How I got banned from a Portuguese restaurant in the platteland

It was like a scene from 'Fawlty Towers', just not as funny, writes accidental tourist Andrew Unsworth

I was supposed to be a happy celebration lunch as I had just signed to buy a house in town. Sadly it wasn't to be, but it was a lunch to remember.

We were at a Portuguese restaurant in a platteland town, and things happen more slowly there.

"There" is best left unnamed, as is the restaurant. Soon I will have to live there, and I do like the restaurant and its good, honest food. Popular with the tourist trade, it generally gets great reviews on Tripadvisor, the arbiter of everything these days.

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I'd eaten there many times, most recently being two weeks before, when I'd had a salad with the crunchiest iceberg lettuce ever - no mean feat in a small town. The waiters were as good as anywhere.

Sheltered from the biblical deluge of rain, we settled on the verandah and, in the absence of champagne, ordered a bottle of good and expensive Portuguese wine. Our food was to be grilled chicken, prawns and fried calamari.

In due course, the food came. Except my fried calamari. "Coming now, sir." Ten minutes later I enquired again, and was told again that it was "coming".

"So is Christmas, but OK," I replied.

I know, the oldest comeback in the book but I got it from my dad and it stuck. Eventually I was told the chef had botched the dish and was doing it over. How does one botch fried calamari? It takes seconds! I pointed out that my companions had nearly finished eating and that if they stopped I would not start. Eating out is a communal ceremony, not a rotating feeding lot.

When my friends were done I went inside and cancelled the order, not that perturbed as I was mainly eating for the occasion, not hunger.

I also asked to pay the bill, but was told it would be brought to the table. "Jeez, don't do that, I want to pay here. I don't want my guests to argue over who is paying it - I want to treat them."

At this point the owner, who had been hovering silently like the ghost of Christmas Just Past, took exception and told me I had been rude to his staff all afternoon. Besides, he said, I had ordered my food 20 minutes after everyone else. I had not, but he was not taking any contradiction and asked me to leave his restaurant.

I refused. Back at the table, my friends were bemused. No, I had not been rude, they agreed. Abrupt, demanding, maybe; not rude. I know that such things are never the waiter's fault, unless it's the thumb in the soup.

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One of my friends, a local resident, decided to complain and make sure my calamari had not been charged for (it had not). He also unfortunately pointed out that on two previous occasions he had had diarrhoea after eating there, in far less delicate terms.

That was like brandy thrown into a flambé pan and he was told to leave. He too refused as our wine was not finished.

The chef then flew out of the kitchen to attack my friend for insulting his food. Waving your finger at a man double your size is very brave but not advisable and this was becoming like a lost episode from Fawlty Towers, complete with Basil and Manuel in exactly the same proportions.

When someone else emerged from a curio shop next door to attack me, I decided it was time for us to leave in the interests of world peace. We abandoned our glasses, capped the wine and fled.

Unfortunately, another of my friends had left his phone in the restaurant and had to return to fetch it. Manuel emerged again to tell him never to bring "those two scumbags" to his restaurant again.

Oh dear, I do apologise, even though it's probably good for my street cred. I have reviewed restaurants for 18 years and been banned from only one, for what I wrote. I have never been kicked out. When I move to town I will leave my city pace behind, eat alone and shut up.

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