Confessions of a Waitress: What Really Happens to Your Food

Everyone will tell you they don't want to know what goes on at a fast food joint. They're too scared that they will never be able to munch there again. I worked fast food for a year as a teenager and to tell you the truth it wasn't so bad. We have all seen the behind the scenes footage and read reports of condoms and rats in burgers, but it can be so much more interesting to look at how our restaurants are run. Restaurants are often seen as a safe haven of eateries, but are they really?

Salads aren't fresh
Most Americans order salads to be good to themselves in a world full of fried foods, but what you don't know could hurt you. Many restaurants require their wait staff make your salad, or at least the cold parts of it. Why does this get dicey? Well, waitresses never have enough time, period. Often they go straight back from busing tables, counting tips, or their smoke break and make your food. Big deal they wear gloves and use tongs. Nope. Nine times out of ten these items are only used when there's a rumor that the health inspector or district managers may show up. The few places I have worked where someone was hired to make salads weren't much better. Even with a full time salad chef the wait staff would often grab the ladles and help themselves to more dressing, etc. without washing their hands first. Then the salad chef would grab the ladles with their clean gloved hands, passing the germs on to the tomatoes and croutons they would usually grab with their hands

Wait, most of it isn't fresh
Let's face the facts. In the 21st century most of our food travels at least hundreds if not thousands of miles before it hits our plates. If E-colli ignorant farm hands and rowdy truck drivers didn't ruin the chow, chances are it's no match for the college kids in the restaurant. In their defense they never really had a prayer at saving it for you. In a restaurant there is no good time to get a shipment in. Every moment of the day is already spoken for so when the trucks comes in they often grab two or so unfortunate souls and unload as quickly as possible. Yes the boxes are often sat directly on the ground, maybe left there for hours. Later the chefs will pick up that same box with their clean hands then go straight back to the grill. If time runs out cold foods maybe left just inside the door until time frees up to put them in the cooler, so you can forget about them staying within the health departments specified temperature ranges.

Disinfectants often get you nowhere
All restaurants are required to have some sort of sanitized water and towels on hand for the staff to wipe off tables and food surfaces with. These water buckets are supposed to remain hot, hot, HOT. Always with the proper disinfectant/bleach to water ratio, and should be changed often. Everywhere I have work at least understood not to cross contaminate the cooks and the servers water by sharing towels, but that was as far as it went. Often these stations are only freshened up at the beginning of shifts leaving hours for them to get cold and murky. Top that of with waitresses never scrubbing the pails, using lukewarm water so they don't burn themselves, using dish soap instead of disinfectant so their hands don't get chapped, and not replacing the towels frequently and you have a mess. I have been present at many health inspections where sub par sanitary water was found.

No you're not crazy, they've never washed the high chairs
Restaurants fit into two categories as far as high chairs are concerned. First, there are restaurants that hardly ever use these chairs. As soon as a baby is done using one the waitress will rush it back over to the stack. A dirty chair will often go unnoticed until a customer gets a hold of it and complains. I worked in a restaurant once where the same woman was supposed to clean them everyday before she left work. Never once in my year plus with that company did she clean them. Between the goo and humidity they would stick together so you always had to brace yourself and try to look graceful before pulling them apart in front of customers. The second category is your family type restaurant. The key thing to remember here is they use the chairs so much that they don't have time to get them spotless. Buffets and other family joints give their waitresses nice sized sections of customers to watch after. With all the running to your toddlers milk, which is never conveniently placed for the waitress, and side work they don't get a chance to wipe down the chairs before another waitress has walked off with the still warm seat for their next table. The bottom line is, buy one of the high chair cozies or bring extra wet naps.

Tales of the dish pit
If you've never heard the term dish pit then you've obviously never worked in food service. It is called so for a reason, and I believe the full title is the dish pit of despair. 99% of restaurants today require a mechanical dishwasher to get all of the plates clean for you. Dishes are placed in racks which hold them upright for the ride. Silverware goes in a similar square bin, but is just thrown in any which way. Next they're hosed of with a pressure sprayer. Now, the dish guys are often encouraged to hurry this step since it uses a lot of water and is time consuming. Then the dishes are run through the machine. This wouldn't be a problem if the machines didn't spend half of the day clogging up and regurgitating food chucks back onto clean plates. I have never worked in a restaurant that I could claim the machine worked efficiently. The good news is the plates are super hot, maybe even hot enough to kill germs, but I'm not sure. Here's where it gets really gross though. The dishwashers just don't have the time to properly wash their hands between dirty and clean dishes. At best they spray them really, really fast and wipe them off on a somewhat clean dry towel. Now the guys back here work hard. Maybe harder than anyone else. But, they're usually the lowest paid and are unfit to perform other types of work so they muddle around in wet shoes all day doing your dishes. They are some of the nicest people you'll meet as long as you properly sort your dirty plates for them, but nice doesn't make the dishes clean.

Cooks aren't always pretty people
True there are some good looking cooks, even great looking cooks. Many of the people on the grills are young college students or managers thrown to the wolves, but there is a dark side. Often the man making your meal is a social outcast of sorts and not the most hygienic person either. I have seen it all. Cooks so foul mouthed they were constantly being reminded of the company's sexual harassment policy. Cooks so foul you want to give them deodorant. Cooks straight out of the movie Waiting. I've seen them smoking while they cook, drop food and pick it up, and an initiation ritual in one restaurant required male workers pleasure themselves into the ice bin. My favorite story is about a Mexican immigrant cook who had a chronic nose picking habit which lost him the job.

If you thought the cooks were scary, you should really be afraid of your waitress
Most places the waiters and waitresses are the most professional looking people on staff. They have to be since they're the ones you see the most of, but they're usually just professional looking. Wait staff culture varies incredibly from restaurant to restaurant. Many will quit and go work somewhere else just because they know their coworkers would be more like minded at another restaurant. A lot of girls out there serving are single moms, raunchy college girls, and down right trailer. Not all, just a lot. With that in mind I'm going to tell you a secret. Even though they can't make things better when the food is taking too long, they can make things a whole lot worse. When you hear about cooks spitting in your food it was either okayed by a waitress or done to spite her. Cooks usually have a good relationship with the servers and would never do anything raunchy to your food unless they tell him too. So next time you want to get snotty with the staff because your food is taking to long, reconsider. You never know if your server is the type who will give the go ahead to sabotage your chow.

There are a million stories to be told, this is really just the tip of the iceberg. And, you have to remember your chances of actually getting sick from dining out are slim, but it could happen. So what are some ways that you could keep yourself safe at a eatery? First off, be nice to the staff. If they like you they will do their best for you. This includes tipping well at places you frequent often. Next, try choosing restaurants where the staff seems to value their job. If 99% of them don't have bills and are just there making drinking money for the weekend they wont care as much. And, if all else fails order food that is cooked hot to kill germs and bring your own disinfectant.