Beer mat = "coaster" for the curious. I was originally thinking a paper tablecloth. It was pretty straightforward to understand via browser translation of the wikipedia article, thanks!

> In some breweries and countries, the beer mat placed on the glass signals to the waiter that the guest does not want to drink any more beer.

Interesting. I’ve always seen this as a signal that a person was stepping away, but coming back. The person would cover it while going to the bathroom, in part so it isn’t as trivial for someone to slip something in their drink. Implying that they intend to keep drinking it once they return.

I’d be interested to know where it means that the guest doesn’t want any more beer.

In the Netherlands that person would be considered an eetpiraat (food pirate) or flessentrekker (bottle puller). Those are terms used in court.

https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/resultaat?zoekterm=Flessen...

https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/resultaat?zoekterm=Eetpira...

> menus don’t seem to have drastically changed over the past 175ish

After looking at a dozen of the ones from the Boston area I have to say that my sampling disagrees with yours.

Turtle, Sweetbreads, Venison, Mutton are all things that would get a foodie OUT to eat today and seem to have been much more common then.

Also much of what I am seeing as "boiled" is going to range from "poached" (salmon) to "braised" (some of the tougher organ meats). Stumbling across a "boiled" chicken, served with rice and cucumbers in an 1800's menu made me jump to "Hainanese chicken rice". That preparation seems exotic to the modern American style but might not be as alien 100 years ago (Flavoring aside).

One massive change is that there is almost no ethnic food on these menus (unless you include French). I looked at some of the LA menus and there were zero Asian, Mexican, or Italian dishes. It's impossible to imagine today that you could look at a bunch of hotel restaurant menus in LA and not find at least some dishes that were inspired by those cultures.

Navigation was quiet confusing to me on my Macbook as well. If the topic was not so interesting I would have left in complete frustration instead of deciding to fight the interface.

And the other way around too - it sounds like you could have had a very similar dining experience as today. It always amazes me how very little difference there is between past people's lifestyles and ours. I know this on a factual level, but being presented with a tiny peek into the past like this is always very humbling to me.

The first menu I opened had tongue sandwiches and hot beef tea.

So some things have definitely changed!

Unfortunately in Europe printed menus almost entirely disappeared after COVID. Before, leather-clad, elegant, printed menus were commonplace, but nowadays every place just has a QR code.