A former hotel worker has posted a warning on TikTok: don’t eat the free buffet breakfast at hotels because the conditions under which it is prepared are grotesque.
Hotel Worker Warns Against Eating Free Hotel Breakfasts
In a NSFW TikTok video (there’s some bad language), Brandi Augustus tells us that she worked for several hotel chains over a 15-year period and has come to the conclusion that you are very foolish to eat the “free breakfast” that many budget hotel chains offer to guests.
@brandiaugustus Don’t eat the free breakfast! #hotelhacks #nightaudit #hotel
Augustus shares about how one paper towel, a single one, may be used to clean the entire kitchen. She say things like waffle irons and dishes are never really cleaned.
However she says you are safe if you stay at a place like a DoubleTree or another hotel that has a chef actually making breakfast.
I don’t actually doubt that hotel breakfast buffets and the kitchens that prepare them would gross us out if we saw how the food was prepared, stored, reused, and cleaned.
Still, I take the “what we don’t know won’t hurt us” approach. Such an approach is not necessarily rational, but I think weighing the odds of whether I’ll get sick from eating this food is rational. After all, the kitchens at some of the finest restaurants have been exposed as rat-infested dens of hazardous waste.
I don’t think about what sausage is made out of, I just eat it. When food drops on the ground, I pick it up and eat it. If my child’s pacifier drops in the dirt, we brush it off and put it back in her mouth.
That’s just me. Maybe I’ll get salmonella poisoning one day and come to regret this course of action. Maybe I’ll go vegan and not have to worry about it.
But for now, I’m just going to acknowledge the warning from Augustus, keep eating hotel breakfasts, and take my chances.
Life is too short to be a germaphobe!
How do you approach the questionable sanitary conditions of hotel breakfasts and buffets in general?
(image: La Quinta // H/T: View From the Wing)
I’d worry more about the Sysco processed foods often used at these hotels more than I would the hygiene aspect. Half the things they offer are chemical laden and disgusting. The worst being the eggs at the limited service properties which are clearly powdered.
My best friend was just saying today that we should go to Savannah. I said I would prefer a day trip there instead of staying overnight. I just cannot with these hotels.
When I stayed at the Trump in Waikiki at Christmas it was beyond phenomenal. I’m sure it wasn’t anything like the Ritz-Carlton Residences nearby, but it was still gorgeous.
However, most hotels are OUT OF CONTROL:
Reader’s Digest, Oct. 28, 2021: https://www.rd.com/list/gross-things-hotels-do-to-save-money
There are so many articles.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/north-america/united-states/new-york/articles/how-clean-are-your-hotel-bedsheets-inside-edition-disgusting-investigation/
And while the Trump appeared immaculate, I do wonder how it would have faired under a microscope.
Hotels, my least favorite part of travel.
I hope Airbnb’s are better.
They dumped the Trump name and the hotel is now called Ka La’i Waikiki Beach, LXR Hotels & Resorts
Do not blame them
I thought hotel breakfast had been eliminated to save me from dangerous surface transmission.
Have you seen the Let’s Go Brandon wrapping paper? there’s tons on Etsy and more. it’s really the best. it’s perfect for 2021.
I don’t censor comments or even your many COVID-19 links. The only thing I delete is commercial links, crude language, and what I deem to be blasphemy. I didn’t delete your comments because of the content (“Let’s Go Brandon”) but because I don’t want commercial links appearing.
Makes sense, thanks. To be clear though to all, my post did not have language or blasphemy.
@Jerry – I had linked you my favorite version of the wallpaper and my fav Let’s Go Brandon ugly holiday sweater.
To see the wallpaper option I liked, google ‘lets go brandon wrapping paper’ then click Images, then it’s second row, fourth one in, red white and blue.
I hope all of Saint Anthony Fauci’s gifts are wrapped in this.
Trolls just need to keep on trolling I suppose, Matthew.
Let’s go, Aaron.
https://twitter.com/censoredmonii/status/1460060845203988488
https://twitter.com/actforamerica/status/1460127232534454274
Troll, troll, troll your boat…
Stick and stones, yo. sticks and stones.
Careful, I can smell that billy goat on your breath…
are these insults from the 14th century? had to google that one. even UA-NYC does better than this.
Nah, not the 14th century. But your thinking regarding modern society, politics, etc, sure are.
Because I won’t bend to communism and socialism and I’m standing up for freedom? hardly.
Quote Aaron
“Careful, I can smell that billy goat on your breath…”
Can you imagine what Aaron’s breath smells like?
C#ck, sh#t, balls and a combo of all 3 from one dude is a great bet. And that’s before noon…..by 8, it’s a combo of 5 guys. And not the Burger chain.
You really keep bring up gay sex a lot, and you bring up me a lot, which makes us all wonder about your fantasies…
I was just making a joke about the poor state of hotel breakfast. Didn’t mean to send everyone off the rails.
We needed a little excitement on this blog, Jerry. Off the rails is currently more fun than on.
I read this and I immediately thought of Hyatt Place / Courtyard Marriott / Hampton Inn and those type of limited-service properties were substantially all of the food is pre-cooked and simply reheated in the “kitchen” by employees who are not even training in proper food handling. Way different than a buffet inside a restaurant of a full-service property. That said, I’m not sure how one could get sick from a pre-packaged sausage egg muffin, assuming it was kept frozen from the factory. As for the waffle irons, they are hot, so I think bacteria would be killed.
Still, my biggest qualm with these type of breakfasts is the utter lack of quality in the food. I would rather have a very simple continental option (good pastry, brand name greek yogurt, fresh juice, strong coffee) than everything else they offer.
That which does not kill us makes us stronger.
Friedrich Nietzsche
I thought that was Kelly Clarkson.
For me, well “germs” at least, ignorance is bliss. Keep me in the matrix
@Matthew
Going vegan wouldn’t really protect you from pathogens in greens. There have been many large recalls due to e. coli, listeria, salmonella, etc. Eating less meat would probably do you some good, though (not to mention that meat is murder).
@Matthew: if you want to discuss about food offline just email me. I worked my entire career with food companies both as an operator and investor. Just do some web search on the plant based burgers out there. They contain preservatives and are so processed that makes them way worse than a regular beef burger. Thus, don’t think that going vegan will make all problems go away. It is a messy industry.
one hundred percent. the ingredient list is a mile long. I had the impossible burger in Santa Fe once and it was tasty but full of crap. I am plant based and vegetarian but don’t need to be a soy boy, that’s for sure. Eat diversely, mostly plants. Whole foods are best.
The breakfast is bad because it is mostly dead animal parts that are full of carcinogens and are terrible for your health.
“Life is too short to be a germaphobe!”
Your friend Lucky would be aghast at that attitude…
My philosophy is, in roughly 35 years of on-and-off traveling, with stays ranging from fleabag motels on the side of the interstate to the Ritz-Carlton, I can’t recall getting meaningfully sick from a hotel breakfast. It’s just not something I’m
You are supposed to clean waffle makers? Who knew? I’m with Matthew – the world is full of germs, and trying to avoid them entirely may do more harm than good, from an immunity point of view. Just be reasonably careful. Avoid raw chicken and raw eggs.
By the way, I had the impossible burger at the VA lounge in IAD. I didn’t think it was that good.
When I had it it was grilled. tasted good like that. but one and done. never again.
“You are supposed to clean waffle makers? Who knew?”
I don’t know that I ever cleaned mine at home aside from a wipe out with a paper towel. It get scorching hot, that kills all germs.
Home BBQ’s are generally dirty by definition (they rarely are perfectly cleaned) but that’s why I give it a good 20 minutes precook at high heat to kill any germs.
I feel the same about waffle irons: They get SUPER hot so germs aren’t surviving. Yes, the batter may be recycled days in a row and such, but that iron should kill nearly anything that touches it. As long as meats are well cooked, I don’t fret too much about it.
Ironically, what people don’t worry about is more likely scary such as lettuce and e-coli because you can’t kill germs by cooking lettuce. The recent McD’s scare was due to a tomato slice supplier, not the quarter pounder patties.
My wife LOVES the free breakfasts. It really is nice to enjoy in a standard hotel, particularly in the states. Overseas, I prefer to hang out with the locals.
I am opposed to burying your head in the sand. Instead, evaluate risks.
That is the trouble what people are doing with covid. They say they are done with doing any measures. They consider it to be like the common cold. Stupidity
It IS the common cold clown to 99% of the people not already half dead. Just like the flu, it’s nothing to worry about. It’s amazing you people are afraid of your own shadow as well,
It must drive you crazy daily that most of us laugh at you and your life of fear. And we still call out mask wearers as freaks to be avoided.
Yeah, right. Just a cold. Good luck with that…
https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2024/10/4ad3c4ed8367-japan-covid-deaths-14-times-that-of-flu-after-guidelines-lifted.html
Interesting repost. You must either be in Asia, or working very diligently on the new UA qualifications post that we’re all waiting for.
Coming up. Two posts, actually!
She looks well nourished.
Sounds like someone just spreading lies to see how many idiots fall for it m
I tend to believe her…
Bottom line is that any hotel that’s got a kitchen where items are cooked on a stovetop or baked in a commercial oven are subject to health department inspections, just like any other “restaurant”. Places putting out prepackaged or “make your own” items (like waffles) are typically not subject to such inspections.
Truthfully, most commercial kitchens subject to inspections are cleaner where it counts than most home kitchens, although there are always exceptions to that generalization.
But the TikTok vid does rightfully highlight that where there’s no oversight, there’s generally no compliance with even the most basic standards. On the other hand, as long as food items are packaged, I’d general have no issue with them, inasmuch as the reason these facilities aren’t inspected is because they provide relatively few vectors for food borne pathogens.
What a silly “tip”. Social media is so specious.