Eat Your Box of Lemonade

This "hyper-contemporary," restaurant has opened in my 'hood. It's unique, intriguing, and has good food, but the concept is incredibly confusing... I feel like the English language is pretty easy for me, even though I natively speak the American dialect *that's a joke*, but the way this place operates, not only do you need to be savvy about reading a menu, you need to be patient with all the "offers" being offered to you and vigilant, nearly combative, about what you are about to have placed on your plate.. Too many options.

Cool logo for Lemonade.

This trendy idea of "Seasonal Southern California Comfort Food" seems nice, but there are really too many options.. There are several outlets in California and just a couple here in the United Arab Emirates. Upon the first visit my only thought was "this place will never last." It looks expensive to run, seems like there would be a lot of waste at the end of the night due to the excessive variety of options and the communication skills needed to get the food.. It's exhausting just to get to the end of the line, then you need to deal with eating it. 

What's that? And that? And that? And that?

More indecipherable options.

Funky interior, looks very expensive.

I thought the brussel sprouts salad was pretty great, so today I went back for a *simple* "Lemonade box." A straight-forward affair, where you only need to make two or three decisions, and it will cost you only 40AED, which is almost $11. Yeah well, there is a cold brussel sprouts salad and other things with brussel sprouts in it, then there is the brussel sprout option on the hot table.. 

Almost there-- I'm almost done-- so much trouble-- be patient.. The lady in front of me is having a lot of trouble-- I need to stay out of it and not try to explain this place.. She is clearly pissed because her meal cost like almost 100 AED, not what she was expecting. Then, I get to make one more decision, what type of lemonade do I want? I got Blood Orange.

I feel like yuppie scum, or like I'm in the episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm where the issues at a Pinkberry turn into high drama. I guess I am letting it get out of hand, but seriously, should a restaurant with that kind of overhead be making you do so much chit-chatting before letting you out the door with your food? No.

In the end, I took this huge pizza-box-looking meal to my place and enjoyed it. Let's not even think about the waste involved either-- because we are in Dubai, we don't think of such things.

P.S. Yes, that is a red velvet cupcake. No, I didn't have to choose the dessert.