It’s not always staff versus the customers when it comes to food disputes, which is good to know when someone’s spitting in your food: The chef at a New Jersey restaurant was arrested after another worker called police to report “multiple health violations.” That included an incident when the chef allegedly spat into a customer’s food, after the diner sent it back for extra cooking time.

Police showed up at the restaurant earlier this week after an employee called in about alleged nastiness going down, reports NJ.com, with the worker claiming that unwitting patrons could be eating spitty food.

A detective investigated the worker’s claim, and police ultimately arrested the chef and charged him with tampering with a food or drug product and disorderly conduct. He’s since been fired, according to a manager cited by Gothamist, who says “for someone to be able to do that, it’s unbelievable, unbelievable.”

The customer who received the saliva-laden meal was contacted and told what had gone down, police said, though it’s unclear what his reaction was or if the restaurant offered him any sort of compensation for the incident.

The local health inspector conduction an inspection of the restaurant and gave it a conditional satisfactory rating, which means the place can stay open for now under the condition that it correct the violations within a week.

Chef at Budd Lake restaurant spit in patron’s food, police say [NJ.com]

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