What's the worst/weirdest restaurant experience you've ever had?

[BruhWhy]

We once went into a very small, posh sandwichy sort of café for lunch with the kids. The vibe felt immediately off, we walked in and the loud, happy conversation the people working there were having abruptly stopped and it was suddenly just dead silent, we were the only customers in there but it was definitely open, I checked! They stopped what they were doing and kind of just stood there behind the counters and stared at us angrily as we situated ourselves, it was SO weird.

I ordered us all drinks and paninis, the woman taking my order didn't say a word to me, just wrote down what I ordered and pointed me back towards the table we were sitting at. The atmosphere was extremely tense throughout and they kept staring at us like we'd just come in and rubbed shit up their walls.

Food came, and as the server set a plate down in the middle of the table with sauces and stuff on it, the plate broke in two. Just cracked as she put it down. She saw it crack, paused for a second, then... walked off 😳

We ate in awkward silence while they stood behind the counter looking annoyed, and then left as quickly as we could. It was so fucking weird and I still think about it 5 years later because I just can't work out why they were acting so strange!

Waitress chucked a bowl of soup over my Auntie (by accident obv). No scalds fortunately.

I cried laughing.

My partner and I went to an ‘all you can eat’ place in york

we rocked up and the place was empty,bar the staff

they asked us to wait for a table-ok,no worries

and we waited-and waited-and waited

an hour later,we finally got a table (still the only customers in the place)

they didn’t do it as ‘help yourself’,they did it as ‘order and we’ll bring it to you’

so we ordered,and waited,and waited and waited-a full 25 minutes a plate of soggy beige crap/slop was plonked in front of us-no sign of the other dishes we ordered or the drinks

so tried to get the waitresses attention and we where ignored-until my partner stood up and she then argued that we hadn’t ordered anything else

my dp wrote down what we wanted and gave it to her,to which she couldn’t speak English and screwed up our note and stomped off

we gave up at this point and put a £10 note on the table and left-only to have the owner chase us down the street,demanding the other £30 for the ‘all you can eat’ and another £20 for drinks we’d never got even though we hadn’t eaten or drank-we’d ordered but never got either

it shut down a week later as it was full of illegals and it was filthy

reopened a few weeks later-only to be shut down not long after for having illegals and being filthy-I left York years ago but my son tells me the same thing happens every few months

That’s lovely.

I don't believe you waited an hour for a table when you were the only people in there.
If its true you shouldn't be allowed out alone!

Many years ago my now DH and I went to the birthday dinner of an old friend of mine. It was with a ragtag group of this friend’s social club mates at a Chinese restaurant on the outer reaches of the District/Piccadilly line.

We were shown to a room downstairs (the restaurant was apparently deserted apart from a couple of waiting staff). We ordered our food, and waited. And waited. And waited. Over an hour later food started to arrive, at wildly irregular intervals. It was OK, but only standard takeaway fare, certainly not worth the wait. My vegetarian DH’s ‘vegetable stir fry’ showed up after two hours, without rice, and turned out to be broccoli and carrots. Nothing else. Not even any sauce.

What made this experience surreal, I realise now, was that I never saw any sign of kitchen activity, or smelt any cooking. I still wonder if it was a real restaurant or just a front for something else, and think they completely panicked at the sight of real customers. I saw the friendship a bit differently after that episode too.

Sorry, just seen it’s a bit of a zombie thread - the ‘similar threads’ section caught me out.

No worries @DatasCat I have thoroughly enjoyed reading the whole thread 😀

BruhWhy · 09/07/2022 14:25

We once went into a very small, posh sandwichy sort of café for lunch with the kids. The vibe felt immediately off, we walked in and the loud, happy conversation the people working there were having abruptly stopped and it was suddenly just dead silent...

It wasn't this pair, was it?

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On my 30th, 16 of us went to an Indian restaurant, I'd been before and had been impressed. The meals came out in dribs and drabs and we eventually realised that they'd forgotten my Chicken Jalfrezi. I asked about it and a few minutes later, something arrived.

The chicken was all raw, so I asked some of my neighbours to confirm it, then tried to get the waiter's attention. Before I could explain, he sneered, "Oh, it's not HOOOOT enough, God, you English are always like that. It's spiced properly."

I told him it was raw and he denied it. Everyone finished up and we asked for the bill, with me telling them not to bother putting mine on. The other waiters came over and started shouting. I tried to stay calm and said that I wasn't paying for raw chicken, so they threatened to get the Police. I agreed and said I'd complain to Environmental Health, too.

The others counted out the exact money and we left. I had to get a sausage and chips, on the way to the pub!

2 spring to mind.
The first many moons ago on holiday around Weston Super Mare. We'd found an odd little pub that did carvery (not a chain) and had decided to take the kids for lunch. I'd hurried DH along and he'd snapped back something like "It's a carvery, they wont run out of food you know".
Well. They did. Just after we'd sat down with our plates. Genuinely thought there was going to be a riot as a very large family had come in just after us and I think only 2 of them had any meat. It was an odd place where you paid on entry as well and staff couldn't see why no meat would be an issue as "there's plenty of veg". Sat watching the spectacle whilst guiltily eating my turkey.

The other was also a hotel in North Wales. Seemed to be run by Basil Fawlty. Went to the restaurant to eat and were handed a menu which contained about 20 meals and told "it's fish tonight". Thinking that was a special we studied the menu, tried to order and much like chicken rice above were told, "it's fish tonight". Strange place, he seemed to spend half his time berating the poor waitress and strutting. We sneaked out and found a lovely Indian up the road.

Hahaha - good for her 👍

Oh you HAVE to tell us who it was?

The only comediennes I can think of who had their own weekly shows were Catherine Tate, Caroline Aherne and Victoria wood and although attractive I wouldn’t call any of them beautiful!

MadamLeota · Today 16:13

Genuinely thought there was going to be a riot as a very large family had come in just after us and I think only 2 of them had any meat. It was an odd place where you paid on entry as well and staff couldn't see why no meat would be an issue as "there's plenty of veg".

I'd be foaming! £12 for a plate of carrots, spuds and greens!

That's made me remember a first and last carvery visit for us.

Was about ten years ago now, we decided to give it a go as we thought the novelty may get our at the time very fussy DD to eat something other than pasta.

We walk in, waited to be seen to, 3 staff members just walking about having chats and ignoring us entirely. After over 5 minutes, I said to DH, loudly "clearly we aren't getting served, let's go".

At that point, a woman i assume was the manager looked up from the end of the bar area and says to one of the chatty lot "can you serve these guests please".

As the guy came over, with a face like as slapped arse at being told to actually do some work, I saw her click her fingers from where she was walking behind us. She gestured to the guy but I couldn't work out why.

We got asked to pay and got our ticket. We were asked for our ticket and he says "oh, no extras for you, paid up front people". I asked what he meant as we hadn't been offered extras and assumed we had to pay as that was part of the restaurant.

"Oh in that case then, Brenda thinks you're D&Ds"

When I looked baffled he said "the manager thinks you look like dine and dash scruffs".

I took the ticket back, walked back round to the bar, demanded a refund and walked out. We ended up at a similar carvery 10 minutes away and it was lovely, staff were friendly and no paying up front.

Bloody scruffs! We weren't in bloody tracksuits thank you very much, I think it was retaliation for me suggesting we leave.

Why don’t people name and shame these places? I would!

@PriamFarrl can I ask the name of the place please? Sounds worth travelling to!

I’ll never forget going to a restaurant in Prague with DH not long after we met expecting it to be every bit as reasonably priced as everywhere else we’d been only to be faced with a bill that cost as much as the flight to get there, if not more!

It really wasn’t a fancy restaurant at all. I mean, it was nice but it had more of a hipster vibe than Michelin star. We got a starter to share, main each and a couple of G&T’s each. Honestly, everywhere else we ate and drank throughout the holiday was dirt cheap which was lucky given how hefty that bill was!

A cafe that had quite an extensive menus and the chap who served us told us he was the owner and he proceeded to go on in great detail about all kinds of dishes and he clearly had a passion for cooking and food.

Unfortunately, my son at the time would only eat burger and chips!

As we ordered, my son said, ‘I’ll have burger and chips but please may I have the burger plain?’ He didn’t want the lettuce, tomato or pickle etc.

The man’a face dropped and for a brief moment we all thought he was going to shout at or even attack my son as he looked so angry! 😩😂

The menus were snatched out our hands and his once friendly demeanour disappeared altogether and we were looked at with great distain!

Food and drink were brought out and he didn’t speak a word whereas before he had been over the top enthusiastic.

My son was the last to receive his meal.

Out came the man and as he plonked the plate down in front of my son and marched off.

There in the middle of the plate, a dinner plate, sat a lonely and unaccompanied beef burger.

Nothing else.

It was so funny and my son’s face was a picture.

As the man watched us all looking at the plate he left and returned with a bowl of chips and duly plonked them on the table, this time delivered with a smirk!

We then had to ask for a bun or roll
and he claimed he didn’t have any!

It was so bizarre to see a grown man so upset my a child ordering a plain beef burger!

He sounds like a top of the range wanker!

Another time we stopped off in a different cafe in the summer and my son saw there were milkshakes on the menu but not plain milk.

He asked for a glass of milk and it arrived. Hot!

I called the woman back and said we were sorry we hadn’t made it clear but my son had meant for it to be cold when he asked for a glass of milk.

She looked at me with a straight face and said, ‘Well when it cools down it will be cold!’

😂😂😂

I

Dinner in a cheap carvery years ago. Ordered apple pie for pudding. I said if it not already hot don't worry about heating it up I prefer cold pie (having worked in a lot of these places puddings are usually reheated). They gave me a frozen solid uncooked pie still in its foil case. Technically correct I suppose. 😁

Last week... Went to a place doing two for one pizzas...chose that place because it had a handful of vegan options. The vegan pizza option was just the vegetarian option with no cheese. Okay, a bit of sauce would have been nice but no biggy. Except there was barely any tomato paste either (the base wasnt even red all over) so the toppings hilariously all toppled off.

But that wasn't what pissed me off....what pissed me off was the ' vegan option' was not included in the 2 for 1 😂

We ate at an Italian. There was only two of us and the service had been slow all night, so after we'd managed to catch the waitress first to ask for the dessert menu, then to order, I asked them to bring the bill along with the desserts so that we could get out more quickly , explaining that I was really tired.

The bill duly arrived and I paid it. Still no desserts.

Just as I was thinking we'd been forgotten about, a waiter hurried out with two desserts that were the same as we had ordered. At last! Before I could even make sure contact, he put them on an empty table opposite, took a big bite out of one of them, then rushed off!
By this time I'm so tired I could have cried.

I went off looking for someone to ask about our desserts and they eventually managed to rustle them up. No explanation or apology and no one bothered to acknowledge us when we left.

Staying at a village inn, I popped down to get a glass of water just before closing time only to find the pub deserted apart from the barmaid, a customer and the landlord in a compromising position.

I’ve never looked at a spit-roasted chicken since then without thinking of that scene.

Soft play. I took my toddler to a session where there was free juice and a sandwich.
He doesn't drink juice so I asked for a glass of tapwater instead and had quite an argument to get it, as apparently only the juice was free.