That’s right; this is a health post that’s not telling you to watch what you eat, but where. Why does where you eat matter? Because it constitutes the attitude of the people making and serving your food. Always be aware of the attitude of your server and the overall atmosphere of the establishment. If it isn’t immedeately apparent that the server loves (or eves moderately likes) his/her job, it’s a good idea to go to another place to eat. My reason for this advice is this: When people don’t love/like their jobs, they make stupid/rash/careless mistakes that can have an immediate impact on your well-being. These people become more prone to under cooking and sabotaging your food–sometimes without even realizing that they are doing it because they just do not care about their jobs.
Image found via Google
I’m sure most of you have already heard about this, but I’m going to talk about it because this event was the main reason I’m writing this post. A couple days ago, a man went to his local (location unknown) McDonald’s and ordered breakfast. He was chowing down on the hash-brown when he realized that something was stuck to the bottom of it. When he flipped the fried potato bar over, he came face to face with a deep fried cockroach that had been plastered to the side of the hash-brown prior to being cooked. Don’t belive me? Here’s the picture the man snapped of his hash-brown (for those of you who have squeemish stomachs, scroll down quickly to the next paragraph):
Image found on MSN.com
Disgusting isn’t it? This is just utterly unacceptable! Many people may argue that it was an accident and probably rarely ever occurs, but how in the world can the person making and serving this hash-brown not notice the giant cockroach stuck to the side of it? The person honestly couldn’t not have seen it, but my attention isn’t on the cooker–it’s on the manager. The man showed the manager the contaminated (and possibly health-threatening) hash-brown and she merely took his receipt and wrote on it that he was to be given the same identical breakfast the next day! Who does that?! A person who does not care about their job, that’s who. I think it’s safe to assume that since the manager (the person who pulls the strings) was not phased by the disgusting thing this McDonald’s had just served, she did not order the fryers to be cleansed of the contaminated frying oil. Some of you didn’t think about that, huh? Now the oil that is contaminated is allowed to keep frying and contaminating all of the ohter foods that had been and will be fried!!! This includes, but is not limited to, more hash-browns, french fries, and pies. And it’s generally common knowledge that the fryers don’t get dumped but for several days–maybe weeks at a time. Some people would argue, “Oh, that’s fine; it’s just one roach–that’s protein!” but I would like to point out that cockroaches pretty much live in disease in sewers and septic systems. Where did this particular cockroach come from? We don’t know. Where was this McDonald’s so that we can defer where the cockroach came from (like from a cluster of woods versus a sewer pipe)? We don’t know. I know that if I ate at fast-food places, I’d avoid every McDonald’s I see for another month or so.
However, this is not a rant against McDonald’s. Many of you know me personally and have heard my anti-fast food rants plenty enough, but this is a warning against eating at places that are run and served by people who don’t care about their jobs. I could use several more examples, some of which have happened to me recently in which I was served food that had been sloppily cooked and, thus, made me sick, but for the sake of your stomachs, I won’t.
My advice to you all is to just be aware of the attitude of your servers. If they look like they want to be somewhere else (or they just don’t care, like the McDonald’s manager), then they probably won’t care about your meal and, thus, may sabotage your food–consciously or not–which may sabotage others’ meals as well.
I honestly hope that you read this post and gleaned my advice from it–this is an issue in America’s fast food empire that is not just centered around McDonald’s, but so many other establishments! Think back on the Wendy’s that had a finger in the chili, and now think of the recent finger found in an Arby’s sandwich. There’s a reason why I avoid fast-food places, and it’s not just because I read Fast Food Nation when I was in high school. These places are just prone to making mistakes because the workers don’t care about their jobs. This also applies to those who are sick. If your server looks like there’s a bug going around–steer clear. If the server has it, the cook might have it, too!
Please take my advice and use it. Thanks for reading, and sorry for any squeemishness I may have caused.
~Love Lindi
