Definitely feels like standardisation could be a solution to the author's woes. Given food ordering places can have templates that fit most restaurants' menus,

Definitely feels like standardisation could be a solution to the author's woes. Given food ordering places can have templates that fit most restaurants' menus, we ought to be able to define open standards for these and then anybody could make a client to interface with a restaurant's system. Payment is probably the only part that couldn't be made standard, but you generally don't pay over the phone anyway