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A menu from a Vietnamese restaurant.

In a restaurant, a menu is a presentation of food and beverage offerings. A menu may be a la carte – which guests use to choose from a list of options – or table d'hôte, in which case a pre-established sequence of courses is served.

History[link]

A lighted display board-style menu outside a French Kebab restaurant.

The first restaurant menus arose roughly one millennium ago, during the Song Dynasty in China^[1] - the only region of the world at the time where paper was abundant. At this time, many merchants often congregated in city centers and had little time or energy to eat during the evening. Because of the large variation found in Chinese cuisine from different regions, the restaurants could no longer cater to the local palates, giving rise to the menu.

The word "menu," like much of the terminology of cuisine, is French in origin. It ultimately derives from Latin "minutus," something made small; in French it came to be applied to a detailed list or résumé of any kind. The original menus that offered consumers choices were prepared on a small chalkboard, in French a carte; so foods chosen from a bill of fare are described as "à la carte," "according to the board."

The original European restaurants did not have menus in the modern sense; these table d'hôte establishments served dishes that were chosen by the chef or proprietors, and those who arrived ate what the house was serving that day, as in contemporary banquets or buffets. In Europe, the contemporary menu first appeared in the second half of the eighteenth century. Here, instead of eating what was being served from a common table, restaurants allowed diners to choose from a list of unseen dishes, which were produced to order according to the customer's selection. A table d'hôte establishment charged its customers a fixed price; the menu allowed customers to spend as much or as little money as they chose.^[2]

Economics of menu production[link]

As early as the mid-20th century, some restaurants have relied on “menu specialists” to design and print their menus. Prior to the emergence of digital printing, these niche printing companies printed full-color menus on offset presses. The economics of full-color offset made it impractical to print short press runs. The solution was to print a “menu shell” with everything but the prices. The prices would later be printed on a less costly black-only press. In a typical order, the printer might produce 600 menu shells, then finish and laminate 150 menus with prices. When the restaurant needed to reorder, the printer would add prices and laminate some of the remaining shells.

With the advent of digital presses made by such companies as Canon, Kodak, Ricoh and Xerox, it became practical in the 1990s to print full-color menus affordably in short press runs, sometimes as few at 25 menus. Because of limits on sheet size, typically no greater than 13 x 19 inches (33 x 48 cm), larger laminated menus were impractical for single-location independent restaurants, and more restaurants began using menu covers to hold multiple sheets. The use of covers also makes it possible to update one or more pages of the menu without discarding the entire product.

More recently, the advent of the Xerox iGen3 digital press allows sheet sizes of 14.25 x 22.5 inches (36 x 57 cm), offering the option of larger laminated menus in press runs of as few as 100 copies.

The changing economics of offset printing in the early 21st century made it practical to produce press runs of as few as 300 menus, but some restaurants may want to place far fewer menus into service. Some menu printers continue to use shells. The disadvantage for the restaurant is that it is unable to update anything but prices without creating a new shell.

During the economic crisis in the 1970s, many restaurants found that they were having to incur costs from having to reprint the menu as inflation caused prices to increase. Economists noted this transaction cost, and it has become part of economic theory, under the term "menu costs." As a general economic phenomenon, "menu costs" can be experienced by a range of businesses beyond restaurants; for example, during a period of inflation, any company that prints catalogues or product price lists will have to reprint these items with new price figures. To avoid having to reprint the menus throughout the year as prices changed, some restaurants began to display their menus on chalkboards, with the menu items and prices written in chalk. This way, the restaurant could easily modify the prices without going to the expense of reprinting the paper menus. A similar tactic continued to be used in the 2000s with certain items that are sensitive to changing supply, fuel costs, and so on: the use of the term "market price" or "Please ask server" instead of stating the price. This allows restaurants to modify the price of lobster, fresh fish, and

Writing style[link]

The main categories within a typical menu in the US are "appetizers," "side orders and a la carte," "entrées," "desserts" and "beverages." Sides and a la carte may include such items as soups, salads and dips. There may be special age-restricted sections for "seniors" or for children, presenting smaller portions at lower prices. Any of these sections may be pulled out as a separate menu, such as desserts and/or beverages, or a wine list. Children's menus may also be presented as placemats with games and puzzles to help keep children entertained.

Menus can provide other useful information to diners. Some menus describe the chef's or proprietor's food philosophy, the chef's resume, or the mission statement of the restaurant. Menus often present a restaurant's policies about ID checks for alcohol, lost items, or gratuities for larger parties. In the United States, county health departments frequently require restaurants to include health warnings about raw or undercooked meat, poultry, eggs and seafood.

As a form of advertising, the prose found on printed menus is famous for the degree of its puffery. Menus frequently emphasize the processes used to prepare foods, call attention to exotic ingredients, and add French or other foreign language expressions to make the dishes appear sophisticated and exotic. Higher-end menus often add adjectives to dishes such as "glazed," "sautéed," "poached," and so on. "Menu language, with its hyphens, quotation marks, and random outbursts of foreign words, serves less to describe food than to manage your expectations"; restaurants are often "plopping in foreign words (80 percent of them French) like "spring mushroom civet," "plin of rabbit," "orange-jaggery gastrique." ^[3] Brian McGrory quips that, when going to a high-end restaurant, he sometimes feels that he needs "an unabridged dictionary, a Biology 101 textbook, and a pile of Fun With Phonics just to figure out the meaning of gianduja ice cream, hazelnut financiers, yellow watermelon, and bulgur crackers[--] just some of the inscrutable listings from the dessert menu..."^[4] Terry Pratchett satirizes this in his novel Hogfather, after a fancy restaurant has its stock of expensive foods replaced with mud and old boots. The resulting menu features such items as Panier de la Pate de Chaussures (Mud mousse in a basket of shoe pastry), Cafe de Terre, and Spaghetti Carbonara (boiled boot laces).

Part of the function of menu prose is to impress customers with the notion that the dishes served at the restaurant require such skill, equipment, and exotic ingredients that the diners could not prepare similar foods at home.^[3] In some cases, ordinary foods are made to sound more exciting by replacing everyday terms with their French equivalent. For example, instead of stating that a pork chop has a dollop of applesauce, a high-end restaurant menu might state "Tenderloin of pork avec compôte de pommes." Although the French term "avec compôte de pommes" is an exact translation of "with applesauce," it sounds more exotic – and more worthy of an inflated price tag. Menus may use the French term "concassé" to describe coarsely chopped vegetables or "coulis" to describe a puree of vegetables or fruit. Another example is the French term "au jus," which means that meat is served with its own natural gravy of pan drippings.

In some fast food restaurants, each menu item has a number and patrons are asked to "order by number."

Animal fries from In-N-Out Burger's secret menu

Another phenomenon is the so-called "secret menu" where some fast food restaurants are known for having unofficial and unadvertised selections that customers learn by word of mouth.^[5] Fast food restaurants will often prepare variations on items already available, but to have them all on the menu would create clutter. Chipotle Mexican Grill is well known for having a simple five item menu, but some might not know they offer quesadillas and single tacos, despite neither being on the menu board. In-N-Out Burger has a very simple menu of burgers, fries, sodas, and shakes, but has a wide variety of "secret" styles of preparations, the most famous being "Animal Style" burgers and fries. This can also occur in high-end restaurants, which may be willing to prepare certain items which are not listed on the menu (e.g., dishes that have long been favorites of regular clientele). Sometimes restaurants may name foods often ordered by regular clientele after them, for either convenience or prestige.

Types[link]

Paper[link]

City Hotel, New Orleans restaurant menu (December 8, 1857)

Menus vary in length and detail depending on the type of restaurant. The simplest hand-held menus are printed on a single sheet of paper, though menus with multiple pages or "views" are common. In some cafeteria-style restaurants and chain restaurants, a single-page menu may double as a disposable placemat. To protect a menu from spills and wear, it may be protected by heat-sealed vinyl page protectors, laminating or menu covers. Restaurants weigh their positioning in the marketplace (e.g. fine dining, fast food, informal) in deciding which style of menu to use.

While some restaurants may use a single menu as the sole way of communicating information about menu items to customers, in other cases, the meal menu is supplemented with ancillary menus, such as:

• An appetizer menu (nachos, chips and salsa, vegetables and dip, etc.)
• A wine list
• A liquor and mixed drinks menu
• A beer list
• A dessert menu (which may also include a list of tea and coffee options)

Some restaurants use only text in their menus. In other cases, restaurants include illustrations and photos, either of the dishes or of an element of the culture which is associated with the restaurant. An example of the latter is in cases where a Lebanese kebab restaurant decorates its menu with photos of Lebanese mountains and beaches. Particularly with the ancillary menu types, the menu may be provided in alternative formats, because these menus (other than wine lists) tend to be much shorter than food menus. For example, an appetizer menu or a dessert menu may be displayed on a folded paper table tent, a hard plastic table stand, a flipchart style wooden "table stand," or even, in the case of a pizza restaurant with a limited wine selection, a wine list glued to an empty bottle.

Take-out restaurants often leave paper menus in the lobbies and doorsteps of nearby homes as advertisement. The first to do so may have been New York City's Empire Szechuan chain, founded in 1976.^[6] The chain and other restaurants' aggressive menu distribution in the Upper West Side of Manhattan caused the "Menu Wars" of the 1990s, including invasions of Empire Szechuan by the "Menu Vigilantes", the revoking of its cafe license, several lawsuits, and physical attacks on menu distributors.^[7][6][8][9]

Menu board[link]

Some restaurants – typically fast-food restaurants and cafeteria-style establishments – provide their menu in a large poster or display board format up high on the wall or above the service counter. This way, all of the patrons can see all of the choices, and the restaurant does not have to provide printed menus. This large format menu may also be set up outside (see the next section). The simplest large format menu boards have the menu printed or painted on a large flat board. More expensive large format menu boards include boards that have a metal housing, a translucent surface, and a backlight (which facilitates the reading of the menu in low light), and boards that have removable numbers for the prices. This enables the restaurant to change prices without having to have the board reprinted or repainted.

Some restaurants such as cafes and small eateries use a large chalkboard to display the entire menu. The advantage of using a chalkboard is that the menu items and prices can be changed; the downside is that the chalk may be hard to read in lower light or glare, and the restaurant has to have a staff member who has attractive, clear handwriting.

A high-tech successor to the chalkboard menu is the 'write-on wipe-off" illuminated sign, using LED technology. The text appears in a vibrant color against a black background.

Outdoor[link]

Some restaurants provide a copy of their menu outside the restaurant. Fast-food restaurants that have a drive-through or walk-up window will often put the entire menu on a board, lit-up sign, or poster outside, so that patrons can select their meal choices. High-end restaurants may also provide a copy of their menu outside the restaurant, with the pages of the menu placed in a lit-up glass display case; this way, prospective patrons can see if the menu choice is to their liking. As well, some mid-level and high-end restaurants may provide a partial indication of their menu listings–the "specials"–on a chalkboard displayed outside the restaurant. The chalkboard will typically provide a list of seasonal items or dishes that are the specialty of the chef which are only available for a few days.

Digital displays[link]

With the invention of LCD and Plasma displays, some menus have moved from a static printed model, to one which can change dynamically. By using a flat LCD screen and a computer server, menus can be digitally displayed allowing moving images, animated effects and the ability to edit details and prices.^[10] For fast food restaurants, a benefit is the ability to update prices and menu items as frequently as needed, across an entire chain. Digital menu boards also allow restaurant owners to control the day parting of their menus, converting from a breakfast menu in the late morning. Some platforms support the ability allow local operators to control their own pricing while the design aesthetic is controlled by the corporate entity.^[11] Various software tools and hardware developments have been created for the specific purpose of managing a digital menu board system. Digital menu screens can also alternate between displaying the full menu and showing video commercials to promote specific dishes or menu items.

Online menu[link]

Websites featuring online restaurant menus have been on the Internet for nearly a decade. In recent years, however, more and more restaurants outside of large metropolitan areas have been able to feature their menus online as a result of this trend.

Several restaurant-owned and startup online food ordering websites already included menus on their websites, yet due to the limitations of which restaurants could handle online orders, many restaurants were left invisible to the Internet aside from an address listing. Multiple companies came up with the idea of posting menus online simultaneously, and it is difficult to ascertain who was first. Menus and online food ordering have been available online since at least 1997. Since 1997, hundreds of online restaurant menu web sites have appeared on the Internet. Some sites are city-specific, some list by region, state or province.

Specific types of menus[link]

• Hospital menus
• Kids' menu
• Railroad menus
• Fast food menus
• Airline meal
• Military rations
• Wine list
• University menus
• Religious menus

See also[link]

• Menu engineering
• University menu

Literature[link]

• Jim Heimann (ed.): Menu Design in America: 1850-1985, English/German/French. Taschen, Köln, Germany 2011. ISBN 978-3-8365-2662-3

References[link]

External links[link]

• OpenMenu - An open standard for restaurant menus.
• University of Nevada, Las Vegas Digital Collection; Menus: The Art of Dining The UNLV Libraries' menu collection is one of the largest and most significant menu collections in the United States. Over 1,500 of these visually stunning menus are available online in this collection providing a unique look at culinary trends, cultural history, and graphic design for more than a century.
• Food Timeline - Culinary History Timeline: Social history, manners & menus
• University of Washington Libraries Digital Collections - Menus Menus, placemats, and other graphic materials from many of the Puget Sound area's most famous restaurants and dining facilities in the years between 1889 and 2003. Go to View All Items to see all menus.
• Digital Menu - Azilen Technologies Launches World's First Android Digital Menu System
• Create Daily Menu - Balanced menu creator

An elaborate storage box made of wood.

Box (plural boxes) describes a variety of containers and receptacles for permanent use as storage, or for temporary use often for transporting contents. The word derives from the Greek πύξος (puxos), "box, boxwood".^[1][2]

Boxes may be made of durable materials such as wood or metal, or of corrugated fiberboard, paperboard, or other non-durable materials. The size may vary from very small (e.g., a matchbox) to the size of a large appliance. A corrugated box is a very common shipping container. When no specific shape is described, a box of rectangular cross-section with all sides flat may be expected, but a box may have a horizontal cross section that is square, elongated, round or oval; sloped or domed top surfaces, or non-vertical sides.

A decorative or storage box may be opened by raising, pulling, sliding or removing the lid, which may be hinged and/or fastened by a catch, clasp, or lock.

Packaging boxes[link]

An empty box made of corrugated fiberboard

A corrugated folder for pizza

Several types of boxes are used in packaging and storage.

• A corrugated box is a shipping container made of corrugated fiberboard. These are most commonly used to transport and warehouse products during distribution, and are rated according to the strength of the material or the capacity of the finished box.
• A folding carton (sometimes called a box) is fabricated from paperboard. The paperboard is printed (if necessary), die-cut and scored to form a blank. These are transported and stored flat, and erected at the point of filling. These are used to package a wide range of goods, intended either for one-time (non-resealable) use or as a storage box for the remaining goods.
  • A variant of the folding carton is the gift box, used for birthday or Christmas gifts and often wrapped in decorative wrapping paper; this type is usually of much lighter construction than a similar-sized paperboard box meant for packaging and distribution.
• A "set up" box (or rigid paperboard box) is made of stiffer paperboard, permanently glued together with paper skins that can be printed or colored. Unlike folding cartons, these are assembled at the point of manufacture and transported already "set-up". Set-up boxes are more expensive than folding boxes and are typically used for protecting high value items such as cosmetics, watches or smaller consumer electronics.
• A crate is a heavy duty shipping container originally made of wood. Crates are distinct from wooden boxes, also used as heavy duty shipping containers. For a wooden container to be a crate, all six of its sides must be put in place to result in the rated strength of the container. The strength of a wooden box, on the other hand, is rated based on the weight it can carry before the top or opening is installed.
  • A variant of the wooden box is the wooden wine box or wine crate, originally used for shipping and storing expensive wines, but now days for decorative or promotional purposes or as a storage box instead of for protection during shipping.
• A bulk box is a large box often used in industrial environments. It is sized to fit well on a pallet.

Depending on locale and specific usage, the terms carton and box are sometimes used interchangeably.

Storage boxes[link]

18th century German gold and mother of pearl snuffbox

Boxes for storing various items in can often be very decorative, as they are intended for permanent use and sometimes are put on display.

• A jewelry (AmE) or jewellery (BrE) box, is a box for trinkets or jewels. It can take a very modest form with paper covering and lining, covered in leather and lined with satin, or be larger and more highly decorated.
• A humidor is a special box for storing cigars at the proper humidity, by means of absorbent materials that retain and moderate moisture coming from the cigars. Powered boxes can also maintain the right temperature.^{[citation needed]}
• A "strong box" or safe, is a secure lockable box for storing money or other valuable items. The term "strong box" is sometimes used for safes that are no longer portable boxes but are installed in a wall or floor for increased security.
• A toolbox is used for carrying tools of various kinds. The term implies a container meant for portability rather than just storage, for instance with hinged lids, clasps or locks, reinforced corners, and handles. Toolboxes are usually very sturdy, but unlike a shipping box containing dunnage, are not expected to fully protect their contents if the box is inverted or upended.
• The common storage box for tools, instruments, glassware, artworks, etc. is a sturdy box made to be longer-lasting and better-finished than a shipping box or crate. For instance, a box might be a rigid paperboard box instead of a corrugated box. Or it could be a wooden box with a sanded surface and mitered corners instead of a crude crate construction. A storage box may or may not have dunnage or cushions that protect the contents if the box is upended or shaken, and usually does not have hinges, latches or locks, but simply a cover. Boxwood gets its name from its superior properties for manufacturing this type of box, although those properties are equally useful when making a decorative box.

Electrical boxes[link]

In electrical terminology, a "box" is used to contain and protect connections, thus:

• Junction box, a fixed container for electrical connections, frequently installed in walls and containing electrical outlets.
• Fuse box, holds electrical fuses or circuit breakers

Postal service boxes[link]

• Post box (British English and others, also written postbox), or mailbox (North American English and others) is a physical box used to collect mail that is to be sent to a destination. Variants of post boxes for outgoing mail include:

• Lamp box
• Ludlow wall box
• Pillar box
• Wall box

Boxes where postmen deposit incoming mail for the recipient include:

• Letter box (in the US usually called mailbox), positioned near or on the mail recipient's home or place of work.
• Post office box, (often abbreviated P.O. box or PO box), a box rented by the mail recipient to be an independent postal address, located in a post office or in the premises of a company offering such facilities. Self-service boxes are unlocked by the recipient, otherwise a postal clerk retrieves the mail.

A relay box is similar to a post or mail box, but totally locked; post office trucks deposit mail that is then retrieved and delivered by pedestrian mail carriers. In the United States, they are painted differently than collection boxes.

Booths that are sometimes called boxes[link]

• Police box, a booth for use by police in 20th century Britain.
• Penalty box, a booth used in sports where a player sits to serve the time of a given penalty.
• Telephone box, a booth containing a public telephone.
• Signal box, a building by a railway to coordinate and control railway signals.

Other boxes[link]

Clear sided ballot boxes used in the Haitian general election in 2006

• Ballot box, a box in which votes (ballot papers) are deposited during voting.
• Black box, something for which the internal operation is not described but its function is.
• Black box (transportation), a durable data-recording device found in some vehicles, used to assist in the investigation of an accident.
• Box, informal reference to large box-shaped parts of a computer, such as the base unit or tower case of a personal computer.
• Coach Box or the driver's seat on a carriage coach.
• Dispatch box, (or despatch box), a box for holding official papers and transporting them.
• Glory box or Hope Chest, a box or chest containing items typically stored by unmarried young women in anticipation of married life.
• Jack-in-the-box, a children's toy containing a surprise.
• Lunch box, or "lunch pail" or "lunch kit", a rigid container used for carrying food. Can also be decorative.
• Mitre box, a woodworking tool used to guide a hand saw to make precise mitre cuts in a board.
• Nest box, a substitute for a hole in a tree for birds to make a nest in.
• Pandora's box, in Greek mythology, a box containing the evils of mankind and also hope.
• Set-top box, a device used to decode and display TV signals.
• Check box, on paper, normally to check off as opinion or option.

See also[link]

Look up box in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Boxes

• The Box^{[disambiguation needed ]}
• Corrugated box design

References[link]

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

General references, books[link]

• Soroka, W, "Fundamentals of Packaging Technology", IoPP, 2002, ISBN 1-930268-25-4
• Yam, K. L., "Encyclopedia of Packaging Technology", John Wiley & Sons, 2009, ISBN 978-0-470-08704-6