Incredibly bad and weird experiences at restaurants

The BBQ Pit
1

I was reading an old thread and enjoyed the stories, so I thought we could start a new one and share fun stories.

I met up with an old friend at a new Indian restaurant - my recommendation - that had opened nearby. We were halfway through our meal when we saw a large RAT scuttle out from under the counter, STOP, perch on his hind legs and look around, and then amble his way away. In shock, I went to talk to the owner, who was standing behind the counter. Now, my aunt owned three bagel shops. I understand restaurants get mice and cockroaches. I also know it gives the restaurant a bad name, so she always used to rush around and clean up.

The owner, to my shock, shrugged and said, “Yup. We get rats.” No motion to get a trap, or clean, or even apologize, let alone reimbursing us!

We had a hard time finishing our meal after that. I’m not used to seeing such…lack of caring…about a RAT! We never went back. A few months later the restaurant closed.

Then I had one lady who must have forgotten to put our appetizer order in early. She brought out the appetizer and 30 seconds later brought out our full meals. It was just me and my SO so we wanted the time to nibble, etc. Then she miscalculated our check, and then disappeared when it came time to pay it for 20 minutes.

2

Many many years ago when Mama D’s was still a thing in the Twin Cities (MN).

A friend and I go to the restaurant in Robbinsdale for lunch. There’s one couple sitting at a table on the other side of the place.

We could not get the waitress’ attention for anything. Calling out, waving our arms as she walked to the couple’s table - nothing. I finally resorted to screaming at her and throwing a piece of silverware at her to get her attention. Just the worst service in the world considering we were half of her customers. I would have left, but my friend insisted on staying. :smack:

We walk out and Mamma D herself has arrived and is standing at the front. She got an earful from us about how far her waitress went to NOT serve us.

3

Might be in an old thread, but we went into a neighborhood Chinese place and somehow offended the dragon lady owner. We sat there for over an hour with nothing more than drinks while the waiters (family, I think) looked embarrassed and avoided us. We hadn’t done anything but be a little boisterous - and by that I mean laughing at some jokes and generally being family-happy - but we later read reviews where Her Highness had done the same to others, for no discernible reason. We just didn’t measure up and she didn’t want our business… so [how do you say Fuck Off, Round Eyes in Chinese?]

We finally left for the Mexican place across the street, and when we told the waitress there what had happened, she told her manager and we were served faster than a Taco Bell.

I never did go sprinkle butyl mercaptan on their sidewalk. (Concentrated essence of dead goat, very powerful, almost impossible to remove, would have made anyone walking up gag and run. They put a few drops in a tanker truck of propane to odorize it for safety.)

4

Two “weird” situations, both vaguely similar.

At a local Italian place I ordered Penne Arrabiata, a favorite. I was eating it and immediately noticed it was spicier than usual. I ordered another beer and asked for water. The chef stopped to chat and noticed I was really perspiring. I asked her to try some. She got a clean fork, tasted my penne, and began coughing. She apologized and offered to replace the meal, but I actually liked it and it became a joke between us.

At MadMex they have a Hatch Pepper special each year whenever Hatch Peppers hit the market. I was there with my son and we each ordered stuffed hatch peppers. Mine were orders of magnitude hotter than his. He tasted mine and was shocked. The waitress came by and she offered to replace mine, explaining that out of every few cases they would have a pepper that was inedible. I chose to be brave and finish my meal, albeit with several more beers.

5

Earlier this year I went to Portobelo with a couple of friends who were visiting Panama and stayed overnight. Portobelo is a historic site with colonial forts but the town itself is a bit of a dump.

When we went out to look for dinner, I found that for some unknown reason all the better restaurants I knew of outside of town were closed. We had to go into town to find a meal. The town was pretty dead too, but we asked at a minimart and then pointed us to a little restaurant off the plaza.

Like a lot of small restaurants in Panama, they don’t have a fixed menu. You have to ask for what they have that day. When we asked the proprietor, he said they had fish, squid, and - I thought he said - langostinos, or prawns. One friend ordered fish, I and the other ordered langostinos al ajillo, in garlic sauce. We didn’t ask the price, since these places don’t normally charge more than about $10-12 for dinner.

When they brought out our meals, ours turned out to be langostas, or great big spiny lobsters. We didn’t object when they brought them, since I wasn’t completely sure they hadn’t said langosta instead of langostino before. Also, we were hungry and there wasn’t any other alternative. We didn’t want to send them back and wait while they made another meal.

They were smothered in garlic sauce, which is a ridiculous way to serve them since most of it ends up on the shell. They were also the worst and most tasteless langostas I had ever had.

When the bill came, they had charged us $30-40 each for the two langostas (which are priced by size). We ended up paying it because we weren’t sure of what we had actually ordered, and my friends were well enough off to pay it without making a fuss. Still, it put a bit of a damper on the trip.

6

One of the basic tests of a pub chef is the ability to cook a steak.

A certain pub in Aberdeen used to be one of my favourite places to take people. For some reason I hadn’t been in several months, so decided to remedy that. A big mistake. I ordered a steak, rare. What was delivered was a steak that was somewhere between well done and case-hardened. So I sent it back. Now I know mistakes happen: the chef might have read the order wrong, got it mixed up with another, etc. But the replacement steak came back as medium. Nowhere near rare. So I sent it back and asked for the bill for the two pints I had consumed. One of the basic tests of a chef is the ability to cook a steak and this chef failed big time.

7

Here’s one from the other side.

In college I worked at a bar that also sold food, but an extremely limited menu. We had deli meat sandwiches that came with potato chips and a pickle. If you wanted a hot sandwich, I put it in the microwave for a minute, as that was the only means of cooking anything in the place.

So, early one Saturday afternoon I am working, by myself as it’s a slow time, and a family of five (mom, dad, and three teens) comes in and sits at one of the tables. I walk over, bring them some menus, take their drink orders, get their drinks and deliver them to the table. I’m now prepared to take their order.

First kid: “I’d like a cheeseburger and french fries”
I cheerfully explain that neither of those things appear on our menu, which is 1/3 of a sheet of paper (printed on one side) listing the 6 sandwiches that we did, in fact, have available.
Dad: “How hard can it be to cook up a burger and fries!?”
I cheerfully explain that it would be rather difficult, due to the complete lack of hamburger, potatoes, a grill, a deep fryer, or any of the other elements that constitute a “burger and fries” or the means to cook such things on the premises. I helpfully point out that there is a Hardee’s directly across the street and they specialize in such fare.
**Mom: **“Do you have soup or salad?”
At this point I’m looking for the hidden cameras. I inform her that we regretfully do not and am rewarded with a large sigh of frustration and rolled eyes.

For whatever reason (my best guess is that I had angered the gods) they stay to eat lunch. Remember, I’m there alone, so I am their cook, waiter, busboy, bartender, napkin fetcher, etc, etc, while also laboring to keep the early Saturday drunks topped up with their beer and a shot.

End of the meal, I take them their bill, they deposit some money on the table, and begin to walk out the door. I go over to clean up their table and realize that Dad, in his exceeding generosity, has rewarded me with a tip of 25 cents.

Now I was pleasant and attentive to this grumpy-ass family of mouhtbreathing illiterates for over half an hour. I felt slighted by this pittance of a lagniappe, so I did what anyone would do, I threw the quarter at Dad as he was walking out the door and yelled:

“Keep your quarter, you cheap fuck!”

It was my favorite moment as a food server, ever.

8

Err… what?

9

Hmmmm… I am of the opinion that this is NEVER a good idea. I’m thinking that your story says a lot more about you than about the poor service.

10

Perhaps it might have been more constructive to simply get up, walk over to her, and say “excuse me.”

Your behavior is inexcusable.

11

Too risky. People were throwing silverware.

12

BM is an extremely potent odorizer that smells like dead skunk and/or week-old dead goat. It’s what you smell, diluted billions to one, when you “smell gas” - propane, butane, NG etc. have no particular odor and without an odorant added, you’d never know there was a leak until it was too late.

A few drops of the stuff will soak into concrete and give the impression you’re standing in a dead horse carcass for weeks. Just the thing to make sure no more nasty round-eyes mess up Dragon Lady’s nice clean restaurant.

13

My cousin, Butyl the Mercotan, does not smell all that much like dead goat.

More like startled skunk.

14

Why are you spying on me when I’m in the bathroom? :dubious:

15

I wouldn’t say so much bad, as rather funny.

Ivylad and I used to go to a (now closed) Italian restaurant. Mom and Pop type place. One evening, it appears a young man was being trained as a server.

He tags along as the waitress takes our drink order, then not 30 seconds later comes back to ask if we’d like some Parmesan cheese.

Oooooookay…we haven’t ordered yet, but sure, we’re at an Italian restaurant, there will be pasta, which must have cheese on it. We told him sure, we’d love some cheese.

He comes back with a tiny plastic ramekin of Parmesan cheese. We watched him the rest of the meal…poor kid was so frazzled (it was slow, maybe four tables) running out of the kitchen with a basket of bread, then turning around and running back in, still holding the bread. I thanked Ivylad for taking me out for both a dinner and a show and we tipped more than our usual amount that evening. He was trying so hard!

16

When we’d already stood up and yelled “Hello”, “Can we get some service over here”, etc. and she just turned and walked away.

I was a lot younger and angrier then, but I can appreciate how people in this thread with nothing going in their lives need to live vicariously through their recreational outrage at other posters.

17

If someone did that to me I’d go in the back and call the cops about crazy people threatening me.

18

I was having dinner at a seafood restaurant, back in my younger days. A waiter that was on his way to another table with a tray of hot food tripped and dumped it all over me. Piping hot seafood alfredo, with plenty of greasy white sauce, covered me from throat to waist. It was burning hot. The manager rushed over, and the waiter looked like he was about to piss his pants, but I laughed it off.

They gave me a free T-shirt from the restaurant, which I gratefully changed into, comped our meal, brought us dessert, and gave me $10 to cover dry-cleaning my outfit.

For a long time after, when I’d go there, the staff would greet me affectionately as “Miss Alfredo”.

19

Somewhat similar situation to Chimera - the restaurant was about half full, we were seated, etc. No one ever came by to take out order, for like forever. Servers would zip by to other tables, but no one ever stopped at ours. And they always had that “I’m not seeing you…” look.

So, as a goof, I threw a $5 bill on the floor in front next to the table, figuring someone would at least stop to see it, or pick it up. Nope, nothing. Still zipping by deliberately ignoring us - and the $5.

So, I do get up and go find the manager and explain. He was apologetic, something about somebody missed assigning the table, everyone thought the table belonged to someone else, blah blah f*ing blah. The waiter who did eventually serve us huffed like mom was makin’ him clean his room, or something.

20

This was one of my situations and our meal and dessert were comped.