How (not) to make a Milkshake

Just as a word of caution, both my wife and son thought that I was exaggerating the incident below. But trust me it happened as I have written - and please be alert because “idiots walk among us”!

As mentioned in my previous blog I have been suffering from TMJ, though it has been getting better. During this period I have had to subsist mostly on a liquid diet resulting in some loss of body weight, and of course eating out has been a challenge. In this state last week I inadvertently scheduled separate meetings in offices, which are more than a hundred kilometers apart. Having finished my morning meeting I was looking at over an hour and a half’s drive. With no lunch packed I decided to pick up a milkshake on the way.

Spotting an outlet as soon as I exited the Ajman Free zone, I pulled in to look at my options. It was a mini food-court, and as I entered I seemed to be the only customer around. The sort of place that makes me uneasy as I fear that the food could be stale. There were four outlets, but only one seemed to be manned. Hence having no alternative I walked across and asked for a Strawberry Milkshake. The guy turns to me and says "Sure Sir, but it will take a while as I have to finish the previous order". Having never heard that response from a "Fast Food" outlet before, I looked around to see who he was referring to. I spotted a man sitting afar, and deduced correctly that his would be the order before mine. Since I was in no hurry I agreed, and then decided to lounge around the counter to put pressure on him.

The poor guy was alone and hence had to man the counter, prepare the food, and serve the customers singlehandedly. It took him a while to finish with the previous customer but, understanding his plight, I was patience personified. At last he turned to me and repeated my order, but it was more in the form of a query – like, “Am I sure I wanted a milkshake?” I responded - Yes, and that is when things started going wrong.

He was either new on the job or had not been asked for a milkshake before, because he looked as if he did not know where to start and what to do. I could literally see him frantically trying to recall his training (if any) as he started taking out the ingredients. His actions did not inspire a lot of confidence in me, and I debated cancelling and walking away. It might have actually eased his stress!

Anyway with all the ingredients out in front of him, he opened the blender, took out the stainless steel container, and then decided against using it. This blender is the sort where the cover hinges upwards from the side, and a hanging rotating arm blends the mix, after the container is slotted in. Don't ask me why, but he just put it aside and started dunking milk, strawberry syrup, and dollops of ice-cream into the plastic glass that he would eventually serve me in. Clearly there is a reason why the mixer comes with a container. It was obviously not apparent to him and I just idly continued to watch him. Having filled up the glass he put it in the mixer and then realised that the glass would not slot into place (since it was not made for it). Now he had a quandary - how does he blend the concoction? He did not want to start all over by transferring the ingredients into the correct container - especially with me watching, so he did something even stupider. He decided that he would hold the glass, while the mixer was blending.

As stated earlier, this mixer had a cover that hinged shut when the mixer is in operation, to avoid things splashing out. Obviously with him holding the glass inside, the cover would not close. I thought that this is it - he would ‘have to’ empty it all into the proper container, as the mixer will not work with the cover open. But apparently the mixer was not idiot proof, and it started. Keep in mind that this is an industrial capacity mixer, not the small geeks that we keep in our houses. Compound the fact that the cover was open with the glass he was using already brimming over to start with, and you can imagine the carnage!

I literally had to leap backwards to avoid the literal rain of blended ice-cream all over. The poor guy was of course in the center of it, and gamely hanging on. He was being splattered in pink and struggling to contain the overflow. The mixer had turned into a wet dog shaking off water, and looking at the condition of the counter I could only imagine the state of the floor.

But this guy was not one to give up. After a minute or so of holding on through this deluge he coolly took out the glass, wiped it down with tissue and put it on the counter. At that moment I do not know what got into me, but I asked him to add cream on top, pointing to the photo of the milkshake as advertised. I normally never have cream, but that day I wanted to see where this situation would go. This was a guy who put me to shame in the clumsy-in-the-kitchen department - and that is saying a lot. And some gut instinct was telling me that the story was not yet over.

He clapped his hand to his forehead and apologized for not asking about the cream and started looking for the canister. Opening and closing all the closets and drawers but failing to locate the cream, he eventually walked to the back of the store and returned with a tall canister of cream. On the top was attached a contraption that looked like a cross between a paint gun and a pressurized injection dispenser. He shook the can, carefully pointed it into the glass and pressed the trigger. There was a huge puff of air that came out and nothing else. He tried again with the same result, but this time there was a small splattering of cream droplets around the glass, but not a single drop on the shake itself.

Now he does something even stupider (if that is possible). He turns the can around and looks into the nozzle to see if there is any blockage apparent to the naked eye. And then - I kid you not – while looking into the barrel of that contraption he presses the trigger to try again. This huge dollop of cream spurts out on to his face and cap. He must have been born with the patience of Job, because without batting an eyelid he just grabbed a tissue and wiped his face. If it had been me I would have been gibbering like a baboon by this time. I would have taken that glass and hurled it at the mixer – no - I would have torn the mixer off its stand and thrown it at the customer. Anyway without saying a word, he layers some cream on to my glass, caps the glass, inserts a straw and hands it over to me.

He gave me no chance to ask for any other toppings, just silently handed over the glass with an air of finality. Something in his mannerism indicated that I should remain similarly silent. So I gave him the money and walked out with not a further word exchanged.

And as I walked away from the devastation behind me, I thought that it might be worth another visit to this place when there were actually a few customers around. If this was the mayhem created for a single milkshake, it might be interesting to see what happened when there was crowd.

And just in case you are wondering - the milkshake was quite good!