AIBU To be fed up of smaller portions for women

[hennaoj]

Fed up of constantly being given the smaller fish, steak, piece of cake in resturants than my husband, I'm taller than him! I'm not on a sodding diet and nor do I need to be on one. Today I was even given a smaller fish than my 13 year old son! Its bad enough that gluten free fish at chippys tend to be smaller anyway for whatever reason, so this ended up being miniscule than everyone elses as my 13 year old son is also a coeliac.

Yup this is a thing and happens alot

There was a poster on here a few years back i guess, her MIL considered her plump and gave her tiny portions but her husband and sons were properly fed. She ordered q pizza! Boss move 😆

Never experienced this nor known anyone who has noticed it. My ex used to insist that when his parents came over for dinner, we must give his dad a mammoth portion each time. His poor dad would look bemused and ask "why do I have so much (whatever it was)?" and leave most of it every time.

@UserBot9to5

There was a poster on here a few years back i guess, her MIL considered her plump and gave her tiny portions but her husband and sons were properly fed. She ordered q pizza! Boss move 😆

I remember that and it's true a lot of MILs seem to do this according to MN, but I don't see how restaurant staff have time to be eyeing up the customers and relaying the information to the chef, so they can serve up portion sizes accordingly.

Where the heck are you eating? I can’t say this has ever happened to me. If we order the same meal in a restaurant, the portions are identical.

I can never eat the whole meal, so I wouldn’t even mind a smaller portion. But I’d expect to pay slightly less for it.

Not in a restaurant but stayed in a B and B once that did evening meals. Went down and was told “I’ve given you 3 pieces of potato, Mrs X, let me know if you want more” I didn’t, but why not just put the veg in the middle of the table? And I’m sure the assumption was cos I’m chunky!

If this happens a lot with steak as mentioned by your follow up, how do you and your Husband have steak? The more a steak is cooked the smaller it is, for example my Husband has his steak blue, mine is medium my steak will always be smaller than his

I eat out 2-3 times a week and have never had this.

I work in hospitality. We are not inspecting the plates that closely to decide who gets what one if they are the same. With more than 2 customers we ask who's having what and put them down as efficiently as we can. Things like steak/gammon are all the same weight uncooked and pies/currys etc are pre portioned so they are equal.
Personally we have been so busy lately that sonetimes it doesnt even register who it is I'm putting a plate in front of!
Although I will admit to on occasion automatically giving the pint to the man!

@hennaoj

It was a chippy with a restuarant, we were eating in. It tends to happen when having steak. I'm not inspecting plates but it can be really quite noticable! Of course it won't be the chef, they don't serve the food.

The size of steak varies according to the cut; a sirloin is bigger than fillet for example. So if you and DH order different steak dishes that would account for size differences.

Can tell there's not many coeliacs on this thread. It's really not uncommon for the gluten free option to be a completely different size, they tend to use the smaller cuts of fish for it in most places we've been to. I can well believe a waiter looking at 2 gluten free plates and giving the bigger piece to the male.

My mother does this every time. Penis portions and skinny people portions are all a thing in her house. She also gives portions out according to who she thinks 'needs feeding up'. She's not even subtle about it so if she deems you've put on weight she will give you a child size portion or sometimes smaller. I'm not sure what she thinks she's achieving apart from trying to embarrass people. Luckily we don't visit often.

Never happened to me. I think it’s weird you obsess over everyone’s food

Never ever happened to me or anyone I've been out with. How bizarre.

But when you get steak you usually choose the sauce, sides and how well done it is.
Unless you're ordering the exact same thing then the chef is just cooking to order - there's really no discrimination here!

@BaronessEllarawrosaurus

Can tell there's not many coeliacs on this thread. It's really not uncommon for the gluten free option to be a completely different size, they tend to use the smaller cuts of fish for it in most places we've been to. I can well believe a waiter looking at 2 gluten free plates and giving the bigger piece to the male.

Thanks to the trend for people to use gluten free as a diet/weightloss tool (because it automatically cuts out many high calorie products) a few years ago, it is definitely a thing where you get smaller portions because they assume you are on a diet.

and because they want a higher profit margin when they've had to heat up a separate batch of oil

OP I know what you are talking about. This has happened to me in places where you buy your meal at a counter, like department stores and garden centres. The person serving always thinks the guy next to you needs more food.

I haven't really paid attention to sizes of cuts of meat, but when I am dining with a male and one of us has ordered a cheeseburger and one of us has ordered a salad, most of the time I get handed the salad instead of my cheeseburger!
Obviously this doesn't happen in a nice restaurant where the server notes who ordered what, but at fast casual places, this is so common (in my experience).

I think your imagination is working overtime. I have never seen this happen - and I've been around a while!

Oh the faux bafflement and ridiculous scenarios people are inventing here to bully the OP are astonishing.

It's pretty fucking simple... wait staff bring out food, hazard a guess at who to put which plate in front of.

If two people have ordered the same meal but one appears larger than the other (or insert some other difference) they make a judgement.

What all this shit about chefs knowing who ordered what, or people taking food off one plate and onto another is fuckery of the highest order.

Yes, I've had a waiter make a judgement based on my appearance as to which meal was mine on many occasions.

Im a fat woman, my sister is variously a normal sized, slim or even very slim woman.

Almost. Every. Single. Time. I will be given the larger meal, the one with chips rather than salad, the one with the massive burger rather than the healthier option.

On most occasions, they're wrong, my sister can eat like some sort of human dustbin and I have gastropareisis and often struggle to eat a bloody starter.

I really couldn't give a shit and we tell them they're wrong or just swap over if they've been too quick to put them down.

I can easily see them deciding things like the woman has the alcohol free drink, the wine rather than the beer, the smaller portion, the salad rather than the burger etc etc.

I can't get worked up about it, I wouldn't start a thread about it - they've gotta offer the plate to someone and they guess based on frequent experience.

But to pretend this is fictional purely because it has never happened to you is also fucking ridiculous.

But to pretend this is fictional purely because it has never happened to you is also fucking ridiculous.

But you're conflating two different things here @WiddlinDiddlin
The OP's supposed issue is that she receives smaller portions from the kitchen simply because she's a woman.
All your examples are about waitstaff making erroneous judgements.
They are two totally separate things!

It's pretty fucking simple... wait staff bring out food, hazard a guess at who to put which plate in front of.

No they really don't. You usually put it down in a way that makes it easier. If the people are sat facing eachother left hand meal goes to the left hand person, for example.

Waiting staff really don't give a shiny shit. And again, the vast majority of restaurants portions control. Difference would be very small.

And actually your example proves its even more unlikey. You say they give the bigger one the larger person. Op is the taller person. Or do you really believe the staff are calculating size difference versions difference in sex and using am equation to figure out what plate goes where, then looking the portion on their plates while walking to the table?

Its extremely unlikey. Especially to happen often enough for op to believe its sex based.

Not portion size but when I order a beer and burger and dh orders the salad I get the leaves in front of me no question.

At nando's the xx hot I order automatically goes to DH.

Bizarre

This definitely isn't a 'thing'.

Are you sure you've not time traveled back to the 70's/80's?. I remember when restaurants used to have the option of 'ladies portion'.