WHEN the problem is as obvious as a fly in your soup, the matter ought to be straightforward to resolve; the waiter should take away the offending dish and bring you a replacement.

But when your dilemma has more to do with the standard of cooking or the quality of the food, then a satisfactory resolution isn't quite so clear cut.

Having found myself in two such situations of late, I suddenly realised I had absolutely no idea about how to complain in a restaurant if my meal was less than satisfactory.

If, like me, you always reply 'yes' when asked ' is everything all right?' when, just occasionally, everything is far from all right, then take a leaf out of Ian Johnson's book.

He's Cumbria Trading Standards leading officer for consumer education and advice and knows a thing or two about how to complain.

"First of all, you must say if something isn't right," explained Ian.

"You have got to give the restaurant a chance to put things right."

Such is the British 'way', however, that we either say nothing at all, or lose our rag.

"Confrontation is not the answer.

Being reasonable is the key.

I can' t stress that enough," added Ian.

"Getting angry doesn't get you anywhere."

In this area, trading standards and the district council's environmental health department work in tandem.

Hygiene, preparation, food up to the point of sale, tends to be environmental health's regime; from the point of sale onwards, when the meal is in front of you, it is more likely to be a trading standards matter.

However, don't worry if you're not sure who is responsible for resolving your complaint.

"We have a procedure where we link with environmental

health," explained Ian.

"We are both concerned with the Food Safety Act."

Foreign bodies, like the aforementioned fly, come in all shapes and sizes - slugs, pieces of glass, bits of metal.

Hang on to the evidence and present it to the authorities if you decide to make your complaint official.

But black and white becomes grey when you are offered a meal where the problem isn't quite so obvious.

Take the grilled cheese and ham baguette I was served in a caf not so long ago.

The smell set my alarm bells ringing; and I certainly wasn't expecting ice-cold tinned ham.

One bite and I'd had enough.

I did challenge the caf owner about the freshness of the cheese but to no avail.

He was expecting us to pay, and we meekly did.

What I should have done, Ian told me, was to hang on to the baguette for testing - I'd paid for it after all.

Better still, I should have trusted my instincts and refused the baguette in the first place, that way I wouldn't have had to pay for something I hadn't eaten.

In this country there is no middle road between someone making an official complaint and insisting that the matter be taken to court for compensation.

"In America there are a lot of mediation organisations and I would like to see more of that here," said Ian.

"Fortunately, in this area, we don't get a lot of complaints about our restaurants.

There is so much competition that the last thing people want is bad publicity."

I suppose the ultimate get-your-own back is not to say anything at the time, and then slag the restaurant off to anyone and everyone.

But that' s not fair!

Head of catering at Kendal College, John Draper, told Food &

Drink: "If there are problems you should attract the waiter or waitress and say something there and then and not wait until after your

meal.

"A lot of chefs may say they never had a complaint but, in fairness, we are only human and mistakes do happen.

However, I would not expect mistakes to be made in the very best restaurants because the control is very, very tight.

You also pay a very, very high price.

However, you should expect a fair meal for a fair price."

Ian Johnson also says restaurants should be given a chance to put things right.

In fact, he reckons the majority of cases are resolved in a reasonable way.

Ian's advice to restaurants is to use a complaint as an opportunity - the unhappy diner compensated with a bottle of wine on the house, for example, will remember the restaurant in a better light than if he was shown the door with that flea in his ear!