la suite dans un instant

18:21 Oct 20, 2011 

La suite usually refers to the NEXT (following) course, however it isn't clear if there are one or two waiters, and if the order is being taken or the plates distributed.

16:17 Oct 20, 2011 

sounds so appetising I think we're all going to be disappointed!

16:15 Oct 20, 2011 

Much full context would probably save all the guessing.

16:13 Oct 20, 2011 

maybe the waiter has had his girlfriend hired in the kitchen and suspects one of the chefs may try his luck with her, so he pops back regularly to the kitchen rather than take a whole order at a time, to keep an eye on things. Or there could be any number of similar reasons. Of course you may have to read/translate to the end of the book to find that out. Maybe this is one of those crucial clues in a Whodunnit.

16:12 Oct 20, 2011 

Bourth makes a good point. Sometimes it's amazing to me how much information can be extracted from so few words and some reasonable assumptions.

16:10 Oct 20, 2011 

It could be (and probably is) true that the waiter has more than one table to deal with. Just because he's ordering starters for one table doesn't mean that he's just started his shift and some of his other tables could be further along in their meals.

The fact is, we need more context and what happened before "ensuite" would probably be useful to know.

There's also the impression that this waiter is in a hurry (a unique situation in my experience!) as he's barking off orders in the kitchen and coming back out immediately. My experience of French waiters is that they tend to disappear into the kitchen for hours at a time :)

16:09 Oct 20, 2011 

un serveur who says all this, not le serveur or notre/leur serveur rather suggests that this is all secondary to the main story being told. Does Asker know any more about this waiter, his role in the action or relationship to the main protagonists, his phone number, etc? I mean, knowing what is going on around before, during, and after this very brief passage might help a lot.

15:59 Oct 20, 2011 

Exactly!

15:59 Oct 20, 2011 

it's a huge table and he's announcing the orders in dribs & drabs (with more to come....)

15:57 Oct 20, 2011 

why does the sentence begin "Ensuite..." ?

14:57 Oct 20, 2011 

It looks as if these might be 8 starters; so 'la suite' here might be the main courses; I suspect the waiter is actually saying "here is(are) the order(s) for the starters, I'll give you the main courses in a tick"

But do we know for sure that the second remark is being made by the same waiter? If it's by another one, just leaving the kitchen, perhaps it means that table X will be ready for their next course very shortly?

I think it may take a bit of unravelling to figure out the exact context of what is going on here.

14:39 Oct 20, 2011 

We sometimes eat at the cafeteria at our local supermarket where the waitress picks up the food from a serving hatch. Whenever she goes to collect our next course, she always hollers "la suite de [table number]" through the hatch.