The Fax Food Connection : The debate is over how the technology changes the customer-restaurant relationship

All over our finger-on-the-pulse town, people are ordering their mussels marinara and their chopped liver, hold the lettuce, without having to utter a word. They are zapping their heart’s desires, in printed form, over to some restaurant through that infinitely mysterious new piece of high technology--the fax machine.

What’s the big deal? When did using the “voice” phone--having to actually speak to another human being--become too “difficult?” ( Voice phone: that’s what a couple of fax-track restaurateur’s called their “older” technology.) Don’t get me wrong, I love terrific new, socially sanctioned toys. But do they make life more user-friendly? Or is faxing-for-food just the next fashionable surplus capitalist tool?

As a child, I was mad about the Automat--I thought it was the most modern thing in the world. Then, one day, I saw a cartoon of it in Mad Magazine: behind all those tiny windows and revolving glass doors stood hundreds of employees just waiting to fill the empty slots with franks and beans, noodles and cheese and baked custard in little brown pots. I thought, “This is the new technology?” I remember that revelation now when I hear the fax freaks claim, “It’s so easy, so much faster than talking to someone.”

In case you’re wondering whether the basic time-is-money types around town are faxing their lunch orders in before they arrive at restaurants (in order to avoid wasting time), my random, non-scientific study shows that fax is being used exclusively for pick up or delivery orders to go.

“There’s no point in using fax for meals eaten in the restaurant, only for outgoing food,” says Bob Spivak, owner of The Grill (with no take-outs) and The Daily Grill (with plenty of them). “I know this from my experience with people who phone in wanting to order in advance. They’re in a hurry and think this will help but it never works out right. Timing is intricate: If the meal’s ready and the customer hasn’t arrived, they end up with cold or overcooked food.”

Still, Spivak plans to offer meals by fax at his Brentwood establishment sometime in the near future. So does the Border Grill, Cabo Cabo Cabo and Junior’s; Hugo’s and the Columbia Bar and Grill are in the “good-idea-we’re-talking-about-it” stage.

Because fax machines are currently in the $800-$3000 range, the great majority of them are owned by businesses, not individuals (leave Donald Trump with his car fax and yacht fax out of this, he doesn’t have to order lunch.) This means faxing is most prevalent at lunchtime, when eaters have access to machines.

Business people familiar with a favorite restaurant’s menu send in orders collectively with colleagues, often several times a week. Tutto Pasta, owned by Silvio De Mori, serves about 15 large fax orders a day to those in their downtown jewelry district neighborhood. If someone wants a special order, like Angelo’s Caesar salad topped with warm chicken breast Milanese, instead of say, the penne with mushrooms and garlic listed on the menu, they have to call in on the voice phone. Tough Luddite luck.

Indeed, the Big Fax Debate seems to be about whether the machines add--or extinguish--the personal touch, whether they provide more service to the customer, or less. Kate Mantilini, the self-described “roadhouse of the 21st Century,” has been doing fax orders for about four months. The people there say they think it give clients an “easy way to go.”

Easy? Only if you know how to follow the rules: Fax orders are only for lunch take-out. The only time you may place your lunch order is between nine and eleven in the morning. (How do you know, before you’ve had your coffee, if you’ll want meat loaf at 2?) You have to remember to write down whether you have an oven or a microwave, if you’re ordering hot food and what time you’ll want delivery. All this means you can’t change your mind after eleven o’clock. “No telephone orders--thank you,” their menu states.

“With voice-to-voice you have more of a chance of messing up an order,” says Maxine Weinman of Maxine’s Seafood Cafe. “With the order right on paper, it’s much clearer for all of us. It’s also fun. And, besides, it leaves one of my two phone lines free.”

The fax/restaurant connection is not limited exclusively to chow-to-go. Fennel does not take fax orders from clients, but they regularly make reservations at their Parisian establishment for Angelenos going abroad. Partners vote on new furnishings for the French restaurant. Michel Rostang, in New York, reviews new dishes, suggests changes in presentation, offers new recipes and makes suggestions for the wine list. Photos get sent back and forth many times a week. And manager Dominique Simon once faxed a drawing of his prize-winning cocktail, “La Douceur Angevine,” over to his friends at Rex, with all the proportions penned in. The cashier’s even received a letter sent from her maman a Paris . But “no love letters,” Simon says. “We only do serious things.”

Yes, serious. Consider a new variety of the power lunch. West Side lawyer and real estate investor Tim Lappen told about one occasion he had recently.

“A colleague and I had planned a meeting. ‘Why don’t we make it over lunch,’ he said. ‘I’ll fax you a menu, circle what you want.’ Well I thought it was a bit form-over-function, if you know what I mean. Phenomenal technology, Navastar over to Bitcom with uplink to a satellite just so I could order a ham on rye.”

Well, as a press release from Kate Mantilini put it, “What could be more upscale than

Upscale? Jerry’s Famous Deli has been using the technology for almost a year. Al Garfinkel (who calls himself “the general”) says the restaurant gets as many as 35 large fax orders a day. “Some of our accounts asked for it and naturally we had to jump in on it. Customers put whatever they want on paper and shoot it through. They include a telephone number and if there are questions, we give them a call. They want a fish order, they want a cheesecake, it’s the same menu, it goes right through. And none of that hanging on the phone.”

But across the street at Art’s Deli, Harold Ginsburg points out that ordering by phone should not be confused with “hanging on the phone.” “Our customers enjoy the contact . We’re personal. Everyone who answers the phone here knows the whole menu. Someone asks, ‘What’s the works?’ we ask them, ‘Well, what do you want? Do you want bread or a bagel with your chicken in the pot dinner? Do you want mustard on your corned beef? What kind of salad dressing do you want?’ It’s the little things that count. Then, if there’s a problem, do you want to hold the customer responsible? This way we can get it right.”

As long as there are some resolute hold-outs so you’ll still be able to make “voice” calls. Says Matty Jordan of Matteo’s take out on Westwood Boulevard. “You call us. Ping. Five minutes. Your food’s ready to go. What’s a matter with the phone?”