Horrible Practices You've Witnessed Behind the Scenes in Restaurants

[Eve]

I dated a bartender once who told me, "never eat the pickles and pickled tomatoes you see in bowls on the table--they sit in open vats in the kitchen for days, and people spit in there and drop cigarette butts and things you just don't want to know."

[SticksAndString]

Originally Posted by Filbert

I also got yelled at once for pouring half a bucket of mix down a drain while I was out, because it'd gone sour, and two people had just complained. I was out alone in the van, but they worked out I was way short on the mix from the amount of money I'd brought back.

.

When I worked at a local fastfood place that also served soft serve ice cream/shakes it was not uncommon for somebody to haul a bag of ice cream mix out from the back and just LEAVE it to sit beside the machine for a good hour or more (sometimes up to 3-4 hrs if we were slammed). Bleh.

I was also the only person (that I was aware of) who followed the "Every 20 Minutes you must wash your hands for at least 20 seconds" rule. I was a cashier and touched a lot of grimy, mucky money and had soda spilled on my hands from making drinks constantly. I washed my hands SO often I ended up becoming allergic to the soap and my boss got upset with me when I asked to bring in Brand X soap which I was NOT allergic to.

I also worked in the snack bar of a department-type store and had one teenaged male coworker who liked to 'play' with the used fry oil by jamming his arms nearly to his armpits in the vats of used oil waiting to be picked up.

[jasg]

Originally Posted by kayaker

I've been served wine with a floating gnat or two, especially when patio dining. I've always just used a fingertip to scoop the fellow out.

Originally Posted by Left Hand of Dorkness

"Spit it out, ye wee bastard!"

Was he doing the backstroke?

[Johnny L.A.]

Originally Posted by Sampiro

A friend and my cousin both worked at the same branch of a major theme restaurant whose name is not Jumpin' Jack Flash but is from a song by the same group.

Well, that narrows it down to about a hundred.

[cochrane]

Originally Posted by Sampiro

A friend and my cousin both worked at the same branch of a major theme restaurant whose name is not Jumpin' Jack Flash but is from a song by the same group.

Originally Posted by Johnny L.A.

Well, that narrows it down to about a hundred.

Unless this is a whoosh, I knew the name right away.

[Johnny L.A.]

I've never seen one.

Also, I've never seen a commercial for one.




.

[Alice The Goon]

I used to love Ruby Tuesday's, back when I had a big thing for burgers. They used to specialize in burgers, and had one in particular that I loved, topped with shrimp and a remoulade. Then they shifted their focus off of burgers and got rid of the shrimp one, and I became less obsessed with finding the perfect burger, so I hardly ever go there anymore. They do have a good salad bar, though.

[kayaker]

Originally Posted by Alice The Goon

so I hardly ever go there anymore.

Wait. . .you said, "Goodbye, Ruby Tuesday's"?

Sorry. I lack self control.

[BrassyPhrase]

Originally Posted by kayaker

Wait. . .you said, "Goodbye, Ruby Tuesday's"?

Sorry. I lack self control.

Heh! That got a good grin!

[SpyOne]

I've worked for McDonald's, Domino's, an independent pizza & sub shop, and a convenience chain working on transforming into a "Quick Serve Restaurant". I have never actually witnessed anything as bad as the worst stuff here, but I have no problem believing it.

In my group of friends, there wasn't a single fast food place in town where none of us had ever worked, and universally wouldn't eat at the place they'd worked. "Are you crazy? I've seen how they make the food!"

But the best story I have isn't mine:
Franchise of a major donut chain where they ran a very clean shop, so the kitchen floor was cleaned regularly and well. Still, .... dropped a whole batch of dough onto the floor. The employee looked at his manager with that "oh crap, what did I just do" look, and the Manager responded, "If there is anything on this floor that can survive in there," (indicating the oven where the donuts would be baked), "We're all dead anyway."
So it was used.

[John DiFool]

Originally Posted by Sampiro

A friend and my cousin both worked at the same branch of a major theme restaurant whose name is not Jumpin' Jack Flash but is from a song by the same group.

Based on the stories in this thread, allow me to guess...

I Can't Get No Satisfaction?
Paint it Black?
Before They Make Me Run?
Brown Sugar?
Down in the Hole?
Let It Bleed? Too Much Blood?
Look What the Cat Dragged In?
Short and Curlies?
The Spider and the Fly?

[Yorikke]

Originally Posted by cochrane

Unless this is a whoosh, I knew the name right away.

Hell, I had no idea either, and I've seen their TV ads...

Joe

[drastic_quench]

I knew too, but I'd love to dine at Sympathy for the Devil.

[chela]

Now the shop I work in is clean,and the food product is superior but they do pinch the pennies, down to scraping tomato paste out of the ridges of the tin can so they can yield a quarter teas[poon more for sauce. But its going too far when the wash cloths they use look like rags. Full of holes, grease stained, dark gray and shredded. Clean they are but, god what a sight to clean a table with a filthy looking rag. Buy a GD bag of new towels once in a while!

[cochrane]

Originally Posted by Johnny L.A.

I've never seen one.

Also, I've never seen a commercial for one.




.

Ruby Tuesday's does advertise nationally. I just saw a commercial for them on the Discovery Channel.

[KneadToKnow]

Originally Posted by SticksAndString

my boss got upset with me when I asked to bring in Brand X soap which I was NOT allergic to.

I'm pretty sure everyone's allergic to Smilex, at least a little.

[gwendee]

I got nothing to add, but I would like to thank all of you for making it easier for me to follow through with my resolution to get back to cooking real meals for my son and myself.

I don't think I'll be able to eat out without worrying for a long time, and I'm not overly squeamish.

I think I'm the most stunned about Bear Claws. I don't ever get them, but I thought they were supposed to be almond flavored not "whatever was leftover" flavored.

Oh wait...I've got one

There was a hole in the wall near campus famous for chilli. It wasn't open 24 hours, but nearly. There was a vat of chilli, always on a low heat. The vat was never changed, just new ingredients added to bring the level back up.

[purplehorseshoe]

Originally Posted by gwendee

... There was a hole in the wall near campus famous for chilli. It wasn't open 24 hours, but nearly. There was a vat of chilli, always on a low heat. The vat was never changed, just new ingredients added to bring the level back up.

I'm trying and failing to find it, but I swear I read somewhere of a custom in ... some Asian village, can't recall details ... of chicken broth being cooked this way in restaurants or inns or something, too, and much like sourdough starter is more prized the older it gets.

[BlinkingDuck]

OH! Do food 'factories' count?

I have never met anyone who works in a beverage industry (beer, water, soda etc) that will EVER drink out of a recycleable bottle.

The place I worked a couple years as a teen I was manning the bottle washing machine. There were several stations and all of them disgusting. They ran the bottles through so fast and only had one person/station looking at quality control...those bottles went by so fast that if you did see a bottle with something in it you had to RUN after it...and while you disposed of it who knows how many others went by. Also, because it took time to clean the machine and add cleansers...they ran the machine far longer than they should have before cleaning/restocking the cleaners. The crap I found in bottles....{Shudder}

I also made soda for a summer when the guy doing it quit. At first, I tried. I really tried. However, I would get yelled at for being too slow. The problem, you see, was bugs. Particularly wasps. They loved the sugar. I also worked in an open area instead of a nice closed one so I couldn't stop the bugs from coming in (but the bosses could see if I was working). In order to meet quota/not get fired I basically had to ignore the bugs in the soda making machine. One time, at the end of the day when I was cleaning the machine, there was several INCHES of dead bugs on the surface.

This was the soda that went into the recycleable bottles.

No way...I just cannot ever drink ANYTHING out of a recycleable container (one that is reused - not aluminum cans) ever since then.

[Corcaigh]

Not a restaurant, but a supermarket. It had a counter where they sold "fresh cream cakes"

The cakes were brought in frozen, then had whipped cream scooshed onto them, then they were put on a plate and put in the cabinet. Anything that wasn't sold was taken back off the counter, the cream scrapped off and disposed of, and new cream put on, and back on display they went. Anything left after that was crumbled up and turned into trifle, and that would have cream scrapped off and reapplied next day.

They also had a stand selling baguettes of all sizes, leftovers from one day would be put back into the oven the next day and heated for a few minutes and put out on the stand so people would think they were hot from the oven. Anything leftover from that was cut up, had garlic butter spread on it, was wrapped in foil and frozen overnight before being labelled "garlic bread" and put out in the chill cabinet.

The supervisor was a filthy so and so, she would leave soaking wet dirty cloths lying in a pile overnight (instead of putting them in a bucket with some sort of bleach or disinfectant overnight). The mops used on the floors were left overnight outside the back door of the shop, heads on the ground. The shop floor would be mopped with cold water and no cleaning fluid of any sort.

Everyone who ever worked in there knew what was going on and wouldn't shop in the place...

[Lynn Bodoni]

They also had a stand selling baguettes of all sizes, leftovers from one day would be put back into the oven the next day and heated for a few minutes and put out on the stand so people would think they were hot from the oven. Anything leftover from that was cut up, had garlic butter spread on it, was wrapped in foil and frozen overnight before being labelled "garlic bread" and put out in the chill cabinet.

I've always suspected that about grocery store garlic bread. It always looks great, but it never tastes like much of anything.

[gwendee]

Originally Posted by Corcaigh

They also had a stand selling baguettes of all sizes, leftovers from one day would be put back into the oven the next day and heated for a few minutes and put out on the stand so people would think they were hot from the oven. Anything leftover from that was cut up, had garlic butter spread on it, was wrapped in foil and frozen overnight before being labelled "garlic bread" and put out in the chill cabinet.

This at least doesn't completely gross me out. I've always imagined that garlic bread exists because some thrifty home cook wanted to serve bread but only had day old and needed to spruce it up.

I am all for reducing waste. If you don't want repurposed foods stay away from meat loaf, meatballs, and many soups.

[Fear Itself]

Originally Posted by gwendee

I am all for reducing waste. If you don't want repurposed foods stay away from meat loaf, meatballs, and many soups.

Not to mention sausage. Mmmm, sausage.

[adhemar]

Originally Posted by purplehorseshoe

I'm trying and failing to find it, but I swear I read somewhere of a custom in ... some Asian village, can't recall details ... of chicken broth being cooked this way in restaurants or inns or something, too, and much like sourdough starter is more prized the older it gets.

We have a restaurant that never changes out the oil they deepfry hamburgers in. I have never eaten there and never will. when they opened a new location they had a police escort moving the vat.

[The Vorlon]

I once was the night auditor at a small/medium hotel, 133 rooms. It had a restaurant/bar on one end.


They made bacon for the buffet once a week.




Got quite crunchy toward day 7

[drastic_quench]

Originally Posted by adhemar

We have a restaurant that never changes out the oil they deepfry hamburgers in. I have never eaten there and never will. when they opened a new location they had a police escort moving the vat.

Deep fried hamburgers? You sure 'bout that? It exists, but it's not at all common.

[Larry Mudd]

Originally Posted by gwendee

If you don't want repurposed foods stay away from meat loaf, meatballs, and many soups.

Not to mention Biscotti and croutons. mmmmm frugal.

[Fear Itself]

Originally Posted by drastic_quench

Deep fried hamburgers? You sure 'bout that? It exists, but it's not at all common.

This place boasts that it has used the same grease for almost a hundred years.

[drastic_quench]

Originally Posted by Fear Itself

This place boasts that it has used the same grease for almost a hundred years.

I'm not doubting the old grease. I'm doubting deep frying a burger -- because it is fairly uncommon.

[Fear Itself]

Originally Posted by drastic_quench

I'm not doubting the old grease. I'm doubting deep frying a burger -- because it is fairly uncommon.

Look again:

Back in 1912, the late Elmer "Doc" Dyer opened his own cafe and began to develop a secret cooking process for the uniquely delicious world famous burgers we still serve here today on Beale Street.

Legend has it that the "secret" was Doc Dyer's ageless cooking grease. This famous grease , strained daily, has continued to produce our juicy Dyer's Burgers for almost a century now.

[drastic_quench]

Yeah, I got that the first time. I think we're having two different conversations. adhemar posted that he's got a restaurant nearby that boasts they never change the oil they use to deep fry burgers. Unless it's the same restaurant, I was just a little bit doubtful about the deep frying burgers part. I know it exists, and I get that the linked restaurant does this. Maybe it is the same restaurant. It's uncommon enough. That's all I'm saying.

[azraiel]

Originally Posted by drastic_quench

I know a pizza place that runs their stinking, filthy mop heads through the dishwasher.

I’m sure the context is important here, but I’ve done the same many times and am not seeing the issue. Working in both small-scale restaurants and large-scale cafeterias, my experience is that it’s not uncommon to run mop heads through at the end of the night before the machine is purged and cleaned. Of course, the places I worked purged/cleaned the dishwasher daily.

Originally Posted by Miss Woodhouse

The same guy also felt it was completely appropriate to test the doneness of the steaks by poking them. Without cleaning his hands before or after. He would handle food, then poke one of the steaks I was cooking, then go back to plating the food.

I cooked steak and burgers by touch, but they were my steaks and burgers, and my touch. I also washed my hands damned near compulsively while on the grill. If someone else had touched my burgers while cooking, I would have killed her.

Once in a small-town restaurant where I was second cook the manager was filling in for first cook (it was that small of a place—there were two second shift cooks and both were out for whatever reason). Of course, that afternoon someone orders an entrée we never serve (pork chops). After timing, cooking, and plating every other piece of the order, my manager catches a plate corner and spills the chops onto the no-slip mat. She looks at me in disbelief, mutters something about not saying anything, washes off the chops before throwing them on the grill for a few seconds, and serves them.

It’s the only example of questionable food-service actions I saw in more than eight years of food service.

Which may be why I’m (too) trusting of restaurants.

[drastic_quench]

Originally Posted by azraiel

I’m sure the context is important here, but I’ve done the same many times and am not seeing the issue. Working in both small-scale restaurants and large-scale cafeterias, my experience is that it’s not uncommon to run mop heads through at the end of the night before the machine is purged and cleaned. Of course, the places I worked purged/cleaned the dishwasher daily.

During serving hours, just before and/or after a load of dishes

[adhemar]

Originally Posted by drastic_quench

Yeah, I got that the first time. I think we're having two different conversations. adhemar posted that he's got a restaurant nearby that boasts they never change the oil they use to deep fry burgers. Unless it's the same restaurant, I was just a little bit doubtful about the deep frying burgers part. I know it exists, and I get that the linked restaurant does this. Maybe it is the same restaurant. It's uncommon enough. That's all I'm saying.

It is the same place, the opened a new location in Bartlett TN and took part of the vat tothe new location with police escort.

It might not be common anymore but apparently it was quite common here and I have been told it was derived from a slug burger, that was quite popular around these parts. I remember reading an article about the lackof slug burgers any more except for Dyers.

I think the name might have something to do with it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slugburger

[adhemar]

Originally Posted by drastic_quench

Yeah, I got that the first time. I think we're having two different conversations. adhemar posted that he's got a restaurant nearby that boasts they never change the oil they use to deep fry burgers. Unless it's the same restaurant, I was just a little bit doubtful about the deep frying burgers part. I know it exists, and I get that the linked restaurant does this. Maybe it is the same restaurant. It's uncommon enough. That's all I'm saying.

the Dyers website doesnt specify that they are deep fried just that it is the same grease so I see where your confusion came from. They are deep fried in a vat of grease not pan fried in a small amount of grease.

[Cub Mistress]

Originally Posted by drastic_quench

I'm not doubting the old grease. I'm doubting deep frying a burger -- because it is fairly uncommon.

You doubt deep frying a burger? I have a friend who deep fries bacon for breakfast!

[SticksAndString]

Originally Posted by KneadToKnow

I'm pretty sure everyone's allergic to Smilex, at least a little.

I don't remember if that was the specific brand, but I was more than just "a little allergic". My hands swelled until they looked like balloons and the skin on my hands was cracked, red and itchy as hell. It took several days of being at home and washing my hands as little as humanly possible as well as multiple doses of Benadryl for them to go back to normal.

The boss blamed it on the fact that I actually took the corporate handwashing policy seriously.Because even though I wasn't on the line cooking burgers and whatnot, I was still making drinks and getting soda spilled on me from that as well as handling raw fruit (bananas, mostly) for banana splits and making milkshakes. I'd worked in food service for a long time and even if nobody else was serious about cleanliness, I was.

[Maserschmidt]

Two words from my past: "chicken hockey."

[gwendee]

Originally Posted by Maserschmidt

Two words from my past: "chicken hockey."

I remembered a common refrain from the first deli I worked at. "Just mark it so WE don't eat it."

[Zsofia]

Originally Posted by purplehorseshoe

I'm trying and failing to find it, but I swear I read somewhere of a custom in ... some Asian village, can't recall details ... of chicken broth being cooked this way in restaurants or inns or something, too, and much like sourdough starter is more prized the older it gets.

I believe it's quite common in the Carribean - pepperpot stew, maybe?

[cantara]

I was a pizza maker for a local chain. We had tours of kids from kindergarten come through and we would make a pizza together. Since I didn't know where the kids hands had been I would throw out the pizza that we made after they left. One day when the kids were trying to spin the dough it fell on the floor and we proceeded to make the rest of the pizza, since I knew we were going to throw it out anyway. After the kids went to sit in the restaurant the teacher asked if I was going to keep the pizza, I told her I would be throwing it away.

I never told the kids, though, so I can imagine the stories that they went home with.

[ralph124c]

Two items:
1) years back, I managed a small bar/restaurant at a marina. The place had a tank in which live lobsters were kept. One day, some idiot discarded some oil from his bilge-the oil entered the tank and killed the lobsters. I called the owner and told him-he said-cook the lobsters and make lobster salad. I said NO WAY- I dumped them and bought new ones-that fool could have killed people!
2) About 10 years ago, my wife and I were in South Beach, Miami. We asked the clerk at the hotel desk for a good Italian restaurant-he told us about a trendy place-he had all praise for it.
We went walking by-and noticed the kitchen door open to the street-what I saw made me gag-they had plates with pasta/sauce on a wire rack, sitting out at a nice balmy 90F! The sauce was covered with scum-it was already moldy!
We would up eating at a good Cuban place-that memory has never left me.

[digs]

Well, I was in need of some quick cash my first year out of uni, and I foolishly followed the advice of Twink's friend Lynchie (see, right there I should've stopped, and gone and gotten friends named Tom and Bob). Lynchie worked at a slow food reataurant.

It was supposed to be faster food, but Lynchie's mom owned the place...

...and was such a micromanager that SHE had to supervise everything. People would come in, order drinks, and wait. Maybe fifteen minutes. Because "Mama" was getting the ingredients out, and peering at each step of the process. And making the bartender start over for any imagined infraction. Another fifteen minutes and the rolls and salads might be ready... because she had to rearrange everything.

And the really weird part? The customers never saw Mama... she was pathologically shy, and would stay behind a curtain that adjoined the wait station. But they sure could hear her hissing-- you'd be agreeing to get a customer a glass of Coke, and everyone would hear a "Ssssss!" from the darkened corner. You'd have to peek behind the curtain, just so you could be informed "Ask them if they want ice in their Coke."

It creeped out the customers, and me. I started having dreams of Mama making me redo things from her hideaway. Finally, on what turned out to be my last night, a child spilled a pop in her lap, and there was the dreaded sound, like a snake about to strike from the dark: "Sssssss!" She made me stop and refold the napkin on the way to give it to the kid's father.

So that's whay I'm no longer working at Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing In The Shadow?

Originally Posted by Sampiro

A friend and my cousin both worked at the same branch of a major theme restaurant whose name is not Jumpin' Jack Flash but is from a song by the same group.

[kath94]

I've never worked in a restaurant. Thanks goodness! But here are my movie theater stories.

At the first place I worked we didn't have a popcorn popper. We ordered "prepop" which arrived in giant bags which were stored upstairs from the auditoriums, then placed in our heater behind the candy counter for serving. I overheard one of the ushers, whose job it was to bring down the bags of prepop, speaking with the manager by telephone. They were discussing the presence of rats, rat excrement in the popcorn bags, and the usher asked how to handle the bags that had holes in them but no evidence of rat poop. <barfy smiley>

At another theater, where fortunately I'd moved on already but my best friend worked, she caught the manager scouring the auditoriums after hours & reclaiming cups to be reused. You see, inventory for fountain soda & bulk popcorn was managed by counting the cups. Reuse a cup & the manager pockets the money. From that moment on I always insist on seeing MY cup coming out of the plastic sleeve. Ugh!

[azraiel]

Originally Posted by drastic_quench

During serving hours, just before and/or after a load of dishes

*urp* Yeah, that's nasty.

[drastic_quench]

Originally Posted by kath94

I've never worked in a restaurant. Thanks goodness! But here are my movie theater stories.

At the first place I worked we didn't have a popcorn popper. We ordered "prepop" which arrived in giant bags which were stored upstairs from the auditoriums, then placed in our heater behind the candy counter for serving. I overheard one of the ushers, whose job it was to bring down the bags of prepop, speaking with the manager by telephone. They were discussing the presence of rats, rat excrement in the popcorn bags, and the usher asked how to handle the bags that had holes in them but no evidence of rat poop. <barfy smiley>

At another theater, where fortunately I'd moved on already but my best friend worked, she caught the manager scouring the auditoriums after hours & reclaiming cups to be reused. You see, inventory for fountain soda & bulk popcorn was managed by counting the cups. Reuse a cup & the manager pockets the money. From that moment on I always insist on seeing MY cup coming out of the plastic sleeve. Ugh!

Speaking of managers running scams, I went to high school with a guy who became a manager at a KFC. He would man the register and ring up orders as less than what the customer ordered, but he'd use a calculator to charge them the correct price for what they ordered, and he'd pocket the difference. So if you order a total of $19.67, he'd only punch in $8, charge you the full $19.67, and serve you everything you ordered while keeping a tally to pocket the difference later. He'd play it off to the customer that the register was acting up. This was back when far fewer people used bank cards. Man, their inventory must have been way off. I have no idea how long he ran that scam.

[grude]

Originally Posted by Lynn Bodoni

I've always suspected that about grocery store garlic bread. It always looks great, but it never tastes like much of anything.

Dunno if it is common in the USA but here a lot of chain grocery stores sell pre-seasoned raw fish and chicken along with the regular plain one..........yep I suspected it and had it confirmed by my wife's friend who works in one. The pre-seasoned is the plain chicken and fish that didn't sell and was close to turning.

[MsRobyn]

Originally Posted by grude

Dunno if it is common in the USA but here a lot of chain grocery stores sell pre-seasoned raw fish and chicken along with the regular plain one..........yep I suspected it and had it confirmed by my wife's friend who works in one. The pre-seasoned is the plain chicken and fish that didn't sell and was close to turning.

I know stores are supposed to rotate stock for freshness and all that. I suspect that my favorite supermarket does the same with fruit. I've got a bowl of fruit salad that I bought yesterday that I have to eat quickly. Fortunately, the sprog likes fruit.

[Larry Mudd]

Originally Posted by grude

The pre-seasoned is the plain chicken and fish that didn't sell and was close to turning.

I think it's more accurate to say that it is approaching its sell-by date- and that isn't particularly disturbing. (at least if we are describing the way it is commonly done here.)

When you buy meat, there is generally an expectation that you may store it in the fridge for a few days, because you are shopping for the week.

When you buy crusted salmon, chicken cordon blu, or some other pre-seasoned meat, it's because it's a convenient quick option- it's not going to linger in the fridge for as long. The "sell by" dates on the package reflect this expectation. Why would you waste meat that may last a week for this purpose?

[thevmax]

Originally Posted by Saintly Loser

Since most (although not all) of the high-end, boutique vodka producers buy their alcohol in bulk from Archer Daniels Midland and then maybe filter it and add some water and flavoring (for flavored vodkas), the customers probably weren't getting anything different from what they'd actually ordered. Still, it's a rip-off. If someone wants to waste his money on what is essentially diluted Everclear, they should be permitted to do so.

HOWEVER...it's not right for the customer to pay a premium price for EverClear when they have ordered Grey Goose! If you have tasted premium liquor and, god forbid, rail hootch, you know the difference. I can easily tell Seagrams Crown Royal from rail brand, and I am willing to pay the difference.