86 The Menu
Every so often, a phrase drifts into popular use and people start trying to figure out what it “really” means. They build theories around it, attach interpretations, and pretty soon something simple starts to feel complicated.
“86” is one of those.
I spent a good part of my life in restaurants, including running my rather small health restaurant, called Kung Fu. It was about the size of a diner—tight space, small refrigerator, limited storage. You couldn’t afford to overbuy, and you couldn’t afford to waste anything either. So everything was carefully planned, carefully stocked, and carefully watched.
And even with the best planning, by the end of the night, things ran out.
Not everything. Just certain items. The popular ones, the ones people kept ordering. You’d start the evening with a full menu, and as the hours passed, you’d quietly cross things off. No drama, no big announcement. Just a pencil line through the item on the chalkboard.
I’d hear one of our cooks saying:
“86 the soup.”
“86 the special.”
It didn’t mean anything mysterious. It meant: we’re out. So take it off the menu.
In a bar, it could mean something similar in a different direction. A customer who was obnoxious might be “86’d,” meaning they were done for the night—no more service. Again, not theatrical. Just operational. A decision made to keep things moving and keep things under control.
I never had to 86 anyone, but I had plenty of food run out on me just as the bus tour pulled up!
What’s interesting is how naturally this simple idea translates into something larger, and how strangely the term “86” has been mangled by the politicians, each with their own agenda and ignorance.
Most rich people have never worked in a diner or a restaurant. I’ve worked in dozens.
In a small restaurant, inventory determines reality. You can only serve what you actually have. You mustn’t buy too much, especially what doesn’t keep. No amount of wishing or insisting changes that, and there’s no way to calculate in advance what you’ll need for the next day’s service, because you don’t know when your crowd will be there.
. As the night goes on, options narrow sharply. The menu gets shorter. What remains becomes clearer and simpler — there’s not much choice.
That’s not a failure of the system—it is the system working.
I was reminded of an old scene in a W.C. Fields film, “It’s a Gift”, where a waitress keeps crossing items off a menu with a pencil, while a customer (Fields) tries to order. One after another, the options disappear as she crosses them off the menu.
It’s played for laughs, but anyone who’s worked in retail food on a real line recognizes the rhythm and the pattern. That slow reduction of available merchandise — the quiet inevitability of it all.
And there’s something honest about that.
“86” isn’t rejection in ANY sense of the word. It’s not a statement about value or importance or necessity. It’s simply reality catching up with itself, revealing bit by bit what’s still available. The conditions change fluidly, and the menu reflects this fact.
You see the same thing outside the restaurant.
Time runs out.
Energy runs out.
Opportunities shift.
Certain options that seemed open earlier in the day—or earlier in life—are no longer on the board. Not because anyone decided to make a philosophical statement about them, but because the conditions that supported them are no longer there.
They’ve been 86’d.
And just like in the diner, there’s no need for a big reaction. You don’t argue with the menu. You don’t negotiate with the chalkboard. You look at what’s still available, and you order from that.
In a way, it simplifies things.
Toward the end of the night at Kung Fu, when the “86” list had grown long, decisions got easier. There were fewer distractions. What remained was what remained. You worked with it, served it well, and that was that.
Maybe that’s the real usefulness of the term.
Not as slang, not as metaphor stretched too far—but as a reminder that life, like a small kitchen, runs on actual inventory.
And when something’s gone, it’s gone.
86’d.
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Yo, here’s the Bardo bus, this way, quick!
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See You At The Top!!!
gorby