Hot Nacho lawsuit

They serve molten cheese in a paper cup? WTF? That is NOT nachos around here. Or have I been missing out some how?
 
casebro said:
They serve molten cheese in a paper cup? WTF? That is NOT nachos around here. Or have I been missing out some how?
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Technically, a restaurant service cup is "paper," but it's not a Dixie Cup. :D Think Starbucks coffee cup type of "paper," or better, think of those shorter, wider, paper "soup cups" you might find at convenience stores. It's very heavy paper, like a kind of thin cardboard, usually coated.

Like this:
http://www.google.com/products/cata...og_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CGMQ8wIwAA#
 
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IIRC, under our local hygiene regulations, food cooked and then kept hot should be maintained at a temperature greater than 63°C. At that temperature skin can be scalded in as little as a second.

Now assuming that similar* minimum temperatures for serving food exist in the jurisdiction of this case, then this statement by their attorney, Cahill, whilst not necessarily incorrect, needs to be qualified:

"Nobody has a reasonable expectation that it be served at a temperature causing immediate and severe burns on contact."

Food, immediately prior to being plated would have to have been held at a temperature which could cause immediate burns on contact. Now plating up, would cause the temperature slightly to drop, and transferring the plates from counter to table would further decrease the heat, but possibly not enough to prevent burns should accidental contact with skin occur. Therefore, I think that any reasonably educated person should have an expectation that hot food, immediately upon being served, may cause burns on contact.

That said, if food is being held at temperatures significantly greater than necessary and which increases the risk of burns by a great degree then steps might need to be taken to address that.

But for me, the critical factor in this case is the alleged wobbly chair.

* - say, within two-three degrees.
 
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slingblade said:
Technically, a restaurant service cup is "paper," but it's not a Dixie Cup. :D Think Starbucks coffee cup type of "paper," or better, think of those shorter, wider, paper "soup cups" you might find at convenience stores. It's very heavy paper, like a kind of thin cardboard, usually coated.

Like this:
http://www.google.com/products/cata...og_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CGMQ8wIwAA#
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It wasn't the cup I was questioning, it was the molten cheese. How do they serve their nachos at disney land? A bowl of chips, and molten cheese in a separate cup? I've never seen it served that way around here.
 
casebro said:
It wasn't the cup I was questioning, it was the molten cheese. How do they serve their nachos at disney land? A bowl of chips, and molten cheese in a separate cup? I've never seen it served that way around here.
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It is common for mass produced low quality nachos.
 
I'm unfamiliar with children and the science of their upbringing, but is that kid the right age to be eating nachos at all? I thought humanspawn was fed on liquids obtained from the female parent for a while, and then moved on to semisolid slimes available commercially.

Also, I cynically suspect the child seized the cup and attempted to drink from it, and the parents then decided to invent a story of "splashing" and wobbling chairs and grassy knolls in an effort to cash in from Disney and Big Nacho.
 
Food is hot.

If I spilled a bowl of soup that I cooked at home on myself it could be hot enough to scar. It's not uncommon. Hell, Nacho sauce sticks to you like napalm.

That said, I think if a customer walked into the restaurant and hit the kid over the head with a chicken wing then Disney would probably still be partially liable for not providing proper safety.

I think it's a moot point all around. The kid was injured in a business, the business' liability insurance is going to pay. No matter the situation the business is partially responsible.

-Maus
 
Alferd_Packer said:
- The burn looks bad, but are there any people here with the medical experience to actually judge just how serious those burns actually are?
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That is at least a 2nd degree burn based on the blistering.
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But in the article it claims that there will be 'permanent scaring', which doesn't always happen in 2nd degree burns.

And like I said in the previous post... we don't know just how hot the food actually was, whether the temperature was excessively hot (other posters have pointed out that there might be health regulations for keeping temperatures high), or how much effect the viscosity of the cheese affects anything (e.g. how much faster it would cause burns when compared to, for example, hot water/coffee).

I'd just not have people make a response based on emotion (OMG! Injured child with a bad-looking picture, burned by an evil international mega-corp!), but instead base their response on facts (which are, at this point in time, lacking).
 
casebro said:
It wasn't the cup I was questioning, it was the molten cheese. How do they serve their nachos at disney land? A bowl of chips, and molten cheese in a separate cup? I've never seen it served that way around here.
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Oh, my bad, sorry for misunderstanding.

I've seen it served separately when it's meant to be "to go," as leaving hot cheese on chips in a container makes the chips soggy.
 
Slightly off-topic, but I used to work in a bowling alley. The cafe there had a nacho cheese dispenser, which had not been used in some time. You want to have seen the residue that was stuck in those tubes.
 
sadhatter said:
Get a group of 100 males, and ask them if they would be willing to put their wang into the substance.
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Oh, Dear Ed! Not this stupid argument again!

slingblade said:
The article says "paper cup." Drinking cup? Or restaurant service cup, like a small dish or bowl?
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I was thinking more of those folded-paper condiment cups.


KoihimeNakamura said:
Er? Most gas stations have a dispenser. Like..

this one: http://www.google.com/products/cata...log_result&ct=image&resnum=1&ved=0CDUQ8gIwAA#

(It's what I see used at all the local stores)
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I think that definitely falls under the category of "mass produced low quality nachos".

commandlinegamer said:
Slightly off-topic, but I used to work in a bowling alley. The cafe there had a nacho cheese dispenser, which had not been used in some time. You want to have seen the residue that was stuck in those tubes.
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No. I don't. :p
 
Alferd_Packer said:
The suit is for damages, not to make something "harmless."

Food that is hot enough to cause 2nd degree burns on contact is too hot to be eaten.

Disney is liable for the injuries to the child.

They will settle out of court.
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Lots of food is too hot to be eaten when it is first made. I could take you into any pizza place in the town, and if you were to jam your face into it right after it was made, you would come out quite a bit like that.

Food is usually too hot to eat when it gets to you, it is a fact of life. If not no one would have invented blowing on food.
 
A Laughing Baby said:
If the fork was laying on the floor where he could have landed on it, then yes, I would say that is in fact a justified suit for negligence. Also, they're suing for damages, not to make the cheese less hot or harmless.

Off-topic, but that's the second time you've brought up the "genitalia as temperature gauge" test. Strange fixation.
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It is a very good gauge, it is one of the most damageable places in the human body, right up there with the face. I could have used dump the cheese on your face as well, but genitalia has more punch. You say weird fixation, i say most appropriate gauge of whether your average person really knows almost any food can be dangerous.

As well considering the original hot coffee suit was about genital damage, it fits in well with the established standard of where food causes the most damage.
 
ZirconBlue said:
Oh, Dear Ed! Not this stupid argument again!



I was thinking more of those folded-paper condiment cups.




I think that definitely falls under the category of "mass produced low quality nachos".



No. I don't. :p
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Enlighten me as to why my argument is stupid. To me the hot food lawsuits always involve the most sensitive places on the human body and this wierd type of argument from ignorance that " Food shouldn't be hot enough to hurt.". If anyone really believed that your average person would have no problem sticking their johnson, or face into hot food. But strangely i think you would only find a small number of sexual fetishists willing to try the experiment.

So please, explain to me how that is a silly argument when people are constantly parroting " food shouldn't be that hot. ". To me it simply shows how people are using argumentum ad anus, where people will say anything to win an argument, usually pulled from an unpleasant orifice.
 
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