Asked not to eat food from elsewhere

[moogoom]

In an independent burger bar tucked away in the corner. It is 7:30 and just finished some shopping with kids in tow. DD has decided burgers are another thing she cant eat anymore so we quickly called next door for a kids sandwich and popped back to previous tucked away seat. The owner comes along and tells me to ask my daughter to put the sandwich away if we are eating in. But loudly so the customers can hear, which they all did. So would you call this pernickety behaviour or her prerogative?

It’s a restaurant, not a food court.

YABU

I’m really curious what posters would do if their picky child was falling off the weight charts

Eat somewhere that we could all have something, or not eat out at all. Not sit in one cafe consuming food bought at another

Because saying eat what I give you or go hungry is the exact opposite of the message we have gotten from every medical expert we have seen

That's nothing to do with taking a bought out sandwich onto someone else's business premises. If I was worried about a child's eating, I wouldn't take her somewhere there was nothing she would eat. If she wanted a sandwich we'd all go into a café. Definitely not all carrying burgers we'd bought somewhere else.

Nominating for Classics. As an example of Drip Feeding in AIBU.

I can't believe the venom of some of the posts here.
If the OP had already bought food there why should they get picky over her daughter eating different food from somewhere else.
I've just come back from Berlin where everyone eats wherever they are. If friends are having coffee in a cafe they come and join them while eating a kebab or a cake bought elsewhere. More often than not they will go on and order drinks or coffee afterwards.
Maybe it's something uk cafes should consider.

YABU. You should have all eaten from the burger van if you wanted to sit down. By taking up spaces and not eating from the van, you would be denying her custom.

Should someone else have sat down at their table with them?

Should groups of two never enter a restaurant if they can't provide a third customer too?

thanks for the advice. I am now a well adjusted human along with my model children

MissVanjie Wed 18-Jul-18 22:35:07
Good god, who is in charge in your house op

Present yr dc with the options of a) all choosing from the same menu, or b) you have to get the food to go

This would still leave the child charge.
Presenting her with options?
No.
Mum should be in charge of what happens.
Children feel safe knowing that life is taken care of by responsible and loving parents and all they need to do is be a child.

I wasn’t defending the right to bring in food. I was specifically addressing all the posters claiming that if the kid won’t eat, she should go hungry.

(We have been lucky that when we have had to eat out we have found understanding restaurants, but I do respect their right to decline outside foods)

moogoom Wed 18-Jul-18 22:46:18
smile thanks for the advice. I am now a well adjusted human along with my model children

Well that's the ultimate aim for parents to strive for.

There’s always someone who brings up an extreme and highly specific case scenario to justify why exceptions should be made in cases where those circs don’t apply

If my child was so picky they were losing weight i would probably not put them in a situation that would trigger food anxiety ie ordering off a limited menu in a restaurant where you don’t know what the food will be like when it arrives

If it’s just everyday being a madam and common or garden pickiness i would: offer the two options above ie pick something from one place or we get it to go or i would ask the burger place if they could just do for eg a plain bun with cheese no burger, or having done that if they were unable to accommodate ms picky i may then ask them really really nicely could she eat a sandwich from elsewhere if the rest of us were ordering and get her drink etc from there, and leave a massive tip

There’s ways to go about things without being a bit of a prick about it, which is what just marching in with outside food and hoping to get away with it is

she could have got the sandwich after and ate it on the way home if shes being fussy

my niece has little snacky bits with her but other than that she eithe doesnt eat a meal or dsis orders her a kids meal

melons i like to preserve the illusion that our house is a democracy so we have ultimatums not commands a lot of the time

I have a picky eater myself and know what a pain in the arse it can be; i also don’t believe in making food a battleground. However the pain of having a picky eater needs to be a pain in MY arse, no one else’s

Yavvvu and abit rude. Totally normal request. What made you think you could eat food bough elsewhere there?

Purpleartichoke Wed 18-Jul-18 22:35:45
I’m really curious what posters would do if their picky child was falling off the weight charts, even at 9 years old

You have my sympathies that you are dealing with a real potential eating disorder.
What I would do is follow all the consultant advice you get.
I hope your child can avoid the in patient treatment and the permanent damage that starvation brings.
I don't think this thread is about eating disorders.
I hope your child comes through as she gets older.

The child in the OP is just being picky, not starving herself.

MissVanjie Wed 18-Jul-18 22:53:23
melons i like to preserve the illusion that our house is a democracy grin so we have ultimatums not commands a lot of the time

This made me along with you MissVanjie. Preserving the illusion is a clever way of putting it.
I have never used commands, my boys just went along with what was happening/what we were eating. We knew their few dislikes so it was easy really.

The key thing was they weren't changing their dislikes from day to day just to be picky.

I thought that pretty much everyone knew that it is, at best, cheeky to eat food from one place in another restaurant/cafe (baby food/ special diets excepted).

If you face a similar situation again, @moogoom, I’d suggest asking the cafe if they can help you - a lot of places will do you something off menu, or modify a dish from the menu for you, if you ask - and if they really can’t help in that way, they may be willing to let you get something - but communication and manners are key.

It was rude of you to bring in a sandwich from another shop, and that rudeness led to the owner getting snippy with you - there was wrong on both sides, but it could have been avoided, if you had had the good manners to talk to the restaurant staff first.

We do this at 5 guys, DD has such way bought on the way and we buy her a drink along with the rest of our burger/fries order.

Never had anyone say anything to us about it and if they did we just wouldn't eat there again tbh.

well i just won’t be giving them my custom again.

I’m sure they’ll be crying into their profits.

It’s pretty standard that you can’t bring food from elsewhere into another establishment. You were rude.

Should someone else have sat down at their table with them? hmm

Was clearly not implying that However if a table of 4 came along and all ate from the van that is better for the owner than a table of 3 with only two eating from the van.

To be honest I've done this with kids, it's not a big deal really and I think I would explain (politely) to the owner that your kids have difficulties with certain foods but you wanted to eat a burger, and pay for it.

If it's a problem you won't do it again but then you may not eat there so often.

If you were bringing in your own adult food I'd see the problem but kids are bloody fussy sometimes.

Takfujimoto
It was a subway in a mock five guys. Thank you! Glad someone understands
I agree it would be cheeky at a cafe or a restaurant or somewhere youd go for an outing. Not a pitstop self serve burger bar.
Its ok i am going to slink off now into mumsnet hibernation until the backlash have gone to feast on another unreasonable person

It’s rude. I used to work in catering and never understood why people thought it would be acceptable to do this. Your choices were to eat somewhere else, let picky child wait, or get a takeout. Why ‘bring in food from elsewhere’ jumped to the top of the list I don’t know. There’s no other business where this would be acceptable. Why so for catering?

I might go and hide under a five star Michelin white-clothed table and eat a subway until somone finds me

Do it! Short term pain for long term gain