Hah, well thank you. The guy who knocked the bottle off was so apologetic, and I was like "Oh, this is such a good story, I'm not even mad."

I’m sorry you got a face full of hot sauce, but the idea of a hot sauce silhouette on the ceiling will never not be badass. You’re tough as nails. 

I once ate at the Brooklyn location because my friend’s roommate bartended there and promised us free drinks. I remember really enjoying a coconut/shrimp fried rice dish (it was absurdly savory) and the Phil Khallins (like Tom Kha soup in cocktail form)... But everything with Sichuan peppercorns in it tasted so…

So much Sichuan pepper. It’s like the business model was: Lure them in with our kitschy Twin Peaks decor, confuse them with our mouth-numbing dishes, keep them here with overpriced Tsing Taos that they will keep ordering to try to get mouth feeling back.

Fellow healthcare worker here. I was once told during my first year that it was expected that there would be a lot of crying in my first year. Not because of the patients or the actual work. Just the supervisors. I remember thinking, “Why the fuck do you work in a place where making people cry for no reason has been…

I’m a bit confused by it, but judging by “After Bowien and other restaurant owners insisted Dimayuga” it seems like power wasn’t entirely his—I’m not suggesting anything like not-guilt, but it might be that power was distributed, my guess is based on investment?

I feel like there’s a really good sketch to be made about about a hapless cook who through other people’s mistakes keeps getting blasted in the face with hot sauce.

Yeah, I think some people like Amanda Cohen and Eric Ripert had kind of pushed back against it. There’s a lot of talk about kitchens being a meritocracy, but when you’re selecting for “tolerance of abuse” rather than “cooking ability”... not so much.

Work with the public; can confirm.

I’ve never understood how folks accept this behavior as normal in the workplace. I was frustrated my first time cooking on a line and flung a waffle batter ladle in anger. Then later when I was cleaning up my mess as I was the only employee it dawned on me how stupid that was. While I’ve never worked in a starred…

Probably not the same but

I think people buy into the justifications- being told you need to be tough to work in the industry so the culture is there to toughen you up and demand excellence. Then you keep the same culture because that’s how you were forged and you paid your dues.

I can’t get the scene where the dishwasher was scalded with oil out of my head. It turns my stomach 

fwiw, I work in food, and I know a lot of people who went the other way. Like, I came up with pans getting thrown at me, but I was also like “I will never do that.”

“Now he took the red-hot spoon and placed it directly on the man’s arm, searing his skin and causing him to cry out in pain.”

Unpopular opinion: Mission Chinese was not that good and staff not that knowledgeable or engaged. 

Like I said, maybe they were just too sensitive about it.”

God grant me the patience and grace of the man branded with the spoon, because I would be in jail right now for using the same spoon to scoop out Le’s eyes.

And though Bowien says that he is “truly fucking sorry,” the post also says that he was “terrified” of Angela Dimayuga, his employee, and that many of the accusers in the Grub Street report were “active participants” in the culture at Mission Chinese.

“It sucks I made money off this industry,” Bowien writes, “I guess it will be cleansing to hear I walk away with nothing but debt.”