Never work in hospitality. Strangest things people have complained about.

[KnopkaPixie]

Here's some to get us started:

"There's broken glass on this steak."
It was fancy coarse ground salt.

"I can't eat from a square plate. It's bad feng shui."

Any more?

Why do you keep going back to that shop?

I was in a restaurant once and the guy at the next table sent his wine back because it was apparently corked. He chose another off the menu, the waitress brought it, a couple of sips and he complained that one was also corked. The waitress returned with the bottle for him. The screw top bottle.

See the McDonalds coffee case where a woman sued cos she scalded herself whilst driving with coffee that she tipped on herself. Said it was too hot

I catered for a fancy buffet some years ago for a group that regularly uses our venue. Next to the cheese board I'd put a jug with celery sticks in it. One of the women (who I'd met before and who was seemingly perfectly normal) on seeing the celery threw her hands in the air and started to sob. She then started to exclaim "celery, celery, oh my god not celery. It brings the whole terrible incident flooding back!" With which she ran out of the room, got in her car and went home. Everyone, including me, was speechless. She attended another event at our venue a few weeks later and was right as rain. I soooo wanted to ask her about the celery moment but didn't dare.

Obviously not something she wanted to celerybrate.

Lol! Needless to say I never served celery in her presence again.

yes but do you quiz restaurant’s that there is no trace of dairy in the main courses because you will be very unwell if there is, then order a dairy pudding? This is also involved ringing restaurants to make special food for them.

Got an order for collection once from a gentleman who'd driven 45 mins+ to our restaurant. He ordered a big serving of garlic prawns and a few other things. Said it was a treat for his wife.
Got his order fresh from the kitchen and off he went.
Got a phone call from him an hour later saying he'd just got home with his food and it was stone cold, didn't we know that his wife was pregnant; were we trying to poison her and risk the life of her baby by giving them cold seafood that had been 'sitting out'.
Tried to reason with him that maybe the hour's drive might have had something to do with it but he was absolutely livid!

A classic from Catherine Tate.

Can't find the GAZPACHO SOUP! one but everybody's seen that so...

Oh, here we are GAZPACHO SOUP!

Keith likes to make up stories as well as jokes at work, then...

The one about the rare vs hard to find steak sounds like an urban myth too.

I thought if a wine was corked it meant that it had gone off/vinegary after bottling, rather than finding bits of cork in the glass. Maybe that doesn't happen any more with screw top bottles?

Yes. It was too hot to serve safely. They knew it was unsafe and hadn't changed how they served it.
More info here
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/12/16/13971482/mcdonalds-coffee-lawsuit-stella-liebeck

Not hospitality, but my friend works on customer services in a supermarket.
She brought back a 2" piece of cucumber 'because the seeds were too big' (she'd eaten the rest of it) and wanted a full refund for the cucumber.
Presumably the seeds in the rest of it were of normal size.

I recall an optician telling of a patient who insisted on having a pair of spectacles repaired while a new frame was ordered. He was told the repair would be fragile but the customer insisted as he needed them for the weekend.

He was banging on the door on Monday morning as he had gone for a flight in his plane on the weekend and banged the frames with his headset and they broke. He didn't take a spare pair, He was screaming he'd report the practice to the CAA/all the regulatory bodies as the optician had 'broken the law and endangered everyone'. He was reminded he was told the repair was fragile. He shouted for many minutes until he was told informing the regulator that his being myopic and going for a flight when he knew his spectacles had broken and had a temporary repair and his not taking a spare pair might reflect more poorly on him than the optician who had followed his instructions. He screamed he'd take his custom somewhere competent then came back in a fortnight to pick up his new frames and demanded a full refund 'for the incompetence' and 'he'd sue'. The refund was declined. He attended for his regular sight test the next year.

And interestingly after that I find coffee served in Costa etc luke warm at best its not hot enough for me. So I always ask for it hotter . I wonder if I am the only one as I have read so many say coffee to hot but I disagree many places ot really isn't

Corked wine occurs when the cork itself has been infected with a particular fungus. It gives the wine a very characteristic smell and taste.

You are right though. A bottle of wine with a screw top or plastic cork cannot be "corked". It may have been spoiled if air has got in at any point but I've never had that happen.

That’s what the consultant said when she marched down to the kitchens to give him what for 🤣
As a vegetarian breastfeeding mother of twins there was nothing for me to eat ( the veg option was omelette which you can’t eat as a breast feeder ) except sandwiches which by then I was sick of.

Off topic but why would you not be able to eat omelettes if you are breast feeding? I breast fed for nearly three years and ate plenty of omelettes during that time.

And "boiling point" is too hot too make coffee. I make filter coffee at home at 80 degrees and it is perfect. Still too hot too drink for a few minutes though.

To be fair, it's been somewhat out of favour since the spread of BSE in the Eighties!

When I was 17 I volunteered at a WRVS tea bar, I then got offered a Saturday job whilst I sat my A Levels.

The number of people who would LITERALLY beg me to knock 5/10p off their purchase to make the number round was astounding. I would say “sorry, no this is a charity” or “sorry if I do that the till won’t tally up at the end of the day” and many would STILL say “please please”.

I was painfully shy so I’m now ashamed to admit when the begging was too much I would give in and put 10p or so from purse at the end of the day.

People would beg for literally minutes.

It would surely be sensible if the menu actually said "macaroni cheese" wouldn't it? Calling it "mac 'n cheese" clearly causes confusion.

from the internet:

Tartar sauce is the usual US spelling, tartare sauce is the usual UK/Commonwealth spelling, and sauce tartare is the French spelling for a sauce made of mayonnaise with capers, pickles, herbs, etc. and often served with fried fish. It is very similar to sauce rémoulade.

Not knowing or being able to understand what thick string is was baffling
Had many people question the rope grown mussels thing, but when explained that they grow on a long bit of rope that dangles into the sea, most people understand. Fair enough for not knowing that bit of specific info. But rope... is thick string.... cord.. like a skipping rope/ect. I spent a good 5 mins trying to describe rope in other words.