Chapter 11, Problem 1RE

A restaurant offers 20 appetizers and 40 main courses. In how many ways can a person order a two-course meal?

To determine

To calculate: The number of ways to order a two-course meal.

Answer to Problem 1RE

Solution:

The number of ways to order a two-course meal is $800$.

Explanation of Solution

Given:

Number of appetizers is 20, and the number of main courses is 40.

Formula used:

The Fundamental Counting Principle

If you can choose one item from a group of M items and a second item from a group of N items, then the total number of two-item choices is $M\times N$

Calculation:

The number of ways to order a two-course meal can be calculated by multiplying the given number of appetizers to the given number of the main courses.

Compute the number of ways to order two-course meal using the equation as shown below:

$\begin{array}{c}\text{Number of way to order two-course meal}=\text{Number of appetizers}\\ \times \text{number of main courses}\\ =20\times 40\\ =800\end{array}$