The Best Way to Train Restaurant Staff on the Menu
By Terry Psaltakis, Founder, ShiftTrained
Quick answer
There are four common ways to train restaurant staff on the menu: tastings, printed study sheets, shadowing a veteran, and quizzing. All four have a place, but the best way to make the menu actually stick is quizzing on their phones, because active recall beats passive review by two to three times. Tastings build description, shadowing builds confidence, but only testing tells you what a server has truly retained. Across 42,290 graded staff answers, the weakest area is price at 38.3% missed, so the best method is the one that measures and drills that gap rather than assuming it away.
Every operator has a favorite way to teach the menu, and most of them are half right. After 30 years I have used all of them. Here is an honest comparison of the four methods that actually get used, and where each one wins and fails, judged against what our data shows staff really get wrong.
Method 1: Menu tastings
Wins: nothing teaches flavor and description like eating the dish. A server who has tasted the braise can sell it. Fails: tastings are expensive, they happen once, and they teach almost nothing about price or allergens. With 44.2% of items carrying a major allergen, a tasting is not going to make a server right about which dish has tree nuts. Keep tastings, but do not mistake them for menu training.
Method 2: Printed study sheets
Wins: cheap, and it feels thorough. Fails: reading is passive. Staff study a sheet, nod, and forget most of it by their second shift. A binder lives in a car; a study sheet lives in the trash. Worse, you have no idea whether any of it landed, because a sheet cannot test anyone.
Method 3: Shadowing a veteran
Wins: real, and it builds floor confidence and the feel of service. Fails: it does not scale, it is only as good as the veteran, and it teaches the menu by accident. A new server shadows for three shifts and still cannot tell you the price of the entree, because nobody quizzed them, they just watched.
Method 4: Quizzing on their phones
Wins: this is the one that makes the menu stick. Active recall (answering questions) outperforms passive review by two to three times on retention, it scales to every new hire without a manager repeating a speech, and it is the only method that measures what a server actually knows. Across 314 staff-and-quiz pairs, people who took a menu quiz more than once went from 67.2% to 84.2%. Fails: a quiz alone will not teach plating or table touch, which is why you pair it with the three methods above.
So what is the best way?
The best way to train staff on the menu is to quiz first, then reinforce with tastings and shadowing, and to point all of it at what your staff actually miss rather than what you assume. We have graded 42,290 answers from 256 staff, and sorted by topic the misses are not what most operators guess:
- price: 38.3% missed
- wine: 33.3% missed
- bar: 25.7% missed
- allergens: 22.1% missed
- ingredients: 19.4% missed
price leads the misses at 38.3%, ahead of allergens. No amount of tasting fixes that, only testing does. The median quiz answer takes 90 seconds, so the measuring is quick. Not measuring is what costs you. For the step-by-step version of the best method, see how to train restaurant staff on the menu.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best way to train restaurant staff on the menu?
Quiz them on their phones, then reinforce with tastings and shadowing. Active recall (testing) makes the menu stick two to three times better than reading a sheet, and it is the only method that measures what a server actually retained. Tastings and shadowing are worth doing, but on their own they teach flavor and feel, not price and allergens.
Are menu tastings enough to train staff on the menu?
No. Tastings are the best tool for teaching description and flavor, but they happen once, cost money, and teach almost nothing about price or allergens — and 44.2% of menu items carry a major allergen. Pair a tasting with a quiz so you can confirm what actually stuck.
Is shadowing a good way to learn the menu?
Shadowing builds floor confidence and the rhythm of service, but it teaches the menu by accident — a new server can shadow for three shifts and still not know the price of an entree, because nobody tested them. Use shadowing for the floor, quizzing for the menu.
Why is quizzing better than a printed study sheet?
Reading a sheet is passive, and passive review barely encodes anything — staff nod and forget most of it by the next shift. Answering questions is active recall, which retains two to three times better, and unlike a sheet a quiz shows you per-person exactly what landed and what did not.
What do restaurant staff get wrong most often on the menu?
Price, at 38.3% missed across 42,290 graded answers, ahead of wine, bar knowledge and allergens. The best training method is whichever one actually tests that gap — most methods never do.
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About the Author
Terry Psaltakis is a 30-year restaurant operator who has opened more than 20 concepts across multiple markets, in every role from dishwasher to Owner. He founded ShiftTrained in Chicago to solve a problem he lived for three decades: pre-shift meetings don't actually train staff. Terry writes about the operational side of restaurant training, AI in hospitality, and what works on the floor.
LinkedIn · terry@shifttrained.com
Last reviewed June 2026
“Since we started using ShiftTrained, wine sales for both bottle and by-the-glass are up 34%. The staff is not scared to talk about the wine anymore.”
George G. · Black Barrel · Chicago
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