They come in a number of guises-including the plain white unlined variety, leaking meat juices. Others are decorated with pictures of poodles and thoughtfully lined with plastic.
There are undoubtedly people out there who`ve never said the words,
”Could I have a doggie bag?”-but their numbers are probably dwindling.
At least 20 million people have walked out of just one family of restaurants, Lawry`s the Prime Rib in Los Angeles, carrying a telltale bag whose contents
Lawry`s, in fact, claims to have been the first restaurant in the country to supply its customers with those little bags into which diners could stuff the last bits of their T-Bones and carry them home with dignity.
To date, Lawry`s -celebrating its 50th year in business-has passed out some 20 million doggie bags since the first one went out the door in the late 1940s.
If the first doggie bags were plain paper affairs, they have improved considerably over the years. Some restaurants provide foil-lined bags, to save your car seats.
Some provide boxy, hinged styrofoam containers-which can surprise people the next morning when they guess which side is ”up”-and some restaurants, Oriental establishments seal leftovers in a square of foil and twist the package into an exotic bird or gondola.
Dr. Rhonda Stallings can absolve anyone`s guilt for eating the doggie bag scraps and leaving Bowser to his bowl of Kibble: ”The trouble with most restaurant food is that it is so spicy.”
Sorry, Bowser.
