Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

Wookie hit it on the head. If you're getting takeout from a fairly nice restaurant where a server or bartender is putting together your order--and thus spending valuable time away from their sit-down customers--you will be loathed if you don't tip.

10% is sufficient (though no one would complain if it were more). If your miserly claws can't part with that, fine, but just know that you are being referred to in the most unsavory of terms as you leave that restaurant. And if you leave a zero tip before your order is put together and that bartender/server sees it...well, let's just say you're a more adventurous eater than me.

Some friends and I ate there a couple months ago and had a fantastic meal. Raw oysters, a cheese tray, macaroni and cheese, corn dogs, hanger steak, brisket, watermelon lemonade (which was one of the best non-alcoholic beverages I've had to date)--we feasted!

Service was impeccable, too.

I am a bartender at a fairly nice restaurant. In many restaurants, we bartenders are the ones on whom takeout responsibility falls. On takeout orders, a 10% tip is nice, but after being stiffed so many times on them, I'm happy with just about anything.

See, you know those neat bags filled with your food and dressings and everything? Those don't just magically appear behind the bar. We put them together, and doing so is a royal and time-consuming pain in the ass. If you order $180 worth of steaks, appetizers, and salads, with 10 different condiment requests, then leave the tip line on your credit card receipt blank, I will seriously pray that you break your leg on the way out.