Even Danny Meyer hates when servers ask, 'How is everything?'

Remember the dread you felt as you were enjoying, say, some lamb tartare with seasonal aioli and wheat berries, only for a server to swoop in, while you're mid-bite, and ask the question: "How is everything?" The worst. Well, Danny Meyer hates it, too. In fact, that question is No. 1 on a list of his most despised"service-isms."

Diners have been complaining about this service scourge probably since the day it was first uttered — Eater's Robert Sietsema even felt compelled to write a whole post damning the practice — but restaurant owners have nonetheless insisted on forcing their staff to repeat the line. But with the most imitated man in hospitality now coming out against the phrase, there may finally be hope that its days are numbered.

[NYT]

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