On the face of it, the relationship seems clear cut.
Customer. Server.
I order the stuff, you bring it. Just so long as you bring it efficiently and don't forget me when I ask for extra sour cream, I'll give you a fair tip. Hell, if you're really efficient, and nice to boot, I might even tip you real good.
Hold up. In an American society where "the customer's always right" is about as relevant as fins on Chevys, the relationship between customer and server can be complex, even fraught with hidden peril. As one local server put it so well: "I see your food before you do."
We've all heard the horror stories. They're like Gere and the gerbil, Rod Stewart and the however-many-cc's. Kentucky Fried Rat. Pissing in the lemonade. Spitting in the soup. Urban myth? Hard to say. Server paybacks are common lore in the community of restaurant and bar workers.
I met with a variety of server folk in recent weeks. Here's what I asked of them: Give me anecdotes, complaints, secrets of the trade and other insider stuff. I promised to leave out the names of servers and establishments. (It's the only responsible way, really; I cannot verify these stories, and it would be very shaky business to associate a particular restaurant with some heinous act of server reprisal.)
What follows is some random info from inside the waitstaff world. Take it with a grain of, um, salt, but the next time you're at a restaurant you many think twice about lapsing into a fit of pique, or copping an arrogant attitude, or jumping your server through hoops — no matter how damn justified you feel as a paying customer.
Gross Pork. I believe this grisly anecdote to be true. I know the teller. I've heard it two times, at least a year apart, and she told it the same way both times. Readers who become queasy easily should probably pass up this little vignette; also, I recommend you not read this if it's getting close to mealtime.
It happened at a large chain restaurant. A man staying at a nearby hotel had come in a couple nights in a row and basically acted like a flaming asshole. He was drunk, belligerent and spouting sexist remarks to the female bartender. He wanted takeout. A pork chop dinner. The restaurant didn't do takeout at the bar, especially on busy nights. The guy wouldn't give it a rest. He wanted his pork chop to take back to the hotel, dammit. The server, who had worked in restaurants for 15 years, felt a previously untapped anger welling in her.
"OK," she said through clenched teeth. "But just remember: I see your food before you do."
"That doesn't matter, honey," the asshole woozily replied. "Whatever you do to it will only make it taste better."
That was it.
The server took the order into the employees bathroom, none too clean a place to begin with. She dipped the pork chop into the dirtier of two toilets, then ran it around the rim of the bowl. She returned it to the takeout container and, as a last gesture, spewed a healthy loogie it. She presented it to the customer who, we can only presume, took it back to his hotel and ate it.
"I thought I'd feel horrible about doing it," the server said recently. "But I felt liberated. I'm just sorry that I lost out on the pleasure of watching him eat it."
Tales From the Kitchen. During my interviews with waitstaff, I heard several other acts of reprisal:
Like the several servers who, when asked to return the soup because it wasn't warm enough, put the bowl in the microwave for way too long while also scorching the spoon in an oven. (Customer tip: If the spoon is served in the soup bowl, beware. It's probably dirty.)
Like the kitchen man at a pizza chain who urinated in the vat of sauce.
Like the server who ran the barbecue brush across the floor before spreading sauce on the ribs.
Like the server who waited on the asshole restaurant owner and served him drinking water from the toilet.
like the server who wiped his butt with a paper towel and then rubbed it on a steak. He used a paper towel 'cause it doesn't shred as easily as toilet paper and would be less likely to leave visual evidence. Kinda gives new meaning to "the quicker-picker-upper."
Disclaimer: It seems appropriate now to remind you, readers (those who are left), that these are unsubstantiated reports, many from hearsay. We have every reason to believe that the large majority of servers would never engage in any such nefarious behavior.
Hey, Bartender. Obviously, bar servers are most likely to encounter customers who are sloshed, stupid and hostile. As such, they are required to more frequently deal with the pain-in-the-ass clientele. But on the up side: They can work some nasty sleight-of-hand without fear of detection from a dazed drunk.
Did you know that olive juice and Coke looks just like beer? Did you know that it tastes nothing like beer? Be an asshole and your bartender might just serve you such a vile concoction. You might gag and complain, to which the rushed barkeep will simply say, "Sorry, don't know what happened. Can I get you something else?"
Did you know that the old tough-guy line "And make it a strong one" is not well regarded by today's bartenders? You are more than welcome to say "Make it a double," and be charged accordingly. Start out with "make it a strong one," though, and, says one local bartender, "You'll be getting short-poured all night long."
On the other hand, if you're getting hammered, nasty and actin' the fool, the bartender might just over-pour your drink and send you into la-la land; it'll feel like someone's dropping anvils on your head in the morning.
Tips from Servers
Don't eat at a high-volume restaurant on major holidays like Mother's Day. "There will be dirty glasses; there will be dirty silverware," says one server. "We usually run out of hot water in the first three hours." Don't expect to eat French onion soup out of a clean bowl. "You know the cheese around the rim," says one server. "There's no way to completely clean it off. They just cover it with more cheese."
Note to middle-aged guys: Female servers, especially young ones, don't want to flirt with you, don't want to listen your barely veiled come-ons, don't want to show you their breasts at your request, and, have mercy, they DON'T WANT TO SLEEP WITH YOU. They want to bring you your stuff and perhaps be professionally friendly. So those of you guilty of such transgressions, do the rest of us middle-aged guys a favor and quit giving us a bad name.
If you're a skinflint 10 percent-or-less tipper, don't issue the server a "verbal tip." This is official waitstaff-speak for when a customer leaves a pittance and says something to the effect of "Good job." Don't do this if you plan on returning to the establishment. Servers are proud of their elephant-like memory.
OK, enough ugliness. What can we, as customers, learn from all this? How can we avoid food sabotage? On the one hand, it's easy: Be very patient and give big, fat tips. If, however, we have the right to expect a certain level of service without fear of having our food tampered with, what are the parameters?
Perhaps the most interesting question I posed to my sample of servers was, simply, how do can we prevent turning the customer-server relationship into an adversarial one? The most common response: Just don't be an asshole.
Hmm. Does not being an asshole mean never sending cold soup back, never asking for more sour cream? No, the servers said, just don't be an asshole about it. Ultimately, every server has a built-in asshole gauge, and it probably changes from night to night.
Let's turn the tables just for a second. Here's something for you servers to get your mind around: Sometimes we're not trying to be assholes. Most of us know you're busy, but you took the job, knowing it was hectic work. So if we ask for more sour cream 15 minutes after we asked the first time, it doesn't mean we're assholes. It means we want more sour cream.
So the second time we ask, we'll try to be nice about it. We owe you that much. We owe ourselves that much, knowing that you see our food before we do.
Remember, restaurant patrons: You indeed have the final say on how much the server gets paid, but don't let that lull you into thinking you're the boss.
This article appears in Feb 27 – Mar 5, 2002.