A food service worker has unearthed the secret unsanitary restaurant practices she’s seen firsthand, from the dirty tea towels used to clean tables to the bits of crust being scraped off the plates.
TikTok user @tequila.9 has gone viral after posting a composite response to @kuyyannunu’s video on restaurant dishwashers, which claims dishes and cutlery are only washed or scraped if they’re still covered with food are.
“I apologize in advance for that information,” she captioned the eye-opening clip, which horrified many unsuspecting viewers.
“I promise you that fork you’re eating with came out of the washing machine with spinach just rinsed off,” she said at the beginning of her nearly 30-second tirade.
TikTok user @tequila.9 went viral after describing the unsanitary restaurant practices she observed while working in the hospitality industry
She stitched @kuyyannunu’s video about restaurant dishwashers, claiming that dishes and cutlery are only washed or scraped when they come out covered with food
“I promise you, the table you’re eating from was just wiped down with a smelly kitchen rag soaked with dirty dishwater,” she continued. “I promise that whoever set your table used nails to scrape the crust off your plate just before you used it.
“And I’m willing to bet that if the health department showed up at the restaurant you’re eating at, everyone in the kitchen would go nuts in the walk-in fridge and all the dates on the food would change.”
The video has garnered more than 4.2million views and 7,200 comments since it was posted last week – and there were plenty of restaurant workers backing its claims.
“It’s the same everywhere. That’s why I won’t work in my favorite places. I choose to be blissfully UNCONSCIOUS,” one person wrote, while another added, “I promise you she’s telling the truth.”
The waiter added that tables are “wiped down with a smelly kitchen rag that was wet from dirty dishwater” and food dates are changed before health inspections
The video has received more than 4.2 million views and 7,200 comments since its release
“That’s mostly for [corporate] Restaurants!’ someone else claims. “I’ve done both [and] Private restaurants tend to keep things a lot cleaner.
“Okay, but the spinach also went through the machine and is also being sanitized,” one user replied jokingly.
However, others who have worked in the food industry insisted they had never experienced the things she described.
“As a chef who takes pride in her lineage, it’s just HER place to work, I promise,” commented one viewer.
“In the 7+ years that I’ve worked in the hospitality industry, none of the restaurants have been like this,” shared another.
Many hospitality workers confirmed her claims in the comments, but others insisted they had never seen the unsanitary practices she described
“All of you out here confirming shit like that and then in the same breath want us to fill the pay gap with tips,” argued another, prompting @tequila.9 to hit back with a follow-up video.
The clerk explained that she’s mostly worked in chain restaurants and is “really lucky” for restaurant workers who have never experienced the things she has at work.
“The main factor at play here is really simple. It is primarily a lack of resources that is absolutely the responsibility of a company and not its employees,” she countered.
“If you have a finite number of teammates and an infinite number of tasks, and management specifically aims to prioritize customer experience above everything else, why do you think back-of-house processes would be a priority for anyone?”
In a follow-up video, she hit back at a commenter who argued that servers shouldn’t be tipped if they don’t follow hygiene practices
The waiter noted that these problems usually occur when the restaurant is understaffed and full leaving them little time to clean as they should
“You don’t want to tip waitstaff because you think they’re bad at their job and you want them to get better, but you want them to be motivated to get better despite the constantly crappy pay. That’s stupid,’ she argued
She found that these problems usually occur when the restaurant is understaffed and full, leaving them little time to clean like they should. She added that incentives are also an ongoing issue.
“If you’re a clean waiter – I was a clean waiter – that’s great, but you can’t monitor the other waiters or the bar or the kitchen or the bus drivers. And more importantly, you shouldn’t do it. For what? A few bucks an hour and crappy tips for people like that? The base wage for service workers is not, or even close to, a living wage,” she said.
“You are one person on a shift in a facility with dozens of moving parts constantly. You’re in the comments posting food for thought about how the filth of restaurants kind of reflects character when you can just say you’re too s*** and broke to tip,” she continued.
“You don’t want to tip waitstaff because you think they’re bad at their job and you want them to get better, but you want them to be motivated to get better despite the constantly crappy pay. That’s silly. You’re dumb. Find a better excuse for being broke and not tipsy, or just don’t eat out.’