Lessons From a Brunch Menu

Menus are such a great place to be creative with the written word. A good restauranteur will recognize their menu as a way to get across the personality of the establishment as soon as a person sits down.

Think about some of your favorite places to eat. Are their menus straightforward, over-the-top, funny, boring? Do they match the vibe of the joint?

I recently enjoyed brunch with friends at a local spot here in Cincinnati. This was our menu. Pay special attention to the listing for the hang over helper.

Did you see the mention of “last night’s fleeting memories”? HA! My dining companions and I got a good laugh out of that. It even convinced someone at the table to order that item.

There are a few lessons to be learned from this breakfast dish.

Be aware of your tone
All of your communications pieces — whether a menu, a blog post, or an annual report — should carry a tone that matches your organization, your audience, and the intent of the message. This menu was spot on in that department.

Capture interest
Give readers a reason to look at the person next to them and make a comment. That’s what happened when we were looking over this menu.

Know your audience
Clearly this same wording would fall flat at an upscale dinner restaurant. When writing anything, it’s important to have a picture in your mind of who the audience is and what will interest them most.

Don’t go overboard
Know when enough is enough. The writer of this menu could have tried to add a cutesy comment at the end of several of these menu items. But that would have taken away from the punch that this one-liner provided.

Perhaps the most important lesson from this menu item is that it was memorable. When you write for your audience, you want something about the message to stick with them. I aim to always have that in mind when working on writing assignments for my clients.

And yes, I would have spelled it “hangover,” per Merriam-Webster. But the menu item description was so clever, I can easily overlook that.

(Side note for those of you local to Cincinnati: I recommend checking out Rusk if you haven’t already. I’ve enjoyed my meals every time I’ve been there. Plus their outdoor rooftop deck is fantastic!)

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• What restaurants have menus that you enjoying reading?
• When’s the last time you had brunch with last night’s fleeting memories?
• What are your top restaurant recs where you live?

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