I was scanning over the Omelet section of the menu for some fresh ideas for breakfast when I noticed this beauty sitting in the dead center of the section surrounded by a red square menu accent: Trash Can Omelet.
I close my eyes and release a dramatic exhale.
“What is it now?” My partner would say to me with a brief chuckle as she glares at me knowingly. “Is it the Fat Boy Burger? You always do this.”
“No. Not the Fat Boy but – that’s pretty bad too.”
I can be fairly critical of the wording of a menu. At culinary university they would harp about how the menu is your best advertising tool. In my time of attendance there were classes designed specifically around the craft of menu writing. After a decade of real menu writing as a professional chef and private caterer I’ve learned a thing or two about word choice and perception when crafting a menu.
Some simple changes to menu wording can allow a higher perception of value to your guests. Moreover, too much flowery language can feel intimidating or presumptuous (we’ve worked with a few of those types as well).
Attempting comedy on your menu intended to reverse a name’s unpleasantness is rarely going to get your desired result. Regular guests of your local dive or greasy spoon may play along but a cold audience won’t be turned on by your “Shit on a Shingle” or “Five Napkin Burger”. Before a guest can see the food and eat with their eyes they first read the menu and see with their mind. The first thing I see in my mind when I read Trash Can Omelet is an Oscar the Grouch type steel trash can with a lid. As for its contents, my mind goes to unpleasant places. Those places are not where I want to be when ordering food and not where you want your guests’ minds to be either.
A la mode fits in a French themed restaurant but I just want to add a scoop of vanilla to my warm lava cake or blondie on a hot skillet. Be careful not to overdue your word choice and risk looking foolish to your guest. Or even worse would be to make your guest feel foolish for asking their server what a la mode means when the simple answer begs they should have known already.
It’s better to sometimes switch “bad words” with more attractive choices that will help your menu perception. Everyone is health conscious so endeavor to use the word crispy instead of deep fried when describing your Rhode Island Style Calamari. Throw in a golden-brown if you like. Changing the word stuffed to filled would brighten the tone of description as well. Imagine stuffing the pork loin versus filling it. Your guests will perceive something similar whether they are conscious of it or not.
Avoid kitchen slang. It is not demi, it’s demi-glace. And if you’re proud of the wine you used in it’s preparation then put Barolo at the beginning.
Calling out the source of your product will do wonders for your item as well. Name the farm where your boar was raised for your ragu or the town in which your “local baby greens” were sourced would do well in the description and at times in the title of the menu item. House-made can only be overused when applied to items that are expected to be made in house. If you are rolling and stuffing the grape leaves yourself then please let your guest know!
None of these suggestions are hard and fast rules for menu writing. What I suggest to the chef or menu writer here is to revisit the menu’s you currently present and see where some small changes in word choice may help your guest visualize and accurately perceive the item you are trying to sell them. The Five Napkin or Fat Boy Burger would be better presented as “Sirloin Burger: Eight ounce sirloin blend, flame grilled on a whole wheat, butter toasted bulky roll with Grassroots Ranch smoked bacon.” The only hard and fast rule is that the Trash Can Omelet should disappear forever.