receive back toOff the Menu , where we bring you the in effect and strange solid food story from my email inbox . This week , we have tales of restaurant client who happen to be celebrity . And , just like all restaurant customers , some are decentand tip 80 % , whileothers are just dogs . As always , these are real electronic mail from real proofreader , though names have been changed .

Opera master drops the mic

" In the ' 90s I worked at popular French cafe on the West Side of Manhattan . The food was n’t extraordinary , but for some reason celebrities loved to give ear out there . Ethan Hawke follow in almost every sidereal day , Uma Thurman reserved a special mesa to suit her dogs , I served breakfast to profusely hungover Johnny Depp and Kate Moss , etc . It was quite the intoxicating experience for a 20 - twelvemonth - old recently get from Oregon . But at the conclusion of the twenty-four hour period , they were just customers , and I was just serve them escargot and croque - monsieur . Except for one Nox .

" It was a Friday and packed and a large bearded serviceman with three women had been induct at one of my tables . They ordered , all of them , the steak au poivre . They were very nice and enjoyed their steak immensely , specially the large fellow . He loved it so much that he grandly insisted that he want to ' sing for the chef ! ' He had been such a pleasure to wait on , and I care singing , so I pass away to get him from the kitchen . So the chef hail with me to the table , the humankind compliment him , and then he bear up . In the heart of a packed restaurant , he start to sing . Someone had the sentience to work off the music and out into that packed dining elbow room soared the glorious voice of the one and only Luciano Pavarotti .

" He eat up to much applause , throw down far more money than the dinner party toll on the mesa , and regally expire the eatery . “– Gina Matthews

off the menu thrillist

Jason Hoffman/Thrillist

Sometimes celebrity campers work out OK

" Back in 2011 , I was serving at a restaurant attached to a hotel hall in a smaller Midwestern NBA city . The Miami Heat were playing the local squad and always stick around in our hotel when they were in townsfolk . I was scheduled to work out the dejeuner shift that had to attend around all afternoon until the dinner staff amount in , so I showed up mid - lunch rush and got ready for my first table .

" It was normal for us to dish basketball game players at this eating place , and walking in this good afternoon , it was impossible not to spy the outrageousness that is Chris Bosh . He was eating with his tiny ( about 5ft - tall ) fiancée and their server say they were a great span to serve . After they finished eating , Chris get up and depart , but his fiancee stayed put .

" She wound up sitting alone in her John Wilkes Booth for a good 45 minutes while the dejeuner rush wind down and her host transferred her check to me so he could pass on . Eventually , her parents fall in her , order another round of solid food , and wound up camping through my entire extend shift . For about four hour total .

W

" Now , do n’t get upset about this . This was the good camping post I ’ve ever had . They were n’t monopolizing a board during a busy military service , they were extremely sweet and courteous , and they tipped 80 % . I was a well-chosen camper when I left that mean solar day .

" Until I labialise a recession in the hotel lobby on my way out and nearly walked face - first into Dwyane Wade ’s fork . " –Emma Reasoner

Fuck the Turtle Man

" Ages ago , I was cultivate at Olive Garden in Kentucky . It was a pretty busy weekday tiffin . Nobody was cover the party table , because that was ordinarily not a thing that got used on a Wednesday during lunch . A group of seven serviceman in courting got sat there . Suits were an rummy thing to see , because this town was pretty blue choker and casual .

" My manager assigned the table to me because I was the closest . Before I could make it over to greet them , all of the FOH faculty was bombilate around , saying thing like , ' Oh my God , that ’s Mitch McConnell ! '

" Being young , from another state , without a TV , and not really into politics yet , I ask one of the other host , ' Who the ass is Mitch McConnell ? ' This is a town that got excited when they regard Johnny Depp ’s granddaddy ( seriously ) , so I was ready to be underwhelmed . Apparently , he was in Ithiel Town to stand some other Republicans in the surface area who were running for various office .

jerry lewis off the menu

Jason Hoffman/Thrillist

I start call out , ' FUCK THE TURTLE MAN ! THE TURTLE MAN IS A FUCKING shit ! '

" I go over to introduce myself and get the drinking order . They ’re all kind of rude and apparently think I was beneath them , but whatever . It happens a mass when you ’re a waiter .

" A bulk of the guys ordered the unlimited lunch soup , salad , and bread-stick ( relieve me while I have some PTSD flashbacks about the goddamn unlimited soup , salad , and bread-stick ) , which , goddammit , you ’re here on the dime of someone backed by the Koch brother , set up real food ! Or well yet , go somewhere nicer .

" Once the salad and breadsticks hit the tabular array , all hell split up loose in the form of getting one - itemed by these guys . It get so bad with that many piece eating all that soup and salad that my managing director had to take over my other tables .

" These fucking human scraps disposals finally baffle their fill of unlimited trashy intellectual nourishment . I dropped the hinderance off , it was give back to me with a card that had some conformation of McConnell ’s name on it . After they give I went over to aid bus the table , and there were a few small piles of pennies . I blame up the check and wait at the reception . No gratuity . Nothing other than the cat who had put pennies on the board . I still did n’t be intimate who the hell Mitch McConnell was .

Ethan Hawke is a dancin' machine

" I act upon at a reasonably well - known Thai establishment in NYC . Ethan Hawke frequented our place . It became so vernacular that I hardly give intermission when I saw him . I do n’t really freak out about most celebrities , and he ’s not my jam anyway , but occasionally a client would freak out and request something exceedingly weird like concord and wassail out of his used glass .

" One night , I was exhausted from two doubling in a rowing and the barkeep was running his card . My boss on occasion glut on disco music and cranked up the book . I was middling resistant to it by that time . I was also falling asleep standing up . I gape and opened my eyes to see Ethan Hawke disco saltation , " Stayin ' Alive”-style . He trip the light fantastic toe the right way up to me , manoeuver his finger and all . I just star at him and nod . “– Martina Neumann

Please don’t kill Ronald McDonald

" In my final year of high school day , I worked part time at McDonald ’s .

My manager yell as I stood over Ronald McDonald ’s exanimate dead body , shocked .

" Our location was in a little Canadian Ithiel Town where the summers were extremely warm . One 24-hour interval , it was some fundraiser McDonald ’s does where Ronald McDonald comes into the restaurant and talk to the kid and congratulates the employees on their full work . We were all old-hat , hot , and techy when Ronald finally make it . He then started running around the kitchen luxuriously - fiving employees , and me being uncomfortable with clowns , I restfully displace to the back room to fend off him . Ronald see me hear to cabbage away and yelled , ' YOU’RE NOT capture AWAY WITHOUT A HIGH FIVE ! ' and jog towards me in the live , greasy McDonald ’s kitchen . The clown then slip on a pool of grease and fell on his back on the trading floor , knocking himself out cold . My director hollo as I stomach over Ronald ’s exanimate body , shocked .

Jerry Lee Lewis is about as creepy as you’d expect

" Back when I was young , two or three hundred long time ago , I worked as a cocktail waitress in Memphis . I had been lift in a nearby little Arkansas townsfolk , and Memphis was the main braggart metropolis in my starry heart when I graduate high school . Memphis , being a music town , had several clubs that extend bully medicine . A new show club open , and I was hired . On opening night for any euphony lodge , it was accustomed for a lot of the club owners to come in and take a table to themselves . They happened to sit in my department . Glenda , an old and wiser waitress , told me to give them great serve , because club proprietor are keen tipper .

" I give that board a lot of attention and made certain their drink never run ironical , their collation were full , and that I was available whenever they needed something . And they were all friendly and nice . Then Jerry Lee Lewis come in and took a seat at the mesa . He started off drinking forked Bloody Marys , but after two of those , switched to double over CC and Orange River juice . And he was pouring them down . He kept giving me teaching all night , calling me ' baby ' and ' knockout ' and patting me on the Eastern Samoa every probability he get .

" I , being immature and naive , was track down that patted Eastern Samoa off essay to keep up with Jerry Lee ’s , ' Baby , get me this , ' ' Sweetheart , get my friend there some of this . ' Pat pat . At one point he got on level with the band and sang a few tunes . That gave me a small rest . At the destruction of the night the club - proprietor table need for their pecker , and when I wreak it , Jerry Lee grabbed it and aver , ' I ’ll take this , honey . ' So I gave it to him and he pulled out a wad of bills . There was n’t a muckle of alteration , maybe a few bucks , but I put his change ( in the little change tray ) on the table beside him and he count at me and give a twinkling as he put the change in his pocketbook . I smile and left the tabular array so they could get their material together and leave , see my tip would be on the table when they allow .

" They left , and I excitedly rush to the tabular array to see how big my crown would be . Club owners AND Jerry Lee , I was expecting a windfall . But there was zip . Zilch . Zero . Not one farthing . Jerry Lee completely stiffed me after all that bullcrap he ’d dished out . “– Belle Anderson

Timothy Olyphant is extremely gracious and forgiving

" I was bartending at an upscale dinner party smirch democratic with wealthy vacationer from NYC . We had this beautiful patio down a fairly long / usurious flight of step , where we allowed client to hang out and order drinks before or after eating . Unless they happened to arrange at the bar then move down themselves ( or I could snag a busser ) , it would fall to me to carry the drinks down the step . No problem for wine / beer / wide-eyed mixed drinks , but there was dead no way to get a martini on a tray down those stair without spilling any of it .

" So . One Nox in summer a grouping of mass had already come to my legal profession , consecrate a few drinkable , and gone down to the terrace , say the rest of their political party was on the way of life . Cool . I had a unconstipated ( and former co - worker , great clotheshorse ) hang out at the end of the Browning automatic rifle .

" I was busybodied with order for the servers when a bounteous guy rope walked up to the bar . He said he was with the mathematical group on the patio , and enjoin another beat of what they ’d had before , plus a glass of wine for his date and a martini for himself . I say indisputable , I ’d get to it as before long as I could .

" My even piped up just then . ' Hey man , are n’t you Timothy Olyphant ? '

" Handsome dude confirmed that yes , he was actor Timothy Olyphant . The two exchanged pleasantry about the latter ’s body of work onJustified , and then Timothy Olyphant went down to fall in his group .

" After a scrap I was finally able to get to the patio group ’s 2nd round : all bottled beer , rock , or Collins glasses , and wine … except for Timothy Olyphant ’s martini .

" My tray was full loaded , and dead balanced except for that damned martini . I barely took one step and already it was sloshing over the edge of the glass ( who the hell design martini glass anyway ? ! ) . ticket were popping up from the servers again , precious seconds were being wasted while I render to cover this tray without soaking it in vodka , and there were no bussers around to help . Frustration go the best of me , I exclaimed to my regular , ' Ugh ! Stupid Timothy Olyphant ’s martini ! '

" … just as Timothy Olyphant was walking back into the prevention .

" ' May I carry that martini down for you ? ' ask Timothy Olyphant sunnily , as my regular suppressed hysterical laughter .

" ' That would be lovely , thank you , ' I replied , each of us act he had n’t overheard what he in spades just take in .

" And that ’s the floor of how I was accidentally kind of a jerking to thespian Timothy Olyphant . “– Margaret Branson

Do you have a eating place , home - cookery , or any other intellectual nourishment - adjacent floor you ’d like to see come out in Off the Menu ( on ANY guinea pig , not just this one ) ? Please emailWilyUbertrout@gmail.comwith “ Off the Menu ” in the dependent business line ( or you may discover me on Twitter:@EyePatchGuy ) . Submissions are always welcome !

bless up herefor our daily Thrillist electronic mail , and get your localisation of the effective in food / drink / playfulness .