85 Times Restaurant Workers Deserved A Bonus Just For Keeping A Straight Face Over These Orders
At a Tex-Mex restaurant – Cheese nachos without the chips.
Yes they did receive a plate of shredded cheese microwaved onto a plate.
Yes they used the free appetizer chips to eat that cheese.
unclemikey0:
I worked at a Mexican restaurant for a few years in college, and had a customer just trying to invent his own dish. Like not even “can I have that burrito, but with chicken instead” or “throw some jalapenos on it”. But more like, just skipping around the menu and picking different ingredients from all over the places to create his own dish that we don’t have. I had to tell him there was no way I was going to be able to communicate to the kitchen what he wants, or figure out how to charge him. Unless he wants me to order eleven different sides of things and he can’t put it together himself, so he should just order something from the menu please.
Almost worse, and I bet everyone that’s worked a restaurant can relate to this, was whenformer employeeswould come in and try to order their old favorite thing that they had created back in the day because as a waiter they knew all the modifiers on the computer. Bro, I get it, and I do that now too, but we’re really busy, please just order something from the menu. I ain’t in the mood right now to order Beef and Bean burrito (sub steak) (sub queso (inside)) (no tomato) (no lettuce) (sub pico) (green Chile (half)) (sour cream sauce (half)) (no onion sub fajita veg) + ((no rice and beans) sub kids nachos(no cheese sub guac)). You could get away with this when it was your employee meal at the end of your shift, and I bet the cooks hated you for it back then too.
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Walked in 5 minutes before close, ordered the Beef Wellington. The server explained that it takes 30 minutes to cook. They said that’s fine.
Point of advice: If you walk into an empty restaurant at the end of the night, and the server mentions a long wait for food, maybe reconsider your order. Everyone wanted to go home except that guy.
jim_br:
I had a manager (banking) that was an absolute PITA to work with. On one business trip, we landed 3 hours late and every restaurant in town is closed/closing. He convinced a Pizza Hut 15 minutes before closing, to let us dine in — four people. They reluctantly agreed.
After being seated, he asked how many people are on duty, the waitress replied three. He opened his wallet and counted out $300 and asked her to distribute it as a thank you.
After dinner, the bill came and it’s about $50-60. He dropped another $100 and thanked the waitress. My coworker looked at him and quite seriously said, “I had no idea you could be kind!” He laughed and acknowledged he worked in restaurants while in college and that’s where he reserves his kindness.
I once had a guy ask if we could “sear the steak rare but without any pink.” He wanted “cooked blood.” I still have nightmares.
moosebeast:
I saw a guy in a restaurant order a steak rare, then when it arrived he complained that it was pink in the middle.
I honestly think some guys don’t know what rare means but have heard that it’s how you’re supposed to ask for your steak.
With a friend at Bob Evans in grad school before classes. As we were getting ready to leave a man came in, asked for 2 bowls of sausage gravy and a Country time Lemonade. Waitress asked how many biscuits he wanted. “None, just bring two bowls and a spoon.” We left before we could watch that horror occur.
Once worked at a stand that sold burgers and hot dogs. This one guy wanted peanut butter and jelly on his dog in addition to the slaw, chili, onions, mustard, and ketchup. We happened to have some there so I got it for him. He said it was the best thing ever.
At macaroni grill: wanted her chicken breast medium rare.
She argued with my manager for 30 minutes, then got served medium rare chicken.
🤷♂️ IDK Man.
She only ate food that was white.
Different_Beyond9872:
Had this once as well. Would only eat anything “with no color”. Exasperated, I tried to clarify and the husband explained their spouse had just had their terth cleaned.
But there was no way I was going back to the kitchen with that request.
I worked at a California Pizza Kitchen and once a lady asked for a bowl of spaghetti bolognese but with no pasta. So yeah, a bowl of sauce. Another time, a half iced coffee/half coke.
Pepsi with a glass of water and extra sugar. Watched the guy pour like 5 sugar packets into his Pepsi and a bunch more into the water. Wtf. He worked at a gym. His teeth were completely rotten.
SunShineNomad:
Some d**g addicts really crave sugar. I’ve seen one pour sugar into Minute Maid orange juice which is already like 27g of sugar in a serving.
I was expo’ing at the time.Woman sent her burger back 5 times because it was too rare.She was only satisfied when the patty actually caught on fire on the grill and was broken down into it’s chemical components.The whole restaurant smelled like a fire but she was happy as a clam eating it.
Judge_Bredd3:
My dad is weird about food borne illnesses. As a result, when I go over and grill burgers, I’m putting his on 10 minutes before the rest. It’s like a hockey puck but it’s the only way he’ll eat it.
ThelatestRedditAct:
I am this weirdo. Not with burgers but with chicken and bacon. I think it’s a texture thing but I love dry chicken. I wouldn’t send back juicy, moist chicken, but I like mine dry. Bacon I like it practically burnt, if it will simply crumble when touched it’s good.
Reading glasses, they were mad we didn’t have a pair for them at our small restaurant that’s open 4 months out of the year.
I used to go to a place in college (U.S. college) that had a soup they humorously referred to as ‘Dog Hair Soup,’ which, as you could guess, was unseriously marketed to people as a hangover remedy. Anyway, someone came in one day and ordered the soup, but then added, “Now, with the Dog Hair Soup, can I choose the breed of dog in the soup?” Everyone within earshot thought this guy was joking, until the person got ticked at the chuckles.*record scratch*This dude seriously thought the soup was made out of dog.
As someone who worked in sushi restaurants for the better part of a decade, you will never believe the number of people who get mad when you serve them raw fish. At the sushi restaurant.
Very high end steakhouse in Vegas. The kind where you get the prices by the ounce. We are talking “I could have bought a car for what this meal costs” and dude ask for ketchup with his steak. I almost b***h slapped him right there. The group I was with still talk about it and its been more than 5 years.
Tmqmo:
People that judge others’ food preferences need to get over themselves.
Worked at a fairly upscale restaurant in rural area. Customers always tried to sound fancy or better educated. One wanted her food with a side of Béarnaise sauce. I’ll never forget the sous chef b******g about “people who learned to be classy from a f*****g Bugs Bunny cartoon”.
One of the restaurants that I worked in when I was younger had a salad bar that used plastic kale.
A customer requested some after we saw them taking it up out of the ice.
Apparently they couldn’t tell it was metal and plastic.
ConnoisseurOfDanger:
Salad bars used to use kale (or fake kale) as a decorative element to cover up the ice and trays in buffets. It was popular in like the late 90s/early 2000s. Pizza Hut did it, and up until 2013 when kale became a trendy superfood, they were the largest purchaser of kale in the US.
When I used to work at McDonald’s, had a dude order a Big Mac and asked for the meat to be medium rare… my brother in Christ, you do not want a McDonald’s slab of meat to be medium rare, not that I had any control over the cooking (other than placing it on the grill and pressing a button).
I was at a Peruvian restaurant; table behind me had 4 Asian ladies who were trying out Peruvian food for the first time. When the ceviche came out, they asked the server if they could actually cook it. In their defense, the menu did say it was “cooked” in lemon juice. Server said no, this is how it’s supposed to be eaten. The table asked “Just put it in the microwave for a few minutes; it’s too cold.”.
Buddy of mine worked at Red Lobster. Customer ordered “salmon steak.” Customer was very upset that he was served fish.
Working at a TCBY and this fancy older gentleman (he was Italian and had gold chains, a deep tan, open shirt, and a equally fancy lady with him) asks to buy the “painting” we had hanging on the wall. This wasn’t a special painting, it was probably what they send to all TCBY stores when they open. I got my manager, she haggled a bit and in the end he got it. They get their FroYo, pull the painting off the wall, and in the most outrageous Italian accent says as he’s walking out the door, “When I see something I like, I BUY IT!” 🤣 I still quote that guy all the time.
Once I had a customer in the drive through order a dozen chocolate donuts.
Sounds pretty normal, except I worked at a burger king and we did not have chocolate donuts.
I asked him to repeat himself, and he confidently said again, “a dozen chocolate donuts”
I said “sir we don’t have donuts here.”
He said “…where am I?”
I said “this is burger king”
Then I heard his wife in the passenger seat start cracking up then he sheepishly said “I thought this was Tim Hortons” and he sped away 😂.
A young couple asked me for a bottle of the “cor-kahge.”
A lady pointed to the filet mignon and asked what kind of fish it is.
And last, after verbalizing a special with polenta, a sweet summer child uttered, “polenta? Isn’t that like giving birth?!”.
Friend of mine had a customer request “chicken head sauce.” Eventually they figured out that the customer was asking for Sriracha.
Gloomy_Ad384:
I’ve heard it called rooster sauce, but chicken head is a new one to me!
Walked confidently behind the bar and wiped her hands with a bar towel bc she did not want to use a paper napkin.
Ordered “the most expensive” single malt scotch mixed with soda.
Requested a zero fat, gluten free vegan pizza.
Requested a complimentary cup of ranch dressing to put on the salad she brought with her from home.
Brought two slices of bread and some cheese and asked the staff to make him a grilled cheese sandwich- said he didn’t need to pay anyone.
Ordered a water on ice, with all the available fruit garnishes, grabbed the bitters and poured half of the bottle into the water. Didn’t want to pay for anything.
Demanded champagne table service, for free, after defending his PHD thesis. He thought the restaurant should charge his professor/advisor afterwards.
I was the customer. I had just moved from Boston to Ohio and asked our waitress for a “fork”. The waitress thought I was asking for something entirely different. After asking me to repeat my request, it became clear that she was really upset. I couldn’t understand why she was so upset until the other members of our party jumped in and let her know that my accent caused certain words to sound differently than what I intended. From then on I always requested a “four-pronged eating utensil” instead of a fork.
I had a customer who aparently had a very restrictive health diet. I spent about 15 minutes telling her all the ingredients in everything. She kept getting upset that we didn’t have USDA-certified organic produce (We weren’t in the United states, so USDA…isn’t a thing)
She finally settled on a vegan salad bowl, with numerous alterations. After reading out every ingredient, the kitchen made her food. She ate half of it, then brought it back and said “I forgot that I wasn’t going to eat rice any more, can you remake it without rice”
I simply said “I’m sorry that you forgot that, but you were informed of all ingredients”.
A friend of mine was a server at a restaurant when she was in college and told me about a regular they had. This customer would ask their server to take a sip from their drink before setting it on the table, every single time. Seemed benign so most obliged. New server refused/thought they were joking, customer flips out, storms out and is never seen again.
Fast forward some time and customer is found dead in their home from an apparent s*****e. It’s revealed that they were suffering from pretty severe schizophrenia at the end and were paranoid of being poisoned. This was not the only restaurant this person had made a reputation for themselves in, and it was always the same request to have the server sip from their drink before setting it down.
I never liked soda. Both myself and my brother were always milk drinkers. It was the bane of my parents existence to find places to eat where we could get milk.
So as a teenager, after taking SATs, some friends and I went out to eat. At Hooters. The entire table and the waitress burst out laughing, thinking it was a breast joke.
I’ve since learned to like iced tea.
A customer came in to the restaurant with a potato and asked us to microwave it with some cheese and butter. We did it because he was loaded and tipped generously.
I was garde manger at a white tablecloth rest.
Had a customer order the tartare well done.
I once had an older guy order a New York strip, medium rare. It came out perfectly medium rare. He cut into it and gasped, ‘It’s bloody!’ I restated that he ordered medium rare. ‘I know what I ordered, but I don’t want no damn blood in it!’ He wanted it well done. But in his mind, that was medium rare. I had it recooked to well done, and he loved it. I still wonder what he thought well done was. Burnt?
Not a restaurant, but my wife and I owned and ran a B&B for about 10 years.
We served a 3-course breakfast on the weekends, and I cooked.
One weekend morning, I was doing custom omelettes to order.
One guest asked for her omelette to be cooked using no fat of any kind – no oil, no butter, etc., apparently for health reasons.
Now, that’s pretty difficult to pull off, even with a non-stick pan.
At least for me – I don’t have any actual food service training.
So, I wound up putting a little bit of water in the pan, and it turned out ok.
She loved it, and the couple became repeat customers.
So, whenever they booked, we did omelettes:-).
As a flight attendant.. tomato juice and orange juice.. no ice. Poured both in separate cups, and got the nastiest look as if I was serving them with my fingers sticking in the rims.
I was wrong. He wanted airplane temp warm canned orange juice mixed with tomato juice, no ice. My bad, my fault.
Went to London with my Mom. She asked for ranch at EVERY RESTAURANT EVERY DAY. Just in case the answer would change.
After the first few tries it became clear ranch wasn’t a thing in London, but some servers had heard of it and said it was on their bucket list to try ranch.
Jäegermeister with milk. I tried it afterwards, it surprisingly works.
I worked in a reasonably high end restaurant in Melbourne. One customer assumed the refined atmosphere meant that all of the wait staff would be fluent in French and placed his order accordingly. It took me by surprise, and being a bit of a bogan at heart I responded with an abrupt and probably too loud “AYE?!” which terrified the poor guy.
He did not leave a tip.
I was working at Truffoni’s on New Year’s Eve when a group of guys came in and ordered sloppy steaks?
I had idea what they were talking about so I told them we don’t have sloppy steaks tonight. They ordered steaks and glasses of water.
As I walked away from the table, they started pouring their waters ON the steaks and laughing. The group seemed like real pieces of s**t.
Was eating at a hotpot place when a guy came in, asked what hot pot was, and then get incredibly offended when they weren’t able to offer AYCE hotpot to-go.
I worked at an Italian Restaurant, Gusti’s Italian Restaurant. Someone came in, perused the menu, then said, “Ya’ll have any Chinese food here?”.
Worked at a coney island and had a customer ask what the vegetable of the day was. He was not a fan of the answer and left the restaurant. About 30 minutes later he shows back up bringing in his own can of mixed vegetables and demanded that we cook them for him lol.
Appletini.. extra dirty.
I was in the service bar and walked out to the table to make absolutely sure the server heard the order properly.
The f****n guy had 4 of them.
And it’s even more vile than it sounds.
Ketchup for their salmon. The owner of the restaurants daughter was the server.
This old guy, about 6’7, stood up and started SCREAMING “you forgot my ketchup, where is the ketchup”.
F’in gross.
At a cocktail bar with some co-workers and one of them asked if she could order a non-alcoholic espresso Martini that also had no caffeine… The server just looked at her before suggesting she order something else.
I was a hostess at a fancy restaurant in the 90s. As I’m checking this old rich guy’s coat, he asked me if my hair was real and if he could touch it 😫
He was there with some 20 something blonde and she was totally fine with his creepy question. This was before hair extensions were a thing so the question was even weirder than it would be today.
Not a restaurant but a British pub. A guy asked for half a pint of Bass bitter (hand pump ale, for the uninitiated) in a pint glass…topped up with water. 25 years later, I still think WTF.
Had a guy walk into my tiny dive bar, plop down, slap his hands on the bar and say “gimme the rack of ribs!”
We do not have a kitchen, have never served food, and certainly don’t smoke ribs in the back 😂.
“Coffee. Extra Hot.”
Now, that is a thing at like a proper coffee shop where they can adjust temperatures on espresso drinks. Less so for drip coffee. Less so at a burger joint, where I worked.
I made him a fresh brew, and then microwaved it for 60 seconds. “Not hot enough.”
Old people ask for weird things.
“Do you serve free bread for the table before the meal?” …it’s a burger joint.
I was a manager in a chain convenience store, and the chain owner a few D’Angelo sandwich shops. They would issue coupons for discounts on D’angelo-specific sandwiches, but customers would sometimes get confused. I was about to leave my non-DA store one day when one of my employees came to get me to handle a customer complaint that we wouldn’t honor the coupon for pre-made sandwiches from differnt vendor. He tried to go back and forth with me, pretending to not understand, screaming and red-faced over less than two dollars.
I told him “Sir, you don’t understand. This offer is for Fresh Made D’angelo’s sandwiches only.”
He says to me “No, YOU don’t understand. YOU’RE going to make be a FRESH MADE D’ANGELO’S SANDWICH or you’ll be ARRESTED for FALSE ADVERTISING!”
I sighed, and said. “Alright. You win,” and made him an offer that would have put me in the r/MaliciousCompliance hall of fame. I’m going to make you a fresh made D’angelo’s sandwich. Give me two minutes to lock up my office and I’m going to drive you over to (street name where we had a store that had a sandwich kiosk) and cook for you. (I had been in that store like 9 years earlier and knew how to cook most of the menu) I locked up my office, pulled my car around, and he refused to get in. I know it was a stupid and unsafe move, and I would never make that move today.
Overhead this is buffalo wild wings, “Can I get chicken breast cooked in coconut oil and rinse off the oil after it’s done.” I’m not even sure how that would’ve turned out.
As a teen, I worked at The Olive Garden.
I once had a lady order fettuccine alfredo, but with “the red breadstick sauce”, not the “white” sauce.
So you want fettuccine noodles with marinara dipping sauce?
No, it needed to be “fettuccine alfredo without the sauce.”
Whatever you say, lady. 🙄.
I used to work at a local place that was mainly a venue for small gigs but sometimes we had a cafe as well. Everyone there worked non profit, the place was non profit. So during the cafe we just had cans of soda, regular coffee, tea and sometimes a small cookie. Incredibly cheap, like € 0.5 for a coffee. Anyway, one time a lady comes in and thinks this must be a Starbucks or something so she tries to order a non fat sugar free Frappuccino (???) and gets mad af when told no.
An older woman order the gaspacho soup and was extremely mad that it was cold and had the server send it back to be heated up.
When I was a little kid I ordered popcorn chicken and cried when I didn’t in fact get popcorn.
A h**ker. Customer argued that because our restaurant was attached to a hotel, we were required to help him schedule a **ker.
I worked at a national chain restaurant in my late teens. The customer pointed to the Super Nachos on the menu and said, “I want the super chips without ‘jala-ma-p***s’.” I’m assuming he meant jalapeños.
I knew someone who asked for chopsticks at an Indian restaurant. He wasn’t joking.
“I would like a glass of water. Also, I want 10 or 11 lemons.”
“Oh and please bring real sugar.”
Uh huh. I charged them for the lemons. When they balked at the price I asked how much are lemons at your grocery store?
I worked at a steakhouse and had a regular that would order a 10oz filet seasoned with salt and pepper. Wanted it raw. It literally never touched the broiler and wanted a literal bowl of ketchup on the side. Never batted an eye.
I once brought a plate of just plain French toast to a table and the guy looked up at me and said “uhm? I need ketchup”.
Had a customer when I worked in a pub order a drink that was half Guinness, half coke.
Apparently was a thing where she was from in Germany.
I worked at a diner. It was a scrambled eggs and fake maple syrup kind of diner. This woman would come in and request fresh cracked pepper on her weird a*s little iceberg lettuce salad. In WV in the holler she wanted us to fresh-crack pepper on her $1.75 bowl of lettuce.
I had a lady ask for the cooks to make her eggs ‘shipwrecked’. When I questioned what that meant, she didn’t really have an answer. She settled on something else, I still have no idea what she actually wanted. I can only imagine the cussing I would have got from the cooks for putting that order through.
Does anyone have any idea what that means? I’m Canadian, maybe it’s just not a Canadian thing? Or not in my neck of the woods anyway.
Neinta:
Sunny side up or over easy with a broken yolk. Not quite scrambled but the yolk bleeds into the whites.
We went out for Pho once, you know, Vietnamese soup. The lady at the table next to us asked for oyster/soup crackers to put in her pho. The restaurant brought her a pile, so I guess it wasn’t weird for them, but I was mystified.
My mum consistently orders a “deconstructed latte”
She doesn’t like “strong flavours” (but she loves red wine?) so she wants the milk in a glass and the espresso shot on the side so she can dip a teaspoon into it and dribble a tiny amount of coffee into the milk.
She insists she likes the taste of coffee despite refusing enough to actually taste it.
I will not order anything for her in public anymore.
As a bartender at an upscale bar in Atlanta, I had an encyclopedic knowledge of bizarre drinks. It was the mid 80s.
I would constantly get someone walking up and ordering something like “a 57 Chevy with red interior and Hawaiian license plates”.
Okay, a 57 Chevy is white cream de cacao and vodka, but what the hell is the rest?
Don’t order a drink you made up at home.
I was on a trip to Italy with a larger group and as I can almost kind of speak italian I was tasked with doing most communications. One member of the group was used to eating ketchup with all meals so I was the one tasked with asking for ketchup. I had to do it several times a day for a week and the request was mostly met with a lot of strong emotions.
I was working at a snooker club. An older gentleman asked for a banana fresh. I was a bit confused and told him, that I could make him a banana shake. He insisted that he wanted a banana fresh. I asked how he prefers it (I hoped that based on the answer I can guess what he wants), but he rather rudely told me to stop talking and go make it. So I went and made him a banana shake. When I brought it, he yelled at me “Was it that hard? Why did you have to annoy me with your questions???” 🙃.
A customer would always come into the place I worked and ordered a piece of fish and six chips (French fries). First time he did it I thought he was joking and I didn’t bother counting exactly and gave him seven, he lost his s**t.
A lady in front of me at Taco Bell ordered some supreme tacos “without the mayonnaise”.
I worked at a McDonald’s next door to an Arby’s. At least once a month, someone would pull into the drive-thru and try to order a roast beef sandwich, or even better, come inside and stare at the menu before asking, ‘Where are your roast beef sandwiches?’
Me: “Any interest in dessert this evening?”
Them: “Can I get your big plate of cookies?”
We’ve never had cookies in 18 years open.
A German friend was moving to the US and after clearing customs she was hungry. A a restaurant she ordered a “ham and cheese son-of-a-b***h”.
Mine wasn’t food. I was out to dinner at a franchise Mexican restaurant with a client, a rich white woman, and she asked the waitress “Does anyone on the staff wear contact lenses and have saline solution? I need to adjust my contacts!”
The waitress actually returned with a small bottle of saline solution! And I slipped her a fantastic tip on the down-low. Because that was some entitled b******t if ever I’d seen it.
I was working at a Mexican restaurant in the kitchen and one of the servers came in holding back laughter, apparently someone had asked him in first day Duolingo Spanish for some dolphin milk lol.
