Comments on: Dirty Restaurant Secrets

By: Joe Denison

Joe Denison — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 18:43:32 +0000

Test the cleanliness of your table — you will be surprised. Check some actual results here: http://www.tabletesters.com. If you are a Facebook member, please join the group!

By: emmiline

emmiline — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 08:01:50 +0000

thanks, i’ll never eat out ever again. awesome.

By: carafein

carafein — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 01:01:13 +0000

I worked at a very upscale restaurant. No bread reusage, no chutney reusuage, no crazy digging food out of the garbage. It was all very clean, organized, and the food was made with care. The WORST thing that we did, was since we were poor waitstaff, if a diner didn’t finish their steak or something, we’d cut the eaten on part off and slice it up and finish it for them. Sad, but we were hungry. We looked forward to the older guys with the arm candy. They ordered big, but the girls never ate too much.

By: Scooter

Scooter — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 19:56:10 +0000

I worked at a DQ for almost 10 years from HS thru college and The Chili came frozen in a jug.
I never messed with peoples food no matter how much of a jerk they were.

Grilled chicken comes pre-cooked and frozen, all they do is “boost” it in a microwave.
They “boost” all of the sandwiches to make the bun (which was toasted way earlier in the day) warm and melt cheese.
The gravy for the chicken strips comes as a Mix that you just pour into water, it is then held in a warmer ALL DAY. Along with the chili and the BBQ pork.

There’s plenty more i could tell but i’ll just leave it at that.

By: ashtronaut

ashtronaut — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 00:39:39 +0000

I worked at a grocery store deli in the late ’80s, and the deli manager grew up in the depression. She’d proudly tell us how her family ate “everything on the pig but the squeal.”

One day, I was told to prepare the chickens for the roaster/spit thingie. I grabbed the case of chicken out of the cooler, and on opening it, was bowled over by the smell. It was a week outdated, and turning GREEN. The deli manager told me to wash it off in cold water and proceed.

I told her I wouldn’t. She could do it herself if she wanted it done.

When I got home from work, I called and reported it to the health department.

Also, don’t buy the cubes of cheese and pepperoni sticks. They just pare the mold off the bigger chunks and repackage it.

The sandwich spread made in the deli is leftover from the ends of meat chunks that are too small to slice. We always left out the head cheese and souse. That part’s not too bad, but in order to make it look more pink and fresh, we were instructed to put in a couple boxes of cherry Jell-O powder…

I’ve got many, MANY more stories about grocery store delis and bakeries that would make you puke.

By: BillB

BillB — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:07:48 +0000

When working as a busyboy long ago, the owner would yell at us if we didn’t re-use lemon wedges and butter pats that were ‘not too badly damaged’
I now ensure those items are too damaged for re-use wherever I go.

Oh- and the rinsing off of items that hit the kitchen floor was pretty common stuff- if there was the time or inclination to do so.

By: aging hipster

aging hipster — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:02:37 +0000

The retirement home I worked for only brewed decaf coffee. We’d pretend that we had both regular & decaf, but it was all the same. I guess safer for the residents who really couldn’t handle caffeine.

By: Gauldar

Gauldar — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:01:00 +0000

@Pwscott

Yeah, I’ve heard that Wendy’s does do that as well. I’m alright with it, just as long as those patties didn’t fall on the floor.

By: pwscott

pwscott — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 16:46:19 +0000

A friend of mine who’s a former employee of a restaurant, with the initials “DQ”, claimed that at one time any hamburger patties that were cooked during the day and not used were ground up for the next day chili. I’m not sure how disgusting that is but I’m sure some of those patties had to be sitting around a while or overcooked. I wonder if Wendy’s does the same thing.

By: Gauldar

Gauldar — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 15:51:19 +0000

A previous employer of mine had lunch at a chain of restaurants called The Pickle Barrel (I have another story about that place), and he was eating the coleslaw but bit down on something hard. He took it out of his mouth, and it looked like what he thought was a tooth. He called the waiter, and the waiter called the manager. He showed the manager it, who kept asking to see it (probably to “take it off his hands”), and he said “Oh no, that’s just sand. Sometimes sand gets in the cabbage and makes a cabbage stone”. A man at the table beside him says “I’m a dentist, how about I have a look at it”?

His response was “Yep! It’s a tooth, and it’s one that should have seen a dentist A LONG time ago”! The manager offered to get him a new serving coleslaw, but my boss said no thanks, he had lost his appetite.

By: Sara's Whimsy

Sara's Whimsy — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 15:28:54 +0000

I don’t really have a gross out comment, but I recently went to a restaurant that just went all non-smoking (due to PA law, believe me they were peeved). Their business has been hit big time. The meals are still filling, but their much smaller. Condiments and napkins are no longer on the table and you can no longer get free refills.s

Imagine not having napkins on the table in a diner.

Talk about cutting costs!

By: Muffin

Muffin — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 15:21:12 +0000

My wife has her first kitchen job out of culinary school, and everything she tells me makes me sad about eating out. This is one of the better restaurants in town, but she’s seen things dropped on the floor rinsed off, things picked out of the garbage can (at least it’s all food garbage…), re-used slimy lettuce that’s been sitting in a tub for a week for salads, microwaving $100 lobsters and plenty more I can’t think of right now.

Nothing really obscene, but still…

By: FishBottleT

FishBottleT — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 14:57:55 +0000

How about adding bacon fat to vegetables to make them just amazing!! Kinda works against itself.

By: felixthecat

felixthecat — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 12:04:45 +0000

I worked two summers at a “gourmet” (LOL) restaurant while in college. Let’s see: food that had been stepped in was served, the rats nest in the oven caught fire so the rats moved to under the refrigerator, the vegetable server guy sweated into the food like a waterfall, the waiters would tell us which customers were nice or bad and the customer got “extras” (though the wait staff was also hated by the cooks and vice versa), rotting stuff was chopped up and spiced, pepper was often cigarette ashes….and on and on.

By: LisaL

LisaL — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 11:38:40 +0000

#5 is just disgusting. I don’t know where another customer has been. I don’t know what they did to those chips. Just… BLEH.