À la carte menu
The à la carte menu is the main dining-room card: individual dishes, grouped into the sections a guest reads in order. It is the most complete of the item menu types, and it shares its field model with the independent terrace menu.
Where it lives
The sidebar entry uses the plural label of the type — by default À la carte menu dishes. Under it:
- All items — the working list of dishes.
- All categories — the sections of the card.
- Bulk create/update — paste dishes from a spreadsheet.
- PDF menu generator — the printable version.
What one record holds
| Field | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Title | The dish name as guests read it |
| Galería | The dish photo or photos |
| Vídeo | An optional YouTube or Vimeo URL |
| Subtítulo | A short qualifier under the name |
| Descripción | The always-visible description |
| Descripción larga | Expanded on demand, behind the info control |
| Precio ración completa | Full portion price |
| Precio media ración | Half portion price |
| Precio unidad | Price per piece |
| Vino recomendado | A recommended wine pairing |
| Descripción vino recomendado | Why that wine works |
| Cóctel recomendado | A recommended cocktail pairing |
The two pairing fields exist on the à la carte and terrace menu types. They are free text — they name a wine or a cocktail, they do not link to a record in the wine list.
The price description fields encourage a useful habit: a portion price may include the count, for example 10,80€ (6 unidades), so guests know what a full portion is.
Its taxonomies
- Menu categories — the sections of the card, one level of nesting, managed in All categories.
- Allergens — enabled for this type by default.
- NOT suitable for — an extra list for guests who must avoid a dish for reasons that are not allergens.
- Options — an extra list for variations a dish supports.
The last two are created independently for the à la carte menu and the terrace menu, and they publish without their own archive pages.
Terrace menu
Enable Terrace menu when the outdoor service needs a card that differs from the dining-room à la carte menu. It has the same fields, three price formats, allergen support, bulk table, Excel export, five public layouts, translation behavior, and PDF tools as the à la carte menu.
It remains fully independent: terrace dishes use their own records and terrace_menu_category categories, have their own archive and appearance settings, and can be added separately to the floating contact dock. Editing a terrace dish never changes the corresponding dining-room dish.
Prices in practice
Fill only the formats the kitchen actually serves:
- A dish served whole and halved uses full and half portion.
- A dish sold by the piece — croquettes, oysters, skewers — uses the unit price.
- A dish with a single price uses full portion alone.
Leave the rest empty. An empty field means "not offered" and prints nothing; a 0 is a real price of zero.
Public layouts
The à la carte menu can be published with any of the five item layouts: Vertical, Price list, Horizontal carousel, Masonry or Swipe. Photo-led layouts reward a complete set of good photos; Price list is the safe choice when the card is long or the photography is inconsistent.
See Choose a layout.
Typical structure
A card that reads well usually needs fewer sections than the kitchen uses internally:
Starters
Salads
From the grill
Fish
Rice dishes
Desserts (only if you are not using the Desserts menu type)Sections come from All categories, and their order there is the order guests read. Nesting is limited to one level, which is enough for a group such as Grill → Beef and deliberately not enough to rebuild a kitchen taxonomy.
Bulk work
This type supports the paste-in table and the Excel export, so a long card can be built from a spreadsheet: titles plus the three price columns, one category per batch. See Paste items in bulk.
Descriptions, photos, allergens and pairings are not part of the paste table. Import the skeleton, then complete the dishes on their own screens.