Mystery Diners Have All the Fun

As many of you know, I’m a faithful viewer of programming on Food Network. Mystery Diners is a new show that has captured my attention. We also watched the short-lived Restaurant Stakeout, but I prefer Mystery Diners. The premise behind both shows is that the restaurants are struggling, getting bad reviews, and losing business. The owners want to find the problem, so in both shows, cameras are hidden and the daily life of the restaurant is captured on tape.

On Restaurant Stakeout, Willie Degel watched the videos, provided a report to the owner, and confronted the staff. On Mystery Diners, Charles Stiles sends in mystery diners in various roles such as employee in training, delivery truck driver, or customer, watches the video with the owner, and allows the owner to confront the staff in question. I think that’s why I like Mystery Diners better. When the owner confronts his/her employees, it seems a little less invasive. It’s not an outsider berating the employee; it’s the owner taking charge of his/her business.

It’s kind of sad in a way because even though I’ve never run a restaurant and never worked in a restaurant, the things these employees do wrong that are hurting business are common-sense things. One employee was running his own catering business out of the pizza joint where he worked, basically stealing his employer’s food to use for his on-the-side business. However, instead of seeing that as a common-sense thing not to do to, the guy’s response was, “It’s just food.” After being fired from the pizza joint, he eventually had to close his catering business. Guess it wasn’t so easy to run when he had to purchase rather than steal his food.

On another episode, a young girl drank shot after shot at the bar where she worked. When the Mystery Diners customers paid for drinks, she put it in the tip jar instead of the register. After the bar closed, she invited in 4-5 friends of hers for a party at the bar, and there they were on camera, drinking from the bar with nobody paying for anything. And the amazing thing? She, too, was shocked that what she was doing was not acceptable.

There have been numerous blunders like these that are so obvious, you would think anybody with a little common sense would know not to do those things. One waitress insulted a pregnant lady several times over the course of her meal. I guess it’s a good thing she was one of the mystery diners so she was expecting it. One guy purposely ordered the wrong kind of beer just because it was cheaper and then put one of the boxes in the trunk of his car.

I understand why all these folks became defensive when they were called in, saw the camera, and realized they’d been caught. It is a bit invasive, but the owner has the right to put cameras in his or her restaurant if he or she chooses to do so. The safest thing, obviously, is to not be stupid and do your job. But still, I can understand why they are offended that they were being taped without their knowledge. However, I can also understand why the owner needs to get to the root of the problem. They want to fix it before they end up on Robert Irvine’s show, Restaurant: Impossible. Even though I can understand why the employees are upset to learn they’ve been filmed and caught doing things they shouldn’t be doing, what I don’t understand is why they stand there and deny what they’ve done. It’s on film.

The one guy said he didn’t steal any beer, and they show him the footage where he’s putting it in the car. Afterwards, he did return it. One girl said she only had a little sip of alcohol while on duty, and they show her four or five clips where she’s sipping drinks. One girl said she didn’t eat the food off the plate she was putting in a to-go box, and after seeing the clip where she was, then just claimed that she was hungry, starving actually. I just don’t get why they go from mad and defensive to lying. Needless to say, all these folks lost their jobs, and the restaurants are all seeing profits again. The good news is that when employees do things right, that’s on camera too, and some employees have earned promotions based on their behavior.

What I find interesting, though, is when they talk about all the things that should or should not be done in the restaurant industry. And I know I’ll be driving Jimmy crazy with this, but now when we go to a restaurant, I’m watching the staff, and analyzing them according to the appropriate behaviors Stiles and Degel have described. Jimmy says that I secretly want to be a mystery diner. And maybe I do, but I think I’ll keep my day job.

New Food Network Show Reveals Restaurant Reality

The latest show on Food Network is Restaurant Stakeout. The show is similar to Restaurant: Impossible only in that the restaurants featured are in trouble. On the Robert Irvine show, the restaurant is failing and in dire financial straits, and it’s Robert’s job to remodel the place, upgrade the menu, teach the staff new recipes, and basically whatever it takes to improve the restaurant and make it successful. On the Willie Degel show, the restaurant is having problems, mainly with staff, and it’s Willie’s job to figure out what the staff is doing wrong and offer suggestions to fix the problems.

Restaurant Stakeout is a pretty interesting show. We’ve watched two episodes, and let’s just say that I hope we never end up in a restaurant like either of those.

To solve the problems, Willie first has to identify the problems. He has his team set up cameras all over the restaurant, and then he sets up camp and stakes out the restaurant, watching the staff’s every move. Sometimes he has the restaurant’s owner with him, and other times he doesn’t, but he makes sure to fill the owners in on what happens when they aren’t at the restaurant.

We’ve seen a variety of disturbing things so far. A waitress not only got into an argument with a customer, but she also threw a napkin at that customer, and when confronted about it, she denied it. It didn’t turn out so well for her after the video was revealed. Another waitress took the customer’s leftovers back to the kitchen to put in a to-go box, but before she put the order in the box, she helped herself to a bite from the plate. That was seriously disgusting. Not only did she have her fingers in the customer’s food that would be going home with the customer, but she was eating after complete strangers. The manager did not check on customers or seem to be aware of what the staff was doing.

On the second show we watched, several employees argued in front of the customers. One poured a drink on another. One waitress let a couple sit for twenty-five minutes before stopping to even ask what they’d like to drink. The bartenders were drinking shots with the customers, and after having a few, they were dancing on the bar; it’d be one thing if it was supposed to have been that type of restaurant, but it wasn’t. The manager here was no better than the manager on the other show.

We saw a couple of good things, such as the waiter who followed a customer into the parking lot to return the wallet the customer had left on the table and the waitress who refused to serve alcohol to a young lady who had forgotten her ID. However, on both episodes we watched, there was a lot more bad than good, and I really hope I never end up in places like those. The lack of management, both on the part of the owners and the managers they had hired, resulted in numerous problems. Had either the owners or the managers stayed on top of the situations and done their jobs properly, the other issues would have been stopped before they created havoc at the restaurants.

The thing about watching a show like this is when I eat out, now I’m thinking about all the things Willie suggests for a good restaurant. A lot of it really seems like common sense, but now I’m making it a point to see if the restaurants where I am are doing any of those things. Today, I ate at a restaurant that I believe would have passed Willie’s tests with flying colors.

Saul Good in Hamburg in Lexington is a great restaurant. The hostess greeted us warmly and with a smile when we entered and we were seated promptly. The waiter was there immediately to see what we wanted to drink, promptly returned with our drinks, and took our order. He also did an excellent job keeping our drinks refilled. Our food was delivered, and in a few minutes, the waiter was back to check on our orders. A little later, the manager was there to make sure we were satisfied with our service. Not only did our waiter seem to be doing a good job, but while watching the other waiters and waitresses, they also seemed to be doing a good job. When we needed a to-go box, he brought one to our table, which I personally think is a much better idea than taking it back to the kitchen to be boxed up.

There are a lot of restaurants out there to choose from, and people won’t go where they are insulted, where they are ignored, or where the staff doesn’t do their jobs. It’s a little scary to watch shows like Restaurant Stakeout because you want to believe that everyone in the restaurant business is honorable, and after you watch this show, you will discover that some of the horror stories you’ve heard about restaurants actually happen. The best advice I can give you is to be cautious when you choose a restaurant, and if it doesn’t look clean, the staff isn’t friendly, and you have doubts, leave and find another place to eat.