What doneness do you want?

The waiter at Chili’s asked me after I ordered my Mushroom Swiss Burger.

I was dumbfucked, like huh? What?

Wait-ah:“What doneness do you want sir? For your Swiss Burger?”

Moi: “Excuse me? I didn’t catch you?

Wait-ah:“What doneness do you want?”

I paused after this, my brain churning for a while as to what he was talking about, it was like a puzzle, or some kind of wordgame in my head..

Doneness…Done?…Did…Done? Ah…Well Done! Medium Done…

He meant how did I want it cooked, ‘doneness’ there the good fella went and invented a new word.

“Ah, medium-well” I replied…that’s the doneness I require!

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25 Responses to What doneness do you want?

  1. meekie May 3, 2006 at 10:13 am #

    LoL…. guess what. The fella at Marche, in The Curve said the same too! I was like…”WAT…??”

    Then this lady next to me explained..he meant how well you like to cook.

    I looked so dumb!!!

  2. walski69 May 3, 2006 at 10:52 am #

    Done did do-ness… Yeah, Manglish can be pretty dumbstriking at times… Nowsaday people really don’t know how to talking correct one… But it makes for a smirk every now and again…

    And this comment is, well… done.

  3. Chris Chong May 3, 2006 at 11:54 am #

    Kena at Marche before also – went to the dessert section and asked the dude behind the counter what sort of cake I was looking at.

    “Grah-per”, he said…

    Took me five minutes to realise what he said.

  4. pik May 3, 2006 at 12:19 pm #

    thats definitely new hahahaha

  5. Intensecure May 3, 2006 at 2:17 pm #

    Brilliant! 🙂
    I’ll be using that tonight when I’m cooking for the in-laws. 😉

  6. Giant Sotong May 3, 2006 at 3:33 pm #

    Apparently, “doneness” is part of the culinary jargon. Only knew this recently.

  7. KY May 3, 2006 at 3:45 pm #

    I see you still have yet to fully grasp the extend of Manglish that we are all so proud of.

  8. S-Kay May 3, 2006 at 4:42 pm #

    “Grah-per”? What’s that suppose to translate to?

  9. Boss Stewie May 3, 2006 at 5:24 pm #

    what ‘doneness’…. ahh some of us malaysians just love to make up words…

  10. suanie May 3, 2006 at 5:53 pm #

    hehehe best waiter evar!

    “Doneness… Done?… Did… Done? Ah…Well Done! Medium Done…”

    reminds me of the sperm whale in hg2g

  11. Chris Chong May 3, 2006 at 6:20 pm #

    “Grah-per” is “grape” pronounced wrongly…

  12. JC May 3, 2006 at 9:42 pm #

    Mushroom Swiss Burger is awesome. But I usually have it at Burger King with the unlimited soft drinks ’cause I guess I can’t afford it at Chili’s.

  13. paradoxx May 4, 2006 at 1:57 am #

    its nothing new and its not made up mate.. its been and still is part of the f&b jargon..

  14. FireAngel May 4, 2006 at 9:27 am #

    OMG OMG OMG I WAS THERE TOO!

  15. crazylogy May 4, 2006 at 3:15 pm #

    wanted to ask, i don go chilli much often but i remembered the last time i been there, chillis was taxing me like they were broke or something. Is this a usual thingy?

    I ordered starter, main course and desert. It was well served, i didn’t order beef/steak… tat is why i miss out the doneless. Anyway when the bills came i just paid without noticing this>>>

    starter + drinks + tax&service charge = starter total

    starter total + main course + tax&service charge = main course total

    main course total + desert + tax&service charge = grand total

    can they charge u this way? i went to fridays but they dun charge me this way?

  16. ShaolinTiger May 4, 2006 at 4:41 pm #

    meekie: Yah it’s crazy, seems like its some dumbfuck American travesty of a word.

    crazylogy: It’s not like that, they just recalculate the entire bill every time you add any items, so you will see multiple totals, each total includes the tax etc UP TO THAT POINT only, not more. It’s not compounded.

    Chris Chong: I didn’t think of grape either…as I haven’t seen any grape cake?

    KY: Well the rest of the table were Malaysian and they didn’t know either…plus it seems it’s not Manglish…it’s dumb fuck Americanish LOL

    JC: I have it at both places, Chili’s one is better than BK, and they have BEER!

  17. jill May 5, 2006 at 5:29 pm #

    hahahaaaa!!!ding dong done!!! 😛

  18. TL May 5, 2006 at 10:23 pm #

    “Doneness” is actually a proper word used in the culinary language to mean how do you want it done. It is not manglish, not american.

  19. ShaolinTiger May 5, 2006 at 11:21 pm #

    TL: It’s not a ‘proper’ word to me unless it’s in the Oxford English Dictionary, which trust me it’s not as I have one.

    You can find it in the American Heritage Dictionary however, which leads me to believe that it indeed another travesty of American English.

    Show me a copy of the OED with that word in and I’ll believe it, until then it remains an abomination from the septic tanks.

  20. foodcrazee May 6, 2006 at 12:02 pm #

    welcome to the world of hospitality with damn good english err….manglish

  21. JC17 May 8, 2006 at 9:31 pm #

    Agree with TL.It is a North American culinary term commonly used.It certainly not “manglish” as many of your readers mistakenly claim.The OED does not have the monopoly on English usage.After all Chillis,I believe is an American company and hence the usage of this term.Thankfully English as in many if not all languages is a living language,it is a work in progress.Even the OED adds new words and expressions to the list on a constant basis.
    As far as your burger was concerned,I am totally perplexed as to why you had a choice of doneness as a beef burger (or hamburger as the rest of the world calls it) should be fully cooked to keep out bacteria.

  22. Shopper May 8, 2006 at 9:58 pm #

    hmm.. I can find this word in my dictionary (Kingsoft PowerWord 2003), it tell me this.

    doneness
    [`dQnnIs]
    n.
    (肉)煮熟的程度

    -___-||

  23. Ront May 10, 2006 at 9:32 pm #

    are you sure it is food he was refering to? or is it…What dumbness (level) do you want (me to be)?

  24. OakmanNZ January 12, 2011 at 1:41 pm #

    Its American English. Like most of the crap you hear it was “Made in America”

    try and find it in the Oxford English Dictionary. You won’t.

 
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