Latest news with #familydining
Yahoo
12 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
5 Things Parents Do at Restaurants That Most Annoy Servers
A restaurant server is sharing the worst ways parents misbehave at restaurants. 'The phrase, 'The customer is always right' is dying out,' Alana Fineman, a comedian and server in Southern California who posts restaurant skits on TikTok, tells Dining out with young kids is draining, between picky eaters, spilled food, whining and restless wanderers. Fortunately, kid-friendly restaurants are equipped with coloring activities, playful decorations and the swift delivery of kids' meals to quell complaints. Sometimes, it's parents — not their children — who misbehave. 'Servers don't want to shame families or discourage them from going out to eat,' says Fineman. 'Parents are usually ... trying their best.' Here are five mistakes families most often make at restaurants, according to this server. Kids make messes and that's part of the experience, according to Fineman. 'It's one thing when a baby throws food from his high chair — it's another when kids rip open sugar packets and dump them on the floor or finger-paint with ketchup on the walls,' says Fineman. 'That usually means that a parent is not paying attention or allowing it to happen,' she adds. Big messes are typically cleaned by bussers, whom Fineman calls one of the 'hardest-working' employees in her field. 'If someone vomits, it's the busser who cleans it up,' she explains. 'Kids shouldn't run through a restaurant — it's not a McDonald's PlayPlace,' says Fineman. Most restaurants lack appropriate spaces for children to cut loose, says Fineman. A high-speed collision with a server can cause broken glass, fallen food, delayed orders and injuries. 'If you're carrying a tray of five martinis or plates of boiling-hot food and a child runs in front of you, you can drop it on the floor or onto a person,' she says. Fineman recalls a hazardous incident at her restaurant. 'Kids in a party of 10 were running around,' she says. 'They climbed over a fence and onto the street, where they threw rocks onto the dining patio.' While no one was struck, the children were lectured by an employee, who Fineman says, 'Did the parenting.' 'Kids get to a certain age when they can order their own food and the parents will say, 'Tell the lady what you want,'' says Fineman. She finds most of this banter 'funny and endearing,' but if the child won't speak up, the server now has a parenting problem. Fineman says gentle prompts from a parent is usually encouraging enough, however, 'Every so often, a parent says, 'We're not moving on until you learn to order.'' 'I can't always be a part of it when I'm really busy,' says Fineman. Picky eaters are usually not a problem for servers — unless parents have big expectations. Fineman says some parents get 'irate' with restricted menus or if chefs cannot produce a specific meal, due to limited ingredients. 'If it's a slow day, they might be able to ... but not every time,' says Fineman. 'There needs to be a contingency plan for what your child can eat.' Fineman proposes that parents plan for kids with dietary preferences by reading the digital menu before coming in. Fineman points to a 'fascinating phenomenon' wherein parents don't necessarily mention when children are included in a reservation. Maybe they hope to sidestep the automatic gratuities that some restaurants apply to larger parties, says Fineman, but most don't realize that children count as guests, even when they require high chairs, which take the same space as a chair. The miscommunication is more of a problem on busier days, when families may have to wait longer for a sizable table. 'There can be an unfortunate domino effect in the restaurant industry,' says Fineman, adding, 'Miscalculating three people can affect the next 45 minutes.' Fineman says parents can rectify this by notifying the restaurant when their party size changes, even by one child. This article was originally published on
Daily Mail
a day ago
- General
- Daily Mail
Restaurant's bizarre requirement sparks fiery debate about adults ordering off the kids' menu
Who knew that kids menus could come with such intense restrictions? That's exactly what TikTok user @ discovered when she went to place a phone order for an Italian restaurant her and her family eat at pretty often. In a now-viral TikTok video, she explained that after putting in the order for her and her husband she asked for the spaghetti and meatballs off of the designated kids' menu for her eight-year-old daughter. But she was told by the restaurant that she wasn't allowed to get anything off the children's section over the phone because the eatery couldn't verify whether or not it was actually for a youngster - and it sparked a massive debate. 'So I order it and they tell me that they don't take orders for kids' spaghetti and meatballs over the phone because they think it's adults buying the spaghetti and meatballs kids' portion and eating it themselves,' the woman said. 'So you can only [get] kids' spaghetti and meatballs if you eat at the restaurant.' She ended the video by posing the question, 'Is this normal?' and social media users definitely had thoughts. Many people flocked to the comment section to share their thoughts, launching a fiery argument about whether or not restaurants should require confirmation that kids' meals are for kids. 'Not normal and frankly asinine,' one TikTok user said of the restaurant's rule. 'Never heard of a restaurant doing this,' another chimed in. A different user commented: 'That's so odd. If I'm buying something, then I don't need to be questioned. If you don't want my money... bye.' Other users pointed out that even if it was an adult ordering off the kids' menu it wasn't hurting the restaurant in any way. 'Kids portions are less money because they are smaller portions and or less expensive food groups,' one said. 'So there should be no business reason for them caring if an adult eats it.' Another TikTok user wrote: 'I'm so confused? Who cares who eats the kids meal? You are paying less because it's a smaller portion. 'Some elderly people needs kids portions as well. That's crazy business.' It launched a fiery argument about whether or not restaurants should require confirmation that kids' meals are for kids Some users even suggested that she cancel the order Very few users explained that allowing adults to eat off of a kid's menu would be bad for business Some users even added that the poster should have canceled her order immediately. 'Please tell me you said, "Cool cancel the entire order,"' one user wrote, to which the original poster replied, 'They offered me the option of getting a side of spaghetti and adding a meatball. So dumb.' 'A sale is a sale - you don't want to sell me a kids meal, I'll go somewhere else. Simple,' another user offered. And while most comments mirrored similar sentiments, there were a select few who didn't find an issue with the restaurant's policy. 'Kid menus are usually a financial loss for the restaurant. The menus exist to entice in families,' one person offered. 'TikTok has normalized adults purchasing kids portions so I kinda get their reasoning but they should know when to enact this 'policy' and it's not when someone is ordering other stuff,' another said.
Daily Mail
2 days ago
- Daily Mail
People left outraged after dad shares Disneyland breakfast receipt
A father has shocked people with a photo of his receipt from a 'Princess Breakfast' at Disneyland California. Taking to X, John '@jrockandrollt' wrote: 'Princess Breakfast at Disneyland with my kids. Almost spit out my coffee. 'If I find that goddamn mouse I am going to mug him.' In the photo of his receipt shared alongside his post, the father revealed he spent $937.65/£695 on the lavish breakfast, including a tip of $150/£111. He explained there were five people in total at the brunch - two children and three adults - meaning the price came to $187/£139 per person. The father also shared a photo of the breakfast in the comments, revealing his meal included beef steak, a devilled egg, asparagus and prawns. And when it came to drinks, the group had just one alcoholic beverage, a Bloody Mary, with their meal. Many commenters were shocked by the price of the breakfast with one person joking: 'How many princesses did you eat?' Another person says: 'There isn't a meal on this Earth worth that much.' On its website, Disney describes its Princess Breakfast as a 'unforgettable 3-course breakfast' accompanied by 'enchanting encounters with some favourite Disney Princesses'. Appetisers could include mini lobster rolls, beignets and banana wraps, and a child main's course consists of chicken and Mickey waffles, while adults could opt for devilled eggs, turkey sausage and truffle mac and cheese. The website also states that the price of the breakfast starts at $142/£105 a person. And for this reason, many people on X felt that John should have been aware that he was booking a luxury experience. One person writes: 'Bro they tell you the price when you book. If you're surprised that's on you.' And 'Ray Q' says: 'Why? You should know roughly how much it would cost before you had it.' 'Parenting in the USA' says: 'They are pretty clear at the Grand California about the cost of that per guest and it takes months to get a reservation. How was the experience over all?' Despite his shock at the price, John admits that he 'enjoyed' the Princess Brunch experience, saying: 'It was fun, the food was probably 7/10, service was attentive and enthusiastic, princesses were all trained pro actresses and spent a lot of time with the kids. I enjoyed it.' In another comment, he adds: 'Kids enjoyed it, so I think it was worth it. The kids definitely learned some new words when I opened the bill though.' The Disney Princess Breakfast Adventures are held at the Trillium Room in Disney's Grand Californian Hotel & Spa. Disney says 'advance reservations are highly recommended' and can be made online or on the Disney app.
Times
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Times
This Lego-obsessed city is Europe's best break for kids
For once, my daughters are excited about lunch. They've even knowingly ordered a vegetable, unheard of in their respective five and four years on this planet. But then, they've never before been offered lunch by a robot. Nor ordered it by slotting Lego bricks together and pushing them into a machine. This is the magic of Mini Chef, the restaurant at the centre of Lego House in Billund, southern Denmark (child meals £15, adult £26). Here meals are made — so the story goes — by a Lego chef in a chaotic kitchen that we watch on a tableside screen. The food then makes its way down a spiral conveyor belt to a pair of robot waitors, Robert and Roberta. Wearing Lego bowties and fixing us with goggly Lego eyes, Robert and Roberta wave at the waiting children, prompting shrieks and giggles. And there is something for the parents: the menu is heavy on veggies and dishes are tasty (think cauliflower and chickpea curry, and oven-roasted salmon). I've come with my husband and three young children to visit Billund's Lego House, the 'Home of the Brick', a towering building that appears like 21 giant blocks stacked in the city's central square (from £27, under 3s free; Inside are 25 million Lego bricks, some masterfully composed into models ranging from dinosaurs to a giant tree, the others scattered about in four 'experience zones' ready for building. Energy levels have been high all morning ever since we were issued with personal — and scannable – bright yellow wristbands at the entrance to Lego House and told to use them to identify ourselves at the cameras stationed around the numerous activities in the four zones. Cue sprints towards buckets of Lego blocks, determined to get there first, and endless jostling in front of screens to grab the perfect memento of the latest creation. The selfies we take using the cameras are stored in the Lego House system for us to access via the QR code on our wristbands when we get home. • 16 of the best family adventure holidays We start by grabbing a Lego base plate to build brick self-portraits of how we're feeling (excited, obviously) and load them into a machine that scans our creations to generate a digital version on screen, which we then watch dance to electronic music. Then we move on to create a fish, which is also rendered digital but then released into an aquarium to swim with — gulp — a giant Lego shark. Everything is brightly coloured, larger than life, interactive and the girls can't get enough of it all. Their younger brother, who is two, struggles to play along. But then we find the Duplo train builder activity, which engages him in quiet play for long enough that I can take his sisters to the Robo Lab to program a robot. It's simple coding and almost certainly the first they've ever tackled. Still, my four-year-old daughter figures it out before I do and gets her robot to move around the digital garden, planting seeds and watering them to make flowers for the bees, while I jab uselessly at the screen doing all the wrong things. A preview, surely, of our future family dynamics when it comes to tech. I had thought there might not be enough at Lego House to engage us for an entire day. But, in each zone we walk through, we're constantly pulled from one room to the next by more and more enticing builds to try. Hours pass, we take dozens of photos, and I begin to understand why Lego has long been the world's most popular toy. I even lose myself in creating an intricate Lego flower, shaping two shades of yellow into petals and combing through seemingly bottomless buckets of blocks to find exactly the right hinge to attach them. I'm normally far too impatient for this sort of activity, yet I probably spend at least 20 minutes here, my daughters both silently building right beside me. By the time I've finished and am planting my flower in the Lego garden, my shoulders have dropped and my breathing slowed. I feel like I do after a yoga class, minus the sore muscles. Only in Billund. • 18 of the best European city breaks with children There are ten Legoland theme parks worldwide, including the one in Windsor, but Billund is the only one with a Lego House. It was in this small Danish town that the local toymaker Ole Kirk Kristiansen invented the brick and it very much remains its home. A large factory and the company headquarters are here and it feels like a town that Lego built — not least because there are vast Lego blocks to climb on in the street, and every second person you see is either wearing a Lego employee lanyard or carrying a bulging bag of goodies from the Lego shop. You don't visit Billund if you don't love Lego. And, if you do love Lego, you'll almost certainly want to stay in the Legoland hotel. The themed bedrooms run from Arthurian knights to Ninjago ninjas and are decorated with characters built from Lego bricks — we find a ladybird above the bed and a butterfly in the bathroom — and have bunk beds for the kids. It's fun, if a little tired in places, and the castle-themed playground within easy hollering distance of our room is a boon come evening and the need to run off steam before bed. Billund is a compact place and everything we need is walkable from the hotel. With three children who all require car seats, not needing a hire car is a huge relief. I instantly love the pleasant 20-minute walk from the hotel to the town centre, winding along a pedestrianised riverside walkway lined with large modern sculptures. We stroll this route several times during our May half-term break, walking into the town for cinnamon rolls at Billund Bageri, dinner at one of the simple restaurants (pizza is a fixture) or to let the kids loose in the playgrounds on the roof of Lego House. One afternoon we walk in for a preview of the Lego Masters Academy, inspired by the TV series of the same name, which will pit talented Lego builders against each other when it launches in September. On the ground floor of Lego House, it will offer hands-on sessions for Lego fans, teaching building skills from foundation level to the technically advanced, for a separate charge (adults and children £23). This is most likely to appeal to AFOLs, or adult fans of Lego — an impassioned community of Lego-lovers who create incredible custom builds, some of which are on display in the Masterpiece Gallery on the top floor of Lego House — but the sessions also cater for builders from the age of five. This makes my eldest daughter the youngest these sessions are suitable for. She's completely captivated from the get-go and creates something far more intricate than I would have imagined she was capable of, which she insists we display the second we get home. I resolve to challenge her more in future and to leave the box of Lego out in the living room more often. Before leaving Billund, we must, or course, visit actual Legoland (adults and children £37, under 2s free). After all, we can see it from our hotel. This is the original Lego theme park, opened in 1968 as a place to display the company's exhibition of models. Now owned by Merlin, today it's more focused on child-friendly rides. We visit twice to spin on the carousel and giggle ourselves giddy on the Flying Eagle rollercoaster. There are rides even my two-year-old son can enjoy (a Duplo-themed mini train, a safari to see Lego animals) and the girls are cock-a-hoop when they discover that Mummy isn't allowed to accompany them on the Frog Hopper. I strap them in and watch them dissolve into near-hysteria together, whooping each other into the sort of frenzy of jubilation only childhood knows as they're flung up and down a tower like a frog hopping in the air. I find myself grinning and waving non-stop throughout their ride. • 13 of the best family-friendly weekend breaks in the UK Sure, sometimes parenting means standing back and letting your children have all the fun but on this trip, more often than not, I've been giggling and whooping right along with them. The home of Lego? It's a blockbuster hit. Helen Ochyra was a guest of Lego House. The Legoland Hotel has B&B family rooms from £300, including a two-day ticket to Legoland ( Fly to Billund
BBC News
03-06-2025
- General
- BBC News
Do you think child-free places should be banned?
Have you and your family ever wanted to eat out or go to a public place but you haven't been able to due to "no children" rules? Well, France is facing a debate about this, as a group of politicians are hoping to bring in a ban on all adult-only holiday spots, including hotels, campsites and restaurants. They are hoping to make it possible to take legal action against places that ban children, saying it discriminates against a whole section of everyday society - of the ban say not everywhere is child-friendly and adults should be allowed to have some places to proposal is a long way from becoming a law, but if it were to go ahead, France would become one of the world's first places to bring in a total ban like this. Do you think it is fair to ban children from certain facilities? Or should adults be allowed to have some child-free spaces if they want them? Have your say in our vote and leave us a comment below too. Views for and against Some adults have spoken out against this idea in France, as they want to be able to choose whether to be around children or not. For example, some adults say they want to feel relaxed to read a book and swim in an adult-only pool, rather than the possibility of having noisy children around when they are on holiday. Some restaurants have spoken out of one too many bad experiences with young people creating lots of mess and noise. Nettie's House of Spaghetti in Tinton Falls, USA, said on their Instagram account that they "love kids" but due to "noise levels, lack of space for high chairs and cleaning up mess", they are no longer able to accommodate also said they wanted to take control of the situation after they were overwhelmed with "kids running around the restaurant".But people on the other side of the debate have said that families should be able to go anywhere and take their kids along too, as they are also members of society. They argue children usually misbehave when their needs aren't being looked after properly, and that it's important for children to learn how to behave properly in shared areas and to learn how to be considerate of other grown ups. And to do that they need to be able to access them.
