My mom and I ate at John’s Restaurant in Palm Desert on Monday.
We both have been sick ever since.
Actually, my mom started feeling better on Friday, but I’m still sick.
My mom ordered a burger, and I ordered a burrito.
The two foods have in common:
Lettuce, tomato, and avocado.
I’m guessing the lettuce was bad because lettuce goes bad pretty easily, and I ate a whole lot more lettuce than my mom did.
I had headaches over and over again for the first day or two.
I’m not going to mention the other symptom that my mom and I had, though you can probably guess.
I haven’t experienced food poisoning in many years, and I’ve never had it this bad before.
My family loves that restaurant, but I don’t know if we feel brave enough to go back for more.
Has anyone on BLF had food poisoning lately, and how long did you wait to go back to the same restaurant? 
Several more things the dishes have in common: the cooks, cookware and utensils, water etc. Food borne diseases are more likely caused by contamination rather than the ingredients going bad. Usually when restaurant food gives me the trots unrelated to IBS, depending on the overall quality I either never go back or go back after some months to reassess.
Hmm…
I didn’t think of that!
Thanks for the insight. 
I would never ho back to that restaurant. I would warn other people via a review and or on social media. Lastly I would write the owner a letter expressing your dissatisfaction.
For food to make you sick, it has to be pretty bad as your body has built in systems to fight it. If your body cant win the fight, that means the owner of the restaurant was grossly negligent in either the food preparation or the food storage or both.
Its completely unacceptable.
My bets are on a cook suffering from an infection that spreads via the fecal-oral route. They absolutely shouldn’t be showing up to their job involving handling other people’s food and the management should have systems in place that prevent that but it’s impossible to catch all cases, especially since sometimes the infection might be asymptomatic. There could be a kitchen nightmares type of scenario going on behind the scenes but it’s not the only (and IMO even the most likely) option.
If you like the restaurant and this is the first time, you could raise the issue with management in a constructive manner, let them know what happened and ask them to investigate, they may have started using a new supplier for example.
I vote for the contamination-by-chef scenario. I mean most food can even look awful, but are still safe to eat. And in a diner the selling qualities are looks and smell. So if it looks good and it smells good, I think it was not the food that expired or so. There has to be some source walking around who a/ has a bug and generously gives it away for free or b/ has touched some food that was really beyond eating and cross contaminated other food.
I was affiliated with a restaurant some time ago that had an ‘A’ rating. I can tell you it was filthy behind the scenes. The rating means nothing.
I’d try to never go back to a place that made me sick for multiple days. If it was just a little sickness the next morning and done then I’d probably give a second try.
Thinking back, I can’t remember a single instance of making myself sick from my own cooking. It’s always from eating out.
There are 1000 ways to get sick in a restaurant. Improper food storage, leaving food out too long, undercooking food, purchasing bad food from wholesaler, rodents, insects, staff not washing hands after using bathroom, dirty utensils, staff purposely sabotaging food (yes it happens.)
And so many more ways.
Yeah, I’ve never gotten this sick from bad food before.
In every other case, it’s been pretty minor.
Also, I’ve never gotten sick from food at home, either prepared by myself or others.
It’s always when I go out to eat, though usually it’s not a real problem like this time.
By the way, I am feeling better, but we’ll see how I sleep (somewhat soon) and how I feel tomorrow. 
Yeh, you gotta have warm raw chicken on a rack dripping chicken-juice onto a salad right next to a garbage bin to get nicked enough points to bring it down from A to B.
Got it years ago from a frozen TV dinner. (que the ZZ Top tune)
Marie Callender’s Chicken, Cheese, and Salmonella dinner.
There was a recall, but only found out about it when it was too late.
Hobo Joe’s in Socorro NM used to be famous, like 40 years ago, among local geologists.
30m down the road and you’d be puking your guts out. The toilets were always nasty from the results of the food.
All the Best,
Jeff
Whenever I go out to eat, I just ask for the salmonella on the side, and then, like, not eat it.
Without submitting a stool sample, you will not be able to determine the source. Knowing which bacterium is involved will help determine the source, otherwise it is just a guessing game.
Also, some bacteria take up to 72 hours before symptoms show so it may not be the restaurant. Again without knowing the bacterium you do not know the incubation period range and without that you cannot determine the source.
People always blame the last thing they ate, not always the case.
Assuming that what you and your mom experienced truly was food poisoning, you should have contacted the restaurant as soon as possible so that the owner or manager could investigate, especially if anyone else had also reported issues. Without doing at least that much, whatever caused your symptoms will not only remain a mystery, it could delay appropriate medical treatment in the event your symptoms continue.
Whatever the cause, I sincerely hope you feel better soon!
This is why you never eat lettuce
Lettuce only exists to transfer Ranch/Blue Cheese/ thousand Island, dressing to the mouth.
I believe the correct thing is to report the incident to the local health department. They may be able to determine the cause. If it is restaurant hygiene then all customers benefit. If it was a problem with contamination on purchased lettuce or ground beef, for example, that too may benefit many other people. The restaurant will not be told who the report came from.
I just submitted a complaint with Riverside County Department of Environmental Health. 