sharing meals

My husband almost always shared an appetizer, main, and dessert in Italy, including Rome, and nobody cared.

A typical Italian meal consists of a first course (generally a pasta dish, but could be rice dish or soup) and a second course (meat or fish), accompanied by a contorno (side dish, like a salad or vegetable).
Generally a meal ends with a fruit.

Antipasto (appetizer) is usually eaten only at special occasions and so is dessert.

Restaurants will have all of the above, but it’s not common for Italians to order antipasto+First+second+dessert unless it’s one of those belly bursting occasions like a wedding or a first communion or Christmas. That is particularly true at dinner (lunch is the big meal in Italy).

Regarding sharing, that is perfectly acceptable.

My wife and I generally share one first course, then order two second courses (which we also share). Or we do the opposite (order two first courses and share one second and one contorno). Either way we don’t eat the entire multicourse dinner.

My husband and I just got back from our trip to Italy. Both in Florence and in Rome we enjoyed dinners and shared each course. Not one restaurant was offended and happily brought a small plate for each of us to enjoy each course.

perfect! Thanks.....We will share meals than for sure...save money for wine :)

We do what Roberto does, mostly. Often we have two antipasti because we like those choices a lot, and then we share a pasta and a secondo! or we each have our own pasta OR secondo. We usually have a contorno as well. With wine, at a good place, the tab is still often 80 Euro or more. Not cheap.

As a former restaurateur I will tell you that sharing a single main course is frowned upon and identifies you as cheap.

I disagree.

It is practical, not 'cheap'.

Especially when traveling, ordering more food than one can eat is wasteful. A take out box does not usually work when staying in a hotel where there is no way to reheat it.

Antipasto (appetizer) is usually eaten only at special occasions and so is dessert.

Ha Roberto, This brings to mind a restaurant in Rome I frequented. A couple of nights, I was full and did not want dessert. The first time, lol, the waiter brought me Limoncello sorbet in a flute glass - compliments of the restaurant; he said and insisted I have it. It was very light, delicious and refreshing. The second time I refused dessert, he brought me a plate of sweets, lol, also complimentary. I realize some restaurants bring a little bowl/plate of mini biscotti with espresso, but, this was a bit different. The sweets were accompanied by a glass of Prosecco. Nice restaurant and waiter, lol. I was very appreciative. The Limoncello sorbet was my favorite.

As a former restaurateur I will tell you that sharing a single main course is frowned upon and identifies you as cheap.

andrew.reis, I don't think it's necessarily cheap. If people want to treat themselves to a fancy meal but want to share for their own reasons, what's the big deal?

Thank you for all the responses. Let me set one thing straight we can more than afford to eat our own meals. I do not eat a lot and neither does my youngest son. When we went to DC I had to sit outside a museum because I had a bag with both our leftover breakfast. I don’t want to carry around a bag of food all day, nor will I.
We will just play it by ear or stomach. I love getting just the first dish and then sampling my families, then dessert if I am hungry.

kbblatnik, portions in Europe are not the excess American-sized ones you may be used to. They seem to prefer quality over quantity over there. We share many of our restaurant meals here in the US, but found we didn't need to over there. The real answer is to not order more food (courses) than you can eat.

That is great! I think many of our restaurants could learn from that lol...

In my experience, the “doggie bag” is pretty well unknown in Italy.
An exception was a pizza place in Venice where they boxed up our remains, at the table. I think that taking unwanted food back into the kitchen might not comply with EU food handling rules, mixing up various patron’s food and so on.

kbblatnik, portions in Europe are not the excess American-sized ones
you may be used to.

That has been our experience as well. A primo pasta course is not oversized at all so we'll split an appetizer, order a pasta apiece+ a dessert apiece. Sometimes we'll even split or skip the dessert but we don't usually eat lunch so by dinnertime we're pretty hungry. :O)

You can also skip the primo and appetizer courses and go straight to a secondi (entree) course if you wish. While we don't personally share entree or pasta courses, we do sample each other's choices.