A diner experience

We used to be big fans of going out to breakfast on weekends. We'd wake up, put a hat on over the greasy hair, and roll down to the Good Egg for an Old Pueblo Skillet or Breakfast Quesadilla. mmm droolllll. The food was good, the service was efficient, the coffee cup never empty, and the bill? $20 plus tip. Awesome.

We've tried to find a similar experience here in Christchurch. This led us to Drexels, an "American style" breakfast diner. We've gone twice now, once to the Riccarton location and once to the downtown location.

The first thing you notice about this diner is that it's way too nice to be a diner.

It's all modern and beautiful. Diners should be old and worn and a bit greasy. This place looks real nice and sleek.

The other thing about diners is that you should never have to plan to go there. When we showed up at the downtown Drexels this weekend, the hostess asked if we had a booking. A booking! Seriously, I almost guffawed. I thought, who would make a reservation to roll out of bed and come to breakfast? It wasn't Mothers Day or any other breakfast-heavy holiday. It was an ordinary Sunday morning in a diner. I would have felt really silly calling to make a reservation. Who would do that?? As it turns out, everyone in Christchurch would do that, and had done it. Everyone but us. They were booked solid for the next hour, she said. We sat to wait for a table to become available while family after family came in and told the hostess about their bookings. Unbelievable.

In the end, we only waited about 15 minutes before being shown to our very nice booth. A minute later, our waitress came and introduced herself. We got the impression she had been shown instructional videos on how to wait tables at an American diner, complete with an introduction ("Hi, I'm Susie and I'll be your waitress") and a quick rundown of the specials. But while she had been shown how to do it, she was clearly not very comfortable with it. We couldn't blame her. She knew, and we knew, there would be no tip in it for her. Tipping just isn't really done here.

We ordered coffee. ("Filter coffee or espresso?") This place offers a "bottomless cup" of filter coffee - standard in America, pretty much unheard of here. We were sorely disappointed after our first trip to Drexels, as our waitress simply refused to refill our coffee cups. We waited AGES. We made eye contact and pointedly slid the empty cups to the edge of the table. Still we waited. Thankfully, this second trip was much better. Several waitresses came by and filled our coffee cups. We were very glad for it.

It's the small things you miss, you know?

The thing about eating out here is that the menu prices are a bit of a shock at first. I ordered pancakes ($15) and Gareth ordered an omelet ($16.50). That seems a bit crazy expensive for eggs and buttermilk, but you have to remember that the prices include tax and you don't have to add on a tip. What you see on the menu is all you pay, nothing more. The bill is still more than it would be at an ordinary diner, but not quite as much more as it initially seems. You would think people go out to eat less because it's expensive, but apparently not. Apparently, so many people are going out to eat that you have to make a booking.

Our food was delicious. Absolutely delicious. We don't know what it is about food in New Zealand, but we have almost never had a bad meal here. (I would even include that pseudo-Mexican food we tried last year in this statement, as it was really good food, just not Mexican food.) There seems to be no bad food here. Maybe it's the fresh, whole ingredients, maybe it's chef know-how, maybe it's a combination of both. We don't know. We just know it tastes real good. My pancakes were thick and fluffy and perfect. Gareth's omelet came with incredibly good guacamole. We rolled out stuffed and happy.