Phoebe Damrosch somehow found time while serving as a backserver and waiter at Per Se to write a book about the experience. Service Included: Four-Star Secrets of an Eavesdropping Waiter is her journal of the years during the opening of the top-notch Thomas Keller restaurant. It’s highly personal, and includes her growing relationship with a co-worker André, who (from her website) is now her husband and father of their child. From the tone of the book, that’s mildly surprising. But personal insights aside, I enjoyed the light look at the intimate details behind the scenes at a restaurant that treats food, dining, and service as higher arts.
It’s also interesting after the book to read the 2004 NYTimes review which anchors the book’s restaurant threads. Reviewer Frank Bruni shares this:
I am handicapped slightly in evaluating the service, because the vigilant staff repeatedly recognized me, and kept a special watch over my table.
From Damrosch’s tale, you know that Bruni’s meals were anticipated and hashed over more times than one could imagine possible. Special watch, indeed.
Damrosch left the restaurant, and some of my interest in her anecdotes dwindled with that departure in the waning pages. Still, a gentle, amusing look at a world I rarely taste.