A Food Network original Reality Show (2012-), starring Willie Degel, a restauranteur. The shows employs hidden cameras, watching the happenings of a restaurant, with the help of the owner.
Restaurant Stakeout provides examples of the following tropes:
- Big Brother Is Watching: the all-present surveillance cameras in Wilie's restaurant chains.
- Black-and-Grey Morality: It is taken as completely acceptible that Willy, by right of ownership and proprietor status, has the absolute right to monitor all his employees 24/7 with intrusive surveillance cameras - even when there appears to be no need for them and no justification. The Orwellian implications of this are never questioned and it is accepted as perfectly natural.
- Hired for Their Looks: In one episode, Willie suspected that the general manager of a restaurant partook in this. He had two undercover women attempt job interviews for waitressing with this manager, and confirmed Willie's suspicions when he hired the young, inexperienced teenage girl over the older, but vastly more qualified woman. He even went so far as attempting to flirt with her.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: The staff at the Red Room in New Rochester was so dead-set in its ways that everyone was quick to snap back at Willie at any suggestion he tried to make, with a few of them ready to defend their teammates, effectively nullifying anything Willie said. After trying several times to provide advice and getting attacked every time, Willie realized It Is Beyond Saving and walked right out, the owners deciding to sell off the property and kitchen equipment.
- Shout-Out: The Nikko's episode features the microwave being taken out to the alley, and destroyed with baseball bats, Office Space-style.
