White Bread + Upper East Side = No No

I've been hearing good things about Danny Meyer's new casual lunch spot, Untitled, located on the basement level of the Whitney. Yesterday I was strolling around Madison Avenue and decided to see what all the hype was about. It was around 1:30pm on a lazy summer afternoon and the place was packed. Doesn't anyone work in this town?? The wait was 15 minutes. My friend and I were eventually seated and we started scanning the menu. The restaurant is a take on the classic American diner food, Upper East Side version (re: tack on five dollars to every item). I saw the pastrami reuben and immediately closed the menu. Done and done. The server then came over to take our order and he said they were out of a few things. I was praying he wouldn't call out the reuben. He mentioned they were out of the tuna salad sandwich and the tuna melt and also the chicken sausage. Fine, I could deal with that. We both order. When the server came back with my iced tea he said the dreaded two words I did not want to hear, "sold out". Damnit! I was all discombobulated so I frantically ordered the house burger with pimento cheese. Five minutes later the manager came over and said they were out of pimento cheese. Ok, this place is popular but come on! The manager said that they weren't actually sold out of these items, but that some of the deliveries never came that morning. Whatever, still not my problem. I ended up with a cheddar burger and a comped meal. No complains from me. But, I'm not a typical Upper East Sider. Let me explain how the two lovely women sitting next to us reacted...

They probably were seated five minutes after us and started telling each other which items looked good, and of course they were rattling off ALL the items that weren't available. I felt like I had to tell them so I leaned over and explained the situation. They looked confused and said this would never happen at Eleven Madison Park (Meyer's top notch restaurant in New York). Honey, just because his name is on the menu doesn't mean anything. I'm sure Meyer has been to this restaurant exactly one time for the opening and thats it. I wanted to tell her that but was actually kind of scared of her. These two ladies looked like their occupation title was "Ladies Who Lunch" so I kept my mouth shut. They both end up getting the turkey sandwiches on toasted wheat. The server was literally shaking when he had to tell them they were out of wheat but could substitute white bread. WHITE BREAD!? These women gasped so loud I thought all the air was going to be sucked right out of the entire museum.  They settled for toasted rye. At this point their faces were red and I was scared for my life. Who knows what these two women were capable of doing.

Now here is the kicker. The turkey sandwich was this measly limp piece of turkey and a blotch of avocado spread, where the menu clearly stated avocado. I was actually totally agreeing with them. They called the manager over and told this poor manager, she was probably 26 years old, that this was totally unacceptable. They sent the food back and decided to just finish their coffee and leave. Of course they didn't have to pay for anything either. 

We all walk out at the same time and the manager again greets all of us and apologizes profusely and handed us all her business card. As a true New Yorker, like these women, we all turn the cards over to see if there is a free cocktail or entree for a future date written in by the manager. Now this goes down as an ultimate classic New York scene: There was nothing written on the back so like whats the point of the card? We all rip up the cards and leave them on the table. Wow, that was an intense lunch but definitely worth it for a free, and actually pretty tasty burger. "Hey, I'm Retired at 28"!