The mystery of the vegan sausage
Once I was taking an order from a female customer, she asked for the *something* sausage & mash but I couldn’t hear her properly so I asked, ‘did you say the vegetarian sausage & mash?’, to which she replied ‘vegetarian? Gross, I wouldn’t eat that.’
I served her the standard sausage & mash then halfway through the meal went over to check everything was okay. She told me it was the meatiest vegan sausage she had ever had.
Lo and behold her fury when I told her not a single thing on the plate was vegan. Who says ‘gross’ to vegetarian if you are vegan!
- To take part in The Morning Advertiser’s Barstool Confessions series please email rebecca.weller@wrbm.com. Stories will always be published anonymously.
Locked inn for a long night
I finished a very calm Wednesday evening shift, closed and locked up the pub to return home for a lovely slumber - only to be rudely awakened at 7AM by a call from the general manager.
She asked how was the close, were the tips balanced etc. and I said it was all fine. After seeing I had nothing else to add, she said: ‘Great, what about the customer you left asleep in the toilets?’
Apparently we didn’t check the bathrooms and said customer woke up at 3AM, tried to escape the now-locked pub and failed, instead deciding to enjoy the free bar opportunity.
Hundreds of pounds’ worth of stock was drunk or smashed up by the time they triggered the door alarm while trying to escape again.
Cash is king
I once spent an entire evening pretending our pub’s ancient card machine was ‘under maintenance’ simply because I couldn’t face doing the end‑of‑day Z‑read again after it jammed for the third night in a row.
Every time someone tried to pay by card, I’d sigh dramatically, tap it a few times, and say, “Yeah, sorry, it’s the network again…”. The machine wasn’t broken at all - I just was.
The funniest part? Customers kept sympathising with me about “technology being rubbish these days.” I let them.
It bought me the easiest shift I’ve had in years…until the next morning, when the manager discovered we’d done 98% of our takings in cash and thought it was a “strange regional trend”. I’m still pretending I have no idea why.
The accidental mixologist
It’d been a long shift when a couple came in and sat down, clearly on a first date and both trying too hard.
The guy confidently said: “I’ll have your best signature cocktail.”
We don’t have signature cocktails, we have laminated menus from 2019 and one Espresso Martini. But I nodded slowly, like a mixologist who has trained for years and years. “Of course.”
I go to the back and stare at the bottles, grab gin, elderflower liqueur, lemon juice and a splash of prosecco. Shake it. Strain it. Garnish with a dehydrated orange we absolutely did not dehydrate ourselves and hand it over.
He takes a sip, pauses, looks at his date and says “This is incredible.” She sips it. “Oh my god.” They start discussing the ‘complexity’. Complexity of what, I think?
I panicked when they asked the name of the cocktail and the first thing that came to mind was ‘The Velvet Currant’. I have no idea why I chose that name.
They ordered another round and came back two weeks later asking if I was working because “only you make it right.” I have no written recipe. It changes every time. Somehow, so far, no one has noticed.
A photo with Oasis singer? Definitely, maybe...
A few years ago, we got an email from Liam Gallagher’s girlfriend asking if they could book a table for Mother’s Day for Liam, his mum and his girlfriend. We have never taken a booking, it’s always been a first come, first served pub.
This was politely explained in an email, we simply told them to arrive early as we would be opening at 11.45am to ease the pressure. At 11.30am we were just finishing setting up ready for service and the queue was forming nicely outside the pub and there in the queue was none other than Liam Gallagher with his mum and girlfriend!
So, we opened the door and they took a corner table. All was well. We had an elderly jazz duo playing that day and the pub was packed.
One of our team, who is a rather proper young lady, very politely asked Liam if he would mind having a photo with the duo. As it happened, neither of them had heard of Liam but then he hadn’t heard of them either!
The Oasis frontman without hesitation agreed and our team member took the photo. She then asked if it would be ok to put the photo on the website and he turned to her in typical Gallagher style and said ‘you can tattoo it on your arse for all I care, love’!
She simply smiled, blushed, and enthusiastically thanked ‘Mr Gallagher’.
Accidents can happen… but twice?!
I had just started my shift behind the bar in a busy London pub when something happened but I didn’t know anything about it at the time.
There were some builders in and some older regulars – it wasn’t mad busy because it was just coming up to lunchtime.
I noticed one the regulars had his shoes off – and his socks too – then I noticed by the power of sight and smell that he has clearly trodden in some dog dirt.
He carried on drinking with his couple of friends but the smell was, frankly, too much.
I saw the barefooted one put his shoes back on and went to the toilets but all this seemed to do was spread the smell and mess around further and it wasn’t until he emerged from the toilet, I found out what had happened.
My colleague went over to the trio and said to the offender that this was the second time it had happened, and clearly none of our local canines were to blame for the crime.
He’d obviously made the mess himself but had decided it wasn’t going to stop him from continuing to drink his pint and didn’t give a monkeys about the pub, the staff or even any other customers as he wallowed in his own filth.
We had to eject him but it took a lot of persuasion and none of us were brave enough to physically ‘help’ him leave the pub.
It’s a tough one because he’s a regular and he has been back since and, if he has soiled himself since, none of us have noticed so we’re giving him a pass – and plenty of space too.
Still don’t know what happened to those socks though…
Risking life and limb in the name of football
When I was watching England back in the day in a pub and Beckham scored that famous goal from the corner, a girl sat at the bar threw her arms up and yelled ‘go on Becks!’
Her left arm was prosthetic and it flew off, hit the ceiling and then came crashing down on a whole table of pints. I still laugh when I think of it.
There was an immediate shocked silence, she looked mortified and then a second later everyone carried on celebrating. Quite the night in the end...
A very rare visitor
During Covid, when there was no inside dining, during a hot bank holiday Monday lunch, a small deer got hit crossing the road and ran into the bar (door was open), dragging its leg and a trail of blood behind it.
The bar staff went to see what happened and it ran into the conservatory restaurant. As the restaurant manager and chef went to try and catch it, it did a runner, jumping into a pane of glass and breaking its front leg, sliding down the window howling.
The diners on the other side of the glass got a real surprise, one of them rushed in to exclaim ‘someone call a vet’...our chef replied ‘I think you need a gamekeeper’.
Subsequently the animal was humanely put out of its misery and a three page letter of complaint ensued from the customer regarding our treatment of animals. We didn’t even get any sausages out of it.
Rookie error - how I ended up buying the regiment a round twice
As a free trade rep looking after the army messes I once had a meeting with the Regimental Sergeant Major in an empty Depot Parachute Regiment Mess.
Having talked business together he was showing me round the mess when we came across a large beautifully polished bell. He told me it had a distinguishable ring and to appreciate it you needed to ring it as loud as possible, so I did.
Soldiers appeared from everywhere and it resulted in me having to buy a round costing more than £125, which in the 80’s was a lot of beer.
A similar trick was played in the Depot Para Mess at Pirbright where they have a hanging the brick ceremony with lots of local people and suppliers being invited.
I had never been before and made the mistake of saying why do you hang a brick from the ceiling. Result was another £100 plus bar bill.
