What a menu du jour is and how to run one.

What does menu du jour mean?

The Cambridge Dictionary says du jour is "used in restaurants to describe a dish that is available on a particular day and is different from those available on other days."

There's a twist for English speakers. In French, menu often means a set meal, not the whole list of dishes. The Larousse dictionary gives "Repas à prix fixe servi dans un restaurant" as one meaning: a fixed-price meal served in a restaurant. The full list of dishes, each with its own price, is la carte.

So in France, the menu du jour is today's set meal. Wiktionary translates it simply as "set menu."

In the US, people use the phrase more loosely. A café might write "Menu du jour" above a board of daily specials, each priced on its own. Either use works, as long as the card says what the guest gets and what it costs.

Menu du jour, carte du jour, plat du jour or soup du jour?

The four phrases sound alike, but each one promises the guest something different.

Collins, as shown on Dictionary.com, defines a carte du jour as "a menu listing dishes available on a particular day." In everyday American English it often just means "menu."

One common slip: "soup du jour of the day." It says the same thing twice. The correct French is soupe du jour, and Washington State University professor Paul Brians gives simple advice in his Common Errors in English Usage: "Keep it simple, keep it in English, and you can't go wrong." "Soup of the day" works just as well.

How is it different from à la carte and table d'hôte?

An à la carte menu lets guests build their own meal from separately priced dishes. A table d'hôte menu is a full meal at one price with limited choice. A French menu du jour is close to table d'hôte; the difference is that it changes daily. If it repeats on a set weekly pattern, it starts to look like a cycle menu.

How French bistros use it

At lunch, many French bistros write the day's menu on a chalkboard, or ardoise. It's often sold as a formule: a starter and main, or a main and dessert, for one price, with all three courses costing a little more. As Fortune put it in a 2025 article on French lunch habits, "a set menu for a fixed price, a formule, is still a regular sight on French restaurant menus at lunchtime."

Watch one word if you borrow the French course names. In France, an entrée is the starter. In the US, the Cambridge Dictionary defines it as "the main dish of a meal." Write "starter" and "main" and nobody orders the wrong thing.

How to run a menu du jour in a small restaurant

• Keep it short. Two choices per course is plenty. Build it from what you already stock, plus one or two things you got a good price on.
• Offer two prices. Two courses and three courses. Guests in a hurry take two.
• Set a window. Weekday lunch is the classic slot. Say when it ends, and that dishes can sell out.
• Price the expensive combination. Work out the food cost of the most expensive starter, main and dessert, and price from that. Our prix fixe guide walks through the math.
• Post it before the doors open. Regulars often check on their phones before they walk over.

These prices are an example for a small US bistro. Check them against your own costs and your street.

Put today's menu where guests look

A menu du jour changes every morning, so it needs a menu that's quick to change. With Menupresso, give it its own section at the top, switch off Individual dish prices, and write the two prices in the section introduction. Change the dishes each morning and press Publish changes; the QR code on the table never changes. When the risotto runs out, the Hide from guests switch takes it off the menu in seconds. For a screen in the window, Menupresso's free TV menu boards update the moment you publish them.

Running a Spanish-style lunch instead? Our menú del día guide covers what's included and how it's priced.