À la carte À la carte In restaurants, à la carte is the practice of ordering individual dishes from a menu in a restaurant, as opposed to "table d'hôte", where a set menu is offered. It is an early 19th century loan from French meaning "according to the menu". The individual dishes to be ordered may include side dishes, or the side dishes may be offered separately, in which case, they are also considered "à la carte". The earliest examples of "à la carte" are from 1816 for the adjectival use ("à la carte meal", for example) and from 1821 for the adverbial
A la carte pay television subscription television services. In this context, a la carte refers to a customer subscribing to individual services, as opposed to purchasing costlier bundles of service from a traditional television provider. To appeal to these customers and expand the availability of their content beyond "linear" television, broadcasters such as CBS, HBO, and Showtime have launched streaming services, including CBS All Access and HBO Now. These services feature their networks' respective content on-demand, and are purchased as a standalone service independent of television providers. Amazon Video added its own a la carte "Channels" platform to its service in 2015, which allows users