Ma’am, your cake is actually a drink

I love exploring coffee shop menus. Especially the ones that have themes. I like to see how they describe, design and present their dishes and drinks.

The other day we visited a café that had received positive reviews. We weren’t disappointed. It was a cosy little place with great food. Once we were done eating, we weren’t sure if we had space for dessert, even though we really wanted to try the apple pie. We decided against it and agreed on visiting again. 

For two whole days, we craved the apple pie and then finally decided to go back just to try it. It was one of those “contactless” digital menus kids are using these days. We happily tapped on the item that said “apple pie” and "Irish coffee" and waited. After a few minutes, the waiter brought us our order. He placed the coffee on the table first, and then a second drink that looked like iced tea. I shook my head confidently telling him we hadn’t ordered it. He looked confused. He checked our order and informed us that what we had ordered was, in fact, an apple pie DRINK. I looked at him and blinked. 

He looked apologetic and promptly agreed to cancel our order. We flipped out our phones to check the menu again. Sure enough, the apple pie was placed under something called “Kombuchas.” I had ZERO idea what that was. Apparently, they’re some sort of iced tea. But at the moment, the only thing I could focus on was “apple pie” popping out of the menu. And it had no description. We burst out laughing. We ordered a cheesecake instead, and that was pretty good too. 

What was my takeaway from this episode? (Apart from another slice of cake, of course) Make sure there are absolutely NO doubts about what you’re offering to your consumers. Try it out on a couple of people. If it’s an apple pie drink, say so. Describe what the experience is going to be like for the user. If there’s a chance they might not know what something is, provide more info. Lay it all out. A basic definition of kombucha might have helped us out. (To me it sounds like some sort of seaweed, to be honest)

Be unambiguous and forthright with your copy. It’s always better to be clear than clever. 

P.S. My father-in-law drew this fake menu as a joke after we told him about the incident. He's awesome.