Dinner Order Flub

A Comedy Trope. A character is eating a fancy restaurant where the menu is in a foreign language. Attempting to appear sophisticated and impress their date, the character points at something impressive sounding on the menu and says they'll have that, only for the waiter to inform them that they have just ordered the dress code, the chef or something similar.

Alternatively, the character could order an actual dish, but add a provisio that indicates they have no idea what it is they have just ordered. When Played for Laughs, often involves the waiter bringing back a heaping helping of the region's finest Foreign Queasine.

Folklore

 * There is an Urban Legend, where a girl sees some Chinese characters on a menu that "look pretty", so she has them tattooed on herself. Later on, someone from China sees her tattoo, and laughs hysterically; the characters actually read "cheap, but tasty".

Jokes
"Customer: (Poring over the menu) I'll have the... (italian-style pronunciation) pageone, please. Waiter: That's not a dish, sir, that's "Page One"."
 * Joke example:

Literature

 * Dave Barry explained in his column "The Evil Eye" that he was getting too nearsighted to read restaurant menus, so he just points randomly at something which turns out to be his napkin, and tells the waiter, "I want that medium rare." This joke also appears in Dave Barry Turns 50, with a medium-rare order of "We Do Not Accept Personal Checks."
 * In Our Dumb World's entry on Burkina Faso, there's a joke about the very low literacy rate of that country when one of their diplomats tries to order a notice that an extra gratuity may be charged for large groups.

Live Action TV

 * The Andy Griffith Show: while in Mount Pilot, Andy & Barney go to a fancy French restaurant. Andy isn't too proud to say he can't read the menu and just orders a steak. Barney points to menu items and gets stuff he never thought of as food.
 * There was a Mr. Bean sketch, which involved him ordering Steak tartare, believing it was just a fancy steak and the rest of the episode revolved around him trying to get rid of all the raw beef.
 * Red Dwarf: Rimmer demanded gazpacho soup served hot, but gazpacho is served cold. He never, ever lived it down.

Music
"So I asked the waiter, "How's the beef?" He said "Ze steak tartar is ze best you ever had." But when he brought it, friends I thought I'd seen rare meat But this wasn't even hurt real bad!"
 * Ray Stevens' song "Gourmet Restaurant" is filled with stuff like this:

"I can understand chocolate eggs, and chocolate bunny rabbits, But a chocolate moose? Ain't never gonna catch on..."

New Media
""The serving of Wi-Fi, how big is the free portion?""
 * From Not Always Right:

Newspaper Comics
"Stephan Pastis: I really don't know what chateaubriand is. It just sounded like something fancy you'd order in an expensive restaurant. I'm hoping it is actually a type of food."
 * Zits manages both forms in one strip. Attempting to impress Sara, Jeremy orders the radicchio, "medium rare, of course". The waiter informs him that the raddicho is a salad and the chef prefers to serve it raw. As Sara and Connie dissolve in laughter, Walt attempts to make Jeremy feel better by saying that when he and Connie were dating he once order "jackets required".
 * One Pearls Before Swine strip had Guard Duck on a date with Maura, ordering "The chateaubriand, cooked medium well, and a glass of your finest pinot noir". Although the actual strip wasn't an example, Stephan Pastis said this about the strip in the "Pearls Sells Out" commentary:


 * (For the record, chateaubriand is a type of food. It's a kind of steak.)

Western Animation

 * The Simpsons: Selma takes Hans Moleman out to dinner in order to seduce him (she wants a baby, and by this time doesn't much care with who). He tries to read the menu but the waiter tells him it's the wine list. "Very good."
 * On Rocky and Bullwinkle, Bullwinkle goes into a coffee shop and looks over the menu. Seeing that refills are free, he tells the waiter "think I'll have some of that there refill."
 * In an episode of Garfield and Friends, Jon is at a French restaurant and tries to order in French and is served a pair of boiled athletic shoes by a French Jerk waiter. In another episode, he ends up ordering the name of the chef.
 * In Hey Arnold! Helga, trying to pass herself off as Arnold's French pen pal whilst in disguise and with a very rudimentary knowledge of French, attempts to make a order from the menu of a fancy French restaurant. It isn't until she's happily tucking into the dish that the waiter informs her that she's eating cow brain and eggs... which prompts a dart to the bathroom. Arnold played it safe with a steak and fries.

Real Life

 * Artist James McNeil Whistler (as in Mother) reportedly went to a restaurant in France and ordered a flight of stairs.