Hotel breakfast hours are a joke

Why must I rush down at 7am and try to shovel food in my gob before the place is filled up with screaming kids and Boomers at 8.30? Let me tell you, neither demographic understands how to use tongs.

Breakfast at hotels is discriminatory. There, I said it.

They tell you that a buffet breakfast, i.e one that is located within the hotel, is included in your stay but what they don’t add is “provided you’re an early bird otherwise  – no food for you!”

I can't stand it! 'Buffet breakfast included - available downstairs from 6am to 9am'.

Listen, if I'm on holiday, I don't want to wake up at the crack of dawn so I can elbow out some tween for hash browns. Maybe I want to sleep in until 2pm, wander down and order some poached eggs with a coffee at 3. If it's included in my rate, I'm entitled to it aren't I?

Yes, ok, sure, hotels are extending their breakfast hours to 11am, but for those of us not ordering from the pillow menu until 5am it's a big ask to rise and shine, get dressed so you look halfway presentable, and rock up to the buffet with only a few hours of sleep under your belt. And you do have to look presentable! Women are down there wearing a full face of makeup! Men are wearing shorts with belts!

Me? I want to relax and go at my own pace. Isn’t that what hotels are supposed to be all about? It’s a resort, not a dorm room. Hotels might as well add ‘lights out by 9pm’.

I don't want to wake up at the crack of dawn so I can elbow out some tween for hash browns. Image: iStock

So does that leave me? Do I order from room service and eat at that weird little desk, pressing down my own coffee pods the wrong way and making a huge mess of everything because I’m bad at that stuff?

I suppose I could move the tray and eat in my bed like an animal. Crumbs in the sheets, grease on the doona. (Incidentally, “Grease on the Doona” would make a great Neil Diamond song, in the tune of ‘Love on the Rocks’). Apart from the mess, there is also the added cost: if you order room service, you can add an extra 60 bucks onto your check-out bill, $120 if your friend or spouse is staying.

We shouldn't have to cop the added cost of room service breakfast. Picture: iStock

Of course, I can find myself a cafe that serves all day breakfast and eat there. But apart from the obvious extra pain of trying to find a nice one while one hungover, I’ll be charged the same price at most hotels whether I eat from the breakfast bar or not. And it’s not fair!

Don't us nocturnal types have a right to sit for an hour or so in the sunlight, like everyone else, watching the steam rise off the hashbrowns, the sausages turning like crisp logs on the rolling hotplates, the air thick with the smell of bacon and maple syrup?

Image: iStock

Why must I rush down at 7am and try to shovel food in my gob before the place is filled up with screaming kids and Boomers at 8.30? Let me tell you, neither demographic understands how to use tongs.

We need change in this area! We need night owls to stop being discriminated against! I have the perfect chant already lined up for the protest march ‘Circadian rhythms are real! Don’t make us pay for this meal!’

You know what else is real? Jet lag. And try as we might, some of us can’t overcome it with a brisk walk or cold shower. So let us decide when to arrive at breakfast - if you can’t keep the buffet open, then let’s have it as an option for lunch. Or, don’t charge us extra for room service. Or, how about this: give us the option of including dinner or drinks so us night owls can get our money’s worth.

Originally published as Hotel breakfast hours are a joke