
I Dream of Canteens - secondary
https://dinnerdocument.com/2019/04/30/i-dream-of-canteens/
======
rfwhyte
As someone who loathes the pretense, attitudes, and money-grubbing of so
called "Fine-dining" I've long dreamed of the emergence of canteen style
dining in the western world. Where I live, every new restaurant is more
expensive than the last, with average entrees easily topping $20 in mid-market
establishments, and $30+ being incredibly common. Prices are so astronomically
high, as establishments are now primarily competing on "experience," meaning
they're spending huge sums on fancy architecture and furnishings, drastically
increasing their cost bases. Since they spent so much just to get the place up
and running, you're subjected to constant up/cross selling, ludicrously
overpriced drinks, and the pervasive sense that if you can't afford to eat
there without caring how much you're spending, you don't really "belong"
there.

I would love for nothing more than a basic, no-frills establishment that
serves simple, healthy food, counter-service style so I don't have to deal
with uppity yet somehow obsequious servers grubbing for tips, as I'm more than
happy to bring my own damn food to my own damn table and am more than capable
of filling a water glass when I'm thirsty. I'd much rather save money, enjoy
my meal in peace and put my dishes in a bin on my way out than deal with the
conspicuous consumption as a performance that so much of dining out has become
these days.

~~~
bluGill
I want good food when I go out. I get offending when I spend $20/person on a
meal and think I could have done better at home myself for $5/person. Many of
those meals are not better than what McDonalds serves for $4/person, which is
a low bar (you shouldn't have trouble beating McDonald's in both taste or
nutrition but few places do).

~~~
lostmsu
With a normal developer salary in Bay Area (assuming ~$100/h), your claim is
equivalent to a statement, that you'd be able to make that meal for 4 people
in 12 minutes. And I assume that's just your time to prepare it, not including
ingredients, cleanup, and equipment maintenance and replacement.

~~~
bluGill
You are making a number of unrealistic assumptions: I'm paid hourly, that my
boss has approved me to work overtime, and that I would actually be working
instead of the time used to prepare a meal.

Working hourly is a reasonable thing, though in my case I'm not. The other two
are completely unrealistic. Working my job for that extra hour or two just
leads to burnout.

When I'm at home preparing a meal my family is there, sometimes helping
(watching your 5 year old cut something for the first time with a knife is a
scary moment you don't want to miss), sometimes singing in the next room.
Either way I make far more than $100/h when I make a meal for my family even
though the only money exchanged is what I pay for groceries.

~~~
lostmsu
It does not matter if you are paid hourly. Many people here can choose exactly
how long they work for the same salary.

Your second point is, basically, that you like the work (on meal prep). But
that is completely besides that point.

The way you should look at this is: would you agree to serve meals for $12 for
a neighboor's family of 4? And I bet the answer is no, you would not.

~~~
bluGill
This is about me and my meals though. My family is getting ripped off when I
spend a sum of money on food that isn't very good. I've spent $40/person for
meals that were as good as I could make at home in an hour, even though I'd be
saving money doing the work myself it was still wroth it because I didn't feel
like cooking.

If my neighbors decide that the meals they can buy are good enough that is
their choice. I won't enforce "my good taste" on them. I find the value is not
there.

~~~
lostmsu
All I was saying, is that you can not claim, that they are trying to rip you
off just because you like to cook at home.

------
tomcam
I am a "high net worth individual" with a large second house in a leafy
Seattle suburb. I use this house solely as an office, where I work by myself.
The room I work in most often overlooks a forested area. But I like to get out
sometimes.

One of the great pleasures of my workday is eating at the local McDonalds,
which is clean, run by nice people, and elegantly designed with plenty of
natural light. They allow me to stay and use their free wifi for a couple
hours if I wish. They have never even suggested that I leave, even after a
marathon 3 hour visit. As a person who grew up not rich in a not safe place, I
continue to be amazed such a thing is possible. My go-to meal is two
cheeseburgers (substitute white cheddar) and unlimited fountain drinks for
under USD$3.50, so I'm probably good for a few hundred bucks a year to them.
Not exactly a prime customer.

For whatever reason, maybe because I get jacked up on 3 diet cokes by the end
of a long visit, it's a fantastic place for me to learn challenging material.
I bring a big iPad and a $20 Bluetooth keyboard/iPad stand, then study my ass
off and take notes in vim. I am under huge stress lately, and having to absorb
a massive amount of technical literature fast while I undertake rewriting a
running, production site with a very tight deadline.

Don't think I'm not thankful for the opportunity every time it happens. It's a
huge privilege IMHO.

~~~
WilliamEdward
You're basically living my dream. How'd you make it happen?

~~~
tomcam
I am truly blessed. I bought a business on eBay during the .com crash of 2000
(esnipe.com) and turned it into a moneymaker. From there I am gone into
investment in domain names and real estate.

I’ve also failed a lot, like the time when I spent $1,400,000 of my own money
trying to beat craigslist.

~~~
rograndom
I think I've met your doppelgänger, but on the east coast. I won't mention his
successful business, but I know he spent at least $1.4MM trying to re-create
Adobe Flash... for Android... in 2015.

~~~
tomcam
Ow

------
starpilot
I see a lot of comparisons to things that are nothing like canteens, possibly
because most Americans have never been to one (Ikea food court is the closest
thing). Canteens (stolovaya) are alive and well in Russia. Here's how the
line-up looks:
[https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Ml0F97OZu6k/maxresdefault.jpg](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Ml0F97OZu6k/maxresdefault.jpg)

Here's what your tray might look like at the end: [https://media-
cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/0c/46/f7/cc/...](https://media-
cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/0c/46/f7/cc/photo0jpg.jpg)

You get charged per item, so it's higher quality than AYCE buffet. There's
tons of variety, and you get to see your food before you purchase it. The
closest thing I've seen in the US might be Bakeman's restaurant in Seattle,
but it was sandwich-focused. The combination of hearty food with a plethora of
options and minimal service is not something I've seen in the US. Some college
cafeterias or museum dining areas are similar, but usually with less variety.

------
andbberger
Sign me up.

Cooperative living (very much in the same vein) sustained me through college.

'adulthood' is comparatively extremely isolating.

Where is one supposed to find a tribe, in a city, in this day and age?

~~~
archagon
Same boat for me: co-op living in college has infected me with a longing for
community. Russia (and Europe to some extent) has a movement of anti-cafes,
which are communal spaces that you pay a bit per hour to inhabit. Come to
work, play board games, read, or just hang out. Coffee is often provided for
cheap.

We could use these in the US. I guess hackerspaces may come close in spirit,
but I’ve never been.

~~~
selimthegrim
I've seen a couple in Montreal but don't know about their current status

------
benzene
I think the closest analogue to this in the US is a mall food court. Many
vendors instead of one, but similarly to the canteen, provides an open
communal space with varied seating options. Of additional note: cheap, fast
food (think McDonalds) is ubiquitous but low in nutrition - healthier canteen
style is up against stronger competition than the WWII-era British Restaurant

~~~
ska
Food courts have really suffered from the mentality of corporate mall
management; contracts with large chains of even 2nd or 3rd tier fast-food
operations are preferred over local options and small operations.

This make the B2B stuff easier, as many malls are owned my massive groups that
run even dozens of malls - and they can make a contract with a large franchise
operation to cover many/all of them (or a restaurant group that can provide
different options). They also don't have to worry about risk on the rent much.

Notice how food quality etc. didn't show up in previous para?

------
sansnomme
To be fair, most Asian cities have stuff like this. It never caught on in the
west due to cultural and political reasons e.g. urban planning in western
nations are designed with cars as the preferred mode of transport and most
housing densities are several magnitudes lower than places like Hong Kong,
Tokyo and Singapore. Just two days ago HN was lamenting about this:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19769292](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19769292)

Other than urban planning, the abundance of street food and lack of tipping
culture in Asia also probably helps.

------
keeganjw
I dreamed of opening up a vegetarian canteen style restaurant. A place that
serves cheap, nutritious, and delicious food and where people from all classes
and walks of life could sit down for a meal. I've thinking about making a
vegetarian restaurant that doesn't advertise itself as such. All the food
should be delicious no matter what, not delicious for being vegetarian. It
should take people a minute to realize that there is no meat in any of the
dishes. I wonder how that would do in the United States.

~~~
galago
[https://www.yelp.com/biz/ganesh-temple-canteen-
flushing](https://www.yelp.com/biz/ganesh-temple-canteen-flushing)

Last year I was in Flushing, Queens NYC and visited this basement canteen. It
had the desired features mentioned in the article. I'm not South-Asian, but I
didn't feel at all unwelcome. It was raining that day, and I sat and drank tea
for a little while to wait for the rain to shop. Cheap, decent food. Plenty of
seating.

~~~
keeganjw
Wow, dang, that looks good!

------
dkarl
I can't imagine the politics of figuring out what kind of food to serve. In
the U.S., Democrats would add quinoa vegetable stew when they came into power,
and the Republicans would proudly ban it and replace it with cheesy beef and
mac. The Republicans would ban imported food, the Democrats would ban GMOs.
The Democrats would mandate a complete vegetarian option, the Republicans
would counter by mandating a minimum of 50g of protein per meal, including
breakfast and lunch. Republicans would race-bait over ethnic food, and some
tone-deaf centrist Democrat would propose "American" names for "foreign" food,
like "chips and cheese" instead of "nachos," to make things less "confusing"
for those salt-of-the-earth flyover morons, thus offending both sides, which
is the closest thing to unity we ever experience.

Maybe having this to fight about would distract some of our stupidity from
real policy questions. That could be a win.

> Unlike in Homer’s Odyssey, there will be no massacre if people stay longer
> than they should or have more free refills than is calculated to be ideal.

This is funny but also grossly unfair to Odysseus and Telemachus.

~~~
noxToken
Maybe I missed this, but where do politics play a role in this idea? I could
see if these were gov't run/funded places, but these could thrive alone via
private business just as many restaurants do. Both parties could exist
alongside each other.

~~~
dkarl
_there are no public canteens in the city (what council could now afford to
hang on to such a quantity of land after cuts?)_

 _After the war Conservatives dismissed them in parliament because they
weren’t making profit. The canteens were allowed to decline, then disappear._

Where I live, and apparently where the author lives, there's no way they could
survive without government support, because they don't extract as much money
from the space as other styles of restaurant do. The restaurant business is
very tough, even without serving affordable food to all classes and providing
ample space for lingering.

------
razius
This is strange to me, canteens are very common in Eastern Europe and I
assumed they exist everywhere, I'm guessing it's due to the cooking styles, we
do a lot of soups and stews which are perfect for this.

------
esotericn
I agree.

It's mind-bendingly frustrating to me that eating out in the UK seems to be a
fundamentally unhealthy affair.

I just want meat and two veg, a curry without a wad of oil, spaghetti
bolognese, whatever. A standard staple meal without a ton of additives or
other weirdness.

If anyone knows of places like this in London I'm all ears. The best I can
think of right now is IKEA food court which isn't the healthiest and isn't
next to anything else.

Basically anywhere I can think of serves bastardizations of real food. Polish
milk bars, as stated below, are the only time I think I've ever eaten real
food outside of a private home.

~~~
selimthegrim
In Edinburgh the central mosque had (still has) a pretty legendary canteen

------
moltar
I love canteens. In Ukraine they have proper canteen chains with good local
food. Very cheap and delicious. Just love it. I’ll take that over a proper
restaurant any day.

------
prmph
Is Panera Bread in the US not such an establishment? good coffee and tea,
plenty of seating of various forms in various nooks, self bussing, etc. I
loved to lose myself there doing remote work when I was in US

------
bluedino
What's different between this and a buffet?

~~~
chickenfries
You usually serve yourself at a buffet, and it’s usually from one vendor. A
canteen like this could have multiple vendors. A buffet is also usually “all
you can eat” and priced to account for that.

------
PeanutNore
I eat at the IKEA canteen all the time. It's a treasure.

------
forkandwait
I hated Panda Express when I lived urban California and there were 1000s of
small Chinese canteens, but now I go twice a week. If they had real China
(hehe) I would eat there more often, but I just get to go.

------
solatic
The author is nostalgic for something that can theoretically exist, but is
very debatable whether it can exist at scale.

The military has canteens. Leaving the budget per meal per soldier aside,
there is inherent difficulty to providing food for hundreds of thousands of
people within a short period, and to providing such food at a relatively
consistent level of quality. Most organizations tasked with providing such a
large quantity of food over a short period of time resort to outsourcing
supply to food service companies which generally provide processed food which
is either frozen or shelf-stable. Fresh produce is difficult and "healthy and
delicious" is practically a pipe dream.

There is a way to deal with this - hire an educated chef who can nurture
relationships with many local farmers to negotiate supply, and actively manage
the kitchen to make the best of the locally-sourced supply, not waste any of
it, and put out a variety of dishes that, while not consistent in their
contents from day-to-day, are consistently delicious. This is what Patrick
Wodni [1] does for a Berlin hospital, but he's an exception because he was
willing to take a large pay cut to work there. How many Patrick Wodnis are out
there, for how many canteens would we need?

[1] [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/05/world/europe/germany-
chef...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/05/world/europe/germany-chef-
hospital-food.html)

~~~
gambiting
Poland still has "Milk bars"(Bar mleczny) which were the staple of dining
during the communist times - they served mostly food based on milk and
flour(hence the name) - pancakes with cheese, pierogi(many different
fillings), different soups......they were extremely cheap and also pretty
good.

And....they still exist today. Krakow has one literally right in the city
centre, next to the most premium of premium estates, where a restaurant
literally right next door will have "western" levels of pricing, and yet they
continue to serve simple, basic food for ~$1-3 per portion[0]. Granted, a lot
of them closed after the fall of communism 20 years ago, but equally they
still exist and still continue serving people. They are not just a tourist
curio either - they are the place to go for students and workers.

[0]
[https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g274772-d269...](https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g274772-d2693216-Reviews-
Bar_Mleczny-
Krakow_Lesser_Poland_Province_Southern_Poland.html#photos;aggregationId=101&albumid=101&filter=7&ff=63142217)

~~~
razius
In Romania we call them "autoservire" or "impinge tava" which translates
literally to push the tray, the food is much much better than fast food and
much healthier as well. See [0] for some example menu.

I always wondered why fast food was such a big thing in the west, maybe it's
because they never had this?

[https://www.facebook.com/pg/CaLaMama1/photos/?ref=page_inter...](https://www.facebook.com/pg/CaLaMama1/photos/?ref=page_internal)

