People Share What Ruins A Restaurant Dining Experience For Them

Exploring new restaurants can be a bit like playing roulette. You never know what you’re going to get. While you can do research on the location and food prior to your visit, there are certain elements that are out of one’s control. From loud music to rowdy guests and unruly kids, there are myriads of things that could get out of hand.

So when one Redditor inquired from the masses regarding disappointing dining experiences folks were quick to respond with their personal restaurant-ruiner moments.

#1

When they don’t put price on menu. Makes me not want to order anything just incase it comes out to $30 per dish and also feel embarassed to ask for price of each item

#2

I’m going to get hated on for this, but..

Children.

However, not every child. I’m talking about the ones that the parents are obviously not putting much effort into. The ones that will run around, cause a scene, pester other diners, and just make themselves a nuisance.. And God forbid you ask them politely to stop, because then Big Mama’s gotta not look at her phone for five seconds to tell you to not parent her kid.

B***h, I wouldn’t have to parent your kid if you actually behaved like a parent!

#3

#QR CODE MENUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

#4

Slow service coupled to food not served hot enough because it’s been sitting in the kitchen too long waiting to be delivered.

#5

Went to a small restaurant that I’ve liked before. For some reason the owners decided to put up a karaoke machine in the middle of the place. With the size of the place and how loud the machine was, you could hear everything at any table.

We sat down, heard a kid trying to sing Let It Go full blast and all decided to leave.

#6

I live in redneckville and some honkeytonk places like to declare their political affiliations so for me the biggest restaurants to avoid are the ones flying the Back the Blue flags or the F&@k Biden flags over the front door.

#7

Concrete floors, high, open ceilings, metal or stone walls. When it’s like they’re trying to create the loudest, most echo-ey place possible.

#8

Tablet menus and buttons to summon waiters. I’m here for an analog, human experience ffs.

#9

When the table you’re seated in wobbles from the slightest touch

#10

Being sat too close together. My elbows need air.

#11

When parents let their kids run around and knock s**t over.

#12

When the tables are too small. Nothing infuriates me more than not having room to eat my food because the tiny table has three other plates on it, drinks, condiments/sugar caddies, what have you. Also I hate those cheap, light, metal chairs that are always freezing and make a loud noise when you move them. And more restaurants should have purse hooks!

#13

When the background music is too loud

#14

You can smell that they wiped everything down with a mildewy rag

#15

Noise. Restaurants need to be thoughtful about how noise reverberates when designing the space, and then take other measures like playing music at a volume low enough that you don’t have to strain to hear those at your table but loud enough it helps distract you from everyone else’s conversations.

#16

A passive aggressive sign that complains about people not wanting to work anymore or some variation.

And getting food poisoning

#17

When they don’t treat/pay their staff well. You can tell, especially if you’ve worked in the industry, and it seeps into every aspect of the place. You can practically feel it oozing out of the walls.

#18

Christian music.

#19

Charging for ketchup.

#20

Bad food. It could be a hole in the wall with a leaky roof and horrible service, but people will still go if the food’s good. They’ll probably just call it a hidden gem with character

Shanilou Perera

Shanilou has always loved reading and learning about the world we live in. While she enjoys fictional books and stories just as much, since childhood she was especially fascinated by encyclopaedias and strangely enough, self-help books. As a kid, she spent most of her time consuming as much knowledge as she could get her hands on and could always be found at the library. Now, she still enjoys finding out about all the amazing things that surround us in our day-to-day lives and is blessed to be able to write about them to share with the whole world as a profession.