After their appearance on Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares catapulted them from being the cranky owners of a Scottsdale, AZ, restaurant to worldwide infamy, the owners of Amy’s Baking Company haven’t really been talking to the media, except to occasionally shout at the cameras that they can’t talk to the media. Then this morning Amy and husband Samy sat down for a local radio interview with another person who has Gordon to thank for her few minutes of fame. [More]
Owners Of Amy’s Baking Company Say Yelpers Are Endangering Their Lives
By May 20, 2013
Customer Repays Chef 15 Years Later For Valentine’s Dinner He Couldn’t Afford
By May 17, 2013
For every case of restaurant owners going ballistic on customers, there are other stories of restaurant staff who actually want to be kind to their patrons. Such was the case in 1997 when a teenager had to borrow $40 from the chef at a French eatery so he could afford to impress his Valentine’s Day date. He’s since returned, 15 years later, to repay that debt — with interest. [More]
Steak ‘n Shake Waitress Scores $446 Tip On $6 Check
By May 16, 2013
It’s nice to ride toward the end of the week with a happy tipping-related story for a change. A waitress at a Steak ‘n Shake eatery in Indianapolis got the biggest bonus of her life when a diner left a 7,433% tip. [More]
Amy’s Baking Company To Re-Open May 21, Hires Damage-Control Publicist
By May 16, 2013
The saga of previously anonymous Amy’s Baking Company of Scottsdale, AZ, continues, with the eatery — which came out of Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares looking like a heretofore undocumented circle of Hell — scheduling a “Grand Re-Opening” next Tuesday night and hiring a publicist known more for damage control than for shilling restaurants. [More]
Waitress Fired By Amy’s Baking Company Tells All
By May 16, 2013
In less than a week, Amy’s Baking Company in Scottsdale, AZ, has gone from a local eatery with a reputation for a touchy owner to an Internet sensation (of the worst kind) after appearing on Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares and then apparently going a bit bonkers online in response to all the negative feedback. Now one of the waitresses fired during the making of that Kitchen Nightmares episode is telling all. [More]
How Not To React To Internet Criticism: The Epic Facebook Meltdown Of Amy’s Baking Company
By May 14, 2013
It appears that the owners of Amy’s Baking Company in Arizona expected an appearance on celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay’s “Kitchen Nightmares” program to vindicate them. They believed that they serve quality food, that they have been unfairly slandered by the entire Internet. Maybe they had never seen the reality program, which features last-ditch efforts to save failing restaurants run by people who are delusional or incompetent…and frequently both. [More]
Restaurant With Ridiculous List Of Line Cook Requirements Says It Was All A Joke
By May 8, 2013
Last week we, and line cooks everywhere, were shocked, just shocked that a restaurant would advertise on Craigslist for a position by listing 44 insane requirements for the job. Things like “you always show up for work, even if sick as a dog. Let the chef see that you’re really sick and send you home” had the Internets in an uproar — but according to the restaurant’s manager, it was all just a silly joke. [More]
Restaurant Has 44 Requirements For Wannabe Line Cooks And Making Fun Of The List Isn’t One
By May 2, 2013
As someone who has never worked professionally in a kitchen but who has watched plenty of restaurant reality TV, let me be the first to say that being a cook/chef seems like an incredibly tough and demanding job. Customers want to be fed tasty things and restaurants want them to be happy. But there’s demanding, and then there are lists of 44 requirements for a line cook job posted on Craigslist. [More]
Restaurant Learns Instagram Isn’t Intended For Hurling Racial Slurs At Bad Tippers
By April 25, 2013
Someone at a restaurant in Delaware missed the class where they explain that the usual place to vent racially biased frustration at a customer is on the receipt, as the eatery is now having to do a lot of apologizing for things that showed up on its Instagram page. [More]
metaTired of seeing pictures online that people have snapped of their food? Maybe there’s a better way. The blog Pictures of Hipsters Taking Pictures of Food offers a much deeper socioeconomic and culinary context for meal snaps. Also, it makes fun of people. [Tumblr]
wish we'd thought of itA Houston restaurant asked engineering students at Rice University to come up with a soap dispenser for its bathrooms that incorporate some sort of kitchen utensil. This is the result, and we kinda want one for Consumerist HQ. [Via Chron.com]
Waiters Sue Employer For Taking Wages To Cover Walk-Outs
By April 5, 2013
Earlier this week, we wrote about the legality (or lack thereof) of employers docking tipped workers’ wages to cover walk-outs and bad orders. Little did we know that the same day, dozens of current and former servers at a Milwaukee restaurant were filing a class-action suit, alleging these sorts of violations. [More]
Restaurant Calls Police In Dispute Over Price Of Vegan Pasta Brought In By Customer
By April 3, 2013
A New Jersey couple who brought their own vegan pasta to a restaurant were not thrilled to find out they were being charged more than if they had just ordered off the menu, leading to the police and American Express getting involved in a finger-pointing fight between diners and owners. [More]
After A Dine-And-Dash, Is It Legal For A Restaurant To Take Money From A Waiter’s Tips?
By April 2, 2013
It’s a story we’ve heard any number of times, both professionally and from friends in the restaurant world. A customer splits without paying the bill, or doesn’t leave enough to cover the full amount; to make up for the loss, the manager takes it out of the waiter’s pay. Can this be legal? [More]
Panera Expanding Pay-What-You-Want Model To All Of St. Louis, But Only On One Item
By March 27, 2013
It’s been three years since sandwich chain Panera opened its first pay-what-you-want eatery, where customers can disregard the listed menu price and pay what they can afford or what they feel the meal is worth. The company soon added others in a handful in other cities. Now the eatery says it is expanding the model to all 48 Paneras in and around St. Louis, though it will only involve one menu item. [More]
Is This Comped Olive Garden Receipt The Real Deal Or Just Viral Marketing?
By March 27, 2013
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When a restaurant receipt story gets wildly popular online, it’s usually because a horrible customer leaves a rude message or because a restaurant staffer insults a diner, but occasionally it’s a happy story about an eatery doing something nice. Question is, are restaurants beginning to fake these stories for positive PR? [More]
Restaurant Uses Twitter To Shame People Who Blew Off Reservations
By March 26, 2013
Allowing diners to reserve tables can be a risky proposition for restaurant-owners, as the business may have to turn away walk-in customers based solely on the reservation-holders’ say-so that they are going to show up. When the diners fail to materialize, it can mean lost business to the eatery, which is why one L.A. restaurant recently decided to start naming names of no-shows on Twitter. [More]
Restaurant Imposes 1% Property Maintenance Fee On Tabs, Hopes No One Notices
By March 1, 2013
When you go out to eat, you generally pay the price on the menu, then a tip for the service staff. Should you also have to pay an extra fee for the maintenance of the building and grounds of the restaurant? One Florida restaurant thought so…at least, until the “personal usage fee” caught the attention of a local TV channel. Then the fee suddenly disappeared. [More]
