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In case you are noting businesses never to patronize again, @infatuationATX keeps a tally of restaurants willing to kill people to open at 25% capacity, which is not enough to keep their business afloat anyway, so just killin people for fun i guess https://bit.ly/35uGVgR
Imagine killing your grandmother to eat at Baby A's
Big disappointment on the list is @CWCoffeeHouse, which just generally seems like the kind of place that wouldn’t expose its community to a fatal disease for profit, but here we are
In general, the restaurants that have reopened in Austin so they can share coronavirus with their employees and customers are some of the city’s worst, so that’s something
like competition is stiff but @guerostacobar has been fighting for the title of worst tex-mex for a while
like competition is stiff but @guerostacobar has been fighting for the title of worst tex-mex for a while
Baby A’s has been inedible since time immemorial, while Bill Miller Bar-B-Q, owned by one of the world’s great Trumpist douchebags anyway, is amazingly not just embarrassed to be serving people at any time, let alone during a global pandemic
I was once served a raw chicken sandwich at @EatDrinkDocs, so I guess they’re assuming anyone willing to eat there is already taking their life in their hands, but of course still happy to put employees at risk
Then there’s @ElArroyo_ATX. While beloved because 95 percent of their funny signs do not include rape jokes, this place was already surviving solely on everyone being too drunk to remember what their food tastes like
You can also sit and eat at @gourdough if you want one of your last meals to include the worst fuckin donuts you’ve ever had
You know @HatCreekBurgers was already a filthy nightmare because when they announced reopening, they bragged that they were going to start (START!) cleaning the playground three times a day
For many years, @hopdoddy has had lines out the door for their overpriced burgers, now you can add “incubate virus for two weeks, kill grandma for a sandwich” to your Hopdoddy time investment calculator
Lonesome Dove: not even an Austin restaurant, just a place for @cheftimlove to make sure dozens more of his employees have to choose between a paycheck and their families’ safety
Mama Fu’s: a crime, but also a restaurant
Sadly @MaudiesTXMex has been serving truly tragic Tex-Mex for a long time and getting a pass I guess because of their Austin icon status but your meal will not be improved by the flavor of “laying in a hospital hallway hoping I win the ventilator lottery"
It was already a rough scene at @RudysBBQ but now you can get a side of suffocating to death in the ICU with your flappy brisket
I mean this with entire seriousness, @SaltySow is hands down one of the top five worst restaurants I have ever eaten at and that includes a combination Chinese buffet, pizza-by-the-slice joint, and smoothie shop in rural East Texas
In conclusion, fuck absolutely every single restaurant owner on this list, not just the bad ones I named here
There are, of course, restaurants that it will break my heart to never patronize again. They are:
- @mimadres
- @andiamoitaliano
- @DonJuanTaco
- @LaPalapaAustin
- @PolvosAustin
- Texas Chili Parlor
But I can’t justify giving my business to places putting folks in danger.
- @mimadres
- @andiamoitaliano
- @DonJuanTaco
- @LaPalapaAustin
- @PolvosAustin
- Texas Chili Parlor
But I can’t justify giving my business to places putting folks in danger.
This is fun! @ItalicATX will also be risking the lives of their employees and employees’ families to serve food to … twelve people
YOU CAN’T EAT FOOD WITH A MASK ON, WHICH MEANS YOU CAN’T SERVE PEOPLE IN DINING ROOMS SAFELY
YOU FUCKIN DING-DONGS
http://bit.ly/3c5RU2G
YOU CAN’T EAT FOOD WITH A MASK ON, WHICH MEANS YOU CAN’T SERVE PEOPLE IN DINING ROOMS SAFELY
YOU FUCKIN DING-DONGS
http://bit.ly/3c5RU2G
Contrast w this extremely responsible update from Home Slice, which let the public know an employee tested positive, they’re shutting down to clean, and will reopen when it’s safe — for curbside and delivery. This is the *limit* of safety. Not dining in. https://bit.ly/2YGe0Fi
You can close as soon as you know someone is sick, but you can’t close before you know they’re sick, and you can’t eat with a fucking mask on, so how it is even a goddamned question of offering dine-in service with “safety” in mind is entirely the fuck beyond me.
Exciting Austin restaurant update! McGuire Moorman Hospitality is reopening dine-in service at Perla’s ( https://bit.ly/3benTwz ) and Clark’s Oyster Bar ( https://bit.ly/2zg80bE ) if you wanna eat some seafood and put service industry workers in danger and maybe kill some grandmas
Let’s talk about restaurants open for dine-in who say they have your health and safety in mind, and what that could possibly mean in practice.
An employee at Thai Fresh — which never opened for dine in and began requiring face masks 4/4 — tested COVID positive. They “fell sick” the last day they were at work, 4/30. Resto closed 5/7, when the COVID positive test result came back. https://bit.ly/3dtvyIS
The staffer who got sick is a presumed “community spread” case, i.e., could have gotten it from anyone, maybe an asymptomatic person.
Regardless, whatever precautions the resto took (and it certainly sounds like they were taking as much precaution as any open food business could, and actively decided no dine-in), someone was sick and positive at work, working with others who came to work for another week.
This is what it means to have "health and safety" in mind — operating without being able to know who is asymptomatic but positive, with a week of lag time between exposure and shutter.
What resto owner can tell diners + employees w a straight face: This is safe?
What resto owner can tell diners + employees w a straight face: This is safe?
It’s worse with dine-in. Because you can’t eat with a face mask on. Here’s how Clark’s Oyster Bar, part of one of Austin’s most recognizable/successful restaurant groups, explains their commitment to health and safety for diners: don’t worry about wearing your mask at the table.
If you’ve been inside Clark’s, you know neither the dining room nor the patio are particularly large. If you stayed in your seat, you could probably stay 6 feet from another person. But anyone carrying food, going to the bathroom, walking in or out, etc., can’t stay 6 feet apart.
So Clark’s is saying one thing: We have your health and safety top of mind and are doing everything we can to keep you safe!
And doing another thing: You don’t have to wear your mask while you’re seated.
Inside, this distinction is meaningless.
And doing another thing: You don’t have to wear your mask while you’re seated.
Inside, this distinction is meaningless.
People who want to believe this is about saving a business or an economy claim, however, that this is necessary! We can’t just not work! What of these small business owners?????
Most businesses can’t run at 25% capacity, which means what they’re doing instead is not saving their business *while* putting employees in danger.
Clark’s might be different, IDK. McGuire Moorman is highly successful and Larry McGuire has never hurt for money in his life.
Clark’s might be different, IDK. McGuire Moorman is highly successful and Larry McGuire has never hurt for money in his life.
Larry McGuire will be fine forever (assuming he doesn’t die of COVID because he’s being exposed at one of his properties, which is certainly possible) but the employees whose lives he is risking — and the families they go home to — well, they’re another question.
Larry McGuire’s got a solid safety net for a million reasons; if his employees become permanently unable to work or die because of COVID, or their family members do, there will always be more people to hire. This is what, I guess, makes opening at 25% capacity attractive to him.
Maybe Larry doesn't know people who have been sick for two months straight. I do. Maybe Larry doesn't know people who’ve lost loved ones to COVID. I do.
But you shouldn't have to know people who are, or be, directly impacted to know better than to open a dine-in restaurant.
But you shouldn't have to know people who are, or be, directly impacted to know better than to open a dine-in restaurant.
Beyond this, you can pretty safely assume that while some restaurants are doing the right thing — like Thai Fresh, informing public about COVID+ and closed — anybody jazzed about serving dine-in customers at 25% has a strong motivation not to share COVID positives or test.
In Texas, it’s not even *possible* for just anyone to get a test easily — so you can be assured from the get-go that restaurant owners are not able to know with any certainty who is positive unless that person is symptomatic, at which point the only solution is time travel.
tl;dr
Because of inadequate testing and no reliable treatment for COVID, there is currently no way to operate a dine-in restaurant with “health and safety” in mind and many, many people will become sick and some will die, and restaurants will close anyway.
Because of inadequate testing and no reliable treatment for COVID, there is currently no way to operate a dine-in restaurant with “health and safety” in mind and many, many people will become sick and some will die, and restaurants will close anyway.
It’s not just prudent to assume that business owners who have a financial stake in lying to employees and customers about “health and safety” are doing so in order to “reopen” at an unsustainable capacity, it’s absolutely asinine to believe they would do anything but.
Welp you can add Trudy’s to the list of restaurants willing to put their staff in mortal danger to continue going out of business https://www.facebook.com/trudystexmex/photos/a.372582169427492/3225771647441849/?type=3&theater
Here’s a fun trend in restaurants right now: turning off comments on posts announcing reopenings to prevent people from suggesting it’s morally inexcusable to offer dine-in services while we have neither reliable tests nor treatment for COVID https://www.instagram.com/p/CAGI9-7FeT_/
Maybe you see something like this and think “I am fully prepared to risk my grandmother’s life to give money to someone who is so deeply aware that what they’re doing is wrong that they can’t handle even the most mild pushback about it”
maybe!
i sure the fuck don't
maybe!
i sure the fuck don't
Get excited, beer fans! @ScholzGartenATX ( https://bit.ly/3bsnsyM ) and @theabgb ( https://bit.ly/2Wuzdk0 ) are reopening for all you hoppy nerds excited about killing grandma for a fucking pint https://bit.ly/2zDSHK4
One fun thing we haven't talked about yet is how the 25 percent capacity rule doesn't apply to restaurant patios! You can just cram in as many people as you want and tell them you hope they stay six feet apart I'm sure it'll all be fine https://austin.eater.com/2020/4/28/21239666/austin-restaurants-reopened-dining-rooms-coronavirus
It’s a little wild to me that @FREEBIRDS_WB and a couple of poke bowl places have reopened for dine-in service, I mean apart from putting the health of their employees at risk being morally indefensible, it’s not like dining in at counter service restaurants was a major draw?
who out there is like "thank god, i can finally sit in this rickety chair and stare at the parking lot dripping hot sauce all over this greasy table, just like the old times wow”
like if anyone is set up to do even better without dine-in service, it’s poke bowls and burritos
like if anyone is set up to do even better without dine-in service, it’s poke bowls and burritos
Another interesting/terrifying thing about dine-in restaurants (which I noticed because @EaterAustin has good details on logistics on their list of places I will never patronize again https://bit.ly/2Shm6jF ) is how much restaurants are emphasizing use of hand sanitizer, which …
Hand sanitizer is one of those things that makes people feel super good and safe and is in fact not actually going to save you from the fact that the actual legitimate threat is other people breathing, a thing most living people do
To the extent that anyone feels comfortable eating in a restaurant right now, I would guess that they manage to do so by imagining that social distancing is more about touch than anything else — that if you aren’t super close to a “dirty” person who can touch you, you’re fine.
Anyway, you should be cautious of any restaurant that’s reopened for dine-in right now, but especially ones bragging about how much soap/sanitizer they’re using. They’re trying to make you feel comfortable without focusing on what's actually dangerous: being around other people.
They do this because, as you may have gathered from this week-long thread
~*~* there is no way to serve people in a restaurant dining room with anyone’s “health and safety” top of mind ~*~*~
and making you forget that is the point
~*~* there is no way to serve people in a restaurant dining room with anyone’s “health and safety” top of mind ~*~*~
and making you forget that is the point
Oh absolutely. Any place offering take-out and dine-in is a risky mess! https://twitter.com/BuffyBlogs/status/1260944399199989760
