Pork-for-veal swap case raises guilt-by-association, moral issues

Nation's Restaurant News, April 3, 2000 by Alan Liddle

Picture this headline tacked to an imaginary newspaper story about an investigation into whether 10 randomly picked used-car dealers had illegally tampered with odometers: "Ten car dealers found to not roll back odometers."

"Outrageous," you'd probably say, and I'd agree with your reaction.

Even in light of recurrent busts of car dealerships found guilty of rolling back mileage to make old clunkers more attractive to unsuspecting buyers, few of us would deem it appropriate to suspect all reputable car businesses and attempt "gotcha" probes every time a roll-back case arose.

Then what is one to think about the headline "Ten Silicon Valley restaurants pass the veal test," which recently ran atop a story in the San Jose Mercury News in San Jose, Calif.? The article chronicled how the paper's restaurant writer ordered veal dishes at 10 area eateries and submitted them to a laboratory for analysis. The findings: All 10 dishes delivered veal, as advertised.

My first reaction to the headline and the premise of the story was indignation on behalf of the industry. I was aghast at the notion that someone at a major metropolitan newspaper would believe there was a need to test menu accuracy at 10 restaurants and a need to report that, indeed, no fraud was being perpetrated on the public.

On second thought, however, I came to consider the article a service of sorts to all the conscientious operators in the area, if not the nation, now under suspicion because of the actions of one man. The chef at Bella Mia restaurant in San Jose recently generated controversy, civil litigation and potential criminal action with an alleged admission that he had been substituting pork for veal for several years.

This was not said to be a case where a careless restaurant employee, insensitive to some patrons' religious imperatives to avoid eating pork, occasionally permitted pork "contamination" of primarily nonpork dishes. The situation at Bella Mia was alleged to be outright, intentional fraud.

The former chef at Bella Mia has been quoted as saying its owner was unaware of the substitutions, but just what weight that revelation carries in a court of law or the court of public opinion remains to be seen. Far more obvious is the damage the San Jose case has done to other operators' credibility.

Sure, there have been food-substitution scandals in American restaurants in the past 15 years, shark meal for scallops being but one type. All were reprehensible, but few if any I can recall involved pork, the consumption of which, almost everyone knows, is forbidden by several religions. I'm told that pork-for-veal swaps once were fairly commonplace, but none I car recall involved deceptions involving as many people over as long a period as are alleged in the Bella Mia case.

Actions of that kind by a chef would be especially out of line because we supposedly are in the age of truth in advertising and menu. And you would think that the litigious nature of these times and the threat of loss of business and personal assets in court would be more than adequate to backstop the moral shortcomings of anyone even considering a strategy of ongoing deception through stealthy food substitutions.

Yet, despite such legal disincentives, here was a situation where it might be rationalized as a good thing that a newspaper article proclaimed that restaurants-- at least 10 -- are not defrauding their patrons.

Given the near-religious fervor toward food of some diners in the Silicon Valley suburbs of San Jose, such a deception by a misguided chef might be seen as a blasphemous betrayal. In truth, it might be as unsettling as finding the mileage on your newly purchased car was double what you'd been told it was. Both deceptions would be shameful.