I’ll have what she’s having. But make mine a double.

Whenever we go out to eat I treat each meal as if it might be my last. This does not mean I savor each morsel once the plate is set before me as if food might never again pass through my lips. What it actually means is that I study the menu and fret over all the available choices in a way that totally pisses off my dining companions and makes the server wonder if I’m mentally unstable. I’ll ask for “just one more minute” at least three times (even at places like McDonald’s, where the menu has been the same since the Kennedy administration). I’ll ask everyone at the table what they’re having. I’ll peer intently at the plates on surrounding tables and wonder if what they’re having might be what I should have.

I usually have no problem narrowing down choices to a “Top 3” but, as the waitress approaches the table for the 4th time, her pen poised as if to jab out my indecisive eye, I panic and blurt out a random dish that was not originally included in my chosen few. And then, to the irritation of everyone within earshot, I’ll worry that maybe I chose the wrong thing. I’ll wonder aloud why I ordered the fish tacos when what I really wanted was a mushroom Swiss bacon burger. And as each dish is laid before us I’ll bite my lip and say, “That’s what I should have ordered, I just knew it.” Exasperated eye rolling ensues as we all dig in.

Sometimes, if I’m too hungry to send our server away time and again, I’ll just cut to the chase and ask, “What’s your favorite thing on the menu?” This is a total crapshoot, but desperate times call for desperate measures. More often that not I’m disappointed … not so much because a crummy choice was offered, but because my ritual was cut short.

Every once in a while, however, the culinary gods will intervene and the server’s recommendation will wipe clean any need for conventional behavior. This is the point when a panic order becomes a “ritualized regular.” I like it when this happens. And so does anyone who has to dine with me. Because once I have a “regular” I never feel the urge to try anything new, never overanalyze the menu, never fret.

The Scratch Lemonade is one such happenstance. I was flipping through the pages of Rain’s drinks (honestly, have you seen this menu? It’s hard-bound and thicker than the Bible) and on the verge of a panic-order-attack when a server approached our table. It had been a day and I really needed a drink so without rhyme or reason I simply said, “Bring me your favorite.”

And then (of course) I fretted until she set her choice in front of me. The glass was filled with a soothing yellow elixir (fresh-squeezed lemonade and Grey Goose), but there were big green leafy things (basil) and rings of jalapeno peppers mingling with the ice cubes.

“Seriously?”

Sip. Surprise – the jalapeno heat melds splendidly with the tangy zest of basil-muddled lemonade. Sip again. Love – I’ll never need to look through that menu again. Sip … hic.