# Restaurants closed on Mondays? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 4, 2002, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305 "2002-06-04T03:53:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Kayeby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9de0a6/32.png) [@Kayeby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kayeby)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2002, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/1 "2002-06-04T03:53:30Z")
Last night my family wanted to go to a restaurant, but when we got there, it was closed. On the door, it stated that the restaurant was closed the first Monday of every month. It really puzzled me - is it a financial/cultural/business/personal thing? I know the owners are Asian (but from what part I couldn’t tell you), but there’s a fish and chip shop (Greek-owned) I know of that is closed every Monday (not just the first Monday of the month). Thanks for any help! ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2002, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/2 "2002-06-04T04:01:56Z")
Many serious restaurants (as opposed to fast-food joints), of many different ethnicities, are closed Mondays, as the chef(s) work hard on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays, weekends being the restaurant’s biggest days. Hence they get Monday off. ---
**Author:** ![evilhanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba8739/32.png) [@evilhanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/evilhanz)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2002, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/3 "2002-06-04T04:05:09Z")
Small restaurants are usually run seven days a week by the owners themselves. Weekends tend to be busiest and they wouldn’t want to be closed too often, so perhaps they’ve just decided to take one day off per month for a mandatory rest. When I worked in a restaurant we might take one day a month to completely take the kitchen apart and scrub it floor to ceiling, appliances, rarely used utensils, and the spaces normally out of reach to daily cleaning et cetera. This was usually done after hours rather than during normal business hours. Hey, why not just call them tomorrow and ask? ---
**Author:** ![Kayeby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9de0a6/32.png) [@Kayeby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kayeby)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2002, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/4 "2002-06-04T05:18:01Z")
Thanks **Duck** and **evil**. That makes a lot of sense, since both food places are reasonably small. ---
**Author:** ![dqa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dqa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dqa)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2002, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/5 "2002-06-04T05:25:23Z")
Recent related thread: [Barber shops and Mondays](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=105644) ---
**Author:** ![tarpal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dfb087/32.png) [@tarpal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tarpal)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2002, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/6 "2002-06-04T16:10:49Z")
Around here, every single sushi bar is closed on Mondays. Not the whole Japanese restaurant, just the sushi bar part. I always wondered why… ---
**Author:** ![SpoilerVirgin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@SpoilerVirgin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpoilerVirgin)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2002, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/7 "2002-06-04T16:32:50Z")
**tarpal** - Sushi requires very fresh fish. If the fish markets in your area are closed on Sunday, that would explain why the sushi bars might be closed on Monday. The restaurants can obtain food for regular Japanese meals, but they probably don’t want to make sushi out of two-day-old fish. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2002, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/8 "2002-06-04T17:21:13Z")
I wouldn’t eat any kind of seafood at a restaurant on a Monday, anyway (or a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday), not anymore (having undergone three bouts of food poisoning from week-end seafood since 1997), not unless it was at a sushi bar, where it’s their business to have the best fish around. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2002, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/restaurants-closed-on-mondays/112305/9 "2002-06-05T03:42:55Z")
_Monday, Monday, can’t trust that day_ I think that being closed on _just the first Monday of the month_ is strange. As **evilhanz** suggested, call them. Then report back. We’re dying to know. Seriously.