Dirt Candy to reopen, but no tipping allowed

Posted: February 3, 2015 at 2:54 pm


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Amanda Cohen doesn't carrot all if you want to tip.

Her lauded vegetarian restaurant is set to open its doors Tuesday in its new larger Lower East Side location at 86 Allen St., and is mandating a 20% administrative fee with every check rather than customary tipping.

The move is designed to provide all restaurant staff, both the servers and those in the kitchen, with a fair wage, Cohen says.

"New York is losing cooks to cities that have a better standard of living," Cohen says. "I can't be part of a system that pays people $12 an hour."

Rather than a service charge, which could only be shared among waitstaff, Cohen is charging an administrative fee that goes to funding the entire restaurant. Everyone who starts to work at the restaurant, from dishwashers to cooks, earn $15, with more depending on seniority. Depending on how the restaurant fares, she'll also award bonuses.

Reservations to get into the smaller, 18-seat Dirty Candy were difficult to come by, often booking two months out. The new 60-seat space is also expected to be a hard table to land. Each stage of the opening and dish development has been cataloged in blogs by the city's culinary obsessives.

New dishes include Brussels Sprouts Tacos with smoked avocado ($30), pickled red onion and salsa verde, and an onion chocolate tarte with smoked almond ice cream ($13).

The push to eliminate tipping has gained steam with notable restaurants, including Thomas Keller's Per Se, Alice Water's Chez Panisse in Berkeley and Grant Achatz's Alinea banning the practice (although Per Se has a line on the check where you can leave extra gratuity above a 20% service charge).

Cohen wanted to build the cost into the menu prices, but worried that customers would have sticker shock. Her goal, once people know the mission - which is currently printed on the bottom of the menu - to have the cost be all inclusive.

Nina Zagat, half of the husband-and-wife team behind the Zagat Guide, says that she thinks customers will accept the change. In a national survey conducted by Zagat at the end of 2013, 72% of respondents said they would like or be ambivalent towards a no tipping policy even if it meant higher menu prices or an administrative fee.

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Dirt Candy to reopen, but no tipping allowed

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Written by simmons |

February 3rd, 2015 at 2:54 pm

Posted in Vegetarian




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