To ask the most shocking things you’ve seen in the food industry

[MrsA2015]

If you’ve a background or currently in the food sector, what secrets and practices do you see? My dad used to work for Pizza Hut many years back and refused to eat from there anymore because of the things he’d seen. Even though I’ve pointed out you can access food hygiene ratings for most restaurants now!

I had an ex that used to work for Harrods in the 90’s.

He got drunk at a truth or dare dinner party once and admitted he used to fuck the frozen meat (gammon to be precise) as it was defrosting as it had a soft middle and used to sell it with his spunk in.

The room went silent.

When he’d sobered up the next day I asked if it was true. He admitted it was and that some of his friends knew and thought it was hilarious so he thought the dinner party guests would too and ‘had he misjudged that?’

I dumped him.

On a positive note, I worked in a McDonald's while at sixth form. That place was spotless. It was scrubbed to within an inch of it's life every night. I mean everything pulled out and scrubbed behind. The floors cleaned every few hours and health and safety procedures were kept to stringently. I mean so much so you could eat off the floor.

I've seen a chef pour any unused sauces/gravy back into the pot. The sauces would come out in a small ramekin so she would just tip it back into the tub! I never eat any side dishes of coleslaw/sauces now.

A restaurant I worked in as a teen used to send out veg in a seperate tray. If it came back half eaten they would just top it up with more and send it back out. I was told to save the veg off plates in a bucket 'for the animals' nope that's tomorrows soup of the day..

Pizza takeaway - chef dripping forehead sweat all over the pizzas he was making.

Local chippy - young girl assistant with filthy dirty long nails, long hair not tied back, rubbed her nose and served up food with same hand and filthy nails.

Hotel I worked at would recycle the veg that was put out on serving platters during the week to make a veg soup on the friday. I know it was stored in the fridge for 5 days at least because the veg would start to go in the 'veg soup' tub on a monday.

another hotel would recycle toast that came back on the racks untouched. Warm it up and sent it out to another table. This only happened if they ran out of bread and the chef didn't have the authority to send a KP out to buy a couple of loaves because all purchases had to go through the manager who would get told off for not ordering enough. It was one of those hotels that hadn't come out of the 70s yet. horrific management practices designed to make your job 100x harder.

There was another hotel the owners took a cut of the tips. They'd all go in a box from dinner service and the owners gave themselves a cut, their son a cut then the waitresses got the rest.
IF you want to tip someone tip them directly. Its the same in housekeeping. Want to tip the housekeeper leave it on the bedside table dont give it a manager/owner. We would never see it.

I used to work in a pub kitchen in the 90s - disgusting. Mouldy bits picked out and the rest was good to serve.

McDonald’s, on the other hand, was spotless. Very good hygiene, regular beepers for hand washing and a thorough overnight clean every night.

Once a server in a sandwich bar did a full-on sneeze directly onto the sandwich she was making for me. I was young at the time and didn't have the nerve to complain but I threw the sandwich straight into the bin outside the shop. What a fool I was.

Please don't think that the most expensive eating places are the safest either, far from it. I knew a very exclusive restaurant where the young woman in charge of deserts regularly spat in the food of some of their famous guests. In fact the more famous you are, the more likely you are to get targeted in some eateries.

Returning food is pretty dangerous too, I never do, I just leave it.

I breifly worked at a food van at Wembly stadium as a teenager. A long lightbulb in the van got smashed and shattered over the hot dog rolls. I told the manager, expecting him to throw them away. He got me and the other person to pick the glass out. We tried out best but there's no way we could be sure all the glass was out. He didn't care.

I wish to this day I'd stood my ground and told him no, but I was young and stupid and everyone else seemed to think it was OK. It wasn't OK.

Well I’ve been put off eating out for life. I know enough about rank restaurants just from watching Gordon Ramsay or the channel5 programmes sometimes on where they close down disgusting hovels. It’s such a shame that one of life’s enjoyable things is ruined by lack of human decency and respect. I do try to avoid eating in places unless I can see the food prep area however there’s always a chance of contamination from the moment the produce is grown! All hail the immune system

Gloves certainly give a false sense of security because they are way more unhygienic then using your (washed hands.) The only time gloves are useful is when handling raw meat then the gloves are binned straight away. I bet if you swabbed gloves people have used for multiple tasks, including handling money, you would be horrified! People are far more likely to wash their hands regularly when they get dirty then they would change a pair of gloves.

I’ve known people to not give a toss about vegetarian food by using the same boards as cooked meat, same tongs to pick up ham then pick up slices of cheese etc. Same gloves to pick up cold sausages (for sandwiches) then pick up salad/cheese/vegetarian food.

I’ve seen things dropped on the floor and picked up and used, including someone’s cooked panini which was scooped up along with the melted cheese which had oozed out on the floor and put back on the plate.

It was very telling on master chef professionals this week when two different chefs used the same board/tray for their raw fish and their cooked food. I’m glad they were picked up on it. I know they were very nervous but as a professional chef it should be built in your brain on autopilot not to use the same boards/utensils/trays for raw and cooked food.

Staff lying about things being vegetarian. 'Vegetarian' dishes fried in animal fat, or made with meat stock, or loaded with cheese made with calf rennet.

OP, yes thank goodness for immune systems, I have to live with the knowledge that I have ingested a fair amount of spit from a man with extremely poor oral hygiene. In fact, he didn't own a toothbrush.

My sister worked for a Pizza Hut delivery as a driver...

They kept the bottles of drink/packaged sides in a SHED at the back. This shed routinely flooded/was filthy. Handwashing wasn't observed.

Said shed once became flooded with human waste due to a burst waste pipe. They still used the drinks bottles that hadn't been actually submerged, and the sides too. Shed remained operational. I nearly threw up when she told me.

I’ve also seen dish cloths that would walk themselves into the bin! How can an establishment clean their equipment properly if the cloth is filthy and smelly? Not all places have a dishwasher. In the last place I worked hand washing was done in the same sink as the washing up was done and food prep. From one double sink they would; wash hands, wash everything up in, defrost prawns in, cool down the boiled eggs in cold water in the sink and de shell them in there too, drain the (catering size) tins of tuna, drain cooked crayfish in a colander (I’ve seen staff wash their hands with soap in the sink whist said crayfish and prawns were draining in the colander.)

And they have a 5 rating!

Clearly this goes on a lot but at the same time none of us get ill so it can’t be that bad?

Worked in a cinema as a teenager. Watched someone sneeze into the nacho cheese and stir it in.

Also, I accidentally dropped a huge tub of jalapeños which went under a fridge. Was made to pull the fridge out (first time in what must have been years) and scoop it all back in to the tub to be served. Absolutely vile. Wish I'd said something looking back but it was my first job and I needed the money.

i work at a well known chain and all i can say about our restaurant is the kitchen is pulled apart every day and walls, floors, and units are washed thoroughly, the canopies are taken apart and cleaned every day, the fryers are emptied and cleaned out every day, i know becuase im the one who does that side, the dish area has a dishwasher, a clean side and a dirty side, pans and plates go from dirty side to clean side, the food is prepped fresh every day, the rules governing food prep are so strict that any of our chefs who deviated from the high standards would find himself very quickly out the door, its an open kitchen so you have to be on top of the game as customers can see everything, they not only have eho's visiting but a company that goes into every aspect of food operation , and another company that goes into every aspect of fire and safety precautions, so not every restaurant is bad

Seriously, how do we all eat out so often and yet come to no harm?! I'm emetophobic but a lot less less paranoid in my 40s than I was in my teens - but this thread is going to ruin me.

I was once quite ill after a pizza hut meal - suddenly I'm not that surprised. I also had suspected giardiasis (unconfirmed, but certainly a a parasitic bowel infection) after a warm chicken salad at a local pub last year.

And very recently my boss suffered 48 hours of d&v after eating an unbranded chicken sandwich from a large railway station in the north.

Of course, we mostly put this kind of thing down to unfortunate coincidence, or "a bug".

Hmm.

When I was 14 I worked in a fish & chip shop. One day one of the bullies from school came in and ordered chips and a pot of curry sauce...

I'm not ashamed to say I spat in her curry sauce before stirring it and serving it (I was out the back...oh...and she had been regularly cornering me at school and throttling me and threatening to stab me so....).

Cross-posted issey - that's a heartening read, thank you!

Are you allowed to say what chain issey?

Issey that sounds like McDonald’s to me!