It was mid-afternoon on a Saturday when my lady friend Triest and I arrived at Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen for our dinner date. The packed parking lot was our first clue that we weren’t the only ones with this idea. I hadn’t eaten much that day, so excitement mixed with hunger as I parked.
Inside, the hostess greeted us with a warm smile, but my heart sank when she said the wait for a table for two would be an hour and 20 minutes!
We promptly added a name and number to the waitlist, never discussing the possibility of scrapping our plan for another day. We were committed. We drove 35 minutes to the restaurant because Triest had a $50 gift card, and the food is always delicious. Without kids in tow — and with dining out being such a rarity for us — this felt like the perfect opportunity to indulge.
Only my patience wears thin with traffic, crowds and long wait times. Add hunger to the mix, and I’m liable to turn into a monster. The last thing I wanted was to ruin the moment for Triest with my grumbling.
But as the minutes dragged on, I almost did anyway — just not in the way I ever expected.
To kill time, we hopped back in the car and drove around the community. Before long, we found ourselves in an upscale neighborhood, surrounded by sprawling homes that felt like a distant dream. Each mansion, each manicured lawn, stood as a testament to wealth and success.
The first half of our wait passed without issue, just unexpected inspiration.
But then my thoughts took over.
As we returned to Pappadeaux’s parking lot, the familiar hustle and bustle greeted us once more. This time, the aroma of fried seafood and Cajun spices wafted through the air, intensifying my anticipation. We sat in the car, people-watching and imagining all the delicious dishes we were about to indulge in.
Triest thought to pull up the restaurant’s menu online. With another engagement later that evening and so many people dining, it was best to be ready with orders when we finally got a table.
Scrolling through the menu, my excitement quickly turned to surprise at Pappadeaux’s inflated prices. The Seafood Platter — two fried catfish fillets, shrimp, oysters, stuffed shrimp and stuffed crab — cost $46.95. I remember enjoying that dish nearly a decade ago, back when it was in the $30 range, and I nervously ordered it on my former company’s dime.
Now, two Seafood Platters will run us $100 — no appetizers, no drinks, no desserts. And just like that, we would crack triple digits on dinner.
Suddenly, I started people-watching through a different lens. I fell silent and grew distant, my mind drifting far beyond the menu for the next several minutes. When I finally parted my lips, I had morphed into a different person — no, not a hangry monster, but a heavy-hearted man.
“Is there any saving us,” I asked Triest.
I paused.
“By us,” I continued, “I mean Black people.”
As we sat in the car, I spotted singles, couples, families and groups filing in and out of Pappadeaux. Some left with bags so large they looked like they had just come from a ritzy shopping spree. I counted four other parties waiting in their vehicles, just like us.
In this predominantly white Chicago suburb, the overwhelming majority of Pappadeaux patrons that day were Black. My mind raced to late Black thought leaders such as James Baldwin and Malcom X. With my question to Triest threatening to change the mood on our date, I recalled Baldwin’s famous quote: ‘To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in rage almost all the time.’
I harkened back to “The Autobiography of Malcolm X,” where, in Chapter 15, the often misunderstood revolutionary discussed the very scene unfolding before our eyes.
“The white people patronizing those places can afford it,” X wrote in his posthumous memoir in 1965. “But these Negroes you see in those places can’t afford it, certainly most of them can’t.”
Of course, everyone has the right to spend their money however they choose, as long as it doesn’t negatively impact others. But that Saturday, I found myself reflecting not on individual rights but on a harsh economic reality.
Black people sit on the bottom rung in virtually every financial category. As recently as 2021, households with a white householder owned 10 times more wealth than households with a Black householder, according to the United States Census Bureau. There are many reasons this disparity persists, many of them systemic and long-standing.
But blaming is always easier than accepting accountability. Encouraging the masses to commit to lifestyle changes doesn’t evoke the same emotional response as urging them to boycott big-box retailers like Target.
My habits have evolved so much it was impossible for me to not notice last weekend’s disproportionate demographics. It was only the fourth time this year that I’d spent money at any restaurant, and just my second time sitting down to eat. My previous three dining experiences had totaled only $100.91, but Pappadeaux plucked more from me on one sunny Saturday afternoon. After years of self-discipline, however, this rare splurge felt worth every penny.
We dined on fried alligator, a half dozen oysters, crab and spinach dip, fried soft-shell crab, fried catfish fillets, French fries and dirty rice — we really went in! But we opted out of alcohol, which saved some money.
Dinner totaled $138.74. Thanks to Triest’s $50 gift card, our balance fell to $88.74 — though that didn’t include the tip. Our waiter, Jaime, was just OK, friendly and attentive, but he was slow. He definitely didn’t deserve a $27.75 tip to himself, as the 20% suggested tip calculated.
But finally, I viewed my tip as payment to the group that delivered our dining experience — not just Jaime, but also the chefs, busboys, dishwashers and food runners. I left an even $27 for the tip, and I still believe our tipping culture is awful and should be abolished.
I paid $115.75 for our eye-opening Pappadeaux experience.
Yet, as I scarfed down seafood from our center table in the bustling dining room, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was a crab in a barrel.
Darnell Mayberry is a sportswriter based in Chicago and is the author of “100 Things Thunder Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die.” He loves his daughter Parker, money and the Minnesota Vikings. You will find his column, Money Talks, each Saturday on cleveland.com and Sundays in The Plain Dealer.
A new column by Darnell Mayberry brings readers along his journey toward teaching his young daughter, Parker, about financial literacy.
