I was a waitress at a very expensive and well-respected restaurant in Little Italy. The kitchen was filthy—disgusting. Two guys worked in the kitchen, Bryant, a stoner white boy, and Antonio—a ghetto-ass black dude. People complain about Little Italy now with all of the staff being Mexican. But what has changed—like it was “Italian” when you used to have potheads who lived off of Pop Tarts cooking your Chef’s special? How about a chef period! I never ate a thing there. Sure, the guys in the kitchen wanted to date me, but I couldn’t trust that. Say "no" or "maybe" one time too many and my lunch is going in the trashcan before it hits the griddle. Actually, the trash can would have been cleaner than the other surfaces in the kitchen—like these guys were going to clean?
We had a man who came in every day to get his stuffed shells for lunch, an older Italian man who totally hated blacks. It’s a small place. You can see the cooks going from the kitchen to the bathroom and the cooks can hear you. It was just an old row house. So, after Mister Tummenello saw Antonio the first time, he would say, every time he sat down to order, “Is that niցցer in the kitchen? I don’t want that niցցer touching my food.”
I tried to get him to quiet down but they always heard. I’d come back to the kitchen and place the order and Antonio would say, “Did that old racist call me a niցցer?”
I would play it down and say, “Look, he’s like a hundred years old. Just let it go.” I never stuck around to see what they did with his stuffed shells, but I can imagine. They had code words for customers they hated, and I don’t know what they meant by “special sauce” or “Memphis rub.” I can imagine though, after what happened with this old Jewish lady. She wasn’t real old, like forty-five—but I was eighteen. So I'm like horror stricken, like I'm going to look like that one day!
She ordered the fillet and it comes with a garnish of parsley and she freaked the hell out, started yelling that she couldn’t have green stuff touching her food, that she wanted a new steak, “What kind of imbeciles do you have working in the kitchen,” “What’s the matter with you, simple girl”, blah, blah, blah.
Of course, those two heard it all. So when I bring the fillet back and tell them she wants another, Bryant says, “Fuck that, rugby rub, coming right up,” tilts the plate, and drop-kicks the fillet to Antonio. And these guys were good. It was like watching professional soccer. So you know they had kicked food around the kitchen a lot. The fillet even went into the drain trap under the sink, then gets kicked out of there and goes skidding cross the dirty floor. Finally, Antonio scoops it up with the toe of his shoe, pops it up, and kicks it with the same foot to Bryant, who catches the thing with his spatula and drops it on the griddle, about five seconds on each side, just enough to raise some steam and back on the plate it goes and I’m taking this God-awful steak out to this God-awful woman.
I just couldn’t do it anymore. I was afraid of pissing them off, as ghetto as they were—would not even bring shit up like this to the owners—are you kidding me!
I got out of there none too soon, let me assure you of that!
I couldn’t even stand to watch the lady take her taste. But she liked it and told me I could go do whatever it was I did when I wasn’t getting orders wrong—and I felt a little less bad about the entire episode.
Honestly, if you eat in a restaurant, you’re fucking insane. I’d rather pick berries on the side of the road.
The Ghetto Grocer Kindle Edition
Gosh James! Why do people pick fights with food handlers? Don't they realize that if they get the food handlers riled up they are liable to spit in their food? Or worse? Clearly this either does not occur to these cranks or else they must imagine that the food handlers wouldn't dare defile their meals. Oh yes they'd dare! Where do you think you are? Mayberry? Well all I can figure is that picking fights with food handlers, especially in places like Harm City, must be a psychosis akin to "suicide by cop". Perhaps then these malcontents subconsciously desire their own demise and therefore reflexively heap provocations upon restaurant staff in the hope that someone will become enraged enough to poison their food and put them out of their misery.
While I thoroughly enjoy Mr Bentham's very literate comments, I must respectfully differ as to the motivations of people who deliberately insult food handlers.
I have encountered more than a few people who are so arrogant that they will deliberately insult and demean others, then become enraged when one of their targets retaliates. Some sociopaths think they are so special that they are entitled to do anything they want to anyone.
You bring up a good point Mr. Hain. FYI Anonymous Conservative describes just the personality type you mention: namely a narcissist (sociopath’s tend to be more charming and manipulative, at first at least): anonymousconservative.com/blog/on-strategies-for-dealing-with-narcissists-in-family-and-social-circles The thing is malignant Narcissists tend to be inveterate poisoners themselves. If you should dare to thwart one of them it’s commonplace for them to try to get back at you by slipping you something that will make you sick. So given the way their minds work it’s surprising to me that they don’t see the danger in provoking food handlers, given that the food handlers can so easily escape detection while getting back at them. They could feed you their shit and you could walk out of the restaurant infected with E. Coli or Hepatitis C and never realize it until you fell ill some days later. Unless as you say, the narcissist’s arrogance makes them believe they are so special they are somehow immune and/or could detect or thwart any attempt to tamper with their food. They could be overly confident in their ability to intimidate people as well. But restaurants are one specific place where they are more likely to suffer a failure in the victim selection process. Combined with their ability to strike back undetected, with restaurant workers you are also dealing with a population group that is likely to be much less morally restrained from seeking revenge than the average citizen. Even in the upscale sports bar in whitebreadistan I frequent I’ve noticed that quite a number of the kitchen help wear ankle monitors. The Leftie judges around here let out some pretty bad actors on work release programs. And where do they get jobs? You guessed it! One wonders what it’s like in HC where at least half of the people in town are “Ghetto”! Anyway, thanks for helping me explore this strange phenomenon.