large booking at restaurant- how to split the bill?

Homeownertobe

onlyroz wrote: »

So on Saturday there is no choice but the tasting menu. So what.

Let's say diner A chooses an 8-course tasting menu while their companion diner B chooses the standard 3-course meal. Presumably the tasting menu courses will be smaller and so will take less time to eat. Therefore, serve diner B's starter with the first course of diner A, and serve diner B's main whenever they're ready. I really don't get the issue, and I don't see how either diner A or B's experience will be diminished by their companion's choice.

Weren't you angrily demanding people not 'invent' situations on this thread before?;)

cbrown372

onlyroz wrote: »

Fine, but for the rest of the week it seem like you can have what you want.

For the record, I like the concept of a tasting menu, and if I was going to a restaurant that served them it would probably be what I would choose.

However, where a restaurant offers a choice between the tasting menu and the standard menu, I really don't see why it makes a difference if different people at the table choose a different option. Sure, it might require a bit of an effort on the part of the waiters to coordinate when the various courses are served, but that's what they're paid to do.

And then we are back to some people at the table twiddling their thumbs while the rest eat their way through 6/7 courses :rotfl:

onlyroz

cbrown372 wrote: »

And then we are back to some people at the table twiddling their thumbs while the rest eat their way through 6/7 courses :rotfl:

And I ask again why does it diminish your enjoyment if you are eating while I am not? Nobody has yet said why this is the case.

onlyroz

Homeownertobe wrote: »

Weren't you angrily demanding people not 'invent' situations on this thread before?;)

I don't recall doing any such thing.

cbrown372

onlyroz wrote: »

And I ask again why does it diminish your enjoyment if you are eating while I am not? Nobody has yet said why this is the case.

Did I say it did?

Andypandyboy

onlyroz wrote: »

So on Saturday there is no choice but the tasting menu. So what.

Let's say diner A chooses an 8-course tasting menu while their companion diner B chooses the standard 3-course meal. Presumably the tasting menu courses will be smaller and so will take less time to eat. Therefore, serve diner B's starter with the first course of diner A, and serve diner B's main whenever they're ready. I really don't get the issue, and I don't see how either diner A or B's experience will be diminished by their companion's choice.

Well, they wouldn't both be eating at the same time and the waiter would be back and forth to the table whilst diner b was ploughing through his meal interrupting as he explained the different courses (which is what they do)

Diner A would still be eating afer diner b as they serve palate cleansers between courses too. It is a really different way of dining. Not something you want to do every week certainly, but nice for a change.

I think it would be a different experience too from a dining perspective if you couldn't discuss the tastes with your dinner companion/s.

I imagine all of the above, and ease for the staff are why they do it.

onlyroz

PasturesNew wrote: »

It probably doesn't help that they'd then be trying to dovetail together the two choices from different menus with different speeds of delivery. And they can't do that as then they'd not know how other diners will be ordering.

They can only do the taster menus if everybody's doing it because otherwise it'd all go teets up pretty quickly.

If a restaurant can coordinate the orders from 50 tables at once then surely they can manage the orders from just one table?

onlyroz

cbrown372 wrote: »

Did I say it did?

You're the one who put the laughing smiley with a reference to people "twiddling their thumbs" as if there was nothing else to do apart from shovel food into your gobs when you're eating out with friends and family. I would have thought that company and conversation were equally important to the food-shovelling.

Homeownertobe

onlyroz wrote: »

And I ask again why does it diminish your enjoyment if you are eating while I am not? Nobody has yet said why this is the case.

Several people have, you just refuse to comprehend it. Perhaps if you ate properly you'd have the necessary cognitive function?;)

onlyroz

Andypandyboy wrote: »

Well, they wouldn't both be eating at the same time and the waiter would be back and forth to the table whilst diner b was ploughing through his meal interrupting as he explained the different courses (which is what they do)

Diner A would still be eating afer diner b as they serve palate cleansers between courses too. It is a really different way of dining. Not something you want to do every week certainly, but nice for a change.

I think it would be a different experience too from a dining perspective if you couldn't discuss the tastes with your dinner companion/s.

I imagine all of the above, and ease for the staff are why they do it.

Why can't you discuss the taste with your companion because you are eating different things? And why wouldn't they be eating at the same time? The two diners will be getting a similar amount of food, just portioned up differently. And why would it really matter if diner B finished their food before diner A? Or are you, like others here, obsessed with the act of shovelling food into your gob rather than actually talking to your dining companion?