Restaurant Management and Operations

Eating out has a long history. Taverns existed as early as 1700 B.C.E. The record of a public dining place in Ancient Egypt in 512 B.C.E. shows a limited menu—only one dish was served, consisting of cereal, wild fowl, and onion.

Be that as it may, the ancient Egyptians had a fair selection of foods to choose from: peas, lentils, watermelons, artichokes, lettuce, endive, radishes, onions, garlic, leeks, fats (both vegetable and animal), beef, honey, dates, and dairy products, including milk, cheese, and butter.

The ancient Romans were great eaters out. Evidence can be seen even today in Herculaneum, a Roman town near Naples that in A.D. 70 was buried under some 65 feet of mud and lava by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius. Along its streets were a number of snack bars vending bread, cheese, wine, nuts, dates, figs, and hot foods. The counters were faced with marble fragments. Wine jugs were imbedded in them, kept fresh by the cold stone. Mulled and spiced wines were served, often sweetened with honey. A number of the snack bars were identical or nearly so giving the impression that they were part of a group under single ownership.

Bakeries were nearby, where grain was milled in the courtyard, the mill turned by blindfolded asses. Some bakeries specialized in cakes. One of them had 25 bronze baking pans of various sizes, from about 4 inches to about 1.5 feet in diameter.

After the fall of Rome, eating out usually took place in an inn or tavern, but by 1200 there were cooking houses in London, Paris, and elsewhere in Europe, where cooked food could by purchased but with no seating. Medieval travelers dined at inns, taverns, hostelries, and monasteries.

The first caf´ e was established in then Constantinople in 1550. It was a cof- feehouse, hence the word cafe. The coffeehouse, which appeared in Oxford in 1650 and seven years later in London, was a forerunner of the restaurant today.

Coffee at the time was considered a cure-all. As one advertisement in 1657 had it: “ ... Coffee closes the orifices of the stomach, fortifies the heat within, and helpeth digesting ... is good against eyesores, coughs, or colds ... ” Lloyd’s of London, the international insurance company, was founded in Lloyd’s Coffee House. By the eighteenth century, there were about 3,000 coffeehouses in London.

Coffeehouses were also popular in Colonial America. Boston had many of them, as did Virginia and New York. Both the words caf´ e, meaning a small restaurant and bar, and cafeteria come from the single word caf´ e, French for coffee.

In the eighteenth century, with the exception of inns which were primarily for travelers, food away from home could be purchased in places where alcoholic beverages were sold. Such places were equipped to serve simple, inexpensive dishes either cooked on the premises or ordered from a nearby inn or food shop.

Tavern-restaurants existed in much of Europe including France and Germany with its winestuben that served delicatessen, sauerkraut, and cheese. In Spain bodegas served tapas. Greek taverns served various foods with olive oil.