TGI Friday's Is Taking Action After Muslim Woman Claims Waiters Put Bacon in Her Straw

Employees of a TGI Friday's in Garland, Texas, will undergo special training after a Muslim woman claims she found bacon in her straw earlier this month.

Nicole Queen charges that her waiter initially seemed irritated when she asked to have bacon removed from a Cobb salad she ordered. Muslims, of course, are not permitted to eat pork. Later, when another waiter later asked her if she wanted a refill of her drink in a to-go cup, she answered affirmatively.

But when Queen made it out to the parking lot, she claims she found bacon inside the straw, WFAA-TV reports. Believing that the forbidden food was intentionally placed, she confronted the manager, but left the location on the day of the incident without a resolution.

"The manager just reacted to me like it was all an accident, he didn’t even try to appear sensitive to what I was saying and said there was no way it was done purposely," Queen said in an interview published on The Muslim Voice blog following the incident. "I wish it was all just an accident but there is just no way that it’s possible."

Rather than keep quiet, Queen made the incident public, leading TGI Friday's to officially respond and take action. The company subsequently said in a statement that it is "very sorry for her experience" and apologized that she was not treated with respect.

"Although we cannot go back and undo her experience, we can and will use this as an opportunity to reinforce the values that guide everyone who works at Fridays," the restaurant's statement reads. "Among those values are integrity, which stresses that we 'treat people with dignity, respect and honesty."

Following the bacon debacle, every employee at the Garland location will now go through a special training session in an effort to discuss what happened, review the company's values and ensure that future guests do not face the same problems.

Queen's website describes her as a former Christian and party girl who converted to Islam. She is now an activist, photographer and public speaker. Throughout the ordeal she said she had no intention of suing TGI Friday's and maintained that she merely wanted to right a discriminatory wrong.

(H/T: WFAA-TV)

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