As economy slumps, doggie bags are in Diners feeling less embarrassed now to take leftovers home

The economy is going to the doggie bags.

In an economic indicator that Alan Greenspan might do well toconsider, restaurants are reporting an increase in doggie-bagrequests over the past year or two. They say it shows that theircustomers are feeling the bite from the unfriendly economy.

"People who wouldn't have thought about it a year ago will say,'You know what? I'm going to take that with me,"' says Izzy Kharasch,a Chicago-based restaurant industry consultant. "They now will takehome the smallest of portions."

The upswing was cited in an industry trends report this month bythe National Restaurant Association, which said one in five dinnercustomers now asks to take uneaten food home. Twenty percent of the450 restaurants the trade group surveyed said their customers wererequesting more doggie bags than two years ago.

Kharasch says he makes extra sure the restaurants he advises dodoggie bags these days, even the expensive ones, where the averagecheck is $80 a person.

"People used to be too embarrassed to ask for doggie bags. Not anymore. They don't want to waste anything," he says.

Who--or what--let the doggie bags out?

Restaurateurs say it is generally the economy, though calorie-counters looking to make today's heftier dinner portions last throughtomorrow's lunch also are doggie-bag users.

Customers at Elliott Fread's restaurant in New York have startedmaking his sandwiches last for two days.

"They won't say it's because of money. They'll say, 'This isreally good. Can you wrap it up?"' says Fread, owner of Bimmy's inChelsea Market. "But I know it's due to monetary reasons."

Judy Katz admits it, to an extent. A book collaborator in NewYork, she and her husband are well-off but "feeling the pinch" fromthe stock market's swoon. They now dine at a neighborhood bistroinstead of the elegant Le Cirque and take their leftovers home.

"My portfolio is gone," she laments. "But I'm not going to give upgoing out to eat. Now we share a meal, and we take home a doggiebag."

Some diners are just staying home.

The average number of U.S. restaurant meals per person per year isdown for the first time since 1990, according to the Port Washington,N.Y.-based NPD Group, which conducts industry research. The numberwas 137 meals purchased per capita over the 12-month period ended inFebruary, down 2.8 percent from 141 the previous year.

Still, the NPD data show the average American still eats out 15times more a year than a decade ago.

"Maybe people think a little more frugally when there is aneconomic downturn," says Steven Anderson, the National RestaurantAssociation's president and chief executive. "But I think we'vebecome such an essential part of people's lives that they're goingout to eat regardless."