You can never be totally sure how clean a kitchen is, unless itâs your own. And this one looks really McSgusting.
A McDonaldâs employee from Laplace, Louisiana lost his job earlier this month after tweeting unsavory photos of his workplace, he told HuffPost.
Nick, who asked to be identified only by his first name, first posted a photo of a âdrip trayâ he says is from his restaurantâs ice cream machine.
Nick posted another photo to show the icky item wasnât from the grillâs grease trap, which is a typically messy spot in fast-food kitchens.
He followed with more lowlights from his establishment, including goo-covered floors...
... and made headlines from Teen Vogue to Cosmopolitan when his image of the ice cream drip tray went viral.
âObviously, we never get chunks of gunk in our ice cream,â noted FoodBeast, âbut you never want to see photos like that coming out of a restaurant.â
Nick says scenes like these were the norm at the store location where he began work in March. Managers are supposed to clean the ice cream drip tray, he said, but he never saw his manager do it. And he says the photos of the floor were taken before the restaurantâs maintenance worker quit.
âSometimes my coworkers would drop the food and put it back on the bun,â Nick told HuffPost. âIâve seen it happen several times.â
Of course, this doesnât reflect conditions at all McDonaldâs restaurants, and weâve seen gross photos come out of restaurants from fast-food to famous landmarks. Just last week, video of rodents inside a Texas Chipotle went viral. But as Teen Vogue pointed out, the photos are a reminder that sometimes kitchens arenât as sanitary as weâd like to think. And isolated or not, the incident will certainly make us think twice before our next bite on the town.
It also provided the opportunity for some classic food service trash talk.
The dirty drip tray at Nickâs restaurant is not a reflection of company standards, a McDonaldâs spokeswoman told HuffPost in a statement.
âWe are committed to running great restaurants that provide our customers with high quality food, service and a clean environment,â the statement reads. âThis is a part of our soft serve equipment that does not come into contact with any food and is required to undergo regular and timely cleaning.â
Louisiana Department of Health records show two McDonaldâs in Laplace. The most recent health inspections in online records, from 2015, show one location had three âcritical correctedâ infractions, including cross-contamination of raw and ready-to-eat food, improper storage of toxic chemicals and unclean surfaces and utensils.
Nick wouldnât say which location employed him. He was fired for posting the photos, he said, but heâs okay with it.
âI feel like I did nothing wrong,â he said. âI sacrificed my job to show people what theyâre really eating.â
This story has been updated with a comment from McDonaldâs.