Uncle Sam

Sue,<BR><BR>Where are you coming from?<BR><BR>I didn't say anything about not paying for breakfast. If you go to a brasserie and order a croissant and cup of coffee, of course you pay for it. And if you only eat 1/2 of your croissant, you can take it with you...you paid for it.<BR><BR>If however, you pay for a breakfast buffet, then you can eat your breakfast, in fact all you want and back for more and more until you leave.<BR><BR>However, then you cannot take whatever else you want from the buffet to feed yourself for lunch...that is not what you paid for.<BR><BR>Get it?

Sue

Uncle, I hate to flog a dead horse, but I'm not talking about a breakfast buffet--I'm talking about a breakfast that is served at your table.

Lana

May I suggest switching from jeans to overalls so there will be more room to stash the stolen breakfast food?

Arlene

First,let me say that I am amazed at so many responses!<BR><BR>Uncle Sam..how did you figure out that I am from New Jersey?<BR><BR>Mindy..once in Toledo..at an outdoor restaurant..I saw a huge extented family of locals eating their own food. They had brought everything in plastic containers. It all looked so good! They started to talk to us and even offered us food.. we did decline, but it looked like they were having a marvellous time. I am sure the owners knew..and I am sure that it was perfectly acceptable. So, now don't criticize me for this...I am only relating an amusing experience.

elvira

Hey, another use for fanny packs! Nothing like stowing stuff from breakfast, like cheese and meat and cut fruit, in that fanny pack, strapping it around your waist, and eating it four hours later! Yum...does anyone know how much it costs to have one's stomach pumped in the various European countries? It's got to be cheaper than buying lunch.

Ohno

Is that overripe breakfast cheese in your pocket or just your unwashed jeans?<BR>Should be interesting in August, cheese and fruit driping tourists, leaving spots on benches.

Faina

Oh, people, people, you made me add to Mable's sarcasm. You're leaving out one very important source of savings: LOCAL FARMERS MARKETS. They always offer free samples, so why don't travel from market to market to market, this way you don't have to spend anything on food at all! And while saving you're learning local customs! And may bring stale rolls or melted butter back home as souveniers!<BR><BR>And if you have to take something "discretely" like some poster mentioned aren't you ashamed of yourself? I would be! I would never be proud of stealing.

Oinky

me? We love vacationing in Italy. First stop is the Court House to see who has applied for marriage licenses. Then we plan accordingly.<BR><BR>We love to attend their elaborate wedding receptions. Since we look Italian ourselves, we always just blend right in. We just smile and glide through those endless tables of heavenly, aromatic and colorful platters of pasta, boar, pork, beef, cantucci, vino, vin santo, and last but not least dessert! We are usually so stuffed that we end up slipping a few of those yummy desserts into my jumbo Dooney Bourke tote.<BR><BR>This is how we travel all through Italy for under $5.00 per day (that's for petrol). hmmmmm perhaps I should write a book?<BR><BR>

Phil

Here's a tip for the frugal traveller:<BR>Years ago I went to a restaurant in Antwerp. My partner and I ordered a delicious platter (tomato stuffed with grey North Sea shrimp). By the time it arrived, she didn't feel well so we decided to leave. I ate mine quickly and, knowing the doggy bag principle was not common, apologetically asked the waiter to wrap up her untouched dish. He said: "Of course, no problem" and added: "Would you believe some of our guests from .... (another European country) sometimes dare to ask us to wrap up food from someone else's table, especially lobster!!"

ja

Well, coming from half of a couple that took a collapsible coler to Portugal last fall, I don't know if my 2cents' woth is even worth that much - but we did hike up to the gas station every day or two and buy bags of ice for said cooler, and, while we had half board at our hotel, we never carried anything away from the dining room with us except the one evening I was feeling ghastly, and we PAID FOR a bottle of fizzy mineral water for me to take to the room. We also bought our beer/wine with our supper every night, as this is how places that sell stays with half board make their profits; the cooler was for my bf's recreational beer supply and our lunch/tapas fixings. We are positively addicted to foreign supermarkets/groceries/delis - a trip to one is like a voyage of discovery for us!<BR>ja

Woinky

Oinky, why stop there? Some nationalities also have huge buffets after funerals. Check out the obituaries. In some countries, they even kindly put up posters honoring the recently deceased just so that you'll know where to look for grub.<BR><BR>Also, I've found that hospitals are another great source of free food. Just walk in around mealtime and see who's feeling too sick to finish what's on their tray. Sure, it's hospital food, but it's really no worse than what you ate on the plane on the flight over.

HowTo

I used to work at a dinner theatre, decades ago. The food they served was disgusting - casseroles and warmed-over veggies and stuff out of a can that you couldn't identify. But every night, patrons would come and eat this goo, and every night (and particularly on Sunday matin&eacute;es), middle-aged to elderly ladies would come with FOIL-LINED PURSES, and when they finished the meal, they would head back to the buffet and throw tuna casserole and stale salad and overcooked kale and Key lime pie into the purse! We could never figure out how they got it out of their purses and "served" it when they got home. It must've been a huge mush. I guess the theory was - it all ends up in your stomach, right? <BR><BR>BLECH!!

Al

You breakfast snipes are pikers. Forget about sneaking food. Just travel the back roads. That way, you will find all sorts of protein on the pavement. If you get there before the crows. Just make sure someone watches out for oncoming traffic.

Becky

You are all making me laugh so hard, I am getting a stomach ache and I haven't had dinner yet.

KenCT

Great thread! All this talk about sneaking into private receptions reminds me....<BR><BR>A few years ago, I attended my college alumni weekend. After commenting at check-in that I was having some difficulty finding my way around, the kid at the desk suggested the most of the buildings probably had not been built when I was a student. That hurt.<BR><BR>So I went to the reception to which I'd been invited, or so I thought. Open bar, great appetizers, terrific conversation. When it was announced that we should move into the dining room for dinner, I gradually realized that I was in the wrong place. This was for the high rollers who had donated millions to the university. <BR><BR>But by that point my new friends insisted that I join them, and we all had a great evening. I don't suppose sneaking into receptions isn't as much fun if you have a clue.

Uncle Sam

While we're talking about scamming free food, how about this one.<BR><BR>When we were waiting tables at a very nice beach restaurant during Summer break from college, we would make a note of the folks getting prime rib or steak. <BR><BR>We'd then have the busboys clearing the tables set aside for a few moments the left overs.<BR><BR>We would then get a steak knife and cut wihtin 1/2 inch of where the person bit into the steak or prime rib and have a real feast. Worked with lobster as well.<BR><BR>Lord, those were the days!

Aurelian

Guess what guys, all these suggestion you will find them in next Rick Steves book "How to eat well and save money in Europe", only $29.99, over 200 pages of pricesless advice, you will pay for the book in just one day. Then Clark Howard is going to recomand it all of his callers.

yuk

I went into that Steves website. There's a family in the regulation loose shorts, baseball hats and tennis shoes eating a picnic obviously in the middle of town on somebody's doorstep.No doubt they've pinched it from their hotel.<BR>For crying out loud. There's always a park or somewhere decent to have your sandwiches.

Brandon

I noticed that picture too and how about the one with that guy sleeping practically on the floor with a cat next to him?<BR>I have to admit that I did a thing or two that I am not proud of while traveling and hoping that nobody can see me, but to take picture and put them on your website, that's as tasteless as it can get, now I want to vomit!

KenCT

I went to that Rick Steves link, too, and though I had never heard of the guy before I started checking this board, I was expecting the devil incarnate.<BR><BR>Since I'm going back to London in a couple of weeks, I checked out the board for London dining. Ended up printing the whole thing. The places I'm familiar with were right on the mark, and I'm going to make it a point to check out some of the recommendations.<BR><BR>And the none of the people there seem as hostile as some over here.