A restaurant server had one of the worst experiences dealing with a Florida man who sat in her section. That’s because after multiple complaints from various tables, her friend ended up getting a request for “Heinz 57” sauce.
TikTok content creator Cocainekenz (@cocainekenz) shared her particularly grueling shift with her audience on a drive home. She got 249,000 views on the clip. In it, she described a night so terrible that she questioned whether the people she served were really “on Earth.” It was only made worse, though, because a request for Heinz 57 toward the end of the night sent her flashbacks to a time when she didn’t know what the sauce was. She says that the situation ended up resulting in her receiving a large amount of hate.
Florida Server’s Normal Night Shift Takes a Turn
The server says she was having a regular evening shift when a group of three sat in her section. At the time, food was taking longer than usual because the restaurant was particularly busy. She emphasizes the fact that anyone who came to the restaurant was going to be there for a while, as it would take at least 25–30 minutes for an order to come out.
She says that a woman at her table of three asked how long the food would take to come out. This somewhat infuriated her. The table’s 25-minute wait for entrees wasn’t unusual—especially on a busy night—and they had gotten an appetizer and drinks, so they weren’t without things to consume. Still, the server says she calmly told the woman their food would be out soon.
“I was like, ‘This is [a] normal timeframe for a Saturday night for food to be coming out to your table,’ and she was like, ‘Well, this doesn’t feel like a normal timeframe to me,’” the server shares.
Things Get Heated
She says she again clarified that their food would be out shortly, but that waits would generally be longer since it is a high-volume restaurant. According to her, the woman then argued back, saying that they had actually been waiting longer than 25 minutes since they had waited 45 minutes to be seated. The server says that as the conversation continued, the woman questioned whether or not the kitchen was fully staffed.
At that point, the server was fully infuriated. She says she told the woman they were actually accepting positions for managers if she wanted to apply and make the restaurant better. The woman glared at her in a way that the server had never seen before, but she says she doesn’t feel bad about the comment.
Server Explains More Problems She Faced During the Night
As the night continued, the server had more and more problems serving other tables. A man who didn’t understand what “orange sauce” was when he was ordering orange chicken was seated in her section. The server says she tried to explain to him multiple times that it was just an Asian-inspired orange-flavored sauce, but the man asked for further clarification.
She says he continued asking her what the sauce tasted like. Despite her best attempts to explain, she simply couldn’t get through to him. The man ended up ordering it anyway and enjoying his meal, but she says she had to explain the concept to him for “10 minutes.”
“He ended up getting his food, and he ended up just eating it just fine,” the server says. “I go over there, [and] he says, ‘I see what you mean now. It does just taste like orange.’”
A Simple Sauce Request Triggers Bad Flashbacks
Then, the most egregious thing happened. The server says one of her friends, Lindsay, asked her if they had any Heinz 57, a classic steak sauce.
“I thought I was never gonna hear about Heinz 57 ever [again] in my life. I never wanted to hear the words ‘Heinz 57’ uttered in my general vicinity until the end of [expletive] time,” she tells viewers.
The server says she previously had a problem with one of her customers who wanted Heinz 57 steak sauce. She did not know what the steak sauce was, which led to her getting lambasted in her comments section. The table did not specify steak sauce, so she thought they were referring to Heinz ketchup, which also has 57 printed on it.
Heinz 57: A Travesty For Servers
The server emphasizes that requests for Heinz 57 almost never go well. She and other servers have apparently noticed that customers asking for Heinz 57 are ruder than other customers.
“My poor dear friend Lindsay had the same exact problem that I did at that table with that gentleman, in which he kept just being really [expletive] nasty to her, asking for Heinz 57,” she says. “She had no [expletive] idea what that was. I said, “Yeah, queen, actually had the same [expletive] problem, as you recall, and the man was also [expletive] mean to me, talking to me like I’m stupid when you just keep uttering numbers to me that actually exist on a multitude of bottles within the company.”
It turns out, servers don’t always have Heinz 57 or even know what it is. The steak sauce, while extremely popular, doesn’t seem to grace as many steakhouses or restaurants as A1 does. So, Lindsay dealt with a rude customer who expected Heinz 57 steak sauce. This is something that their restaurant seemingly does not have. The reminder of the previous Heinz 57 experience triggered Cocainekenz. Despite making $2,700 in sales and good tips, she left the restaurant feeling upset.
Was It Heinz 57 or Just Mercury in Retrograde?
While the server blamed Heinz 57 for ruining her night, others brought up how Mercury was in retrograde.
Another server said, “Tonight was so bad I googled mercury in retrograde and indeed it is [by the way]. Cause why was every table seemingly inconvenienced by the fact that I was asking them what they wanted to drink?”
When Mercury is in retrograde, it means that the planet is “moving backward,” from the Earth’s perspective. While the planet is not physically moving in the opposite direction, the Earth’s position when compared to the planet makes it appear that way. Many astrology fiends argue that when Mercury is in retrograde, it brings about chaos that leads to clarity. In other words, the planets might bring negative experiences or “practical hiccups,” as Parade describes. That leads to possible growth, but it also can feel inundating.
While it’s not an explanation that can fully explain customer difficulties, it is one that commenters tied to the server’s experience.
AllHipHop reached out to the server via TikTok comment and direct message for comment. We’ll let you know if she responds.
