled on the plate.\u00a0 Typical Uruguayan restaurant menus are gradually including or even giving way to creative changes,\u00a0exactly equal to changes in\u00a0dining out when I was a young thing: we were usually offered soup of the day, roast of the day, followed by jelly and icecream or tinned fruit salad and cream. (it was\u00a0Tasmania\u00a0in the mid ’60’s, after all)\u00a0 Australian restaurant far and indeed peope’s home cooking is very interesting these days.<\/p>\n
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