This submit initially appeared within the June 19, 2023 version of The Transfer, a spot for Eater’s editors and writers to disclose their suggestions and professional eating ideas — generally considerate, generally bizarre, however at all times somebody’s go-to transfer. Subscribe now.
To me, there isn’t a worse destiny at a restaurant than reaching the top of a meal and realizing I’m too full for dessert. It occurred not too long ago: I sat right down to eat at Center Youngster Clubhouse and instantly honed in on the dessert part of the menu. They had been serving Key lime pie. I wanted it.
However by the point my associates and I had plowed by way of a Caesar salad, burgers, and a hulking, bone-in pork chop, I used to be uncomfortably full and wanted to lie down. The Key lime pie might need been out of attain, if not for my signature dining-out transfer: ordering dessert to go.
I’ve been doing this since school, when, on a visit to South Carolina with my mother, I used to be stuffed completely stuffed with fried oysters however discovered myself unable to stroll away from the bowls of banana pudding being delivered to the tables round me. As we deliberated over whether or not to order the pudding, our server recommended taking it with us. A few hours later, whereas we lay in our lodge beds watching a film, we dug into a bit of plastic deli container of banana pudding, passing it forwards and backwards as we ate, discovering ourselves as soon as once more swaddled within the intimacy of the restaurant’s hospitality.
Nonetheless, there are limits to this system. Frozen desserts are the obvious since they’ll hardly ever final greater than 20 minutes. Typically eating places additionally pre-portion desserts like budino into glass jars, which may’t go away the restaurant and aren’t straightforward to switch. At a high-end restaurant, the desserts are sometimes composed of a number of distinct elements that hardly ever survive the journey house; something that’s going to require extra maintenance than merely sticking within the fridge might be not a great candidate to take house. If I’m contemplating dessert to go, I’ll normally defer to my server.
“I wish to order dessert, however I’m actually full. How do you assume this Key lime pie would do for takeout if I needed to eat it a bit of later tonight?” Typically this query causes a number of nervous glances and equivocating, through which case I’ll merely get the dessert on the restaurant and energy by way of. (What a burden!) Different instances, although, servers are delighted, not occasionally sharing that additionally they like to take house leftover bits of desserts on the finish of their shifts.
As a devoted lover of dessert, I think about it my responsibility to take part in its consumption. Trade data says that lower than half of diners in a eating room will order one thing candy after their meal, making it troublesome for a restaurant to afford the price of a devoted pastry chef, reducing the standard of desserts when the job falls to a busy line prepare dinner.
Taking dessert to go isn’t only a special-occasion transfer. Actually, I’d argue it’s higher deployed at your neighborhood spot on a standard night time whenever you don’t wish to stuff your self to the gills, however that in just a few hours, you’re actually going to lengthy for one thing candy.
The place I do that most frequently is my neighborhood pizza spot, Stina Pizzeria. Stina is ostensibly a pizza place, however chef Bobby Saritsoglou additionally seems attractive seasonal salads, grilled seafood, and a chocolate-tahini layer cake that by no means fails to name my title. I typically go in pondering I’ll simply have a salad and some small plates however emerge hours later stuffed with pasta, pizza, and the nice and cozy glow of Saritsoglou’s hospitality. On these nights, I’d hate to overlook out on dessert, so I decide to take the cake house. I stow it in my fridge, pulling it out an hour or two after dinner when my abdomen has settled barely and I’m prepared for just a few extra bites. A restaurant-quality dessert is an excellent frivolity. Taking it house to take pleasure in on my sofa, presumably in my pajamas, is a real luxurious.
Maddy Sweitzer-Lamme is a author residing in Philadelphia.
