Hah! I came here for this comment. My friends actually pick fun of me when I tell them I go to restaurants alone, but I thoroughly enjoy it. I'll usually bring in a notebook, a book, or something to do... and... take, my, time.

I'm on my own schedule when I eat alone. I can eat as slow as I want to, I can order as fast as I want and what I want, I don't have to think of things to talk about, etc. I absolutely love people watching as well, so when I want to take a break from my food or my work, I can sit back and look around the room and check people out.

I'm that guy. I love it.

I'm that guy too. If you really want to throw people for a loop, bring a notebook to thoughtfully write in and snap pictures of your delicious food. I had no idea until after a few times doing this in Italy that everyone was assuming I was a travel writer / food critic. I literally had people at other tables ask me who I wrote for, and when I told them no one they didn't believe me and begged me to tell. It was awesome :)

In some places in England if you're spotted doing this they'll think you're a 'mystery shopper' and you get the 11 out of 10 service level.

I ate by myself at Gordon Ramsay's three-Michelin-Star restaurant in London, and got the 7 course tasting menu. It was awesome! I took photographs of everything and detailed notes. The maitre d' kept coming over to chat with me, and I was treated like royalty. I don't know if this is because they thought I was a food critic, or if they just treat everyone so well. It is a small restaurant.

More recently I ate at Frank Pepe in New Haven and a couple at another table invited me to eat with them. How often does that happen in the US? Maybe all the time if you eat alone! But I felt like I was in Europe.

They kept wanting to know if I was a food critic. They seemed a bit skeptical that I just love good food. The fact that I have a nice camera might make me look more "professional".

For me part of the awkwardness is purely physical. Talking doesn't require extensive use of your hands and the person you are talking to are generally at eye level. Whereas reading and writing feel much more like an interruption to the meal rather than a compliment to it.

Eat at the bar. There's usually more going on and it's much less awkward. Even better is you won't need a reservation and the waiter isn't bummed that the table is half empty.

I travel for a living, M-TH, and I've taken up shop at the bar on numerous occasions at nice restaurants.

That is what they are there for. Just don't go in there looking homeless and you'll be well received.

This one of the things I learnt from business travel; sitting at the bar means you can talk to the waitstaff plus everyone else waiting for tables, you'll end up feeling a lot less lonely than sitting alone at a table.

I noticed with myself that I feel intensely awkward dining alone. But if I'm travelling for business, it doesn't bother me: at that point, I have a totally legit reason to be eating by myself.

Then I realized that other diners, strangers, have no way of knowing whether or not I'm out on business or in my own city. After that, I got a lot more comfortable eating alone wherever I am: for all these people know, I could be a travelling businessman or have any of a dozen other "legitimate" reasons to eat alone.

Of course, in actuality, no one there even cares or notices me. But I found having the right mental frame helped it not bother me.

I've also found I get pretty awesome service when I eat by myself, and I get to focus on the food more which is nice. It's peaceful.

I eat breakfast and lunch alone about a lot of the time. I love it. I enjoy eating with company if we are there for a more leisure lunch and can enjoy the time. While working though I generally don't like eating with anyone because most of the time people just end up venting about their job.

The one little break I have during lunch I don't want to be talking about work. I want to enjoy where I'm eating or more often than not I go eat my lunch at the beach or a park in between clients and might listen to music or a podcast.

When I do go to restaurants alone even if it's a nice place I will sit at the bar. I like to make small talk with those people if it is not busy.

Along with eating I go surf, golf, and skate alone a lot of times. However, with all these things I generally end up meeting and talking with people. Sometimes I don't though and it's nice just to focus on the activity and just enjoy that.

It's nice when people will come eat, surf, golf, etc. with me. However, given time constraints I don't let people not coming with me a lot of times get in between me going and enjoying a place or activity if it's something I want to do and that's the time in my schedule that permits me the time to go do that thing.

I think this feels really awkward at first but one can get used to it.

My hypothesis as to why it feels awkward is that one is afraid that other people might think, "Oh, look at this guy, he can't find anyone to go out to eat with him". But this is stupid, because obviously those other people that are there in groups don't go out every night to dine with friends either. They might just do the eating alone nights at home by themselves. Which objectively speaking seems no much "worse" than doing it in a restaurant, except that it is more hidden from the public.

So, just realize that those other people also eat alone, but when they do they might be too scared to even go out and rather sit at home. That makes you brave and adventurous compared to them! ;-)

While this thread has prompted me to break my personal taboo of not going to fancy places by myself, my actual reason isn't how about how other people perceive me, but my perception as to what the proper role of such a restaurant is: a place to celebrate company through good food and good atmosphere. Going by myself would violate that--at least, I think it will--; I figure I ought to give it a try and see if anything feels lost from that.

Just go for it, trust me. I'm writing this from a nice Belgian restaurant where I'm all by myself, they serve nice Belgian food and excellent Belgian beer, and on top of that I've been eating out mostly by myself for the last one year and a half, and I've never felt more at ease when eating out.

The thing is that I've never felt comfortable when eating out with acquainteces, for one thing because I'm very slow eater so I'd always left lots of food on my table, and second because I've never been at ease with talking when your mouth is full with food. Plus you cannot made dirty jokes when someone's eating :)

As things are like I know, myself eating alone and at ease,I've discovered that I really do enjoy good food and a nice drink (I was almost indifferent to it before) and that I'm not that keen on making compromises anymore when it comes to eating out, because the decision where and when to eat depends only on me. And I've also become a lot more confident when talking to complete strangers, this coming from an introvert guy.

And on top of that, people watching and listening is extraordinary!

You could treat it as a way to celebrate good food itself, or as an occasional treat for yourself to celebrate You Being Awesome.

It's not awkward if you sit at the bar. Just bring your smartphone. When you have a chance, talk to the bartender. Eventually, someone else is going to sit down, and see that you're friendly with the bartender, so you must be a nice guy. Then maybe you'll talk to them.

I get this as well. While it's been a long time since I've dined out somewhere nice alone (somehow the awkwardness doesn't quite apply when you're somewhere mid-range at lunch time, or at stopping off at a bar for a burger and a beer and some along time), it's always felt a touch awkward.

I guess it's because food is powerfully social. Whether its the idea of breading bread with a stranger when you're travelling, or eating dinner with your family, or taking your other half to a nice restaurant, there's very strong social imperative when it comes to eating - and it's one which exists in pretty much every culture that I can think of.

I do it all the time.

If you don't want to sit at a table, typically restaurants have a bar area where you can order food and it's not as strange to see people dining solo there. It's also socially acceptable to chat with other people at the bar.

Ever since I moved to another city, I eat alone all the time (breakfast, lunch, dinner). I have very, very few friends, and the few I do have live a bit of a ways or we just aren't that good of friends (so I guess they're technically acquaintances). Part of my family lives here, and they just think I'm extremely strange (they've never moved to a different city, though).

It's pretty normal for me now. The only restaurants I won't go to are the ones that are very fancy or where there is a huge social aspect to it (e.g., Korean BBQ restaurants; I've heard they actually turn singletons down! I don't want to risk that.).

> I don't want to risk that.

You might be joking, but don't worry about "scoffs" from people you don't know and will never meet again... you can learn things from them and move on.

Thanks. I'm not joking and you're right that I can learn from them and that would be the end of it.

However, I am not a spontaneous person. I like to plan things out a lot. Especially because I live in a huge city where I must drive (and I hate driving) and things are so far apart from each other. I guess this could motivate me to be more flexible, think on my toes, and generally improve what some may see as a character flaw.

Maybe one day.

I'm the opposite. I can eat at a nice restaurant alone and enjoy my thoughts and not think twice about it. When I see someone else eating alone, my heart breaks and I contemplate asking them if they would like company.

Do you feel the sam when eating alone in a restaurant in a remote area (like a foreign country) where you don't know anyone?

Me too. And there are some where I'd really like to eat more often. I don't mind going to the movies alone, though.