10 Dirty Little Restaurant Secrets

Discussion in 'General' started by brandon73686, Sep 22, 2009.

  1. #2 Glass Jar, Sep 22, 2009
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 22, 2009
    Waiters of GC, tell us it isn't so!

    I had a friend who worked at Carvel for a couple years, once he started working there he never ate Carvel ice cream again. After he told me what it is and how they prepare it, I never did either. I won't ruin it for you guys though, ignorance is bliss :D

    And holy shit, look at the comments on that article. Even worse stuff than the article itself.
     
  2. Theres alot more where that came from, I use to work at a restaurant.
     
  3. Don't be pissy with the people serving your food either, unless you like eating foreign substances
     
  4. Fixed. ;)
     
  5. The one about re-using french fries is fuckin disgusting.
     
  6. I worked in a restaurant (kitchen) for a few days (i literally quit because of how gross it was) and there was a lot of disgusting shit. I will never eat at that restaurant again, and i just try not to think about it when i eat at other restaurants... at least i havent been in their kitchen lol. My first day of work at the restaurant, they had me empty the grease tray outback... it had not been emptied in months. there was a lot of other shit i witnessed too, just in my 3 days working there

    Now, i'm a caterer. I can tell you that catered food is much cleaner, although its probably not as high quality as you think it is. I work for a high-end catering company, and a lot of the food is prepared pretty half assed. The general tso's is just prefried chicken nuggets, recooked with the sauce on it. A lot of the stuff is pre-prepared - its not bad, and its really clean, but its a shame because its a bit of a scam to the clients imo. Restaurants scare me though - i stick to a core group that i've been eating at my whole life, and if i'm not there, i try and eat somewhere with an open kitchen
     
  7. #8 cannabis, Sep 22, 2009
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 22, 2009
    I've worked in restaurants for a while, now i'm a caterer and only # 10, 9 ,6 and 1 sound convincing. I know from experience 6 and 3 are done.

    But 2 is really dangerous when it comes to old people with heart conditions and things i worked at a hotel and they would stress this a lot and would prob fire someone if it was an issue...

    But shit does happen esp with privately owned restaurants, the business boils down to making things look good not quality. Let me tell you something about polished silverware, it's done by hand and 90% of the time the person hasn't washed their hands and uses them to get rid of stains the dishwasher couldn't get out...
     
  8. I'm not really all that surprised or horrified by it. All the guys I smoke with are cooks so I know how cheap kitchens like to be. the only thing that was a bit alarming was the rotten meat part.
     
  9. Haha I worked at a restaurant for 3 years and after reading this I'm not surprised at all.

    I def agree to never be a dick to the people serving you your food..

    You will regret it.
     
  10. Agreed.

    It will come back to you in one way or another regardless of where you're eating.
     
  11. I used to work at a supermarket, and I witnessed some pretty horrific atrocities committed to food there.

    For example, you know those delicious rotisserie chickens people are so fond of? If you watched the amount of grease and fat that drips off those things while they cook, and then congeals over the surface of the skin, you would never eat them again.

    In the meat room of the supermarket was where the managers wife made prepared foods that they sold in small plastic tins. In no particular order, I'll list all the shit I witnessed her do.

    1. Cook pasta out of the same pot she had just cooked pulled pork in, without cleaning it.

    2. Cut up cooked Meat Loaf on a cutting board she had just used to cut raw meat on, chicken, beef, etc. Without cleaning it.

    3. Drop both cooked and uncooked hamburger patties on the disgusting floor, and then reuse them. Yes, we had cockroaches.

    Theres more but I have to run. I'll finish this post later.
     
  12. Capers Cafe at PDX airport cuts off the super hairy parts of tomatoes to use in sauces and soups. Only the safe tomatos get used on sandwiches. Personally I find that revolting. Not to mention they treat their employees like total shit as well. I would never eat there.

    As far as what I've seen, all of those are false, but I don't doubt people fall for that kind of stuff... How do you NOT know what seaweed is?

    Plenty of restaurants have dirty little (keyword little) secrets, but unless you're some sort of psychotic gemophobe who goes beyond the States health expectations to prepare your own food at home (you don't wash your hands twice after touching your face, you never pick something up off the ground without washing your hands twice afterwards, the list goes on), most of the shit we do shouldn't worry you.
     
  13. So they were brought to room temp and STILL sold to customers?
    Thankfully my store's rotisseries aren't that way lol.
    But whats wrong with the grease? You're already stuffing your face with meat and skin anyway, and most people heat their food when they eat it so the fat would just liquefy again.

    The rest of those examples are nasty, though I've never seen someone do it.
     
  14. 8. Substituting Top-Shelf Alcohol with Generic Booze

    7. Topping Pitchers of Beer with Seltzer Water


    Well I know those two are true :/
     

  15. yea, where i cater, we use silverware sometimes, and that never even runs through the dishwasher. I usually just stand over the sink with my friend, one of us soaps and rinses, the other one dries. Its not too bad, but not everything comes out clean, i'm sure. I've noticed some where food remained and got stuck, etc. All the bowls we use and plates and whatnot for pizza or fruit or w/e hardly get washed - just enough to get the shit out. A lot of stuff goes on behind the scenes, but damn do our catering setups look amazing.
     
  16. most of em are true.. im a waiter/cook at a seafood restraunt, if a piece of fish falls on the floor, they just fry it a lil longer to get the germs off

    if the dishes come out of the dishwasher still dirty, you dont clean it again you just smear it :/
     
  17. The coffee part is usually reversed. We serve only decaf coffee, but tell people that we have both. When they ask for decaf we just walk back into the kitchen, wait 5 to 10 seconds and walk back out on the floor with the "decaf".
     
  18. Yes, when the heater setup they had broke down, or was simply off and whoever was managing didn't know how to turn it on, (only the butcher, the owner, and his wife ever touched the thing), then they were sold at room temp. This happened regularly.

    What else....

    -They used Raid in the kitchen, which goes against every Health standard there is.

    -They regularly fucked with the expiration date on things they packaged, like steak. They'd reprint a date on it to give it a few extra days. Meat that was expired or was just about to expire was moved to the "Value" part of the meat section, and sold at a discout; though to their credit, they left the expiration dates on it, so you knew what you were risking with that shit.

    -The fruit refridgerator had mold everywhere, this was never addressed, at least when I worked there.

    -Raw hamburg and other such meat was often handeled without gloves.

    -The Mexican food section was full of Goya and other such canned goods that were older than time itself, and had developed a thin layer of dust.

    -The fried chicken they sold in small plastic boxes was more often than not Tyson chicken they cooked on a stovetop.

    -On more than one occaision I saw bugs crawling around in the produce.

    -The milk you see in the very front of the cooler in any supermarket is the milk thats expiring the soonest, you gotta reach in back to get the freshest milk, though this is standard procedure for and it actually makes sense.


    I know theres more things I saw there but that's all I can recall, for now.
     
  19. i can tell you from experience that most places dont have the cleanest kitchen and a lot of places cut corners. its cost effective and helps on food cost, but at the price of the guest eating the food.

    do you like kfc? how about a pound of grease in every eight pieces of chicken? gross. i will never eat kfc after have worked there

    do you like jack in the box? i was a manager at one for quite some time, and i can tell you that jack is a pretty honest place. probably why i still eat there a few times a week. this doesnt mean that all JIBs are the same way. it depends on the restaurant and the management.

    i can tell you that a few people did some floor spice on there burgers when being complete douchebags. remember the cardinal rule, never bite the hand that feeds
     

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