# Restaurant Bread Baskets
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [May 1, 2025, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736 "2025-05-01T03:34:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 12
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)
#### Post date: [May 2, 2025, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/41 "2025-05-02T15:24:38Z")
> [@FairyChatMom](#):
>
> I can’t remember if the one really nice place does bread or not - haven’t been there in years. Maybe they’re the ones who had the warm brown bread served on a cutting board? I have vague memories of that bliss…
Steak & Ale served warm brown bread on a cutting board, but I haven’t been to one since the early 1990s and they’ve gone defunct since then. I’m hard pressed to think of which restaurants I go to with any regularity serves bread. Carinos used to serve bread bread with a tasty mixture of olive oil and herbs to dip it in but they all closed in my area. Texas Roadhouse serves their rolls and they’re good. Cheddar’s serves the absolute worst bread in the world. There is an Italian restaurant near me that serves the second worst bread in the world but the food is surprisingly good. The first time I went and got their free bread I was sure I was in for a bad experience but was not disappointed.
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### Author:  [@LurkMeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LurkMeister)
#### Post date: [May 2, 2025, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/42 "2025-05-02T16:36:26Z")
For various reasons I haven’t been eating at restaurants for a few years, especially the type that put out bread baskets. But I remember eating at several that instead of putting out baskets with just one kind of roll they would have a variety of different types. As I remember this would include ones like rye, pumpernickel, sourdough, etc. There was sometimes a near-fight as everyone would try to get their favorite.
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### Author:  [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)
#### Post date: [May 2, 2025, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/43 "2025-05-02T16:40:01Z")
I dunno about an actual basket, but Lambert’s Cafe was still throwing rolls to customers the last time I checked.
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### Author:  [@Tokushizu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tokushizu)
#### Post date: [May 2, 2025, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/44 "2025-05-02T17:04:21Z")
Then of course there are (or at least were when this thread was created way back when) Chinese restaurants where bread is/was served. Thankfully I’ve never been subjected to that.
> [@Bread with your Chinese Food?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bread-with-your-chinese-food/449421):
>
> So … the incredibly beautiful SO and I were kicking around Northern New Hampshire the last couple of days when we decided to stop in for dinner at a local Chinese restuarant. It was the greatest thing since chopped liver, which we decided not to order since there were other things we wanted. She had the Chicken Chow Mein; I had the Roast Duck (and the Egg Drop Soup … ohmigod … with just a touch of peas and carrots and so thick with egg and ohmigod it was the best I’d ever had) and both were ins…
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [May 2, 2025, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/45 "2025-05-02T17:17:53Z")
Yeah, it’s done here in RI. Not every Chinese restaurant, only one that I’ve been to, but I was told about others. Common dinner rolls are included with every meal. Never heard of any explanation for this, but there’s no explanation for a lot of things in this state.
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### Author:  [@Die\_Capacitrix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Die_Capacitrix)
#### Post date: [May 2, 2025, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/46 "2025-05-02T17:46:27Z")
Greek restaurant serves bread with their own brand olive oil. Which is for sale.
Most of the western food restaurants (Swiss, Italian, German, Spanish, Portuguese, etc.) here serve bread. Chinese, Japanese, and Thai restaurants do not.
At the (mostly) pizza restaurant, if you order a salad, you’ll get a piece of bread as well, or maybe even a basket. But if you just order pizza, no bread for you.
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### Author:  [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)
#### Post date: [May 2, 2025, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/47 "2025-05-02T18:30:25Z")
> [@Great\_Antibob](#):
>
> Lambert’s Cafe was still throwing rolls to customers the last time I checked.
I forgot all about “The Home of Throwed Rolls”!
[ ](https://thewalkingtourists.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/IMG_7316.jpg)
I missed one that was pitched to me from waaaay across the dining room. It rolled around the table, and I was fine that it’d been touched by five other people.
(Anyone who’s obsessing about “I wonder if anyone else has ever touched my food?” is missing out on building a lot of handy immunities…)
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### Author:  [@WolfpackJeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WolfpackJeep)
#### Post date: [May 3, 2025, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/48 "2025-05-03T00:20:20Z")
There was a family-run place in Freeport, ME called The Broad Arrow Tavern that offered baskets of bread that had been baked in-house (up until the pandemic, of course). That was freakin’ _amazing_…there were typically white and brown breads in the basket, and on Sundays they would often do something really special, like bread with a thin layer of cheese baked on top, or little muffins. Post pandemic they started buying their bread from a local shop, then switched to blah stuff from a food service, then stopped the bread baskets altogether when they changed ownership. 😕
> [@Odesio](#):
>
> Steak & Ale served warm brown bread on a cutting board,
That was sooooooo good!! I really miss that place; for a chain, they had really great food.
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### Author:  [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)
#### Post date: [May 3, 2025, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/49 "2025-05-03T00:52:38Z")
> [@WolfpackJeep](#):
>
> That was sooooooo good!! I really miss that place; for a chain, they had really great food.
I’m not quite sure if my tastes have simply changed over the years (they have) or the quality of some of the chains I loved has gone down.
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### Author:  [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)
#### Post date: [May 3, 2025, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/50 "2025-05-03T04:03:38Z")
Having spent many of my formative dinners in Wisconsin, “Land of Ten Thousand Supper Clubs”, I’ve learned to expect The Bread Basket and The Relish Tray.
Those two are your guarantees that you’ve found a good ol’ Friday Night Fish Fry, or the best steak of your life.
Imagine our reaction when a new “We’re Trying To Be An Old Fashioned Supper Club” opened up, and we sat down at… an empty table.
> _"Ex-cyuuuse me,_ I am Gazpachiolio, and I will be your Appetizer Facilitator this evening. Now, we do have a relish tray for two, featuring seasonal cruditéd vegetables, for only $18."
Our hearts sank…
.
eta: Luckily, when the kid brought a girl home, and she wanted an authentic Supper Club, we found her a classic joint with all the accoutrements!
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### Author:  [@WolfpackJeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WolfpackJeep)
#### Post date: [May 6, 2025, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/51 "2025-05-06T00:08:17Z")
> [@Odesio](#):
>
> I’m not quite sure if my tastes have simply changed over the years (they have) or the quality of some of the chains I loved has gone down.
I swear I can remember a time when Applebee’s was good. Heck, if my mom was willing to eat there, it must have been halfway decent!!
I also wonder how some of my favorite restaurants would have fared if they had made it to today. I have an early '90s menu from Carbur’s in Portland, ME; looking back through it, I’m confident that if the restaurant still existed, the menu would look nothing like that, and not just because of the jokes. And I wonder if the food was as good as I remember; at the time, I thought their spaghetti and marinara was out of sight, but I’m sure it was just something they bought from a restaurant supplier.
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### Author:  [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)
#### Post date: [May 7, 2025, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurant-bread-baskets/1017736/52 "2025-05-07T20:50:49Z")
No mention yet of The Cheesecake Factory? They provide a basket with two different types of baguette. The sourdough is good, but apparently the brown stuff is so distinctive and popular that they sell it packaged in grocery stores. If I eat it is because my wife has called dibs on all the sourdough.
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