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Waiters' Secrets Revealed: They're Not Just Spitting in Your Food
By
John Del Signore
Published Dec 1, 2009
Modified Dec 1, 2009
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By
John Del Signore
Published Dec 1, 2009
Modified Dec 1, 2009
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Hot on the heels of "100 Things Restaurant Servers Must Stop Doing!" and "64 Things Restaurant Patrons Must NEVER Do!" comes "30 Secrets Your Waiter Will Never Tell You," compiled from two dozen servers nationwide. It's hardly a secret that servers do unspeakable things to your food when you complain (or just for fun) and silently judge you when you make an unsophisticated request, but there are some new insights here, such as:
- "On Christmas Day, when people ask why I’m there, I might say, 'My sister’s been in the hospital,' or, 'My brother’s off to war, so we’re celebrating when he gets back.' Then I rake in the tips." —Chris, a New York City waiter and the founder of Bitter Waitress.
- "At one restaurant where I worked, the salads were made up to three days earlier. They were sitting on a tray with a thousand other salads in the refrigerator. The waiters went back, grabbed a plate and some dressing, and handed it to the customer." —Jake Blanton
- "If you make a big fuss about sending your soup back because it’s not hot enough, we like to take your spoon and run it under really hot water, so when you put the hot spoon in your mouth, you’re going to get the impression—often the very painful impression—that your soup is indeed hot." —Chris
- "If you are a pack of females, you want separate checks. And I don’t mean split evenly by the number of people. I mean split down to the exact number of Diet Cokes with lime each person consumed. And if eight gals order a $14 appetizer to share, that needs to be split into $1.75 each. If you are a pack of females over age 55, I’m near tears. You want all of the above, plus you’re going to complain about every … single … thing. —Kansas City waitress Charity Ohlund's favorite customer stereotype."
The list goes on and on, and includes other highlights such as dipping butter in the dishwater and a suggestion to "check out the bathroom. If the bathroom is gross, you can be sure the kitchen is much worse." Peruse the whole inventory of dirty secrets on, um, Reader's Digest! Or just give up on throwing money away at restaurants. [Via Grub Street]
Tagged
nyc
restaurant
secrets
servers
tricks
waiters
John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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