The Stepmother’s Counterattack: Raising a Child in a Bygone Era
Chapter 516 - 515 Punishment

Chapter 516: Chapter 515 Punishment

"Little sister, are you feeling any better? Have some water."

In the private room, seeing Shen Mingzhu’s pale face from vomiting, Shen Xiangnan hurriedly brought her a cup of hot tea.

Shen Mingzhu took the tea to rinse her mouth and instructed the shift leader, Ma Xiaoping, to ensure the private room and kitchen were well-guarded.

"Don’t touch anything on this table or in the kitchen. Wait for me to handle it when I get back."

Ma Xiaoping nodded hastily in agreement.

Shen Mingzhu put down the teacup and took Shen Xiangnan to Zhenwei Restaurant across the street.

After arriving, Shen Mingzhu led Shen Xiangnan to apologize to guests at the three tables that had reservations, offering them not only a sumptuous lunch but also compensating each customer with four dining vouchers valued at fifty each.

From now on at Shenji, for every hundred spent, one could use a voucher.

The vast majority of customers were understanding and could sympathize with the difficulties of doing business, accepting Shen Mingzhu’s apologies.

There were a few customers who were unforgiving, accusing Shenji of lacking integrity and cursing that Shenji would shut down sooner or later, to which Shen Mingzhu responded with a smile to each one.

Making money is hard, just like eating shit.

Being scolded doesn’t result in losing a piece of flesh.

After dealing with the customers and returning to Shenji, Shen Mingzhu first checked the private room and the kitchen, finding everything as she had ordered it, then she summoned all the employees for a review meeting.

"I have said since the first day Shenji opened that the ingredients must be fresh, particularly the livestock, river delicacies, and seafood slaughtered in the restaurant, which must be lively before slaughtering; sick or dead ones must not be served."

After Shen Mingzhu finished speaking, she called on Julie, "In today’s situation, when the customer just arrived and the main dish, the king crab, was dead, how should it have been handled?"

"Apologize to the customer immediately and explain the situation. If the customer is willing to wait, call the seafood shop to deliver right away. If the customer doesn’t want to wait, offer to switch to another dish or help arrange dining at another restaurant."

Shen Mingzhu signaled Shen Xiangnan to step forward, "Do you think Manager Julie’s handling procedure is correct?"

Shen Xiangnan nodded, his face showing shame, "Correct."

"Since you know this is the correct solution, why did you choose the wrong way to respond?"

Shen Xiangnan lowered his head.

"Speak! Knowing it was a dead crab, why did you serve it to the customers to eat?"

Shen Xiangnan’s face was full of shame, "King crabs are so expensive, I thought it would be a waste to throw them away. I figured since they had just died, they should still be edible."

Hearing this, Shen Mingzhu immediately ordered Julie to steam all of the remaining king crabs.

She then took Shen Xiangnan and the other employees to the private room.

"If you think it’s a waste, then you eat up all the dishes on this table."

Shen Xiangnan didn’t dare to disobey Shen Mingzhu’s order, starting with a spoonful of crab roe soup.

After just the first bite, he vomited with a "wow"

It was not only extremely fishy but also had a foul and bitter taste.

He had never tasted such awful crab roe soup.

Shen Mingzhu glared at him coldly, "Eat it, no throwing up. If you do throw up, you’ll have to lick it up and swallow it!"

Shen Xiangnan clenched his teeth and, fighting against the fishiness and foulness, shoveled the crab roe soup into his mouth spoonful by spoonful. The ordeal was so painful that his eyes bulged slightly, giving him a ferocious look.

After he finished, Shen Mingzhu pointed to the steamed garlic crab legs on the table, "Continue."

Shen Xiangnan ate mechanically, like a machine.

After the crab legs, there was fried crab meat, and then crab congee to eat.

By the end, Shen Xiangnan was vomiting uncontrollably into the trash can, just like Shen Mingzhu earlier.

Watching this, the other employees felt a shared distress and showed sympathy.

At this moment, Julie brought in the steamed king crab.

Three king crabs were steamed, filling three large plates to the brim.

Shen Mingzhu motioned Julie to divide the three plates of king crab into fifteen equal portions, one for each employee.

"Executive Chef Shen and I have already eaten one, the remaining three will be for you all to taste. Everyone, please taste and see what dead crab tastes like."

The employees exchanged looks, their faces revealing little emotion.

Probably all thinking that the taste might be slightly off, not as fresh and sweet, but how bad could it possibly be?

However, once they actually tasted it, they realized they had underestimated the situation.

The flesh of the dead crab tasted like tofu dregs, not firm or springy at all, with a strong putrid smell that was absolutely nauseating.

Only after she saw that every employee had tasted the dead crab meat did Shen Mingzhu continue speaking.

"Customers spend over three hundred yuan to dine in our restaurant, and what they get is something worse than dog shit. If you were in their shoes, how would you feel? You’d be so angry you might want to smash up the place!"

The private room was silent as a grave, with everyone afraid to even breathe too loudly.

Julie stepped forward to replace Shen Mingzhu in explaining the hazards of dead seafood to the staff.

"Aside from the poor taste, seafood deteriorates rapidly after death and produces toxic substances. These toxins can cause serious harm to the human body; at best causing vomiting and diarrhea, at worst endangering lives."

Hearing this, the employees’ complexions changed.

Shen Mingzhu spoke coldly, "You’re all worried about your own health. Your lives matter, don’t the lives of the customers who spend money at our establishment matter too?"

"Serving such food to customers, what’s the difference between that and committing robbery and endangering lives? If a customer falls ill after eating, who can take responsibility?"

"Shen Xiangnan, can you take responsibility?"

Shen Xiangnan shook his head in defeat.

Shen Mingzhu looked at him, "Out of four king crabs, two were dead. When you received the goods, were you sleepwalking? Why didn’t you check them thoroughly?"

Shen Xiangnan’s lips quivered, his expression full of remorse.

"I always check carefully before. Just today, they said they were in a hurry to deliver to the next place, and I thought there had been no issues before, so I didn’t look closely."

Shen Mingzhu maintained a cold expression, not wasting any words as she took out a calculator to calculate today’s losses.

The cost price for four king crabs was 826 yuan, other side dishes and ingredients cost 80 yuan, and meals for three tables at Zhenwei Restaurant cost 569 yuan. Including compensatory vouchers, the total loss amounted to 4075 yuan.

"Today’s loss is equivalent to all the earnings of this establishment since its opening. In other words, two months’ work for nothing!"

Shen Mingzhu tossed the calculator in front of Shen Xiangnan with a smack.

"Next, I announce the punishment for today. The performance bonuses and benefits for this month of all staff will be canceled; only the base salary will be paid out. Anyone with objections, stand up now!"

The floor manager, Ma Xiaoling, looked around and stood up.

"President Shen, the front-of-house staff aren’t aware of what happens in the kitchen; our job is to provide good service to the customers. It doesn’t seem fair to penalize everyone when they haven’t made a mistake."

Shen Mingzhu looked at the other servers, "Raise your hand if you share this opinion."

One by one, three or four people raised their hands.

Among them were those responsible for the cash register and for cleaning.

The rest who didn’t raise their hands appeared more or less dissatisfied.

Shen Mingzhu then turned to Julie, "Manager Julie, do you think the front-of-house staff should be penalized?"

"They should."

"Give your reason."