Many American families have been to an Olive Garden at least once in their lives. It's become an Americanized Italian food staple that's affordable, tasty, and serves large portions, allowing for plenty of leftovers.
Although some might want to deny it now, going to Olive Garden as a child was a true delicacy. Let's not forget about the unlimited soup of choice and dressing-drenched salad, the creamy Chicken Fettuccini Alfredo or the Tour of Italy, and, of course, the Olive Garden breadsticks drenched in butter that one definitely couldn't pass up on.
💰💸 Don’t miss the move: SIGN UP for TheStreet’s FREE Daily newsletter 💰💸
No other restaurant could ever match Olive Garden's iconic unlimited cheese grater, which never ran out, or its bottomless raspberry lemonade, which contained a day's worth of sugar in one glass.
Related: Iconic Mac & Cheese favorite faces bizarre lawsuit
Although the quality is nowhere near that of a Michelin-starred restaurant, it's a top choice for big families who don't want to break the bank when going out for a meal on a weekend night.
An Olive Garden customer finds a "concerning" message on a breadstick
In mid-November, a customer dining at Olive Garden (DRI) claimed she was served a breadstick with a series of letters and numbers printed on it.
She backed up her claim by posting a photo of the strange discovery to her TikTok feed with the caption, "Guys, why are there letters on my Olive Garden breadstick?" The photo consisted of a half-eaten breadstick with the letters "O" and "K" and the number six clearly printed on it.
View the original article to see embedded media.
The social media post instantly went viral, accumulating millions of views and thousands of comments explaining the finding.
One user commented: "They're from frozen bags, so the label must've like gotten on that one."
Former Olive Garden servers and bartenders also supported the claim, with one commenting, "Looks like the coding on the plastic bags they come in with the package date."
Other users began sharing similar experiences with other chain restaurants, including one about finding a price tag at the bottom of an egg bite from Starbucks (SBUX) .
When Olive Garden learned of this social media post, it quickly commented on it through the restaurant's TikTok, saying it was "concerned" about the finding. It also provided her with an email so she could give them her name and the location where she was dining when she found the message on the breadstick.
Related: A popular breakfast restaurant announces big change, delights fans
The customer posted a follow-up TikTok later that same day with a screenshot of an email she allegedly received from Olive Garden, in which she was awarded a $100 gift card for the unusual finding.
Various users praised Olive Garden for its customer service, with one user commenting, "This is how things should be taken care of," and another adding, "Now that's good service."
Previous unusual incidents with Olive Garden breadsticks
As unusual as this may sound, this is not the first time a similar incident has happened to Olive Garden customers.
One customer commented on the TikTok post, saying this happened to her as a kid when Olive Garden used to serve pizza. The ink from the receipt had transferred to the cheese, so the restaurant gave them free dessert.
More Restaurant & Food Industry News:
- Taco Bell menu changes avoid troubling fast-food trend
- Coca-Cola announces it's bringing back a nostalgic beverage
- Starbucks makes a major move many coffee drinkers will love
Twelve years ago, a Reddit user also posted a phorm of an alleged Olive Garden breadstick with letters and numbers printed on it.
A Reddit user commented that this happened twice while they were working at the Olive Garden and stated that "both times it was a result of the breadsticks being taken out of the bags they arrive in and set on top of the bag while they wait in line to be buttered up and thrown in the oven."
They also added that the oven where the breadsticks are warmed up ed next to the soup pot, which has steam coming out of it and could cause the ink to transfer.
Another user backed up the claim by commenting: "...The breadsticks come frozen in a bag with numbers printed on them and a lot of the time the ink would rub off onto the bread and make black marks and sometimes even full markings like this. The person toasting and buttering the breadsticks didn't catch it or was too lazy and didn't care."
Related: Veteran fund manager sees world of pain coming for stocks
