The sign, mandatory by law, is in all restaurants: “Visit our kitchen”. Have you done what the sign says? Have you ever asked to take a look at the back of the restaurant?
Me either. Every time I visited a kitchen, it was for work – prearranged and with no intention of inspecting anything. You always end up seeing something you wish you could unsee.
The plate invitation is a formality. Nobody wants you there, you don’t want to be there. Restaurants, as some like to say, exist to provide experiences. A make-believe in which the customer is someone very important, worthy of subservient treatment.
Getting to know the backstage of the show, even if they are beautiful backstage, kills the fantasy – you will see old and dented pans, greasy stoves and ingredients of lower quality than expected for such a noble establishment. You know the shrimp flambéed in cognac? It is a fifth-rate caninha, dyed and flavored. It happens in the best houses in the business.
Everything can always get worse. The kitchen of a restaurant, hidden from customers (open kitchens are always well maintained), can reveal poor hygiene and inhumane working conditions.
No matter how long you stay for just a minute or two, it’s possible to catch the mood of the employees, to sense when there’s something sinister in the air.
This Wednesday (31), columnist Leonardo Sakamoto and reporter Daniel Camargos reported on UOL a police operation that caught 17 people held in a regime analogous to slavery in restaurants in São Paulo.
There are three sushi places in the north of the city, all belonging to the same business group. Operation Sushi Paulistano – a task force of the Federal Police, the Public Ministry of Labor and the Regional Superintendence of Labor – found the workers in an accommodation described, by a tax auditor, as “filth”.
No hot shower in winter, one of the employees said he hadn’t showered for five days. The men slept in an environment that, according to the operation’s agents, smelled of sweat and urine.
If you are not moved by the situation of the workers – recruited in the countryside of Piauí and Paraíba – think about the hands that will prepare your sushi. It’s a not-so-unusual situation.
In 2019, in Rio, a similar operation caught ten employees of two restaurants sleeping in a small room infested with rats and cockroaches. They had been co-opted in Ceará. In São José dos Campos (SP), also in 2019, a Japanese restaurant kept four people –from Bahia and Sergipe– in an infected basement.
They are networks that bring people from far away with false promises. From the Northeast, Paraguay or China. It’s easy to ignore and keep eating. Even more so when you order the range at home, through the app.
Speaking of which, I went to see the menu of one of the Japanese from Operação Sushi Paulistano on iFood. Promotion: carvery for two people, R$ 70. Dessert included.
We already know that there is no such thing as a free lunch. It’s time we started to be suspicious of too cheap food.
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I am currently a news writer for News Bulletin247 where I mostly cover sports news. I have always been interested in writing and it is something I am very passionate about. In my spare time, I enjoy reading and spending time with my family and friends.
