À la carte - Wikipedia À la carte For other uses, see À la carte ( disambiguation ). Look up à la carte in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. For the custom car, see Ala Kart ( custom car ). Steak à la carte, with no side dish or garnish ; these must be requested separately. Part of a series on Meals Meals Breakfast Second breakfast Elevenses Brunch Lunch Tea Dinner Supper Combination meal Kids ' meal Snack Value meal Components and courses Full course dinner Amuse - bouche Hors d'oeuvre Soup Entrée Roast Main course Salad Side dish Entremet Dessert Meal preparation Related concepts À la carte Banquet Boodle fight Buffet Cuisine list Drink Eating Food History of breakfast Snacking Table d'hôte Table manners In restaurants, à la carte / ɑː ləˈkɑːrt / is the practice of ordering individual dishes from a menu in a restaurant, as opposed to table d'hôte, where a set menu is offered. It is an early 19th century loan from French meaning `` according to the menu ''. The individual dishes to be ordered may include side dishes, or the side dishes may be offered separately, in which case, they are also considered à la carte. Contents 1 History 2 Other uses 3 See also 4 References 5 Bibliography 6 External links History The earliest examples of à la carte are from 1816 for the adjectival use ( `` à la carte meal '', for example ) and from 1821 for the adverbial use ( `` meals were served à la carte '' ). These pre-date the use of the word menu, which came into English in the 1830s. Other uses More broadly, the term is not exclusive to food. Today, it can be used in reference to things such as television. To watch television à la carte refers to paying for a provider where the viewer can choose from an option of programs to watch ( e.g., Netflix or Hulu ), instead of watching from set programs. See also Omakase Table d'hôte, the opposite of à la carte Buffet List of French words and phrases used by English speakers Pro rata, a method of billing or other calculation based on proportional usage Business and economics portal Food portal References Jump up ^ `` A la carte ''. Oxford English Dictionary ( 3rd ed. ). Oxford University Press. September 2005. ( Subscription or UK public library membership required. ) Jump up ^ `` Online Etymology Dictionary ''. etymonline.com. Retrieved 2 May 2016. ^ Jump up to : Oxford English Dictionary Jump up ^ `` à la carte -- definition of à la carte in English from the Oxford dictionary ''. oxforddictionaries.com. Retrieved 2 May 2016. Jump up ^ Richard Bailey, Eating Words, Michigan Today, 13 May 2008. Archived 25 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine. Jump up ^ `` Menu '', The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th edition, Houghton Mifflin Jump up ^ `` A-la - Carte Cable TV Is Basically Here ( It 's Just Not on Cable ) ''. The Simple Dollar. Retrieved 2 May 2016. Bibliography Baraban, R.S. ; Durocher, J.F. ( 2010 ). Successful Restaurant Design. John Wiley & Sons. pp. 17 -- 18. ISBN 978 - 0 - 470 - 25075 - 4. Committee on Nutrition Standards for Foods in Schools, Food and Nutrition Board, Institute of Medicine ( 2007 ). Nutrition Standards for Foods in Schools. National Academies Press. page 83. Mosimann, Anton ( 1983 ). Cuisine à la carte. Macmillan Publishers Limited. 304 pages. External links Look up à la carte in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. À la carte pricing strategy Meals Common meals Breakfast Second breakfast Elevenses Brunch Lunch Merienda Tea Coffee break Dinner Supper Components & courses Apéritif and digestif Hors d'oeuvre Amuse - bouche Entrée Roast Main course Side dish Entremet Dessert Savoury Meal replacement Snack Table service Buffet Conveyor belt sushi Dish Finger food Full course dinner Multicourse meal Platter Service à la française Service à la russe Silver service Small plates Presentation Dining room Eating utensils Food presentation Garnish Nyotaimori Pièce montée Serving size Tablecloth Table setting Tableware Dining Table manners / Eating utensil etiquette Toast Regional styles Anju Antipasto Cicchetti Banchan / Korean table d'hôte Bandeja paisa Dastarkhān Dim sum / Yum cha Fika Izakaya / Sakana Kaiseki Meat and three Meze Plate lunch Pu pu platter Rijsttafel Sadhya Smörgåsbord Tapas Tiffin Thali Zakuski Packed Airline meal Bento Convenience food Dosirak Instant breakfast Packed lunch Take - out TV dinner Menus and meal deals À la carte Table d'hôte Blue - plate special Combination meal Free lunch Free refill Happy hour Kids ' meal School meal Suspended meal Tasting menu / Degustation Value meal Value menu Communal meals Banquet Barbecue Commercium Communal dining Dining in Mangal Picnic Potluck Sittning State dinner Supra Tableround Tea party Related topics Catering Cook Cookbook Cooking Culinary art Cuisine outline Drink Eating Food Meal preparation Meal delivery service Restaurant Snacking Waiting staff Coffee culture Tea culture Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title= À_la_carte&oldid = 865789571 '' Categories : Restaurant menus Hidden categories : Webarchive template wayback links Use dmy dates from May 2016 Use American English from May 2016 All Wikipedia articles written in American English All articles with unsourced statements Articles with unsourced statements from July 2018 Talk Contents About Wikipedia Català Čeština Deutsch Eesti Español 한국어 Íslenska Italiano Bahasa Melayu 日本 語 Norsk Português Simple English Suomi Svenska Türkçe 粵語 8 more Edit links This page was last edited on 26 October 2018, at 04 : 35 ( UTC ). 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Question: the french term 'al a carte' menu means
Answer: "according to the menu"