I just heard it for the first time today but I googled it and apparently it’s a real thing.
The cliche is that Olive Garden is the place you take your boyfriend/girlfriend to in order to break up with them.
Like I said, I had never heard of this. Am I uniquely clueless? Did everyone know this except me?
Geez, another thing I did wrong. I always just left them a note and moved to another state.
To answer seriously, no, I had not heard this. But I can see it. Apparently if you’re doing it “right” (there is a right way?) you want to be in a public place like a restaurant in case of, I guess, an emotional or possibly violent reaction?
Well, if you’re breaking up, why waste money on a good restaurant? And no, I’ve never heard this.
I’ve never heard it about Olive Garden but I did hear the same thing about Red Lobster.
Me either. My brother Managed an Olive Garden between his many wives and gfs. and jobs. May be some truth to it.
I think you have this backwards. Maybe taking someone to an Olive Garden is the reason they break up with you.
It’s the ongoing breadsticks and salads and complaints, and asking for more water and… 
I usually get dumped by e-mail; never heard of the Olive Garden thing.
Didn’t you ever see Moonstruck? You take them to a little family-run Italian joint in Brooklyn.
I thought that’s what you went to IKEA for.
Hey, it beats ghosting. Barely.
I worked at an Olive Garden for several years eons ago. If this is a cliche, it’s come up only this century.
To answer your question — no, never heard this cliche. And I don’t think it’s yet some “Everyone knows that!” thing.
First date with the missus was to Olive Garden. She introduced me to Insane Clown Posse on the drive. Rolling up on 12 years happy together.
Maybe the cliché has more to do with wisely having giant bowl o salad and scrummy breadsticks onboard before saying the magic words, “I break with thee, I break with thee, I break with thee.”
I think that’s the point and that’s why you take your future ex-girlfriend to Olive Garden instead.
I recall seeing it in the Internet joke dictionary of “facts”, but not very frequently and it’s been a while.
It really sounds like something that originated in someone’s standup act.
Hmmmm no…the line is “when he fuck me good I take his ass to Red Lobster.”
Do you own or work at an Olive Garden?
I’ve heard the (apocryphal?) story where the waitress tells her coworkers and customers that the couple at the corner table are holding hands and whispering; she’s certain he’s going to propose. Then, when the woman starts to cry, the restaurant errupts with applause. Yeah, they’re breaking up.
Saw this on a sitcom I think. Probably helps to go their a couple of times before breaking up so as not to be too obvious.
Right. Olive Garden is nice enough, but not too expensive. Breaking up at Burger King would be too tacky, but there’s no point in splurging at a four-star French restaurant for someone you’re not going to see again. Olive Garden says “I want to be nice to you, but not that nice.”