Chefs Shared the Dark Secrets of Cafes and Restaurants That Are Easy to Notice From the Doorstep

Even if you like a certain restaurant chain, you should know that the quality of the food they serve in different places may really depend on the management and staff. In order to avoid having a negative experience, chefs and other cafe and restaurant employees shared their own observations that can help us predict how good the meal will be, before it even starts.

Bright Side has chosen the most unexpected recommendations so you will now know what to pay attention to before you sit at the table.

• If there’s a self-serve soda machine go ahead and take a napkin and wipe around the inside of the Sprite/clear soda nozzle. If your napkin comes out pink, brown, or orange SKIP THE SODA. A Sprite nozzle should come out clear. If it’s pink or orange then it’s slime mold (it’s actually a bacteria, but that’s what we call it). If it’s brown, it’s likely cola. But if the cola nozzle was put on the sprite dispenser and is still brown, you know the nozzles aren’t being cleaned properly. Also, go ahead and look closely at the ice chute. I see green algae in those a lot. © StumbleKitty

• When the server can’t recommend the food, it’s a bad sign. A good restaurant doesn’t just allow their servers to eat the food, but likes it when they do so they can give educated feedback to the customers. I always like seeing a table of servers having their shift meals and the table is laid out with all the good stuff and they are enjoying the food and each other — it means the food is really good and they don’t work for bad people, which is something I like in a restaurant. © zazzlekdazzle

• A good amount of hot food isn’t truly kosher/halal, and a lot of seemingly vegan food isn’t either. A skillet that made sausage during the breakfast shift might not have been washed before being used to cook whatever you are eating. © sibuttadopo

• My red flag is going into a busy restaurant and noticing that none of the tables have food, or that not many customers are eating yet. This usually means the kitchen is going down in flames. © jeraco73

• Overworked staff. What cleaning jobs do you think are getting missed if the staff are far to stretched and or unhappy at work? © fiendlymcfiend
• My best friend says it’s a large menu. Chances are a lot of things on a menu means that they are frozen. Also, it’s difficult to train people to be good at making 40 different things, so the quality is going to suffer. © michaelad567
• Look at the salt shakers. If they are dirty, the kitchen probably is too. © faployst

• Ask where their oysters come from. If they don’t know, you don’t want them. This tip works for most seafood. © MaterialImportance

• Mondays and Thursdays are typical new inventory days. Eat out on these days for the freshest food. © XmagnumoperaX

• Don’t buy drinks at recreational centers (like bowling alleys, pool halls, arcades, nightclub hybrids) that never clean their beer lines. There is always a lot of mold. © onyxandcake

• If you’re eating ethnic food and all the customers are of the ethnicity in question, then the food is probably going to be awesome. © Cogidubnus-Rex

• I was employed by a national pest control service and the salespeople told me that if the dining room is dirty or gross — do yourself a favor and walk out, because their kitchen is gonna be much dirtier. © BringMeTwo
• If the restaurant has a coffee machine visible, take a look at the steamer. If it’s covered in white, it means they don’t clean it after frothing the milk. Most likely they don’t run steam after heating up the milk, meaning that there is residual milk inside the nozzle of the steamer, which gets burnt and generates bacteria. Don’t order the coffee there. © fernanzgz
• My ex-husband was a chef. We always left if he saw workers not wearing non-slip shoes. He says that’s super important and if they don’t care about that, he doesn’t even want to know what that kitchen looks like. © GhostOfYourLibido
• An open kitchen is a trend today. If you enter a relatively new place and the kitchen is closed, it’s a bad sign. It means they probably have something to hide. © unknown

• Go to their bathroom and see how well-kept it is. That should tell you everything you need to know about the place. © unknown

What types of things make you leave a cafe or restaurant instantly and what makes you want to order food in one?