Fancy Table Service Falls Apart When Waiter’s Shirt Catches on Fire

Lately, it feels like more and more restaurants are going out of their way to go viral online, à la Salt Bae, whether it’s by serving food in a theatrical manner or designing dishes to appeal to the Instagram algorithm.

Sometimes, though, it’s still possible for a restaurant to go viral the old-fashioned way: by mistake. In the viral video below, a maitre d of sorts pours oil onto a tower of meat perched atop a burning flame. But once the top of the meat tower is ablaze, it knocks the pot holding the oil open and the pot catches fire, too. The maitre d jumps back and flings the now-lit oil onto a fellow waiter, the trolley holding the meat tower and an unoccupied table nearby.

The waiter, who at this point is on fire, runs away, tearing off his flaming shirt, only for his undershirt to also be on fire, before running out the restaurant’s back door.

Given the inferno unfolding, people in the comments were in awe of the cameraman’s skills, with one person writing, “for the Camera person. They shot that like a Spielberg movie. Bravo.” Another added, “Comp the cameraman’s bill. Shooting video like he directed the whole thing.”

Somehow, though, this isn’t the strangest viral video of a restaurant employee on fire that the internet has witnessed this year. That honor belongs to this video of a man deliberately setting his hand on fire and using the blaze to flambé the food. There are culinary implements for that, my guy — but that would be far less likely to go viral, wouldn’t it?