Ben Cas­nocha com­piles a list of griev­ances and obser­va­tions on “restau­rants, tips, and bread bas­kets”. For example:

If I were a restau­rant man­ager I would spend 30 min­utes with each of my wait­ers explain­ing the research around how to max­i­mize tips from patrons. For exam­ple, leav­ing a mint with the bill or draw­ing a smi­ley face on the bill have been shown to increase tip. Research also sug­gests that the tip amount is only mar­gin­ally con­nected with the actual qual­ity of wait ser­vice. Bot­tom line is that many wait­ers miss out on easy psy­cho­log­i­cal hacks that would increase their tips.

And this; one of the four rules-of-thumb from Tyler Cowen’s recently updated Eth­nic Din­ing Guide (via Kot­tke):

Avoid dishes that are “ingredients-intensive.” Raw ingre­di­ents in Amer­ica [and likely the UK, too] — veg­eta­bles, but­ter, bread, meats, etc. — are below world stan­dards. Even most under­de­vel­oped coun­tries have bet­ter raw ingre­di­ents than we do, at least if you have a U.S. income to spend there, and often even if one doesn’t. Order­ing the plain steak in Latin Amer­ica may be a great idea, but it is usu­ally a mis­take in North­ern Vir­ginia. Opt for dishes with sauces and com­plex mixes of ingre­di­ents. Go for dishes that are “composition-intensive.”