'A seafood restaurant should not smell fishy': 25+ Restaurant workers explain the red flags hiding in plain sight while dining

Author image for Remy Millisky
Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Oct 5, 2023 11:00 AM EDT

I never knew that checking the bathrooms before you eat at a restaurant was a "thing" until today. That's because these chefs, waiters, diners, and one health inspector, all gave their opinions on the sketchiest things to look out for while eating at restaurants. 

As one person shared, they always go and check out the bathrooms at an establishment before eating there. The reasoning is that the restrooms are fairly easy to clean, and most places clean their restrooms every day to remain hygienic. So if those sinks are looking grimy and the floors are sticky… just imagine the environment your food is being prepared in. 

Sometimes really great food does come from dirty restaurants, I'm so sorry to tell you. As a younger person, I would have probably not dined at a dingy restaurant. But if you try the food there and it's really good, you tend to turn a blind eye to these things. You think to yourself, "They know what's good for me, and they have a letter from the health department, so…" And that's how you find cute little hole in the wall spots. The less Instagramable, the better. 

Scroll down to read all these responses to prepare for the next time you have to choose where to dine out. Then, check out these customers who got the instant karma they deserved, like the woman who berated phone store employees, walked out of the store, and instantly dropped her brand new iPhone on the ground. 

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  • 01
    Motor vehicle - 'If a restaurant has a huge menu... It's all frozen.'
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  • 02
    Font - Chefs, what red flags should people look out for when they go out to eat?
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  • 03
    Font - worriedSeahorse4. When the menus are super dirty and never cleaned, that means everything is super dirty and never cleaned
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  • 04
    Font - mereWhiting7 If a restaurant has a HUGE menu.... Its all frozen.
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  • 05
    Font - GrooveProof as a cook most of this has been covered. Don't go to places with large menus, don't eat anywhere with a dirty dining room/bathroom (duhhhhh). More specifically...go to places that are busy. Dead places will sell you less fresh food because that food is gonna sit there a lot d longer. edit: if you have friends that are cooks, ask them where to eat. Everyone knows everyone in the restaurant industry and these people know which places are absolute hookups and which places are fak
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  • 06
    Font - danegermaine99 Anthony Bourdain had a whole slew of things in his book Kitchen Confidential related to this. Off the top of my head • kitchens are hard to clean. Bathrooms are very easy to clean. If the bathroom is dirty, the kitchen is way worse.
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  • 07
    Font - • Monday's seafood special is last Friday's "didn't sell" • when he worked in NYC, the 1st buyers at the fish market were high end sushi restaurants, then other high end restaurants, then everybody else, then the cat food people, then the "Korean Deli" places (the fill your container from a buffet then pay by weight places).
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  • 08
    Font - • when meat comes in, the lowest quality steaks are thrown in the cooler and marked "save for well done" as any difference in quality is destroyed by cooking the meat to well done - the best steak and the copiest steaks taste the same when well done.
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  • 09
    Font - DukeOfJokes Chef of 10 years here. Stop looking at yelp reviews and instead check job postings. If they have phrases like "End of summer/ retention bonus", "were like a family", "looking for Rock Stars", "where work becomes play" or other cliches and buzzwords, it means their having trouble keeping staff around, and if they can't keep staff around they probably can't keep customers around either. 1 or 2 ads are fine but if they have multiple openings, especially in back of house it's goin
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  • 10
    Font - The Troyminator If Gordon Ramsey is in there trying a bunch of different dishes while cameras roll, run because he's filming Kitchen Nightmares.
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  • 11
    Font - geminixTS Number one thing is the amount of items on a menu. If a place had a large number of items it's usually not made in house.
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  • 12
    Font - 06 gucknbuck A seafood restaurant should not smell fishy
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  • 13
    Font - RebelGage Check the bathroom, if it's not clean GTFO. Any restaurant that's has multiple cuisines GTFO. (Chinese, Italian, American, Etc.) If you're eating "ethnic" food and the majority of the customers in the restaurant are not of that ethnicity, GTFO.
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  • 14
    Font - Voidsmithing Lots of good advice here, but here's a slight modification: don't just look at the size of the menu. Look at its efficiency. Note the actual number of ingredients across the whole menu. Think about how many different products they're going to have to carry to execute that menu. Fewer products mean fresher products because they can actually turn over their inventory quickly.
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  • 15
    Font - Plus, it means the chef actually thought about the menu and how it functions. It means that every dish was thought out. That's the secret to the Cheesecake Factory always being at least acceptable (I'm not saying they're anything to write home about, but they're at least consistently satisfactory). The actual number of products they carry is far smaller than you think, and they employ A LOT of prep cooks.
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  • 16
    Font - This-Garbage-3000- I look for a busy joint with lots of return clients.
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  • 17
    Font - helllohaha I am not a chef but places have too trendy of an aesthetic are never that great. Makes sense tho, they're depending on the aesthetics to draw people in and not the quality of the food
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  • 18
    Font - ares5404 Not a cook but... always check your meats before they eay them ESPECIALLY CHICKEN AND ORGAN MEATS. I had one bad encounter with chicken livers... tasted off and one was slimy, only ate 2 and psat out the third... sick for 3 days
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  • 19
    Font - Scottcmms2023 If a place is decorated like they went to target, I'll avoid it. Places that look slapped together are a no no. You know they put the most effort into the front, and if it looks off I'll leave.
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  • 20
    Font - gordo65 Not a chef but... whatever the front and dining room look like, the kitchen looks worse. So if the booths are worn and the floor is dirty and the sign needs repainting, run. Old people have lost their sense of smell and have too much money, so they gravitate toward places that have high prices and terrible food. If you see a bunch of old Buicks and Cadillacs in the parking lot, don't bother going in.
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  • 21
    Font - blankspaceforaface. If a place is constantly hiring and especially if it's hiring managers, stay away. Probably means that there's no organisation (so hygiene is gonna be questionable) and the people working there haven't been there long enough to give a f
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  • 22
    Font - WWDB I had a friend in the hotel industry who warned me to never sleep in a restaurant, and never eat in a hotel.
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  • 23
    Product - Kingslayer_Seven If the chef has no tattoos.
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  • 24
    Font - jimmykicking Not a chef, but the smell of dirty oil makes turn back out of the door.
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  • 25
    Font - Own_Narwhal5174. When people don't wash their hands!
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  • 26
    Font - cinnamon_cm My husband's rule is, if it's a good restaurant there will be old people eating there. They're not king around with bad food. He wants to wait a few months to go to the new hip places where every customer is under 30, so the staff and cooks can figure out their vibe
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  • 27
    Jaw - Stewbydew Look up! Check the lights, light fixtures and air returns.
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  • 28
    Font - tobaccoandbeans When you look at reviews for restaurants, check the menu pics as well. If the first pics are the drink menu or drink specials, the food is glorified bar food. Advice from a local in a popular beach destination
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  • 29
    Font - Niranaeth If food is served extremely fast (less than 10min after order) chances are good it's conveniens food
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  • 30
    Font - PleaseDisperseNTS. The only "Specials Menu" you should look at is at Asian restaurants, that's because the Special really is the specialty of that chef, from the region he/she is cooking from. In most Western restaurants the specials are something the kitchen is trying to get rid of. Usually there's only a few portions left and it's going to the trash if it doesn't sell in a day or two.
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  • 31
    Font - No-Entrepreneur-2724 Front of house, the people that greet and seat you and take your order, seems miserable. It's what you will notice right away and it means something is wrong.
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  • 32
    Font - Agreeable_Situation4. As a customer, hand blow dryers in bathroom. I will straight up leave
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ask reddit waiters waiter customers Kitchen Confidential restaurant chef food service chefs kitchen food eating dining red flags
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