Camille Hugh and her boyfriend had just been seated at Siggy’s Good Food restaurant in Soho when a server dropped off a plate of eggplant, veggie and tofu lasagna at the neighboring table. Hugh’s stomach instantly growled in hunger.
“It looked so good, but it was so huge,” gripes the 20-something fitness blogger from Kensington, Brooklyn. Hesitant to order such a large plate of food, Hugh requested just a half-size portion of the mammoth meal instead.
“The server told me I would have to order the entire thing,” she recalls of the incident last year — despite her offer to pay the full $15 price for a pint-sized portion.
(After eating exactly half of the lasagna, she had the leftovers boxed up to go. When asked for comment, Siggy’s simply stated that they “only serve full-size portions.”)
Hugh is among a growing number of diners — Amal Clooney included — who are requesting partially portioned meals at NYC restaurants, leaving chefs divided on how to handle such demands.
While some oblige as a matter of goodwill, others are refusing to sacrifice the quality of their dishes — and won’t even split a meal on two plates for diners, because it goes against their philosophy.
The trend gained some clout earlier this month when Amal was spotted dining with husband George at Patsy’s Italian Restaurant in Midtown, where she feasted on chicken breast tre colore and a half-size portion of penne with spicy marinara.
“She said, ‘American portions are large,’ ” recalls executive chef Sal Scognamillo, who says such inquiries are not uncommon, especially at lunch and among his international clientele.
“If they ask for it, we’re more than happy to do it. We cut the food in half and charge for half of the dish,” he says, adding that the rule applies to all menu items.
Requests to lighten entrees have become so prevalent that some restaurants, such as A.W.O.L. in Williamsburg, now have half-size entree options listed on their menu. A month ago, the farm-to-table joint began offering two specials a night available in two sizes.
“You don’t open a restaurant to say no to people,” opines A.W.O.L.’s head chef John Powali. “That might have worked in the 1980s or ’90s, but not today.”
Recent specials available in two sizes include skirt steak with fingerling potatoes and vegetables ($28 for eight ounces, $15 for four), as well as salmon with quinoa ($26 for eight ounces, $14 for four). The sides remain about the same size for either option.
“It’s important that everyone focuses on customers,” adds Powali. “There’s no limit to what we would accommodate.”
But before you march into your neighborhood steakhouse demanding half a rib-eye, know that many restaurants are steadfastly opposed to the trend.
“When customers want a half-portion, the meal loses the beauty that the chef creates,” argues Paola Pedrignani, owner of Amaranth on the Upper East Side. “The appearance of a dish is just as important as the taste.”
Just as she refuses to serve a smaller-scale version of her entrees, Pedrignani also doesn’t believe in splitting a meal between two plates. Her compromise? Presenting guests with the original dish before a server splits it tableside.
Other chefs, such as John Gibson of Stonehome Wine Bar and Restaurant in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, worry that it’s misleading for diners who might be basing their decisions off of their neighbor’s orders.
“If someone is looking at the price of the bigoli pasta, then they look five seats down and see someone just had it delivered but don’t realize that it’s only a half-portion, that is concerning,” says Gibson.
Chefs agree that weight-conscious women are fueling the trend in the hopes of slimming down without sacrificing their social lives.
“I recommend all of my clients ask for half-portions of their food,” says Amy Shapiro, a dietician with Real Nutrition NYC. “It’s instant portion control. A lot of restaurants think that people want to get their money’s worth, so they give them big portions of food. If you ask for half of a portion, you can clean your plate without feeling like you ate too much.”
Limiting her portion size is how Hugh, author of the forthcoming “The Oil Free Diet,” has lost more than 30 pounds since 2012.
“Most restaurants think I’m trying to shortchange them when I ask for half a portion,” Hugh admits.
“I have friends and family who work in restaurants. I know they want to turn a profit. I don’t have a problem with paying full price for half the meal. The restaurants that are able to accommodate me, I’m more likely to revisit.”
For others, it’s about being able to enjoy more variety in a single meal. Teri Volpert, a stay-at-home mom on the Upper East Side, is a regular patron of nearby Paola’s because of the restaurant’s willingness to halve any pasta for $16, a policy that’s printed on the menu.
“It’s a nice way to have a variety. Sometimes I mix and match, or share plates,” says Volpert, who frequently dines with her parents and her young children in restaurants around Manhattan — and says that asking for half-size entrees is especially beneficial for the latter.
“My 12-year-old can order half a chicken paillard, or half a chicken Milanese. He wouldn’t be able to finish a full order anyway.”
Still, half-entrees can be a recipe for waste — at least in the kitchen.
“I cannot cut a steak or a piece of fish,” says Pedrignani. “These are expensive items, and we can’t guarantee that we will sell the other half.”
If the kitchen at A.W.O.L. is forced to split a nontraditional item, such as an “airline chicken breast,” which has the drumette still attached, the leftovers commonly end up in the cooks’ stomachs.
But Powali maintains that the strategy will pay off in the long run.
“It’s helped our sales, because more people are keen on ordering the entrees,” says Powali, who adds that he’s also selling more cocktails and desserts.
Money matters aside, the issue mostly boils down to how comfortable chefs are with customers intruding upon their craft.
“The customer isn’t always right,” says Gibson.
Though Stonehome does tend to fulfill the majority of requests that come through the kitchen, it depends on the restaurant’s volume, and the request itself.
“If someone wants a half-size of the chicken, that doesn’t work, because we serve a leg and a breast,” he explains. “But salads and pastas, those don’t have to be compromised.”
For Gibson, it’s about balancing customer needs with those of his small, cramped kitchen.
“If we can easily do it, we’ll accommodate. But I’m not going to make one person happy at the expense of everyone else.”