Ordering dinner while on a date
I came up with these thoughts after a dinner date last night and a lunch meeting today:
Ordering I
This is something that you should consider whether you are out on a date or if a friend, colleague or business associate invites you out to eat: be modest. Don’t order the most expensive thing on the menu. Consider what your date or host is ordering. Do you really want to order a $40 item if they are only ordering a $10 plate for themselves? Believe me, if you order something expensive your host will not think you have sophisticated tastes.
On more than one occasion I have been out on date where my date has ordered something very expensive on the menu. If she was trying to impress me she failed miserably: One could not even pronounce what she was ordering or knew what the food was (my query to her went something like this: “Didn’t you just tell me you were a vegetarian? You do realize that is meat, right?”).
On another occasion a colleague was telling me about the tough financial times she was having and how she was surviving on canned beans. Feeling sorry for her I invited her to a nice lunch. To show her appreciation she ordered the most expensive item on the menu, soup, salad, extra bread, wine and dessert. My lunch cost me $12; her lunch was closer to $60. That was the last time I took her out.
Don’t take advantage of people’s generosity even if you don’t plan to see them again. And if you think your date should be splurging on you think again: This person may have saved up just to spend a few hours with you. You may blow your chance with a really nice person.
For that matter, if someone asks you where you want to eat, don’t start listing all the expensive restaurants that you know or have heard of. Again, be modest.
Ordering II
Try to keep things simple: Don’t start changing the cook’s recipe by asking him to replace this for that. It is understandable if you are asking to have something taken off if you don’t like it or are allergic to it. But, if every time you are going to the restaurant you have to spend a considerable amount of time asking what is in the plate and then having things changed you are just being a pain in the ass.
Ordering III
Be nice to the staff. Yes, they are there to serve you and work for tips (at least in the USA) but they are not there to take your BS. A lack of respect for your wait staff (strangers) is a not a good thing. If my date does this, I see this as a good excuse to move on. (My thinking is that if she is treating strangers like this, how will she treat me after a few weeks?)
