“In most restaurants, after 8 p.m. or so, all the coffee is decaf because no one wants to clean two different coffeepots. I’ll bring out a tray with 12 coffees on it and give some to the customers who ordered regular, others to the ones who ordered decaf. But they’re all decaf.”—Charity Ohlund, Kansas City waitress. Check out the things restaurant owners wish they could tell you.
“We put sugar in our kids’ meals so kids will like them more. Seriously. We even put extra sugar in the dough for the kids’ pizzas.”—Waitress at a well-known pizza chain. Want to avoid waiters altogether? Visit the best buffets in all 50 states.
“If you’re a vegetarian and you ask if we use vegetable stock, I’m going to say yes, even if we don’t. You’ll never know the difference.” Find out the things servers won’t eat at their own restaurants.
“At a lot of restaurants, the special is whatever they need to sell before it goes bad. Especially watch out for the soup of the day. If it contains fish or if it’s some kind of ‘gumbo,’ it’s probably the stuff they’re trying to get rid of.”—Kathy Kniss, who waited tables for ten years in Los Angeles. Your friends will love these holiday food gifts.