Foods You Should Never Order According To Restaurant Staff

A cocktail that costs one dollar seems to good to be true, doesn't it? Well, you know the old saying... it probably is. That theory was confirmed when someone claiming to be a disgruntled Applebee's bartender sent Darron Cardosa, better known as "The Bitchy Waiter," a video to share with his followers. In the video, we see the Dollarita being made, and honestly, it does not look delicious. Apparently it's a mixture of one gallon each of bottom shelf tequila and generic margarita mix, and then three gallons of tap water. And it's all made in a bucket, as one might expect dollar cocktails to be.

Another video shows that Applebee's makes $1 Long Island iced teas using the same bucket method, but it's still not exactly what you'd expect. You know how Long Islands typically have five different liquors in them? Well, the Applebee's bargain version takes care of that with just one bottle of booze (apparently all of them combined?). It's a mixture that the bartender who made the video says smells like "rubbing alcohol mixed with playdough." Mmm.

Bottom line: If Applebee's is offering any kind of dollar drink, it's obviously not going to be a craft cocktail. But hey, if you don't really care what it tastes like–or what bucket it was mixed in–by all means... 

Buffets are hit and miss on a good day, so this tidbit from a former Cici's employee might not come as much a surprise: "Worked at Cici's pizza for 3 years. Don't get pizza from the buffet. That buffet pizza has probably been sitting there for a good solid hour. We used to press the spatulas into the old pizza to squish the juice out and make it shiny again. It's free to custom order any mini pizza to be made right then and there."

Anyone else having a hard time scrubbing the image of "squishing the pizzas to get the juice out" from your brain?

Great mussels are a culinary experience you'll think about for days. Unfortunately, you'll also think about bad mussels for days, but more in the way you'd think of a horror movie—it's not even that good while it's happening, and the aftermath can be really traumatizing. Like, Exorcist level traumatizing, in more ways than one (*cough* projectile vomiting *cough*).

Of course, not all neglected mussels will lead to a Linda Blair moment, but this Redditor's warning doesn't exactly leave us wanting to test the theory. They suggest not ordering "anything with [mussels] from Bonefish Grill." Why? Because the Redditor "used to work at one that left the [mussels] under the sink, in the dish washing area, for hours on end, before placing them back in the walk in cooler."

No steak should taste like licorice, and yet, according to this Redditor, one at Applebee's does: "...don't get a bourbon steak from Applebee's. It's like a black licorice tasting steak. It makes no sense. I'm convinced that every one of those I ever cooked was someone trying it for the first time. I remember one time we accidentally cooked an extra one, and we offered it to a waitress to eat. She took one bite and immediately spit it out. She kept asking us all night 'what did you guys put on it?!' She was convinced that we had put something nasty on it to mess with her. We didn't do anything to it... that's just how bad they were."

When another Redditor suggested "It's steak with sautéed mushrooms and onions, you can't really screw that up," another commenter replied, "Yeah, at some places that 'sautéed' veggie s*** sits in a quarter pan under lamps or in a warming drawer soaking in some sort of butter substitute. It started out in a blast oven to make it hot fast, and got moved to the line soon after."

If you're one of those "always save room for dessert" types, you might want to rethink your position when dining at Texas Roadhouse. Several employees have less than positive things to say about their employer's end-of-meal treats, with one Redditor confessing, "[The desserts] are all awful and even our CEO says he doesn't want people having room [f]or or wanting to spend time on them." 

Another employee chimes in to say, "...we have brownies that are the same taste and consistency as hockey pucks." And just when you thought it couldn't get any worse, one more Redditor agrees saying, "Does your store still do the mini birthday brownies? Thank God we switched to just ice cream for birthdays—those little brownies could chip your teeth with how stale they got." So if the servers offer you a free birthday dessert, you know what to do...

More bad news for cocktail lovers... Apparently TGI Fridays' mixed drinks don't pack much of a punch when it comes to getting buzzed. One employee warns, "I wouldn't advise getting any drinks unless it's just hard liquor. [W]e basically just fill the cup with ice and sugary flavor with a splash of alcohol." Lesson learned: Stick to shots, beer, and wine.

Aren't those little crocks that the baked beans from Steak 'n Shake come in just adorable? Well, they might be cute, but one employee says they might not be very clean: "Stay away from the baked beans at Steak 'n Shake, the little containers they cook them in never get completely clean no matter how many times they are washed." Womp, womp.

Fans of the famous P.F. Chang's lettuce wraps might want to look away, because more than one Redditor took the happy hour favorite to task, and they all shared a similar sentiment when it came to how that tasty chicken filling is prepared.

One user pulled no punches, saying, "The P.F. Chang's Chicken lettuce wrap meat is all the trimmings from the meat cutting guy all ground up. Mostly fat." Another chimed in, saying, "I previously worked at a large chain Chinese restaurant that rhymes with bangs. Those of you that eat the chicken lettuce wraps and think they are healthy, you're wrong. They are 100 percent white meat, what they don't tell you is that it is all the fat, skin and connective tissue from the breast ground and seared before being made into the lettuce wrap mix..." And yet one more Redditor piled on, saying, "...they're made out of the leftovers and remnants of the chicken used for the actual entrees. They're almost entirely made out of fat and gristle." 

On the up side, at least it's delicious fat and gristle.

If open jars of jams, jellies, and other condiments on diner tables freak you out a little, you're never going to want to eat breakfast at IHOP again, as this former employee has some very bad news about the maple syrup you're about to pour all over your short stack.

"Always ask for 'to go' syrups at IHOP. That s**t on the table has probably been there for years, with just a bit added to it to fill it up. The warm stuff they bring you goes back, gets dumped back in the pot, then re-served. Little kids suck on that s**t and god knows what else goes on. Yuck," the Redditor colorfully explained.

The good news is at least we now know to avoid communal syrup in favor of (hopefully) hygienically sealed containers. Will you look high maintenance with your request? Maybe. Is not eating germ syrup worth it? Absolutely. 

Sometimes you just want a basic fettuccine Alfredo — nothing fancy, no bells or whistles, just that simple pasta and that rich, creamy white sauce. And if you're looking for basic Alfredo, why not go to Olive Garden? It's cheap and it gets the job done, plus you can take advantage of those unlimited breadsticks. 

But one Redditor suggests that the next time a fettuccine Alfredo craving hits, you stay home. Here's why: "Fettuccine Alfredo from Olive Garden. It's a ripoff. It takes 20 seconds to make the dish. Servers purposely wait to send orders to the kitchen just to make it seem more authentic. Save $15 and make it yourself at home..."

They're definitely not wrong. With a $1 box of pasta and a $3 jar of sauce you could be eating Alfredo for days at a fraction of the cost. And really, all you have to do is boil water. You can handle that.