I was just reading this MSN article about 10 restaurant secrets. Some were pretty obvious and others not as much. Either way, it’s good to know if you like to eat out a lot.

The article summarized:

1. Everything is rigged in the restaurant to get you to spend more, including the menu, lighting, colors, etc. For example, they’ll list the most profitable dishes first and bury the least profitable one somewhere in the middle.
2. Waiters will go to work sick. They are usually not making much and can’t afford to stay home from work. Stats say 58% of restaurant workers go to work sick!
3. Markups at restaurants are very high. Yes, your coke only costs the restaurant about 15 to 20 cents!
4. More and more restaurants have cameras now so don’t think about stiffing the check. They are also there to prevent employee theft of wine bottles and such.
5. Be careful of cheap substitutes when ordering seafood. Out of 24 US cities, there was a 50% chance that you did not get the fish that you ordered. Another easy scam is to label crabcakes as “Maryland-style” versus Maryland. If they are “style”, then it wasn’t made from crabs from the Chesapeake Bay.
6. Reservations are not always a guarantee. Most places will overbook and count on a certain number of no shows.
7. Specials sometimes aren’t so special but instead make use of the day before’s leftovers.
8. Restaurants have no reservations in adding tons of butter and calorie-heavy addons to your food. Restaurant meals average 1000 to 1500 calories!
9. Your waiter/waitress doesn’t always get all of your tip. Many restaurants practice in using a tip pool where all of the night’s tips are divided amongst the people working in the restaurant including sometimes the management!
10. Never eat out on a monday, it’s mostly the weekend’s leftovers.

Click here to read the full article.