Quick Lunch Vernacular & "Blue Plate"

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   From THE RESTAURANT MAN, January 1929, pg. 50, col. 3:

_QUICK LUNCHPLACES_
_HAVE OWN VERNACULAR_
   CAFETERIAS and "coffee pots"have a language all their own,says a writer in
The New York Times.  An English visitor, for example, would experience great
difficulty in understanding the patois inwhich the counterman shouts orders
to the chef.  To the busy New Yorker, however, for whom the cafeteria is
almost a daily necessity, the (Pg. 51, col. 1--ed.) language of the short
order is a living language.
   All the elements requisite to the definition of a languageare present in
modified form in the jargon of the quick lunch.  It has nationality,since the
argot is limited to the self-service restaurants of thiscountry.  It has
universality,since the chef who learned the language in New York can readily
understand a counterman's orders in San Francisco.
   It has age, traceable sources, and therefore tradition, since the
cafeteria as an institution is about twenty years old.  It has classicism,
inasmuch as many of the terms have come down unchanged to the present.  But
cafeteria argot is, above all, alive, for it varies with the times and is
constantly changing to keepstep with modern verbal transmutations.
   When the customer perched on a stool before the cafeteria counter
instructs the counterman to ""draw one, he is simply asking for a cup of
coffee.  If he likes it black, he says, "Draw one dark." The early countermen
had to be humorous as well as fast and deft to hold a job.  They were the
most prolific lexicographers of cafeteria language.  Filling an order for
black coffee, they "drew one in the dark."
   Light coffee is known as "drawing one pale." Coffee and cake are termed
"coffee and!" Another call for coffee is "Java up."
(Col. 2--ed.)
   Cake is still cake in coffee pots and there isno general nickname for pie,
but crullers have lost their family name.  A doughnut is a "sinker," a
contorted cruller is a "pretzel," while the long, twisted bar of soggy dough,
sprinkled with sugar, goes by the unsentimental name of "sashweight."
   "Poach two on," yells the counterman.  "Poach two on," repeats chef, as he
drops two eggs for poaching upon a piece of toast.  Those early
countermen,with their efforts to make a cafeteria resemble a side-show, when
relaying this order, called for Ädam and Eve on a raft." The word "ëggs" is
never used, as something superfluous.  "Scramble two," "boil two," and "fry
two" all mean eggs to the initiated.
   "Hash brown" does not refer to brown hash, but to an order of hashed brown
potatoes.  Early countermen, never noted for good taste, shouted for hashes
as "Clean up the kitchen."  "Home fry" is the way to designate German fried
potatoes.
   "Bowl of veg" cries the counterman to the offstage chef when a customer
has requested a bowl of vegetable soup.  Late at night or very early in the
morning the self-service restaurants get many calls for a "bowl of half and
half."  "Half and half" is a bowl of milk and cream in equal quantities, into
which a (Pg. 54, col. 2) package of "breakfast food" is emptied.
   Sometimes a patron orders a steak and cautions the counterman to have it
"well."  He means, of course, he should likethe meat well done.  If he wants
fried eggsand wants them fried on both sides, theservitor passes along his
order as "fry two over." An order of fried eggs is regularly accompanied by
French fried potatoes, but if the customer declines the vegetable he tells
the man behind the counter to "hold the fried."
   A "stack o'wheats" isa group of flapjacks.  Similarly, a "stack o'bucks"
is an order of buckwheat cakes.  The early countermen terselycommanded
thecook to "stack ém up."
   "Becky's eggs" is the way baconand eggs are known in cafeterias. A Swiss
cheese sandwich on toast issimply a "Swiss on."  Toast for sandwiches is "on"
and nothing more. If two customers oder loins of pork at the same time, the
counterman calls, "Loin o'pork, two in."
   Whenservice is unduly slow and the customer complains, the counterman will
ring the bell at a little slide door behind the counter to attract the chef's
attention and say, "I got a Hamburger workin'."  The chef will reply,
"Firin'"," which signifies that the chopped meat is sizzling over the fire.
   A "blue plate" (OED 1935--ed.) is the label given a special daily
combination of meat or fish, potatoesand vegetables, sold at a special
price,and is ordered with the words, "Blue plate."  "Silver out" is the cry
of the counterman for more clean tablewear from the kitchen where it has been
washed.
   A veal cutlet is a "motorman's glove," "combo" is ham and eggs, "franks"
are frankfurters, milk is "the cow's." The "bad news" is the check.  There
are many more expressions in the lingo of the cafeteria with the same strain
of rough good humor, but itsdictionary is yet to be written.  The modern
quick-lunch isa friendly place, with all the ready comradery of thedefunct
saloon and none of its vice.

April 1929, THE RESTAURANT MAN, pg. 19 photo caption--Blue Plate Restaurant
at Wilkes-Barre,Pa.

April 1929, THE RESTAURANT MAN, pg. 28, col. 2:
_"Blue Plate" Wins Popularity_
By John F. Toedtman
   A PLEASING innovation in restaurant service which ismeeting with popular
approval is the self-serve "Blue Plate Luncheon" each noon and evening at the
Y.M.C.A. Cafeteria, Dayton.  (...)