Penny For Your Thoughts
By: Nancy Whitaker
What do people usually do on a date, before a dance, celebrate a birthday or just do it because it is fun?
We do this when we don’t feel like cooking or we do it because we are hungry. We do it at graduations; church events; ball games and county fairs.
This is not hard to guess. It is going out to eat.
Now, if your palate prefers fast food there are quite a few choices in that area.
There are fast food eating establishments that serve everything from fish, lobster, steak and chicken.
There are fancy sit down restaurants to buffets which cater to almost every taste bud.
So, going out to eat has become a matter of choice or occasion. Some restaurants have a special on a certain night and people tend to go there on that night.
No. None of us like to be served bad tasting food, cold food or find dirty silver wrapped up in our napkin. Since we are paying for our meal, most of us want to get our monies worth.
Not too long ago my friend, Denny, and I went driving and stopped at a restaurant. The place specialized in fish and chicken.
I remembered it as having good service, good food and good pie.
Hmmmm. How wrong I was.
We got seated without incident and our order was taken. Then we waited, waited and waited.
Others were also waiting and it looked like very few people had gotten their food.
Finally our food gets to us and it looks very unappetizing. I had ordered fish and it looked like fish sticks. I like fish sticks but when we are eating out in a restaurant, I do expect a nice dinner.
Our baked potatoes were brown on the inside from sitting too long. The salad was a few pieces of lettuce with a cherry tomato on top plus it was warm and wilty.
After tasting our food, we found out it tasted as bad as it looked.
Another lady had what looked like a baked potato and she was trying to eat it, but had tried unsuccessfully to remove the skin.
I signaled for the waitress. I told her about how disappointed we were with the meal and I told her, “I recommended this place and I am very disappointed in your food and service.” I said, “We are not eating this and not paying for it either.”
While it wasn’t her fault, the waitress apologized and told us we did not have to pay for the food.
When we were back out to the car my friend said. “Wow you spoke up.” He said he probably just would have paid for it.
But to me, who enjoys eating out, that dinner should not have been brought to our table. So, yes that establishment left a bad impression on me.
Now things could have been worse, as many diners and home cooks as well, have found all kinds of gross items in their food.
Even though I have never found anything alive in my food, others have.
Here are some of the inedible items diners from different places found in their food:
A child and his mother found a cooked chicken head in the child’s nuggets. I would have freaked out. If the chicken head was in a MC Nugget, it must not have been a big head.
Another unlucky person was drinking a can of soda when he felt something hard in his mouth and proceeded to spit it out. It was a deceased frog. Oh my. I don’t know whether to say, “Poor frog or poor soda drinker.”
Of course we have heard horrid stories about pieces of fingers, bandaids and spiders being found in food.
I hope you did not read this right before going out to eat or cooking a good meal.
Every one has some bad experiences when dining out or cooking at home.
One thing which happened to me happened at a carry in. We were going to eat and then play music. I took homemade club sandwiches and the looked fantastic. I had put toothpicks in the sandwiches to hold then together. They were plastic and various colors of picks so I wasn’t concerned about anyone swallowing one.
Well it happened and I felt so bad. One man was enjoying his sandwich and did not see the toothpick in it. When he swallowed, the pesky pick got stuck cross ways in his throat.
The next thing I knew he was gagging and trying to breathe. He had to go by EMS to the hospital and have it removed.
When summer gets here some days it may be too hot to cook, BBQs will be going on as well as outside picnics so beware of eating a bug, swallowing a toothpick, drinking a frog or finding a spider in your “eats”
Have you ever found anything strange in your food? Do you ever speak up and let anyone know?
Let me know and I’ll give you a Penny for your Thoughts.
