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!

Local chain pub, ordered the duck. It came in two parts and one bit tasted off. Myself and DH had the most horrendous d&v. If it happened now, I’d report it.

Every cafe/pub I’ve worked in has been clean. One pub recycled the drip trays into the beer batter, but the trays were clean.

My mum's a fully trained chef - last worked as one in 1989 though

Said vegetables left on plates, sauces, coleslaw, cream , jams - basically anything reusable - were scooped back up and reserved. Veg was rinsed under tap and then microwaved. Said worst she saw was the same portion of broccoli served to 4 different people.

Head chef used to have rashes under her breasts and groin/thighs - used to dust herself with cornflour whilst cooking

Regularly vomiting into sink whilst cooking breakfast still drunk.

My own experience of meals cooked for a very large instituion - thousands of meals cooked daily - some few hundred to thousand meals travelled to venues up to 50/60 miles away after being cooked... by the time it reached the recipient it must have been inedible.

Am i still safe to buy a pizza from the pizza counter at asda?

Butcher I went to was handling raw meat with her bare hands and then answered the phone without washing her hands , touched the cash machine etc . Needless to say I never went there again

This shit is why I took great pride in my pristine kitchens when working in restaurants and cafes. When other staff members were sitting around doing nothing waiting for customers I was hauling fridges out to clean behind them. When I worked for the dirty hand boss I still used glasses to serve ice and it pissed him off no end. He was always telling me off but I just couldn't follow his orders. It was rank and I said so.

I did have some bosses who told us to put uneaten table veg back out in new dishes but they were never around long enough to stop us binning it and hiding it under the slops. Fuck em, what were they gonna do?

@moonmaker our local butcher picks mince out to weigh with his bare hands and wipes them down his apron or on a tea towel. I won't buy from there anymore but it's amazing how many people don't even notice! The assistant weight meat on plastic on the scales as she should but the butcher puts meat straight on it, no bag. Ew.

@CheekyFuckersAreEntertaining she also wiped her hands on her clothes .
This was ten years ago and I still remember it . Ugh .

In my younger days I worked in pub kitchens, I would always be offered a meal on duty, only in one pub would I eat his hygiene was scrupulous. I worked in others where alcohol was added to cream to disguise the fact it had gone off, mould scraped off cheese, lemons for drinks stored on the floor of a filthy cupboard, flies sitting on somebody's ploughmans, when I pointed it out was told as I wasn't eating it not to worry, tinned crab passed off as fresh, snail shells reused and dogs in the kitchen. I also worked for some event caterers, at a posh wedding we ran out of plates so wiped the starter plates with paper towel to re use for dessert, one time somebody forgot to bring the prawns so went back to get them, defrosting them on the way by placing them on the dash of the car and turning the heating up full blast. I rarely eat out I am afraid!

Moral of the thread. Do not eat anywhere other than your own home and only cool food you’ve grown yourself.i regret starting this thread! How disgusting, I’m astounded that most of malpractice is in big name places. I’d like to own a cafe one day and vow to have transparent walls to the kitchen and lashes to anybody breaking hygiene rules. Better yet I’ll just do it all myself. Waaaaaaaah