Line #49 Main/LethalEatery


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14	[[quoteright:350:[[Radio/LesDeuxMinutesDuPeuple https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/snack_bar_chez_raymond.png]]]]
15	[[caption-width-right:350:[[AsbestosFreeCereal Almost 90% of our food is non-toxic]].]]
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20	->"''Let me just tell you now, I would never, '''never''' have put a spoon of anything in my mouth if I knew '''this''' was taking place!"''
21	-->-- '''Creator/GordonRamsay''', ''Series/KitchenNightmares''
22
23	A large number of comedies feature restaurants and other food service venues that would give any self-respecting health inspector a heart attack. Food is sold months or even years after its expiration date, it's often prepared by an uncouth cook who manages to get a great deal of hair and bodily fluid into whatever he's cooking, murky MysteryMeat (which usually contains vermin or [[TheSecretOfLongPorkPies something else]] nobody would ever want to take a bite of) is used, and certain delicacies may even [[ItCameFromTheFridge have a life of their own]]. In terms of beverages, expect BadToTheLastDrop coffee, [[ShoddyKnockoffProduct Shoddy Knockoff]] soft drinks, and, if it serves alcohol, ATankardOfMooseUrine beer. Usually, this means that EvenTheRatsWontTouchIt.
24
25	Generally, this trope can come in two distinct flavors:
26	* A single street vendor or establishment, probably situated in '[[WrongSideOfTheTracks the bad part of town]]' or a WretchedHive, which produces infamously bad food designed to be as cheap as possible using less-than-edible alternatives for ingredients.
27	* A deeply unscrupulous chain (usually serving as a TakeThat to one in RealLife) on a mission to extract as much profit from chumps stupid enough to eat their fare as possible, caring little for how often their product induces food poisoning. The food, served by {{Burger Fool}}s, naturally, might also contain bizarre polysyllabic chemical additives with [[ArtisticLicenceMedicine an improbably high chance]] of causing cancer or all sorts of other nasty diseases.
28
29	A Lethal Eatery may employ a LethalChef or two, but in some cases the food tastes alright... At least until the unlucky customers discover [[IAteWhat exactly what was in it]].
30
31	Compare GreasySpoon, a less extreme variant of this trope, and the SisterTrope FoulCafeteriaFood. Compare and contrast PovertyFood and ReducedToRatburgers, being similar situations PlayedForDrama where the ''only'' food people have is of abysmal quality.
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33	----
34	!!Examples:
35	[[foldercontrol]]
36
37	[[folder:Comic Books]]
38	* In one issue of ''ComicBook/{{Chew}}'', a sushi restaurant that is actually a front for organized crime discourages legitimate customers by never changing the sushi. Unfortunately for Tony Chu, his investigation requires him to eat some.
39	* ''ComicBook/{{Viz}}'' has "Hen Cabin", whose proprietor's rule is that anything can be covered up with batter and anything that doesn't need to be covered up with batter is too expensive to make a profit on. Also, the unnamed bakery in "Drunken Bakers", due to the proprietors' crippling alcoholism rather than malice.
40	[[/folder]]
41
42	[[folder:Comic Strips]]
43	* Irma's Diner in ''ComicStrip/{{Garfield}}''. To say the place is not up to code would be an understatement. The soup has hair in it with rollers, the coffee [[TastesLikeFeet tastes like turpentine]], there is a hoof in the meat loaf, the cows for the hamburgers are burned alive, and dozens of other examples over the years. There was even one strip where Irma claimed the cook was home sick with ''anthrax''.
44	* ''ComicStrip/RichardsPoorAlmanac'' has a recurring series of "Restaurant Closings", listing different colorful eateries and their equally colorful health code violations.
45	[[/folder]]
46
47	[[folder:Fan Works]]
48	* ''Fanfic/TheBoltChronicles'': In "The Baseball Game," more than half of the Prairie City Schooners baseball team is laid low with food poisoning the day of the final game of the Single-A World Series, thanks to dining at a sketchy barbecue joint the night before. Given that one of the menu items is called "Ptomaine Tasties," they should have known better. When the team runs out of players, honorary {{Mascot}} Bolt is pressed into playing duty.
49	[[/folder]]
50
51	[[folder:Film -- Animation]]
52	* In ''WesternAnimation/TheMitchellsVsTheMachines'', the family stops at a diner over Katie's objections that it has really bad Yelp reviews. Cut to them all throwing up.
53	* Gusteau's is wrongly thought to be this in ''WesternAnimation/{{Ratatouille}}'' when a rat is seen inside. It costs Anton Ego his job.
54	[[/folder]]
55
56	[[folder:Film -- Live-Action]]
57	* In ''Film/{{Spaceballs}}'', it's implied that the customer of a space diner contracted the alien parasite from the food he was served. The scene is an obvious reference to ''Film/{{Alien}}'' with Creator/JohnHurt even reprising the role.
58	* In ''Film/SweeneyToddTheDemonBarberOfFleetStreet'', not only is Mrs. Lovett a self-confessed terrible cook who makes "the worst pies in London" (never bothering to improve on anything) with meat from dead animals found in the streets, her shop has bugs everywhere, some of which she smashes with her rolling pin (and then she uses said rolling pin to make more pies). Sweeney Todd's attitude and face in that scene say it all.
59	[[/folder]]
60
61	[[folder:Jokes]]
62	* A man goes into a run-down diner and orders a cheeseburger. The cook, a huge, greasy man with flies buzzing around him, grabs a handful of ground meat, shoves it under his armpit to flatten it into a patty, then empties his nostrils on the patty for the cheese. The horrified customer points this out to the waitress, who shrugs and says "You don't want to know how he puts the holes in the donuts".
63	[[/folder]]
64
65	[[folder:Literature]]
66	* The Ghoul's Diner in ''Literature/DanShambleZombiePI'' would qualify if a large percentage of the customers weren't already various forms of undead. The living customers are nearly all various Unnaturals who do not have the same vulnerabilities to food-borne disease as humans would.
67	* Most of the restaurants in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'s'' Ankh-Morkpork are like this, and the narration claims that trying to have public health laws would be like "installing smoke detectors in Hell."
68	** ''Especially'' [[HonestJohnsDealership C.M.O.T Dibbler's]] infamous 'sausage inna bun'. The precise composition is a disgusting pork-product mystery, and it's often alleged consumption can have debilitating if not lethal effects for those unaccustomed to it. In ''Literature/TheFifthElephant'', serving Dibbler-style sausages is stated to be a capital offense in {{Uberwald}}, and accordingly no Dibbler equivalent appears in the country.
69	* ''Literature/{{Ratburger}}'': The villain Burt is a shady fellow who owns a burger van and sells to pupils at the protagonist's school. [[SpoilerTitle As one might expect]], it turns out the patties are made from ground-up rats.
70	* A medieval-era example: the Lazy Eel in ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'' is an inn that offers the oldest whores and vilest wine in White Harbor, along with meat pies full of gristle and lard that are inedible on good days and poisonous on bad ones.
71	[[/folder]]
72
73	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
74	* On ''Series/{{Cheers}}'' Norm's favorite restaurant, the Hungry Heifer, is sometimes described like this. He goes there because the food is cheap and tastes OK, but there is the occasional stomach-pumping incident.
75	* ''Series/{{Daredevil\|2015}}'': Josie's Bar has health violations all around, but since Nelson & Murdock are loyal patrons who've helped Josie out of legal troubles, [[HospitalityForHeroes they're allowed to have a huge tab there]] and overlook the moldy water pipes.
76	-->'''Matt Murdock:''' See that... that's why we, uh, keep our cocktails neat.\
77	'''Foggy Nelson:''' Pretend you're abroad. On vacation someplace exotic, but no mojitos. Josie just throws mint in the beer.
78	* ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'':
79	** Marshall and Lily get food at an unhygienic deli and have gotten food poisoning more than a few times. They continue to eat there because the food is that good. And because they give them free soup every time they get sick from it.
80	** There's also the infamous Gazzola's, a Chicago pizzeria that was a favorite of Ted and Marshall's in their college days. The food is generously referred to as "underdone", they get horrifically ill every time they eat there, and rats are not an uncommon occurrence. The place ultimately ends up getting shut down for good by the city.
81	* ''Series/KitchenNightmares'' is more ComedicSociopathy; at some locations, Gordon suffered food poisoning and openly stated he could have been ''killed'' by the, ahem, cooking. In the US version, food safety violations forcing Gordon to shut a restaurant down was a relatively frequent occurrence.
82	* Torgo's Pizza in ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'', ultimately closed down due to sanitation problems.
83	* ''Series/ThatMitchellAndWebbLook'' featured "Didldidi", a cheap "bargain" supermarket parodying Lidl and Aldi, where all the food on sale is unfit for human consumption or past its sell-by date (or both.)
84	* ''Series/YouCantDoThatOnTelevision'' has Barth's Burgers, serving the only burgers in town with, as the slovenly chef/proprietor is always proud to point out, "spit in the mixture." The skit usually ends with the kids joking about non-cow animals (or even [[ImAHumanitarian people]]) ending up in the burgers, which always prompts the response from Barth "I ''heard'' that!"
85	[[/folder]]
86
87	[[folder:Music]]
88	* French-Canadian series ''Les 2 Minutes du Peuple'' has "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgpLyJ5_-YE Snack Bar chez Raymond]]".
89	* Music/KingCrimson: [[Music/InTheWakeOfPoseidon "Cat Food"]] is about a supermarket full of low-quality food, with the narrator describing "a tin of Hurri Curri" as "poisoned especially for you," claiming that the products are "not even fit for a horse" and "drowning in miracle sauce," and bitterly comparing meals made from them to cat food in the choruses.
90	[[/folder]]
91
92	[[folder:Video Games]]
93	* ''Videogame/Afterlife1996'' has a few of these as options for Gluttony punishments. The better examples of this trope include "Pinhead Pizza" (where everything tastes good but is full of throat-ripping metal), "The Pandimensional House of Vermin" (which teaches you rats [[TastesLikeChicken do NOT taste like chicken]]) and especially the "Ecoli Shack" ("[[TwoWordsAddedEmphasis Two words]]: Cow Sushi").
94	* ''VideoGame/AlphaProtocol'' has a Gelato shop that's actually a front for the NSA (maybe). The place is covered in an inch of grime and the stork clerk/handler walks out of the back licking the gelato scoop and then scratching himself with it. Mike, who can potentially have 20 years of field experience depending on the background, has a look of muted horror and revulsion on his face.
95	--> '''Mike''': "I think I got salmonella just walking in here."
96	* In ''VideoGame/CrashTeamRacingNitroFueled'', the track Drive-thru Danger involves the warring Gasmoxian restaurants Toxic Burger and Nuclear Pizza. While not much is said about the latter's food, the bored-sounding intercom operator at the beginning of the race indicates that Toxic Burger lives up to its name:
97	-->Thank you for choosing Toxic Burger. How can we poison you today?\
98	Unfortunately, I'm not at liberty to disclose the nutritional value of any items on our menu. Thanks for understanding.\
99	Toxic Burger's not responsible for any irritation, burning or permanent loss of esophageal muscles, blah blah blah...
100	* ''VideoGame/Cyberpunk2077'': The Buck-A-Slice pizza chain seemingly has this reputation in Night City, with the pizzas themselves described as having a lot in common with styrofoam. In fact, V is able to determine the location of a SnuffFilm producing ring based on the presence of the pizza in one of their recordings, given that ''nobody'' would go out of their way to get it.
101	* In the original ''VideoGame/FearEffect'', there's a stealth sequence which requires you to get through an ''impossibly'' disgusting kitchen, with the chefs breaking any and every health regulation they can think of. Get caught? You die instantly - turns out this is a ''Triad-owned'' kitchen, and every chef in the place has a gun and very little tolerance for trespassers.
102	* [[SuckECheeses Freddy Fazbear's Pizza]] in ''VideoGame/FiveNightsAtFreddys'' is due to be closed down because of concern over public health risks to diners - parents have reported blood and mucus oozing out of the mascots. [[spoiler: Plus, there's the whole issue of the animatronics being possessed and homicidal...]]
103	* ''VideoGame/HectorBadgeOfCarnage'' has Chez [=LeBouffett=]. The place is swarming with flies and if you complain about the meat on your plate the waiter will grab your half eaten meal, dump it back into the buffet cart and then serve you a new plate from the ensuing pile. Hector does some horrifyingly disgusting things in the game but he refuses to eat the food at the restaurant.
104	* The [[MeaningfulName Dur-T Cafe]] in ''VideoGame/Mother3'' appears to be a former GreasySpoon that [[FesteringFungus rotted]] into one of these; luckily, it no longer actually sells food (or drinks), but its sheer filthiness ''alone'' would ''easily'' be able to kill someone in real life. Also, its women's restroom has quite-literally been used by '''[[ItMakesJustAsMuchSenseInContext wild cows]]''' (well, ''one'' wild cow, at least).
105	* ''VideoGame/SamAndMaxFreelancePolice'': Stinky's Diner specializes in making the worst possible foods imaginable. Grandpa Stinky even takes great pride in the culinary dark arts to the point that his granddaughter who is also named Stinky was literally born from a cake called "The Cake of the Damned".
106	* In ''[[VideoGame/ShadowrunReturns Shadowrun: Hong Kong]]'' a series of Shadowland forum posts paints a dire picture of "Uncle Tse's House of Pork". One poster mentions that they've been stuck on the toilet for two days straight, only being able to post thanks to the wonders of portable networking. The other "reviews" aren't very encouraging either.
107	* The first ''VideoGame/TyTheTasmanianTiger'' game has you lasso Shazza's turkeys in the Outback Safari to prevent then from reaching Greasy Gus's Diner. According to Shazza, the last time they ate there, they were sick for a week.
108	* The entire point of ''VideoGame/WeHappyRestaurant'' is selling highly dangerous food to people and watching them mutate and die while spending all their money at your restaurant.
109	[[/folder]]
110
111	[[folder:Web Animation]]
112	* ''WebAnimation/BigtopBurger'': Zomburger prides themselves on making burgers so bad and inedible that people only buy them to make humorous Instagram posts about them. They're markedly more successful than their rival Bigtop Burger, which sells regular burgers.
113	-->'''Frances:''' The worse the food, the better the sales.
114	-->'''Cesare:''' Bad food sells burgers, Steve. Bad food sells burgers.
115	* ''WebAnimation/TheGrosseryGang'' webseries takes place in the Yucky Mart, a near-abandoned convenience store where the food has rotted so much that they have gained sentience. The store is rated F from the health department, and the food served is literally vomit-inducing.
116	* In the ''WesternAnimation/EverAfterHigh'' webisode “Duchess Swan’s Lake”, the lake is being polluted from a filthy restaurant run by an ogre-like creature that spills sludge into the water. There are frogs bathing in one of the pots. The restaurant understandably gets shut down for health violations. For a show about fairytale characters, this just seems ''[[NauseaFuel unnecessarily sickening]]'', especially when poor Duchess falls into the disgusting water.
117	[[/folder]]
118
119	[[folder:Webcomics]]
120	* The Golden Trough in ''Webcomic/{{Freefall}}'' is a prime example. "High" points include:
121	** [[http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff300/fv00217.htm Formerly known as "The International House of Decaying Invertebrates"]]
122	** Signs announcing that "[[http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff300/fv00221.htm Almost 90% of our food is non-toxic]]"
123	** A cockroach [[http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff300/fv00222.htm dying after taking a single bite from Sam's plate.]]
124	* In ''Webcomic/{{SSDD}}'' the kebab place that Tessa's squad visits after getting drunk has a sign stating [[http://www.poisonedminds.com/d/20121015.html "Got food poisoning? Next meal is free!"]]
125	* In ''Webcomic/TheWhiteboard'' Doc has a mild panic when he discovers his new girlfriend works at [[http://www.the-whiteboard.com/autotwb2318.html a coffee shop]] that re-used old coffee grounds, charged by the sheet for napkins, and used sugar that turned people's teeth purple. [[spoiler: Fortunately it turns out the old owner was arrested after Doc's last visit to the place and Cara actually bought it.]]
126	[[/folder]]
127
128	[[folder:Western Animation]]
129	* When WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButtHead work at Burger World, something usually goes wrong. If it isn't that the boys have decided to deep fry some earthworms, it's that Beavis has used the spatula to scratch his jock itch. The two hooligans have come close to burning down the place more than once, and even managed to cause an epidemic from their tainted food at one point.
130	* In the ''WesternAnimation/DaftPlanet'' episode "Snitchy and the Phobe", Ched and Harley get jobs at Hudson's dad's TV network. In it, they investigate the kitchens of restaurants across Maple City, exposing them as this.
131	* ''WesternAnimation/{{Daria}}'': Jake develops anasakaiasis after a business lunch at a sushi bar called Tokyo Toby's. After pulling a worm out of Jake's throat, his doctor complains about how that 'worm farm' should have been closed by the Health Dept by now.
132	* ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'': For similar reasons as found on The Simpsons, also created by Matt Groening.
133	** Panucci's Pizza follows this trope, among other things the owner scratches himself with a pepperoni roll, blows his nose with pizza dough, and uses his pizza paddle to spank his employees and kill rats.
134	** Elzar's is also crawling with roaches despite being a gourmet restaurant.
135	** There's also the Cygnoid pizza shop. The restaurant uses manure in its pizzas due to a gross ignorance of Earth cuisine.
136	* ''WesternAnimation/TheGreatNorth:'' [=MomaPoppa's=], [[QuirkyTown Lone Moose]]'s local Italian restaurant, is this in spades. While working there temporarily, Ham finds out that they rinse and re-use uneaten noodles, horrifying him and the family. Their dining area is nice enough, but their offices are lined with algae-ridden fish tanks, with several of the fish in them dead. Ham is later tasked to pick up a salad starter for Momma...from the floor of her car, which is filled with trash and a birdcage with multiple birds living in it. Even after Ham and Judy expose them in the local news, people continue to eat there as the townspeople believe the food is good enough to be WorthIt.
137	* Every restaurant in ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim'' is caked in grime and filth and staffed by disgusting uncouth slobs. All part of the hilarious misanthropic atmosphere of ''Invader Zim''.
138	* Flip’s Food and Fuel from ''WesternAnimation/TheLoudHouse''; Flip is shown to sell expired products and soak his feet in the nacho cheese. The Loud family would gladly purchase food and fuel elsewhere, but seeing as it’s the only known gas station in town, the family has no choice but to keep going there.
139	* ''WesternAnimation/{{Kaeloo}}'': In Episode 64, Mr. Cat starts a fast food restaurant where trash from the dumpster is served as food if they run out of ingredients, the toilets haven't been cleaned for so long that a giant sea monster lives inside them, and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking the counter is dusty]].
140	-->'''Pretty:''' ''(after eating there)'' I had a small intestine graft, a pancreas graft, and a colon ablation.
141	* ''WesternAnimation/ThePatrickStarShow'': In "[[Recap/ThePatrickStarShowS1E21ThePatrickShowSellsOutNeptunesBall The Patrick Show Sells Out]]", Patrick starts his own restaurant that only serves one food: rocks with jelly put on them. They shatter the teeth of whoever attempts to eat them. But it's the only restaurant left at that point, after Mr. Krabs and Plankton moved businesses, so the citizens are left with no other options.
142	* Just about every restaurant in ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' is dead guilty of being this.
143	** There's the Kwik-E-Mart where nearly every perishable item is past its expiration (yet Apu charges exorbitant prices anyways).
144	** Moe's Tavern is home to herds of rats, has cockroaches swimming in its pickled eggs and occasionally uses old hypodermic needles as martini straws. In one episode, the health inspector dies after eating one of the pickled eggs. That isn't even the worst part, when a new health inspector shows up a week later, ''the corpse of the previous inspector is still there''.
145	** Then there's Krusty Burger, which isn't above using mad cow beef or stapling together half-eaten burgers for resale. Heck, in Treehouse of Horror XX, they cause the freaking ZombieApocalypse from their burgers!
146	** Captain [=McCallister=]'s restaurant, The Frying Dutchman, has its food crawling with giant cockroaches and got a D rating from the health inspector.
147	** In the movie, Lard Lad's Donuts was shut down by the health inspector and so they give away all their donuts for free. You can spot a rat running off with a donut in its mouth.
148	** According to Mayor Quimby, ALL fast food restaurants in Springfield were rated Awful to Mediocre.
149	* ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'': The Chum Bucket, owned by the show's antagonist Plankton. The food there is so hazardous that people who eat it can die of food poisoning.
150	** Although the Chum Bucket is usually the primary example of this, the Krusty Krab is often if not ''equally'' as guilty of being one too. Especially in "Born-Again Krabs", when Krabs wanted to sell a rotten Krabby Patty to save a few cents, refused to let [=SpongeBob=] make another one until he had sold the rotten one and then got severe food poisoning when [[TooDumbToLive he ate it himself to prove it wasn't so bad]].
151	--->'''Squidward:''' [=SpongeBob=], can I get one with less... fog?
152	** Another episode had Mr. Krabs focusing the marketing on [=SpongeBob=] after a food critic praised him, culminating in him selling "Spongey Patties" which were krabby patties with a sponge pattern and color... from sitting out of the freezer.
153	** And another had Mr. Krabs force [=SpongeBob=] serve pure grease to the customers instead of meat and bun.
154	** Another had Mr. Krabs get Sandy to develop a new kind of krabby patty that ends up turning everybody into krabby patty zombies.
155	[[/folder]]
156
157	[[folder: Real Life]]
158	* In 1993, an [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Jack_in_the_Box_E._coli_outbreak E. coli outbreak]] at Jack in the Box restaurants sickened 732 people and killed four children. The event was a turning point in the restaurant's history, as well as for food service and food safety overall. Jack in the Box overhauled its operations after the incident and set new standards for food safety.
159	* The fast-casual chain Chipotle has acquired this reputation after suffering from a number of outbreaks of food-borne illness, which is commonly thought to be due to the company's preference for sourcing organic ingredients.
160	[[/folder]]

Context Main / LethalEatery