MSN just ran a slideshow on seven things restaurants used to do that basically don't exist anymore. The teaser doesn't give away the items, so I'm not going to pretend I know what made their list. What I can tell you is it got me making my own, because I read the whole thing with the specific ache of someone who misses things that were, in fairness, kind of inefficient. That's nostalgia for you. It does not care about efficiency.

For me the big one is the tableside cart. You rarely see anyone flambé at your table anymore, and the debone-the-fish-with-a-flourish bit has gotten rare too. There was a whole performance economy around that stuff, and in a lot of places it's been replaced by a QR code where the theater used to be.

Then there's the physical menu itself. A big sauce-spotted document you held like a newspaper. Now it's "scan here," which, my theory, is corporate for "our printer broke in 2021 and we never fixed it." (I have no evidence for this theory. I stand by it anyway.) I've eaten at places where I finished the entire menu on my phone and got distracted by a text halfway through ordering. The golden age did not have this problem.

Free bread stings too. A bread basket used to be a given, a little pre-game warm-up the kitchen sent out just because. Now, at more than one spot I've been to lately, it's an artisan sourdough service with cultured butter and a story about the starter's name. The bread's good, sure. But I miss the basket.

My own list of golden-age things I miss, no slideshow required: dress codes people actually followed. Live piano instead of a playlist called "Dinner Jazz Vol. 4." Ashtrays at every table, fine, we can skip that one. And my personal favorite, waiters who wrote nothing down and somehow got every order right. That last one still feels like a magic trick. I once watched a waiter in New Orleans take a nine-top's order entirely from memory, cocktails included, and nail it. I can't remember why I walked into a room.

Some of this is just time moving on. I don't miss smoke in my hair, and I say that as someone who once left a jazz bar smelling like a campfire had adopted me. But the thread running through all of it is the same. Restaurants used to be an event. You dressed up a little, you sat a while, the staff performed the evening for you. Now plenty of tables feel turned and torched before you've finished your second drink, and half the dining room is filming their entrée.

Every place has something worth keeping, and the good news is the golden-age stuff hasn't fully died. Tableside guacamole survived. A few old piano bars are still hanging on. Steak houses never gave up on the cart. And those tiny-menu places I keep writing about, the ones that do four things perfectly? They're carrying the same spirit, just in a smaller package.

Which one do you miss most? Mine's the waiter with no notepad. I'd take that bit of theater over a QR code any night of the week.