21 Signs You’ve Stepped into a Terrible Restaurant

It can be hard to find a decent restaurant, especially when you’re someplace new. A recent online survey asked, “What is a red flag that you are in a bad restaurant?” We collected the top 21 responses.

A Long Menu

A Long Menu
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“When it has pages and pages of food that don’t really make sense or go together.”

“Gordon Ramsay said: a long menu tells me, your customer, that you’re willing to apply heat to anything edible and serve it to me like it’s a decent meal. Find one page worth of things you are good at, and stick to it.”

Dirty Restrooms

Dirty Restrooms - Elena Berd _ Shutterstock.com
Photo Credit: Elena Berd _ Shutterstock.com.

“Dirty washrooms are another Gordon Ramsey one. If they are too lazy to make something the customers are going to see clean, what’s the kitchen going to look like?”

“All Chinese buffets have dirty restrooms, but I have yet to find one with good food.”

Celebrity Food Names

Celebrity Food Names - emka74 _ Shutterstock.com
Photo Credit: emka74 _ Shutterstock.com.

“As a former Buca Di Beppo server, here is a list of ghost kitchens you should never order from: Mr. Beast Burger, NASCAR Refuel, Pardon my Cheesesteak, Buddy V’s Cakes, Mariah Carey’s Cookies, and Guy Fieri’s. The ingredients come frozen and aren’t cooked well.”

“Any places with celebrity names are always changing to keep up the facade.”

A Dirty Menu

A Dirty Menu
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“If I see a menu with filth on it, I’m walking out.”

“Generally agree, except for the amazing hole-in-the-wall greasy Chinese joint I used to go to as a kid. Everything was so good.”

Not Busy But Slow Service

Not Busy But Slow Service
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“The restaurant isn’t even busy, but they take ages to serve you, and when they finally do, they seem reluctant.”

“What the is that? I’ve never seen that before. That would be a customer, Jane.”

“This job would be great if it wasn’t for all the customers.”

No one From That Country Eats There

No-one From That Country Eats There
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“An ethnic restaurant with no customers of that ethnicity in a town with a large population of those people. You have to ask why!”

“A sushi restaurant in the West Virginia Appalachian mountains was not…. the best.”

“I was going to say an Asian restaurant full of white people.”

Huge Chain Restaurant

Huge Chain Restaurant - 8th.creator _ Shutterstock.com
Photo Credit: 8th.creator _ Shutterstock.com.

“I’ve eaten at rat holes with amazing food and had terrible food at nice steakhouses. If it’s a small ethnic restaurant and you see kids doing homework or employees eating at one of the tables, try the food; it’s always good.”

“There are little mom-and-pop diners where the decor is kinda hokey, but the food tastes better than anything you’d get from a chain restaurant.”

Microwaves

Microwaves
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“There’s a restaurant in my town that is consistently crowded. Fairly expensive. When my wife and I went there, it was dirty, the food tasted stale, and my wife saw six microwaves in use in the kitchen.”

“There’s this Mexican restaurant in my town; a friend worked there, and he said they used a lot of microwaves. I don’t go out for microwaved food.”

Bad Lighting

Bad Lighting
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“I leave restaurants almost immediately if they use those bright white fluorescent mall lighting. I don’t want to eat under that.”

“Don’t travel in Asia; some of the best meals I’ve had were served under strip lighting.”

“Lighting is a big one for me. I worked in a few restaurants, and the bosses/places that kept the lights low were all about “ambiance” and not at all about hiding uncleanliness.”

Menu Items Unavailable

Menu Items Unavailable
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“There’s a place that literally has “BEST PIZZA” in the restaurant name. The menu has pizza on it. But if you order a pizza, they’ll tell you they don’t have pizza. It’s hilarious, ”

“One restaurant I went to was tropical-themed, and I ordered the Special, which was ‘Surf N Turf.’ The waitress told me they were out of the surf, and the turf was still frozen. This was at around 5 pm, so it’s not like we walked in when the place opened.”

Bad Smells

Bad Smells
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“Either like industrial-strength cleaning products or a straight-up sewer.”

“There is a certain smell after mopping with dirty mop water. I recognize it from when I worked in a restaurant, and I can’t stand it. This often means the floor will be sticky too. Makes me want to run right out.”

“Taco Bell smells like D-grade meat and rancid beans to me, and I cannot fathom how anyone can eat there.”

Cockroaches

Cockroaches
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“I went out with some friends to a mid-priced restaurant. I was really broke, so I feigned not being hungry. I noticed a cockroach crawl onto the table and quickly scurry out of sight. That is one of the few times I was happy to be poor.”

“While we were talking at Taco Cabana, I watched a roach crawl OUT of someone’s tacos and go scooting over their rice.”

Dirty Floor

Dirty Floor
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“If they can’t keep the floor clean, they aren’t cleaning the important stuff.”

“Old saloon protocols meant sawdust & peanut shells were left on the floor to soak up blood & other fluids, which made sweeping faster.”

“The floor matters. This is where you eat. Some things matter more than others, and if the dining room is dirty, the kitchen will be too.”

Unexplained Popcorn

Unexplained Popcorn
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“If you smell freshly popped popcorn, but they don’t serve popcorn, they have a cockroach infestation. The smell is the result of a potent insecticide and dead roaches.”

“And if it’s the kind of restaurant where the general atmosphere does not lend itself to having a popcorn machine, yet for some reason they DO have a popcorn machine, consider that they may be trying to cover up for something.”

Food From Many Countries

Food From Many Countries
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“For me, the biggest red flag is when the menu crosses three ethnic groups.”

“Saw an Italian-style place advertising Irish eggrolls for Saint Patrick’s Day. My dad knows people who work there that confirm they are terrible.”

“Korean/Jap/American will result in really funky food where I am from. I’m not a huge fan of fusion as it’s so easy to do badly.”

Fish Smell

Fish Smell
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“A strong fish smell is always worrying. Even fish-selling restaurants (the good ones) aren’t supposed to smell fishy. No pun intended.”

“I remember going to a sushi place with a friend of mine once, and it smelled like fish as soon as we walked in the door. I looked at him and told him we needed to find a new place because I’m not getting sick tonight for the sake of bad sushi.”

Carpeting Throughout

Carpeting Throughout
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“What is up with that? They covered the lovely tile floor at our local restaurant with an ugly carpet. Now the place smells because people keep spilling on the carpet, and they can’t clean it up as easily.”

“Especially if the carpet has a smell of soaked-in old vomit.”

No Sanitation Rating Displayed

No Sanitation Rating Displayed
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“In the states I’ve lived in, no sanitation rating in sight is a bad sign.”

“Occam’s razor tells me that the reason for this is that the restaurants in small towns have bad sanitation and therefore bad ratings.”

“I grew up in a place where sanitation ratings had to be immediately visible from the public entrance (usually taped to the front window or right at the hostess stand).”

Unprotected Buffet Food

Unprotected Buffet Food
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“Years ago, we went to a fancy buffet. The kid in front of me sneezed…his height was such that he was below the glass fence. He was facing the food. We left and never went to a buffet again.”

“The glass fence thing is called a sneeze guard. I became much less interested in buffets when I put together that name and the fact that not everyone is that tall.”

Rats

Rats
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“I always worry if the rats bring out the appetizers.”

“Depends on the rats. First, ask if any of them have had aspirations of becoming professional chefs, like Ratatouille.”

“I think it’s worse if the rats are the appetizers.”

“And rat turds on the sandwich are never good.”

Lots Of Senior Diners

Lots Of Senior Diners
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

“Lots of older customers usually means bland food and/or small portions.”

“What is it with the elderly and bland food? You lose taste as you age, so you’d think they’d go for stronger-tasting foods. When I’m elderly, I will eat only the most pungent of foodstuffs.”

19 FALSE MYTHS THAT ARE SO OBVIOUS YOU’LL KICK YOURSELF FOR BELIEVING THEM

Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

Sometimes it’s hard to sift fact from fiction, especially when certain long-ingrained myths are still perpetuated by society and in the media. A recent internet survey asked, “What’s an annoying myth that people still cling to?”:

19 FALSE MYTHS THAT ARE SO OBVIOUS YOU’LL KICK YOURSELF FOR BELIEVING THEM

20 AMERICAN FOODS THAT THE REST OF THE WORLD CAN’T STOMACH

Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

They say you are what you eat, but for these treats, you might want to wish otherwise. Here are 20 foods that Americans may love but the rest of the world just absolutely can’t stand:

20 AMERICAN FOODS THAT THE REST OF THE WORLD CAN’T STOMACH

19 PEOPLE WHO DESTROYED THEIR ENTIRE LIVES WITH ONE SIMPLE MISTAKE

Photo Credit: Pearl PhotoPix/Shutterstock.

We are only human, and we all make mistakes, but sometimes mistakes have disastrous and life-changing consequences. Recently, someone asked the question, “Who destroyed their entire life by making one mistake?”:

19 PEOPLE WHO DESTROYED THEIR ENTIRE LIVES WITH ONE SIMPLE MISTAKE

22 THINGS WE ALL SECRETLY KNOW ARE TRUE BUT WON’T ADMIT

Photo Credit: Shutterstock.

Sometimes the truth can be difficult to swallow. Someone recently asked, “what are the truths people don’t like to hear?”:

22 THINGS WE ALL SECRETLY KNOW ARE TRUE BUT WON’T ADMIT

Source: Reddit