A Unique Take on Room Service

Hector Tamez frequently visits Uni, the izakaya nestled in Boston’s stylish Eliot Hotel. He appreciates the presentation and the familial atmosphere, but most importantly, the Chiang Mai duck carnitas. “I’d choose it over many highly-rated Michelin-starred places any day,” Tamez remarks.

When the pandemic struck, Tamez supported local Mytouries, including Uni, by ordering takeout, but he found the experience lacking. By summer, he began dining outdoors again, limiting his visits to just a few spots, including Uni. Although indoor dining in Boston resumed in late June, Tamez, a cardiologist at Harvard Medical School, was hesitant to eat indoors anywhere except his home—until he found a clever solution.

In October, just before Halloween, Tamez noticed a post on Uni’s Instagram unveiling a new option: savor the restaurant’s a la carte menu in the privacy of one of the Eliot Hotel’s suites. With a maximum of six guests allowed per room and a 90-minute limit, this experience offered Tamez a chance to enjoy the comforts of indoor dining (like warmth) while feeling secure. “There’s no data proving this is completely safe,” he admits, “but I feel more at ease with this choice.” He and his wife have dined in the hotel’s suites several times since the concept launched in early November.

For nearly a year, restaurants have been on the verge of collapse due to pandemic-related closures. With ever-changing regulations on indoor dining and the uncertainty of relying on outdoor service—especially during the chilly winter months—restaurants must continually innovate to survive. Hotels have faced similar challenges. With a significant drop in business and leisure travel, hotels averaged just 44 percent occupancy in 2020, down from 66 percent the previous year, according to the American Hotel and Lodging Association. For restaurants located within hotels, the presence of many vacant suites sparked a logical idea: why not transform rooms into exclusive spaces for private pandemic dining?

Offering a luxurious twist on room service, guests enjoying Uni’s in-suite dining are escorted to their private dining space in one of the hotel’s 14 suites set aside for this experience. Each multi-room suite at the Eliot features a French door that separates two dining parties. The menu is accessed via QR code, and a masked, gloved server enters to take the entire order in one go. Meals are then delivered all at once, allowing diners to savor their dishes at their own pace. Meanwhile, a nostalgic hip-hop playlist fills the air through bedside Sony alarm clocks across all 28 rooms. Sake casks and bottles embellish the credenzas and side tables.

Uni isn’t the only hotel restaurant venturing into in-room dining, each with its unique approach. The Crossroads Hotel in Kansas City offers guests an overnight stay along with their meal, while the Hewing Hotel in Minneapolis features pre-recorded videos on room TVs explaining each course. Some establishments have converted nearby rooms into staging areas for plating dishes. For others, guests can easily request additional drinks, napkins, or condiments by calling the front desk.

A crucial aspect of the success of these private dining concepts is ensuring employee safety. In many hotel private dining setups, servers only enter to take orders and then leave meals on carts positioned just outside the suite. If staff must enter the room multiple times, guests are required to wear masks. Hotels like the Hewing, Hotel Du Pont, Detroit Foundation Hotel, and Crossroads limit each room to one party per night, facilitating thorough sanitization and air filtration. Uni’s private dining rooms accommodate two groups per night. At Crossroads, chef Ian Wortham has streamlined meal delivery, timing each course’s consumption to minimize staff entries into rooms.

On the same day Uni launched its suite dining initiative on Instagram, Le Crocodile, the French brasserie at Brooklyn’s Wythe Hotel, began taking reservations for its private dining spaces, called Le Crocodile Upstairs. The idea sprouted from a casual remark made by chef Aidan O’Neal during an April public relations meeting, joking that hotel rooms would soon be repurposed for private dining. “It felt like a wild notion in April, but as the year unfolded, we revisited and realized we could actually make it happen,” he shares.

What started in just a few rooms blossomed into a 13-room operation, adding 70 seats alongside Le Crocodile’s outdoor patio and indoor dining options, according to O’Neal. Once fully operational, guests paid $100 per person to host parties of up to 10, enjoying three courses from the a la carte menu while lingering in their hotel room until the 11 p.m. curfew, allowing for one group per room each night. Beds were removed and replaced with dining tables, beverage storage, and air filters. Demand for Le Crocodile Upstairs remained consistently high during its nearly two-month run.

Due to New York City’s current prohibition on indoor dining, Le Crocodile has temporarily halted all services, including in-suite dining. While hotel rooms are classified as private residences, O’Neal notes, “it’s certainly in a gray area of whether it’s a restaurant or just a hotel room. You book the room, but you aren’t really in the restaurant.” Le Crocodile consulted with the governor’s office, which advised treating private dining as indoor dining, prompting the suspension of operations. Once indoor dining is allowed again in the city, O’Neal emphasizes that his focus will be on reviving the main dining room and patio rather than private dining.

While Le Crocodile chose to be cautious, other restaurateurs view the hotel room dining loophole as a crucial opportunity. At Philadelphia’s Walnut Suite Cafe, a collaboration between Walnut Street Cafe and the AKA University City hotel, operators have embraced in-room dining as a workaround for the city’s indoor dining ban, in place since early December. “If you check into the Four Seasons today and order room service, you’d be served in your room,” explains Branden McRill, founder of Fine-Drawn Hospitality, which manages Walnut Street Cafe. McRill argues that Walnut Suite Cafe’s setup is much closer to traditional room service, where all food is delivered at once, rather than private dining, thus adhering to restrictions.

However, the exclusivity of the private-suite experience has fundamentally changed how Hector Tamez, a Harvard cardiologist, perceives dining out. Restaurants can often be too loud and crowded, but in a hotel room, he feels distanced from the chaos and more significant. “It feels like you’re the only diners in the restaurant. If the pandemic ended tomorrow and Uni could continue offering suite dining, even at an additional cost, I would likely still choose it,” he states.

Allie Volpe is a writer based in Philadelphia. She has contributed to the New York Times, Playboy, Rolling Stone, the Atlantic, and more. Carolyn Figel is a freelance artist residing in Brooklyn.