Anyone ever work in a restaurant...

[RadioFanatic]

I worked at a chain restaurant well known in the southeast region. I can't tell you the number of times I saw cooks drop spatulas, etc. on the floor and then just pick them up and reuse them - YUM - some extra seasoning!

 

[TJ's Mom]

This is the grossest thing I ever saw! I was very young at the time and too scared to say anything. If this happened today, I would have made sure the girl was fired.

I was working at a restaurant and it was late. A girl working with me was given a 2 top. I waited for her to greet them, but she didn’t, so I greeted them and took their drink order. I went to the back, told her she got a table, and handed her the new ticket. She complained about getting seated so late and peeked around the corner to get a look at them. At then she decided that they did not “look” like they would tip and said I will show them. She got their drinks made and then stuck her finger up her nose and put a booger in the straw and marched those drinks to the table!

I was stunned speechless. She had been there forever and I was too scared to do anything about it. It is still one of those things I find myself thinking about every once in awhile and wished I did it differently.

 

[TheOtherVillainess]

I once worked at a fast food place where the old grease from the fryers was stored in these HUGE drums until the grease disposal company could come and pick them up. We had a teenager who I swear must've been on SOMETHING. His favorite activity (when it was slow and the boss wasn't present) was to go back, pull the lid off the grease drums and stick his arms up to the armpit into the old nasty grease. He said it felt good and was fun to play with. :sick2:

TOV

 

[Alex2kMommy]

One time I was working the closing shift at a place kinda like putt-putt and they made me and another girl clean the men and womans public restrooms. I was furious

UGH, I had to do this once, too (at the same fast food place.) But the worst part was some guy didn't wait, ignored the sign in the doorway, and came in and used a urinal right in front of me while I was scrubbing out a drain in the floor! I was so creeped out, scared, really! Who would do such thing? Why didn't he at least use a stall which had a door for privacy???

I just kept my head down and scrubbed like crazy. I tell you, that was the cleanest floor drain ever!

 

[texaslassie]

A friend of mine said she worked at Burger King and one night after closing some guys put some frozen hamburger patties on the floor and skated around the restaurant on them, then put them back in the freezer!

 

[themarquis]

my boss at a cafe was sort of an old drunk. We served beer and wine. We put cups underneath the beer taps to catch all the runoff and foam. At the end of the day, she'd have one of us pour all the nasty runoff into a "to go" cup with a lid and then drink it as she drove home from the cafe She also occasionally ate food off guests plates when they were done with them.

Those things wouldn't effect the customers' food, but I did catch her a couple times take a sip of a customer's coffee drink BEFORE it was served to them. She'd do it furtively, hunching behind the espresso machine. She said she wanted to check if the espresso was being brewed properly, but I don't know why she didn't just make herself a shot of the espresso! I think she liked to live dangerously...

 

[FluffyPumpkin78]

This isn't really gross, but more embarrassing...I did a culinary internship at a casino in Lake Tahoe. I was working in the buffet one night, and I dropped a big pot of lobster bisque on myself. It was very hot, so I let out a scream. Well, one of the little pantry cooks was right there, and tried to take my pants off! I am sure it was just a reflex action, so I ran into the chef's office and cleaned myself up and checked myself out. Thankfully I didn't get any burns, just slightly scaled. The other cooks that were around teased her for awhile about trying to get my pants off.

My dh works for a restaurant, and he runs a very tight ship. He is very conscious about what is going on in his kitchen, and doesn't tolerate anything but professional behavior from his cooks.

 

[jen0610]

This was back in the 80's when I worked at Lees Famous Recipe.

We use to have bottles of honey sitting on the table for the biscuits. On every Sunday, there was this older couple, they had to be in their late 70's, early 80's, that came in between 2 and 3 o'clock. Now, all of us girls knew as soon as you saw them coming across the parking lot, one of us needed to go out into the table area and take the honey bottles off of the empty tables. Now this may sound like a strange thing to do, but this nicely little ol' lady had a bad (nasty) habit. Not only did she like to put honey on her biscuits, but she also like to suc* the honey directly out of the bottle. That's correct. She would put the nozzle of the bottle in her mouth, close her lips around it and suc* on it, just like a baby with its milk bottle would. There is no "smilie" for the grossed-out dance us girls would do.

In the 2 years that I worked there, there were a couple of times when we wouldn't get to the bottles of honey before they got to a table or someone from another table would give them the one sitting on their table. So if they happened to snag a bottle, as soon as they left the restraunt, we would pull the bottle and throw the whole thing away. And we lovingly called this couple, "The Honeysuckers".

 

[lori1043]

I worked as a waitress in a chain restaurant that had a cook that stood there with his hand in his pants when he wasn't actually cooking- he was the salad prep guy- never ate salads there-ever! I have to say that i LIKE to eat out at places where the kitchen is "open"(like a Houston's) or at a hibachi place where it is made in front of you. I ALWAYS use a straw since working in the restaurant buisness since the washing machines sometimes just don't do a great job and I wipe my untensils.

This IS a gross thread!!

 

[Mono~rail]

This thread makes me think of a funny Kids in the Hall skit. A guy was working a hot dog stand at a ball game, and the weiners were green and spoiled. He didn't want to serve them, but the vending manager insisted they were still good. The guy argued bit the manager wouldn't give in. The guy took the weiners and put them in the toilet. The manager walked in when he was trying to flush them. The manager says, "I got here just in time. You almost ruined them!" Next they showed the guy serving and selling the weiners that had been in the toilet!

 

[Stepharoonie!]

I was once a waitress. Can you believe it? LOL.

Anywho, at a national chain place that served "chicago style pizza", we had these giant iced tea bins. Once on the counter, they were very, very tall and you just pushed a button on the side to make fresh tea. At night, the bin is turned upside down after being cleaned, to prevent anything from crawling in.

It was my job to clean it one night, so I took the bin to the dish station, dumped it, and heard a loud, "THWACK!" I looked to see what it was, thinking maybe the filter fell into it....uhh, no. It was a dead, drowned rat. Apparently someone didn't turn it over, and it crawled in there during the night...then someone made iced tea, and it drowned.

Yes, the tea was served all day. Anytime I had a patron that wanted iced tea after that, I'd say the machine was broken.

 

[Stacerita]

All of these remind me of my high school days working at a restaurant. The only thing different was some of my stories were really icky. I was young and didn't know better so I kept my mouth shut about a lot of stuff. But after a while I couldn't take it anymore and quit. Some of the nastiest things that happened while I worked there were managers and workers having sex on the food prep table. Ewww!