Navigating Culinary Crossroads: A Guide to Dining Out When Traveling

Ever scrolled through Facebook and stumbled upon posts about dining out when traveling, full of questions, criticisms, and tales of culinary adventures? You’re not alone. In this post about dining out when traveling, I want to talk about the differences and even provide some tips to help you have a better experience. (Yeah, I’ll also talk about tips because it comes up frequently)

On any given day I can count on seeing a post on the book of faces where someone is asking about dining out while traveling in another country – or criticizing the experience they had while dining out traveling abroad – or criticizing what someone else ate while they were traveling abroad.

Dining out while traveling will be a unique experience, often shaped by cultural differences. Many of the criticisms and questions are rooted in a single base fact – Dining out in America is different than dining out pretty much anywhere else in the world.

Let’s acknowledge that these are general guidelines. Your experiences may vary in different countries and restaurant types. However, these tips can help you navigate diverse dining cultures, manage expectations, and make the most of your culinary adventures.

We are Not The Same

Dining out in the United States is all about efficiency and turnover in the restaurant business. With few, mostly high dollar, exceptions, the goal is to extract the maximum revenue from each table, with minimum effort. Capitalism at its best. This requires aggressive cost management and a steady flow of customers paying their bill

During our travels, we have found that the majority of the rest of the world is about enjoying your dining experience.

We noticed this particular distinction in the pace of service. In the US, your server will likely try to get a drinks order from you as soon as you’re seated and then take your food order when drinks are delivered. Then your bill will show up about half way through your meal and the server will say “No rush, I’m just gonna leave this here for you. I’ll take care of it whenever you’re ready“.

Think about this for a moment; you’re somewhere with your wife and you ask when she’d like to leave. If she says “Whenever you’re ready” do you dawdle at all or are you taking that as a cue that you’d better beat feet? Just sayin’. (Don’t judge, Sandra agrees with me here)

Outside the US it’s very common for us to be seated with menus and then pretty much left alone until we signaled that we need something. Drink and food orders are taken together and typically served together. If we want drinks ahead of food then we need to let the server know that. Let me reiterate that point – If you want your drinks immediately, as opposed to being delivered with the meal, you must communicate that to the server.

Once your meal arrives, don’t expect constant check-ins – odds are high that no one is coming to check on you. Remember, they more concerned about you enjoying your meal than hurrying you out the door AND… They aren’t worried that the food is okay because they trust the kitchen to do THEIR job properly. They aren’t coming to refill your drinks because people in other countries don’t guzzle down gallons of liquid while eating. If you need a refill or something, you need to politely signal your server and let your server know. That refill, by the way, is almost certainly a new drink as far as your check is concerned. Our ‘free refill’ policy isn’t common in much of the world. When you are finished eating, you will probably have to get your servers attention again and ask them to bring the check. It’s actually considered rude of them to bring the check before it’s been requested.

These things don’t represent ‘bad service’, they represent fundamental cultural differences in the way restaurant meals are experienced. Embrace the pace.

Payment Procedures at Counter Service Cafes

Another thing that took some getting used to is the payment routine at counter service cafes. In the US, when you order at a counter, you expect to pay immediately. Outside the US it is not uncommon to pay after finishing your meal, even if you order at the counter. You order, you enjoy your meal, and then inform the counter staff that you are ready to settle the bill. Even if you’re sitting outside. It took a bit of getting used to, having spent the majority of our adult lives in the US. At coffee/ snack shops we are used to, you place your order, pay, get your coffee / pastries, go sit down. At all the cafes we visited in Europe you will place your order and go find a seat. They’ll bring your treats to you and then when you are done you’ll have to find someone to take your money.

The Biggest Tip on Tips

Servers in the US make the majority of their income from tips. There is a separate minimum wage for ‘tipped workers’ and it is currently $2.13 per hour¹. In order to generate tips, servers need to make sure that their diners are happy at every point during their visit and the motivated servers will check on you constantly.

Drinks will be refilled, sometimes without you even asking. They will come and check on you to ‘make sure everything is okay’. “Is all your food tasting good?”

(Something that always struck me as crazy is when people tip poorly because something was wrong with the food – steak wasn’t cooked right, peas were mushy, whatever. The server didn’t prepare the meal, why are you punishing them for someone else’s mistake? Did you let the server know there was a problem? Did they make any attempt to get it corrected? That’s what they are responsible for; if your over easy eggs had hard yolks it isn’t the servers fault.)

In the US the default tip is considered to be 20%. You’re reminded about the tip on the check. If you pay by card there will even be helpful math most of the time to let you know the correct amount to add for various percentages and the lowest one will rarely be less than 20%.

Outside the US, the minimum wage is just that, the minimum. They don’t make a distinction for various ‘classes’ of employee. Your server is paid the same as if they were the cashier at the grocery store. On those rare occasions where the credit card slip or POS machine has a suggested tip amount, it will start at 10%, not 20%.

While tips are appreciated, they aren’t usually expected. Whether you wish to tip or not, always check the menu closely for fine print – sometimes you’ll see a notation that a ‘service charge of X% is not include in the prices’. That means your total is going to include an extra percentage. Sometimes you’ll see similar verbiage regarding taxes. A place we visited a couple times in Costa Rica stated right on the menu that 13% tax and 10% service charge are not included in the prices shown. Our lunch was $27 at menu prices and $33.12 when the check was totaled.

How you pay is different

When were were last in the States, the process was; the server brought you your bill. You put your card on the bill or folio/tray and they take your credit card and bill away. They run a preauthorization on your card for the amount of the check (and most places assume you’re tipping big when they do the preauth) and bring you back the credit card and charge slip for your signature. But now it has a ‘charge slip’ that includes blank lines for the tip and the total. You fill in those amounts and then they run the actual charge to your card.

When dining out when traveling outside the United States we generally saw one of two common scenarios

1) most common, they bring you the check/bill with a total on it and once you say ‘okay’ they run your card. Right there while you watch. In fact, a lot of the time they’ll never even take possession of your card, you just tap it on the machine.

2) common in smaller places, there is a single payment counter like the good old days and it’s the same routine – they show you the total and then charge your card.

In both cases if you don’t mention to add a tip, they probably won’t either.

Oh and if you choose to leave a tip on the table in cash, don’t just leave it on the table… you may want to let them know otherwise they’ll probably run after you to return the money you forgot.

One of the first phrases I learned in Spanish was ‘propina en effectivo’; basically, ‘I’ll tip in cash’. (The very first phrase I learned was ‘Lo siento, no entiendo’ which is ‘I’m sorry, I don’t understand’)

You’ll see the mandatory ‘service charge’ more frequently in high tourist areas and it’s because they get a lot of Americans who are conditioned to tip.

Another thing we should talk about when discussing dining out when traveling is the conversation about ‘leaving some coins from your pocket’ as a tip. Americans think would be insulting but that’s the fault of the one dollar bill, IMHO. What most Americans dining out when traveling fail to realize is that in other countries anything smaller than a 5, is a coin. In Europe I frequently have something in excess of US$5 equivalent in loose change.

Because of pay toilets I don’t like to leave the apartment without at least two 1 Euro coins and two 50 cent coins. Now imagine carrying round $3 worth of coins in the US; you’d need suspenders and a belt. The picture below is over US$7 worth of Euros so ‘a few coins out of my pocket’ easily covers a 10% to 15% tip on our usual 15 to 20 Euro meal when dining out when traveling.

Note that a table charge – ‘coperta’ if you’re in Italy, for example – is NOT a tip to the server. If it is called anything other than ‘gratuity’ or ‘service charge’ you can almost guarantee that money just goes straight into the restaurant and not the staff.

Spotting Tourist Traps – When dining out when traveling- every picture tells a story

Dining out when traveling in the countries we visited, pictures of the various dishes are not all that common on restaurant menus except for two situations – the restaurant has a signature dish that is physical attractive <or> they serve a lot of people who don’t speak the local language, i.e. tourists. If there are 30 entrees and 30 pictures, probably they expect to serve a lot of people who have to point and guess, i.e., tourists.

Actually, now I think of it, when dining out when traveling, if there are 30 entrees on the menu I’m becoming suspicious unless the place is huge. Most places will have what we Americans consider to be a small number of entree options because it’s easier to be consistent. Plus, it cuts down on both prep time and food waste. The more expensive and/or larger places may have 15 or 20 entrees in various categories but we don’t usually frequent those places. We’re looking for the place where the chef is really very good at like 5 entrees and so that’s what they serve.

Ok, maybe if there are 30 entrees and 5 pictures, maybe the owner is an aspiring graphic designer…. but what are the chances…

When dining out when traveling places that primarily serve their local population usually won’t have bilingual menus and they almost certainly won’t have English-only menus. The places that DO have multilanguage menus or multiple menus in various languages do it because they expect a lot of diners who don’t speak the local language aka tourist.

The language and pictures issues exist together for the most part and while the presence or absence of either of those things doesn’t necessarily indicate a good or bad dining experience; the presence of either or both of those things does call into question the authenticity of the cuisine.

If the only menu is on a chalkboard and written in the local language, they are almost certainly not targeting tourists.

One thing we can pretty much guarantee is that if you can see a tourist attraction from the restaurant when dining out when traveling, you’re going to overpay. For a better, more authentic meal experience, go around the corner

Dining out when traveling: Menu-less Wonders and Plate of the Day

I have mixed feelings about places that don’t HAVE a menu. We usually equate those with luxury dining or ‘fixed menu” but we visited a place in Paris many years ago that served steak and fries. That’s it. They come around with trays of each item and you get more on your plate or wave them off. I was suspicious of the scheme but the place was PACKED and I did not hear a single other English speaker the whole time we were there. It was actually a little creepy, to be honest. When I say the place was PACKED, that is not hyperbole – we were elbow to elbow with the people on each side of us. The back wall was a continuous unbroken line of banquettes with a row of like 6 two-tops and they literally had pull the tables out whenever someone was ready to leave. Yes, I would go back, LOL.

There are also quite a few places that have a ‘plate of the day’ as the menu. The chef got whatever ingredients in the market that morning and if you want to eat, that’s what they are serving.

Dining out when traveling: Choose your words carefully

On the topic of language, if you are going to be dining out when traveling learning a few basic words and phrases will improve your entire travel experience immensely and if you learn a few food specific words and phrases it will improve it even more.

The obvious ones that everyone should learn are the basics of civilization, of course. Hello, goodbye, please, thank you, yes/no, where is the bathroom, excuse me, how much is it; those are the key minimum words to learn no matter where you go or what you’ll do when you’re there. Learn the basics of ‘large’ and ‘small’.

If you are planning on dining out when traveling and you have specific foods that you dislike or can’t tolerate, take the extra step and learn to recognize them in the local language. Some are obvious; I didn’t need help to figure out that ‘tomate’ was the Spanish word for tomato. Some are not so obvious; ‘hongo’ required some thought. I had to look it up so I could ask for mushrooms on my pizza. Some are tricky; ‘pepperoni’ doesn’t mean the same thing in Panama as it means in Portland… without Google translate I would have never come up with the Portuguese word for ‘cranberry’.

Google translate is our friend, my Spanish is very weak and I am not confident in it. What I have found helpful is to do the translation and then rather than immediately hitting the ‘play’ button, I actually try to read out the translation. If the person I’m talking to doesn’t get it then I can still have the phone do it properly but by making the attempt I am improving my abilities ever so slightly each time.

Maybe they are judging you. Who cares?

To address a negative thing I see come up for discussion pretty regularly when travelers are talking about dining out – my basic rule is ‘If it’s on the menu, it’s okay to order it’. Corollary to that – ‘if you don’t want to eat it; Don’t.’

I bring that up because of all the BS I read about people concerned with things like if they are in Italy and order a Cappuccino after 10 am the server is going to judge them or something. “I don’t want to offend anyone by ordering the wrong thing” Is it on the menu? Yes? Then it’s okay to order it.

There are also the culinary police who criticize folks for ordering food they are familiar with rather than whatever the local delicacy or specialty is. If you are in Costa Rica and you order a hamburger because that’s what you want; go ahead and tell that person who criticizes you for not ordering the casado to pound sand. It’s YOUR meal. (make sure you don’t pronounce the ‘n’ that isn’t there in the word casado – because ‘casado’ is a tasty rice and beans dish but ‘cansado’ is tired.)

Also, seriously, even if the server is judging you; so what? Are you ever going to see them again?

Do Sandra and I encourage each other to try unfamiliar dishes all the time when dining out when traveling? Yes we do. Do we encourage other people to try unfamiliar food sometimes? Yes we do. Do we expect everyone else to follow our pattern ? No, we do not.

If you want to eat pizza for lunch and dinner every day when dining out when traveling the world you will miss out on some amazing food. However, it won’t impact my life an iota. I don’t care what you eat and neither should anyone else. The only people who get to criticize the way you travel are the people paying for it. 3 weeks into our stay in Portugal we hadn’t tried bacalhau or sardines yet. Not 100% sure we will (we didn’t). If someone criticizes us for not trying them, will I feel bad? Ok, well I will feel bad, for them; because they grew up thinking they have a say in our lives – and how sad is that.

Final words on dining out when traveling

Enjoy the pace! Take your time. Most of the world treats mealtime as a casual paced event.

Take a chance when dining out when traveling! Try something new and if you hate it, just order something else. The server isn’t going to be as upset as you think. They’ve had people hate that dish before.

Take comfort. Order what you want to eat dining out when traveling.

Take a chill pill. Don’t worry about what the server thinks, they already know you’re a tourist and(!) you’re never going to see them again.

Take a break. Ignore Negative Chad on Facebook who wants to control how you eat. You should be enjoying your travel experience, not worrying about whether other people think you enjoyed it correctly.

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1. $2.13 is the FEDERAL minimum wage; many states have established a higher minimum wage than Federal so the minimum for tipped workers is also higher. Whatever YOUR states minimum wage is, if you subtract $5 you’re probably pretty close to what the servers are paid. Not all states have a ‘tipped wage’ so that’ adds a whole ‘nother wrinkle to the conversation about ‘how much to tip’ Another fun fact; the threshold to call someone a ‘tipped worker’ is that they are routinely expected to collect $30 or more in tips per MONTH. ↩︎