Toddler Served Sangria Instead of OJ at Olive Garden – Another Babe Served Booze!
Olive Garden Served Sangria to Toddler
It seems that it would be a rare occurrence for a restaurant to serve alcohol to not just a minor but a baby or a toddler. But just this week there has been not one but two cases discovered where the very young were being served a booze filled beverage. The first was the case of a baby being served a margarita at Applebee’s, and on the heels of that scandal it turns out a 2-year-old was given a glass of sangria at the Olive Garden.
It started innocently enough, mom Jill Van Heest, of central Florida, had ordered her son Nikolai an orange juice at the popular Italian food chain Olive Garden. The beverage was served to him in a plastic cup and the promptly boy drank most of it. Shortly after, the toddler reportedly got rowdy and noisy. Like many mother’s of toddlers, she though he was just doing that ‘terrible twos’ thing, until the waiter and the manger of the restaurant apparently came to her table and confessed that they had accidently given her son a sangria – a mix of orange juice, pineapple juice and white wine.
She told ABC Action News, “How disorganized can your bar be that you serve something with alcohol to a child in a cup – with a lid nonetheless – and not recognize it for half an hour?” She continued describing the event saying, “I kinda started to tell him, ‘You can’t be loud, we’re at a restaurant,’ and trying to tell him how a good two-year-old should act. But I couldn’t discipline him because he wasn’t acting out… he was drunk!”
The mom rushed her son to the hospital where she had to tell the ER staff that her two-year-old was drunk. The doctors gave him an IV drip.
Olive Garden is taking responsibility for what happened with their spokesman saying:
‘This was an extremely regrettable accident caused by the failure of an employee to follow our strict operating procedures. We have absolutely no tolerance for failure to follow our operating procedures and we took swift, appropriate action to deal with this situation. We take the responsibility that comes with serving alcohol seriously.
We offer our sincerest apologies to the family of the child, and to all of our guests, whose trust we work so hard to earn. We recognize that trust has been jeopardized by this isolated event, and we are focused on ensuring our guests experience the high standards of service that they’ve come to expect from us.”
Do you think these chains should be punished for their mistake? Either through a lawsuit or some kind of fine?
Photo: Flickr Sherina
No. But the chain OUGHT to reimburse the families for ny medical care they sought. For us, we have a 10K deductible, so that ER visit would be quite expensive. I guess if they weren’t willing to re-reimburse, I’d have to sue to recover that money, plus the expenses associated with the suit itself.
Thought the insurance company would likely subrogate it, LOL!
Should these chains be punished? Yes.
First, Darden’s insurance should cover any type of medical cost associated with the child.
Second, there should be a heavy fine for serving not just a minor alcohol. As an establishment they risk losing their liquor license for pouring the child the drink.
I know that Darden has very high standards and strict policies and procedures to help minimize situations like this.
Man, I spent so much time/energy trying to get served when I was 18-19-20y/o. Who knew all I had to do was order a kid’s drink?!
If you’ve ever worked at a restaurant, you know that juice is kept in the bar. I’m impressed that the staff came forward. I’d like to see restaurants with bars move towards single serving juice–cans, boxes, and bottles. Who knows how old that juice is anyway…when was the last time YOU ordered a screwdriver?
this story is SAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’m guessing this has happened more often than not, but these incidents have now been brought to the attention of the public more. Maybe all the restaurants that serve alcohol need to have at least one LCB official on site to oversee the serving of alcohol.
Ok, so as someone with inside insight to OG operating procedure, they need to cover their ass with more than the parents and the public. The OG Sangria is a mix. Simple juice and sugar, to have wine mixed with it as it is served. So, either this bartender took the time to pour both the wine and the Sangria mix into this kids cup or they were not following their own operating procedure.
Honestly, it sounds like malicious intent to me. Like someone was having a bad day and thought it’d be funny. He/she HAD to add the wine into that cup with the juice mix – somehow that just does not sound accidental to me. Obviously, the person working the bar or whoever mixed those drinks should be fired. Not only is serving alcoholic beverages in a “to-go” style cup illegal and NEVER done, but to put that in an obvious child’s cup?? That takes more than having a tired/bad day to accomplish. No forgiveness for those so called accidents – people handling and distributing alcohol have a higher responsibility than those who do not. Obviously the restaurant should also pay for medical expenses (and the meal if you ask me). Guess I’ll stick to ordering milk for my daughter at restaurants!
Here’s what I’ve recently heard from several people who have serving experience at chain restaurants—Its common for servers to drink out of those opaque, lidded kid’s cups behind the bar, as a way to sneak booze on their shift. So the waiters in these cases may have picked up or been handed the wrong “kiddie cup.” Of course no restaurant is ever going to admit that’s what happened.
Never even occurred to me before to check my kid’s OJ before she drinks it.
The restaurant should absolutely pay the medical bills! If it were my child I’d try to press criminal charges along with a lawsuit. We hardly ever take our 3-year-old to restaurants that serve alcohol because the combination of dim lighting and the usual bar/restaurant background noise scares him. He prefers brightly-lit establishments that include a juice box with their kids’ meals. But next time we take him someplace with a liquor license I am tasting his juice first!