TikTok claims there’s a hack to get bigger portions at Chipotle: Put men’s names on your orders

If your lunch order is a little lacking in portion size, your name might have something to do with it—at least according to some social media users. A viral theory claims that takeout orders from fast-casual chains with men’s names receive heftier portions than those with women’s names.

After months, even years, of gender-related speculation circulating online, one TikTok creator decided to put the theory to the test and conduct a series of experiments.

She placed identical orders at Chipotle, one using her own name, Emily Joy Lemus, and the other using the name “Andrew.” Holding the bowls side by side, to the naked eye there does seem to be a perceivable, if marginal, difference, with “Andrew’s” order piled slightly higher.

Still skeptical, those in the comments demanded scientific proof. Lemus ran the experiment again, but this time she weighed the two identical orders on a food scale—one under the name “Tom” this time, the other under her own name.

While again, the difference wasn’t unequivocal to the eye, the scale told a different story. “Tom’s” bowl clocked in at 714 grams, but Emily’s was only 686 grams, a nearly 30 gram gap. “This is insane that this is a hack,” she said.

On Reddit and Threads, others reported that the trick has worked for them, too. “It’s frustrating having to pay for extra portions when men get that much just for being men,” one Reddit user wrote.

Some, however, remain unconvinced. “As a current employee, nobody is looking at names,” one Chipotle employee assured. A Chipotle manager added, “we make the orders as quickly as possible for anyone no matter what gender you are.” Others suspect it is simply a matter of different employees being more or less heavy-handed with their scoops.

But recent research does lend credibility to the idea of an unconscious bias in portion size when it comes to perceived gender.

A 2025 study published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology found participants associated men with larger portions, while women were expected to be satisfied with less. However, the study didn’t offer any particularly strong evidence that this impacted behavior.

Wanting to further test her theory, Lemus also took her informal experiment to the Mediterranean fast-casual chain Cava. This time, she found the opposite to be true: The order with the woman’s name clocked in heavier than the one with the man’s.

“What that tells me is that Cava is for the girls,” she said.