During my daily tiring 1.5 hours long back and forth journey from college to home, I overheard a girl in the metro talking about lemon spaghetti at a pizzeria that I had been to (she was the one talking loudly, I wasn’t eavesdropping). This got me thinking about how people remember certain dishes from certain restaurants because I have the memory of a goldfish.

After that day, I paid more attention to the things I ate and tried to think harder about the food items I have eaten at restaurants that I would recommend to people if ever asked for advice that is. The more I visited restaurants, the more I started observing things and so, I’m here to write about my wondrous observations.

I noticed that there are quite a few factors that make us remember certain places better than others. Food is obviously the main element, then there’s the company you are with, the environment or the ‘vibes’ as my generation calls it and how instagram-able the place is (or if you got any good pictures there). There are some minor details as well such as the wait time for food, the servers and their attitude towards us and service charge. (We have been taught in one of our papers in college that charging service charge in India is illegal, so we always ask the staff to eliminate it from the cheque because we are intelligent and we want to use it to our benefit. Now that you know about it too, try asking the staff to remove it the next time you visit a restaurant. DISCLAIMER: I am not responsible for the embarrassed reaction you get from the people you are with).

One of the first food dishes that I ever remember remembering was this caramelized onion pizza from ‘The Big Chill Cafe’. The first time I had it, I fell in love with it so obviously, I ordered it again when I went with a different friend group. I hyped up the pizza as if I was hyping up my best friend who was all dressed up. And Lo and Behold, the pizza tasted nothing like what I was expecting. It was just AVERAGE, to me and my friends. All that hype was worth nothing.

I don’t know whether it was me tasting it for the second time that made it less appealing or the chef was different. Whatever it was, all I know is that it looked good. Sadly, I didn’t take a picture of it but ever since then I have eaten multiple pizzas at multiple restaurants whose pictures I have clicked and whose tastes I remember (maybe).

This is not the start of my food blogging journey. Marketing involves observing what people like and don’t like, what they prefer or don’t prefer and most importantly what makes them come back to the product or the brand. Hence, this review is my way of dissecting food items and restaurants from an (amateur) marketing perspective.

Let’s get to the crux(t) of it, shall we? laughs alone

Como Pizzeria

The best and probably the heaviest pizza I’ve ever had was one from ‘Como Pizzeria’. I went there with my friends for dinner and I honestly can’t wait to go again. It was fluffy, it was tasty and they had an entire ball of cheese on top of it. It doesn’t look too aesthetic in the picture but trust me, once you have their pizza, you will never like any other.

Why I remember it: The taste stuck with me. Every time I ate or even saw another pizza, I was reminded of this as if it was my unforgettable toxic fake friend who I can’t get over. Apart from the taste, I think it was also the company and the conversation that we had. I vividly remember the mini ‘would you rather’ game we played, how we introspected our 10-year long friendship and how we coughed loudly every time someone smoked their life away.

Here’s a collage of some aesthetic yet not so delicious pizzas. To be honest, I don’t remember how they tasted but it’s the pizza’s fault for not being tasty, not mine.


Tera Vita

Next up is this red sauce spaghetti I had in Khan Market at a cafe called ‘Tera Vita’. Honestly, I feel that the name does not live up to the food and the atmosphere inside the cafe. I really thought my friends are taking me to a shop that sells milk when I heard the name but boy, was I wrong. It’s the prettiest cafe I’ve ever been to.

Why I remember it: LOOK AT THAT BEAUTIFUL FLOWER WALL. The colours, the neon quote, the music they played and the spaghetti of course; everything combined was a chef’s kiss. Also, this was the place where we tried to get the service charge removed but the staff came back at us with the question “Did you not like our service?” so we had to go along with it.

Kaka-po

It would only be a rational and complete article if I mention the most dreadful place as well. We accidentally entered a high-end restaurant right after college, with our bags on our backs, hair scattered around and our faces looking like we came back from the Mars mission without sleeping.

There were 6 of us and we ordered a pizza and pasta. The quantity that they provided was lesser than what a bird would eat when it’s on a diet (I have no memory of the taste, it was that average). It only left us feeling hangrier. But this is not even why we collectively want to forget this place. We wish to forget this cafe because our tummies were not the only thing that was left empty after this visit. :)


Moral of the story

We are able to recall certain dishes because of a variety of reasons. The most important one is that we would order that dish again when we visit that particular cafe or restaurant. And we will visit that particular cafe or restaurant if we like the environment that it provided us with.

In conclusion, everything is connected. The overall experience of an individual eating out should have little to no flaws for them to come back and even recommend the place to others.

Oh, and by the way, I couldn’t find the lemon spaghetti on the menu of the cafe that the girl in the metro mentioned. I will always be on the hunt for it.

That’s all for this article, see you next time!