Maybe that guy wasn’t a guest, maybe he was an employee.
Possibly. We had a choice of bringing our own lunch or eating in the buffet at a pretty good discount – the club was small and the buffet was the only place to eat – but we had only a half-hour so almost all of of us opted to pack our own.
Also the guy I talked to didn’t say anything like, “Dumbass [name] took too many cookies so the boss made him eat 'em.” This was a momentary conversation in the midst of our other duties when I asked what was up over by the wall.
Haven’t worked many restaurant jobs, huh?
That expression came from the military. It was actually an admonition NOT to waste food. Particularly in World War 2, a lot of draftees were still coming out of the Depression, and the prospect of seemingly unlimited food at meal times dazzled them.
That isn’t the OP’s problem.
A friend of mine goes to Las Vegas every year or two with the sole goal of spending as little money as possible while eating and drinking (alcohol). It’s a game for him.
He told me about a breakfast buffet that was pretty pricey, but was all you can eat/drink including Mimosas. He was going up to get Mimosas so often that one time he requested two. The server gave him a nasty look and said it was one at a time. So my friend chugged down the one in his hand and then asked for another.
He also figured out the way to get the most liquor for the least money playing the slot machine at a bar where drinks were free as long as you were feeding quarters .He’d order a Long Island Iced Tea while getting comfortable in his chair and preparing to drop a quarter. Once served he’d drop the quarter and chug the drink simultaneously. He’d order another, then wait until the slot’s timer was at “1” before dropping his next quarter. Rinse/repeat.
Sounds like the OP should stop inviting them over for dinner if their behavior is that unacceptable.
Either that or just simply tell them what you want them to do.
There are plenty of things people do that are weird or annoying but don’t cross the line into unacceptable.
Right. And it doesn’t sound like these guests are even aware that their hosts consider it unacceptable, if the hosts do at all.
That’s he SOLE GOAL? Not gambling, taking in a show or the sights?
How much does he spend on airfare/hotel to eat and drink so cheaply?
(Vegas sure is different from when I used to go, when airfare, hotels, and food were incredibly cheap!)
I know people like that. For some people the game of avoiding spending is their justification for taking a vacation at all or spending on other leisure activity. They wouldn’t enjoy something that seems like an unproductive and costly activity at all if they couldn’t get their personal pleasure out of saving a few cents here and there.
His absolute sole goal, yes! He doesn’t gamble. Doesn’t go to shows. He LOVES the Las Vegas vibe, the never sleeping thing. He manages to swing a cheap room, although those days may be gone after the last time.
He arrived, checked in, put his bags in his room, then got shitfaced drunk. He didn’t remember his room number, or even the right floor. He rode the elevator to a floor above where he thought his room was, then started trying his keycard on each room, figuring on working his way down.
Turns out there’s security monitoring him doing this and they grabbed him. He insists he’s a guest of the hotel but has no ID on him, just his keycard and a wad of cash. They were very reluctant to tell him his room number and he was shitfaced. Eventually some higher up guy wrote his room number on a post it, stuck the post it on his shirt, and shoved him out of his office.
Good times!!
(He’s a good friend; an alcoholic who views the movie Leaving Las Vegas as a beautiful love story.)
So much this. As @nelliebly said, food is a gift that should be freely given to guests that have been invited.
I’m 70 later this year and was raised by parents who themselves were adolescents during the great depression. NOTHING was wasted and we as children were taught by them to “clean up our plates”.
However, my wife (although raised in an even more modest environment) was not of the same mind when we raised our children and our grands when younger were worse yet for wasting food. Society has simply become more wasteful.
These people are guests in your home so in my opinion, you just have to suck it up. Bad manners? most definitely but if you try to change their eating habits you’re bound to offend people.
I remember a story about how a week or two before D-day Eisenhower wanted to check on how the troops were eating. He and some aides stopped at a chow hall during breakfast time and went through the line. Already having eaten breakfast all he wanted was a sample but the servers were all, “It’s the General!” >plop< and he wound up with about three pounds of food on the tray.
He ate a few bites and started to push the tray away, then saw a large sign on the wall,
“Take all you want but eat all you take.”
–Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower
It took a while but he finished it all.
I have not read the entire thread, so pardon me if this is a repeat.
I know a woman who was a child in Germany during WWII. She always left a (small) bit of food on her plate. Because she could.
This is a very true statement. I was just thinking about the folks who have been taught to line pans with aluminum foil so they don’t have to wash the pan. Saving effort instead of resources. 
I heard about a study a few years ago that concluded that teaching kids to “clean their plates” actually leads to obesity later in their lives. If you’ve been taught to eat everything on your plate, you end up overeating in an attempt to avoid “waste”
Sure, if you overload the plate to begin with. Once scoop of potatoes instead of two, one piece of roast beef instead of two, two scoops of peas instead of one. Teaching children portion control is key of course.
Well, to be fair, less washing does save some resources.
While using up others, like aluminum. Water can be reclaimed, aluminum foil can’t unless it is clean of all grease.