The Return of Tableside Service

There was a time when some of the most memorable cooking in a restaurant took place nowhere near the kitchen.

My introduction to tableside cooking began early in my hospitality career, when I worked as a waiter at the Cavalier restaurant on Kapiʻolani Boulevard and later at Chez Michel, where I had the pleasure of working with legendary Honolulu restaurateur Michel Martin at Chez Michel's original Kalākaua Avenue location. I also prepared Crêpes Suzette at the Ship's Tavern in the historic Moana Hotel, now the Moana Surfrider. Both the Cavalier and Chez Michel practiced service au guéridon, the traditional art of preparing, carving, and finishing dishes beside the guest's table.

It was a time when the dining room was very much an extension of the kitchen. Deboning trout, carving rack of lamb or chateaubriand, and preparing Steak Diane were skills that belonged to the waiter as much as the chef. Desserts offered another opportunity to bring a little theater to the table, particularly Crêpes Suzette, Cherries Jubilee, and Bananas Foster.

There was a technique to these preparations, of course, but they weren't especially difficult once you understood the fundamentals. You learned how ingredients behaved, how to manage the heat in the pan, and when to introduce the spirits. With practice, the movements became natural, and you could concentrate on the guests rather than the mechanics of preparing the dish.

Those skills stayed with me through my years at Hy's Steak House in Waikīkī, where tableside preparation was part of the dining experience. Beyond the classics, I eventually developed two signature flambé desserts of my own. One was Chocolate Lovers. The other was Sinatra's Strawberry Flambé, named not after the famous singer but after my Doberman, Sinatra. I suppose every good dessert deserves a story, and that one was mine.

What I remember most wasn't the flame or the occasional applause it inspired. It was how much guests enjoyed the experience. They watched, asked questions, laughed, and sometimes became part of the conversation. The preparation gave us a few minutes together that went beyond the usual exchange between server and diner. There was something especially satisfying about creating a dish in front of the people who would enjoy it.

I hadn't given much thought to how uncommon these preparations had become until I recently came across something in the MICHELIN Guide. Apparently, the rest of the world is beginning to rediscover an old pleasure.

An Old Tradition Finds a New Audience

In January 2026, the MICHELIN Guide published its inspectors' observations on seven emerging culinary trends. Alongside developments in ingredients, fermentation, and live-fire cooking was a section titled "Service Is a Culture."

Its observations caught my attention.

In Hangzhou, China, at La Villa, and at Mémoire in Penang, Malaysia, Michelin inspectors reported that trolley service is making a comeback, creating opportunities for greater interaction between guests and the people serving them. Elsewhere in China, restaurants such as Sense in Hangzhou and Fu He Hui in Shanghai are bringing elements of preparation and presentation into full view of their guests.

In France, the traditional service au guéridon is receiving renewed attention. Meat or fish arrives on a trolley to be selected, carved, or finished in the dining room rather than emerging from the kitchen as a completed plate. Michelin described this as "a way of putting the front-of-house back at the center."

That observation resonated with me because it recognizes something beyond the preparation itself. The traditional dining room had its own knowledge, techniques, and standards, and the people working there were expected to master them.

The chef was responsible for the cooking, but the captain or waiter might have the final responsibility for presenting, carving, saucing, or completing the dish. Doing it properly required an understanding of the food and the confidence to engage comfortably with the people seated around the table. The work demanded skill, and guests recognized it.

The Dining Room Becomes a Stage Again

The revival isn't limited to traditional French service or restaurants trying to recreate another era.

In February 2026, Resy published an examination of tableside service returning to New York restaurants. What struck me was the variety of ways restaurants are interpreting the idea.

At Francie in Brooklyn, owner John Winterman has made tableside duck carving a signature experience. The duck is presented whole before a captain carefully carves and plates it in front of the guests. Winterman, whose background includes Gary Danko in San Francisco and Restaurant Daniel in New York, understands how much preparation goes into making such a presentation appear effortless.

According to Resy, the restaurant now serves around 50 ducks during dinner service, far more than Winterman initially anticipated. Francie's traditional cheese trolley has also become a popular part of the dining experience, inviting guests to explore different cheeses while learning about their origins.

At The Golden Swan in Manhattan's West Village, French omelets are prepared tableside during weekend brunch. Guests watch as butter foams in a copper pan, the eggs are cooked and folded, and the omelet receives a finishing touch of black truffle, caviar, or Maine lobster.

It's a relatively simple preparation, but one that requires skill, precision, and practice. In a city where brunch can be a hurried affair, the presentation encourages guests to slow down and enjoy the moment.

Then there's Adda, an Indian restaurant in New York's East Village, where butter chicken becomes an interactive tableside experience. Guests select their preferred wood smoke and compound butter before the dish receives its final preparation and presentation. The familiar comfort dish becomes something more memorable without losing its identity.

I like that example because it demonstrates how tableside service can evolve beyond the European traditions with which many of us are familiar. There's no reason that bringing food to life in front of a guest should belong exclusively to French cuisine or formal dining. The possibilities are as varied as the food itself.

Another expression of the tradition can be found at The Penrose Room at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs. The restaurant maintains elements of classic dining-room service, including tableside carving of Beef Wellington and flambéed Baked Alaska.

In September 2026, Michelin recognized general manager Joseph Freyre with its Colorado Service Award. In an accompanying interview, Freyre discussed maintaining the restaurant's traditional standards while allowing its dining experience and cuisine to evolve.

That balance matters. Preserving a tradition doesn't necessarily mean preserving every aspect of the past. What is returning isn't the old dining room in its entirety, with all its formality and ceremony, but an appreciation for the personal interaction that made certain experiences memorable.

It Doesn't Have to Come on a Silver Trolley

The definition of fine dining has changed considerably since the days when white tablecloths, polished silver, and carefully choreographed service were widely associated with the finest restaurants. Michelin has never required such formality when awarding its Stars; its distinction is based on the quality of the cooking, not the surroundings.

Today, some of the world's most celebrated dining experiences take place at intimate counters, in open kitchens, and in restaurants where formality has given way to a more relaxed relationship between guests and the people preparing their food.

Michelin identified this as another significant trend: the growing popularity of counter dining, where guests sit close enough to watch chefs prepare their food.

At Sushi Anaba in Copenhagen and ÓX in Reykjavik, proximity between diner and cook creates a different kind of relationship. Guests observe the precision of the preparation, the handling of ingredients, and the decisions that go into producing each course.

There's no elaborate carving trolley or flambé cart involved. The surroundings can be considerably more relaxed, and the interaction may be between a guest and the chef rather than a captain or waiter. Yet the appeal is much the same.

Something changes when guests can see the skill behind what they're eating. The preparation becomes part of their understanding of the dish, and the person doing the work becomes part of the experience.

Traditional tableside service and contemporary counter dining approach hospitality from different directions, but they share an important quality: they allow guests to connect with the people responsible for their meal. That connection is difficult to reproduce through a screen, a reservation platform, or a beautifully composed plate arriving without explanation.

Whatever Happened to the Maître d'?

All of this makes me wonder whether another familiar figure might eventually regain some of the prominence once associated with the finest dining rooms: the maître d'hôtel.

For much of the history of formal restaurant service, the maître d' was far more than the person greeting guests at the entrance or managing the reservation book. The position carried responsibility for the dining room, its standards, its personnel, and the experience that unfolded throughout the evening.

A good maître d' knew the guests, understood the menu, directed the rhythm of service, and worked closely with the kitchen. Captains and waiters operated within a structure in which their technical abilities, product knowledge, and judgment were taken seriously.

Michel Martin, with whom I worked at Chez Michel, was very much a product of that tradition. He had begun his own hospitality career as a waiter and became one of Honolulu's most recognized restaurateurs, known as much for his personal attention to guests as for the French dining experience he created. He understood that a restaurant's reputation was built in the dining room as well as the kitchen.

Somewhere along the way, the balance of attention shifted. The rise of the celebrity chef brought enormous recognition to the culinary profession, and much of it was deserved. Chefs became authors, television personalities, entrepreneurs, and the public identities of their restaurants. Guests increasingly chose where to dine based on the name associated with the kitchen, while the dining-room professional often became less visible.

Restaurant service changed as well. More casual dining formats, rising labor costs, smaller service teams, and the pursuit of greater efficiency gradually reduced the opportunities for elaborate tableside preparations. Many of the skills once expected of experienced waiters became less common, and in some establishments disappeared altogether.

Not every change was a loss. Formal service could be unnecessarily rigid, and few restaurants today could justify the staffing required to reproduce every detail of the traditional dining room. Still, I wonder whether something valuable was left behind.

A great chef can create an extraordinary meal, but a great dining-room team determines how that meal is experienced. The welcome, the timing, the knowledge, the confidence, and the ability to recognize what a guest needs without being asked all contribute to the evening.

Perhaps the renewed interest in tableside service will help restore some of that recognition, and perhaps we'll see the maître d' regain a more visible role as the person responsible for orchestrating the guest experience.

Bringing Back the Craft, Not Necessarily the Ceremony

There's a practical side to all of this. Tableside service takes time. It requires training, equipment, adequate space, and people who are comfortable performing under the watchful eyes of guests. A poorly executed presentation can be more distracting than memorable, and a waiter who isn't confident with a carving knife or a hot sauté pan shouldn't be improvising in the dining room.

The showmanship came naturally once you knew what you were doing. The same was true of carving a rack of lamb or removing the bones from a trout. What looked effortless to a guest represented time spent learning the technique, repeating the preparation, and developing the confidence to perform it gracefully.

That knowledge doesn't have to disappear simply because dining has become less formal. A restaurant might offer one signature tableside preparation rather than an entire menu of them. A waiter might finish a sauce, carve a roast, present a selection of interesting cheeses, or prepare a dessert. Even a thoughtful explanation of an ingredient or a preparation can give guests a stronger connection to what they're about to enjoy.

The point isn't to recreate the past or insist that every dining room should return to white tablecloths and silver service. It's to recognize that hospitality has a craft of its own, and that the people working in the dining room deserve opportunities to practice and demonstrate it.

Something Worth Bringing Back

Looking back, I realize how fortunate I was to have learned those skills early in my career. Preparing food tableside taught me more than technique. It taught me to be comfortable around guests, to anticipate their reactions, and to understand how much pleasure could come from a little personal attention.

When I prepared Crêpes Suzette or Cherries Jubilee, the dessert was only part of what the guests were receiving. The conversation, the anticipation, and the few minutes of undivided attention were part of it, too. And when I think about Chocolate Lovers and Sinatra's Strawberry Flambé, I remember the enjoyment of creating something of my own and sharing it directly with the people who ordered it. There was satisfaction in that, both for the guest and for the person performing the service.

I don't expect restaurants everywhere to begin rolling flambé carts back into their dining rooms. Many won't have the space, the staff, or the inclination. Nor do I think they need to.

But I find it encouraging that restaurants in such different places are rediscovering the appeal of visible craftsmanship and personal interaction. Whether it's a carving trolley in France, an omelet prepared in New York, or a chef working directly in front of guests in Copenhagen, the underlying attraction feels familiar.

Perhaps the most encouraging part of this revival isn't the return of a particular preparation or style of service. It's the renewed appreciation for the people who make dining an experience rather than simply a meal. If that eventually leads to greater recognition of the dining-room professional, and perhaps even the return of the maître d' as a defining presence in restaurants, I would welcome it.

After all, the flame was never the whole show. It was the people around the table who made it worthwhile.

If this essay resonates, Hospitality Between the Lines is just below.