Taking food home from a pub/restaurant

[storminabuttercup]

My grandma often does this, say for example she orders a roast beef baguette and she can't finish it, she wraps the other half and pops in in her handbag. Years ago this would have really embarrassed me, but she did it today and it didn't bother me, was I being unreasonable before to be embarrassed or now to not care I wonder?

Thought I'd pass it over to the mn jury! :-)

My nan does this all of the time. She even tried it at a carvery - think she was going to try and squash half a chicken into her bag . I was mortified

You were being unreasonable before. Older people often have smaller appetites and tighter budgets...so it makes perfect sense for her to take (what was paid for already) home to enjoy later on!

I regularly do it, especially meaty stuff (doggies at home). Usually I ask the staff to wrap it for me, which they always do happily.

(Must add, I only do it where I have paid for a fixed amount. Wouldn't dream of trying to bag a chicken from the all you can eat carvery :o)

A couple of years ago we took my mum for a birthday meal at a posh Argentinian steak house. Unable to finish her (incredibly expensive) piece of steak, she asked for it to be wrapped up so she could take it home "for the dog".

She actually did feed it to the bloody dog! Argentinian steak!!!

What Kladd said. Perfectly acceptable. And having worked in a posh restaurant, its completely the norm, across the board regardless of the age of the diner.

We have been asked if we want to take anything home before, in all sorts of restaurants. Depending in what it is we sometimes say yes.

My gran does this with EVERYTHING but makes me put it in my bag! She did t with a buttered tea cake once and despite telling her she put it in my bag and got
Greese and butter over everything!

It's absolutely fine. It will end up in the restaurant's bin if you don't put it in your bag, so there's no reason why it should be a problem for anyone.

It's one of those things that's embarassing for young people, like being seen in the pound shop. Thriftiness is mortifying to youths.

Our local indian restaurant always asks if we want the left overs bagged up and mostly everyone takes little brown bags home to use up latter.

Yep I've done this. Leftover sausage from my sausage and mash has come home for the furries. I don't see a problem, better that than the bin?

I think as I've got older and realised the cost of things I'm of the opinion that we've paid so the staff don't care! I've been offered it twice with ds, once when I ordered him a ham sandwich and he slept through the meal (what a peaceful lunch that was) and more recently we ordered him a kids pizza in a Italian restaurant and it was huge and he was only 13 months (silly ordering it really) and it was great as he was hungry a while later and finished the lot!

My teenage self was very unreasonable I see that now

My MIL eats half of the chocolate that comes with her coffee and wraps the rest up for later.

She has an exceedingly small appetite.

It's perfectly OK. I wouldn't hesitate to ask for something to be wrapped if necessary, although I don't bother if a napkin will do.

I also don't hold back from asking to taste things before buying, eg stuff from the deli counter. I suspect a lot of people don't realise that it's a perfectly reasonable request and you do not have to wait to be invited.

It seems to be a British trait to be a bit timid about these things.

Royal China in London (a quite pricey Chinese restaurant) will happily put into plastic takeaway containers anything you cannot eat for you to take home. We had to do this the first time we ordered the set meal there and found ourselves unable to get beyond the starter and crispy duck! You see lots of people leaving with these.

It's the it thing to do, ecologically and in today's economy.

I won't ask if it is a relatively small amount, although I could ask for a "cat" bag , but definitely it it was at least half of a big portion.

It's normal and perfectly acceptable. I always do it - sometimes for the dogs, sometimes for lunch the following day. That way you don't feel as if you have to finish something and I've never seen restaurant staff be anything other than helpful at a request for a 'doggy bag'.

Its normal and we've often done it. Most restaurants are very good about popping it in a carton or wrapping it up for you. Only once were we refused in a restaurant in London who told us that it was against health and safety regulations (didn't stop us fishing out a carrier bag and taking it with us anyway it was steak and we weren't leaving it behind!)

I think Americans are a lot more relaxed about asking for food to wrapped up 'to go'.

That Kay Scarpetta's always doing it in the middle of meals when her cell goes off.

soandso how could it be against safety regulations to consume the same meal off the premises? Utter nonsense!

We were once told that they could provide some foil and we could wrap it ourselves but they couldn't wrap it for us, because of the dreaded 'health and safety' apparently if we didn't store or reheat the leftovers properly and get food poisoning, we could then try to sue the restaurant

Oh yes, we Americans always ask for food to be wrapped up. It almost feels rude not to, like you're saying you didn't like it enough to finish it.

I can see now I've been unwittingly embarrassing myself all over London, ah well.

I just have a small appetite and a fast metabolism; can only eat a weeny amount at a time but am hungry every 45 minutes like clockwork. If I keep eating when I feel full, I'll make myself sick. I always take home food whenever we go to a restaurant.

I will often get a separate bag to put the food in because I don't want it stinking up my own bag, though.

It seems very unbrittish to take food home , when ive been on holiday to america its the done thing , although i dont know why we dont do it here , seems sensible especially for old people who maybe cant finish , after all we have paid for the food ,