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Cooks that don't wash their hands.


Four Winds

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We went to a small Mexican restaurant today, it only has a few tables. It has an open kitchen so you can see everything that goes on.  There was only one person working, she very friendly so no complaints there.  While she was preparing the order for another table, I never saw her wash her hands.  When she took our order, I watched to see if she would wash her hands before cooking the food. She did not.  What would you do in that situation?

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Ok, now we have my pet peeve.

I'm not a raving germaphobe, I can't take what you just described. I would have been out of there.

I went to a Subway and they were NOT using gloves...I left after voicing my opinion.

Edited by .ZZ.
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We wash our hands ESPECIALLY after using the facilities; its hard enough to keep from getting ill over who knows what.  If you ate at a restaurant (which I don't recommend) even a fancy one, its your fault for being super sick because you used all the door handles, maybe you adjusted a chair, maybe you grabbed the table edge while getting in, could be anything!

You can bet on one thing! and that's that they don't wipe everything down with a bleach cloth, we do around here at home. Yes loads of lotion or your fingers pay for it.

Only takes a couple drops.

What's by my sink or just above it ?

A smaller white plastic mini of Clorox and brown little plastic bottle of hydrogen peroxide.

A drop of this one ,,,, a drop of that one, plop cloth in, wring out, all set, maybe twice a day that!

Oh, have clean cloths all the time! 

Nobody ever does that, I do, have well not a hundred but there's always some ready for the laundry and fresh ones around here and there.

Edited by MWoo7
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1 minute ago, MWoo7 said:

We wash our hands ESPECIALLY after using the facilities; its hard enough to keep from getting ill over who knows what.  If you ate at a restaurant (which I don't recommend) even a fancy one, its your fault for being super sick because you used all the door handles, maybe you adjusted a chair, maybe you grabbed the table edge while getting in, could be anything!

You can bet on one thing! and that's that they don't wipe everything down with a bleach cloth, we do around here at home. Yes loads of lotion or your fingers pay for it.

Yep, without fail, EVERY person I know that works/worked at a restaurant says "Never eat there!"

Horror stories even from a supposedly "High scale" place like: A steak fell on the floor and the "chef" just put it on the fire anyway. Uh-uh that will not work for me.

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Yep , too many horror stories is RIGHT !  ZZ

Like if camping out, I laydown a ____tch and cook things well because I don't want anyone sick for days on my account, they think its being tchy I SAY ITS COMMUNICATION.

Yep, mini jug of hydrogen peroxide and mini jug of Clorox out camping or on fishing trips too ! never hurts.

Its well worth the little extra to avoid food poisoning.  AND GUESS WHAT I WOULD HORD/HORDE if I became one of the fall out shelter people ? I forget what they are called ? bug out , bug outters ? oh well.

11692791_1034446133246596_82538978333022

oh hahahahahahahahaha they call themselves PREPPERS ! as in Sargeant Peppers!

now I should remember that !

 

Edited by MWoo7
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1 minute ago, .ZZ. said:

Yep, without fail, EVERY person I know that works/worked at a restaurant says "Never eat there!"

Horror stories even from a supposedly "High scale" place like: A steak fell on the floor and the "chef" just put it on the fire anyway. Uh-uh that will not work for me.

I don't eat at restaurants; end of story.  Same reason I don't take taxis or buy processed foods and live out in the country.  There are a lot of things this attitude doesn't help (hospital stays, for example, scary), airline flights, but one tries even then to keep one's eyes open without being a pest.

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speaking as an ex chef....I saw this daily, in more than one place too. Line cooks would start work, getting changed into their whites while having a smoke....then straight into the kitchen to 'prep' for the night....no hand washing for some

One, when questioned about it... even stated that the heat of the cooking killed any bacteria...

THE WORST for me tho, was as a customer in a Chinese restaurant....sat just one table away from the swing doors to the kitchen....we heard an awful sound of someone in there coughing up phlegm....as some men do. It wasnt a cough tho....it was the sound made by trying to force it up out the throat... the last thing you want to hear...... we got up and left

Edited by seeder
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I was head cook at a well known tourist spot here in ND for a couple of years. The management at the time there where awful. I actually had a toe to toe argument with the boss because he wanted me to use the off fish in the kids meals.

The same gentelman also through a couple of frozen scallops in a bowl of chowder I was cooking and didn't mention it. If I hadn't spotted them they may well have gone out half cooked. And hey presto food poisoning.

We don't bleach surfaces because that introduces toxins into the food prep area, but everyone should sanitize after following the three step cleaning process. Scrape, wash, rinse, sanitize.

And ofcourse wash your hands. Yuck!

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17 minutes ago, MWoo7 said:

We wash our hands ESPECIALLY after using the facilities; its hard enough to keep from getting ill over who knows what.

A couple of weeks back, we had just finished eating dinner at a "nice restaurant" I went to use the restroom, one of the cooks comes out of a stall and leaves without washing his hands :(

Maybe he was planning to wash his hands in the kitchen, but I had to let the manager know what I saw.

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He shouldn't wash his hands in the kitchen sinks. And he should have washed them especially in front of customers even if he was expecting to wash them in the kitchen. Hands can't be too clean.

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On one of Gordon Ramsays nightmare kitchens...it showed a chef drop a steak on the floor....pick it up, look at it for visible debris, then put it straight back in the frying pan

 

found the clip.... it was actually chicken

 

Edited by seeder
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Just now, Kismit said:

 And he should have washed them especially in front of customers even if he was expecting to wash them in the kitchen. Hands can't be too clean.

That is what I was thinking, at least wash your hands when you know a costumer is there.

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Maybe she did wash her hands and u didnt see it ?? But if she didnt i would have walked out, i make cooks wear gloves or wqsh yhere hands

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Just now, coolguy said:

Maybe she did wash her hands and u didnt see it ?? But if she didnt i would have walked out, i make cooks wear gloves or wqsh yhere hands

Like I said, it was an open kitchen, I paid attention and she didn't wash her hands.  She also didn't wash her hands before cooking the food for the table that sat down after us. 

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see my last post....I found the video clip and edited my above post

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Yup, I'm a cook as well and I see this kind of stuff a lot, and it p***es me off so much. I take pride in what I do, my work area is always clean, I'm always washing my hands (to the point that the other cooks get mad at me), and I always clean and sanitize after cutting, cooking or working with raw meats.

But I will say that my job is a pretty clean kitchen. Dropped food was thrown out, things are cleaned and sanitized, etc. it's nice. But I think it might be out of fear of me that the others are so clean.

There was this one incident, an incident that had the whole restaurant walking on eggshells around me and people were not allowed to bring it up for fear that I would start screaming again. We had this new kid come in and was working on the line. He came back in after smoking and walked right by the sink, when I told him to wash his hands he was like "what ever man" and put them under the water for like 10 seconds. Then when he was plating a dish he dropped a shrimp onto the raw chicken cooking board and picked it up and threw it back on the plate, but that's not the worst part. He then used his finger to wipe the edge of the plate. He gets around half the plate, stops, sticks his finger in his mouth and licks it clean, then proceeds to use the same finger to wipe around the edge of the other half of the plate. This whole time he's doing this he's oblivious to the fact that I've stopped calling tickets and that the whole kitchen is silent. I can't really give a first hand account as to what exactly happened after that, but the next thing I remember was the kid on the ground outside the back door. From what the others in the kitchen have told me I guess I yelled "Get the **** out of my kitchen", smacked the plate from his hands and hauled him to the back door and literally picked him up and threw him out of the door. lol I was so afraid I would be fired because I was not a manager, but when chef found out he made me sous, so it all worked out.

Edited by Odin11
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12 minutes ago, quiXilver said:

I'm with Mr Carlin on this one.

 

Oh I agree 100%, but in a business where lawsuits run wild, and one incident can close a restaurant, there's no room for error.

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I have 3 rules, keep it clean, keep it stocked, and keep up my standards. If you can better them fantastic but don't drop them, you won't work at my station if you do.

I am in the position that not only do I work in hospitality I am very recognizable and quite well known. I couldn't even get away with not washing my hands when I'm out.

Edited by Kismit
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49 minutes ago, seeder said:

On one of Gordon Ramsays nightmare kitchens...it showed a chef drop a steak on the floor....pick it up, look at it for visible debris, then put it straight back in the frying pan

 

found the clip.... it was actually chicken

 

I've fired a girl for doing this. It's the physical contamination of dirt and things that's the problem not the germs. 

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20 minutes ago, quiXilver said:

I'm with Mr Carlin on this one.

 

Quicksilver, if we serve a customer with an auto immune disease or say leukemia we could make them awfully sick or worse.

It's done to protect the most vulnerable in society.

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I have and will leave an establishment if I see a cook not washing their hands.  I have also been known to tell the manager of the establishment as well as their corporate office.   I also hint that I work for the local Health Dept. and that seems to get some results.   ;)

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I would get up and walk out and never go back 

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I have walked out of a restaurant when the cook came out of thd bathroom with his apron on. Health codes here state the apron is to keep contaminates on clothing from being transferred to food.  The apron acts as a barrier between clothing and food.  I told the manager as I was leaving about the health code that was violated and told him I was going to share what I saw.

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9 hours ago, glorybebe said:

I have walked out of a restaurant when the cook came out of thd bathroom with his apron on. Health codes here state the apron is to keep contaminates on clothing from being transferred to food.  The apron acts as a barrier between clothing and food.  I told the manager as I was leaving about the health code that was violated and told him I was going to share what I saw.

I think you did the right thing.

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