Chef Fights Off Knife-Wielding Thief with Soup Ladle

When you're selecting a soup ladle, it's important to choose one that has a hooked end and a long, angled handle. The hook will keep it from slipping into your stockpot, and the handle will make for an easier, more even-handed pour. That long handle also makes it easier to swing, Louisville slugger style, if an armed robber tries to steal from your restaurant.

On January 4, a man in an orange hoodie and a black facemask pushed through the door of the Chen's Garden restaurant in Brooklyn and pulled a long knife on one of the employees before trying to climb over the counter. As he was launching himself toward the cash register, he couldn't have imagined what would happen next: the kitchen staff ran out of the back of the restaurant, ladles blazing. The two workers swung their utensils at him, before one even grabbed a stool to potentially throw at him. The robber got the message, running back out the door. The entire terrifying ordeal took less than 20 seconds.

"I turned around and saw the guy … and I picked up my knife," owner Yan Lin told the New York Daily News. "I didn't want him to jump over the counter, so I decided to fight back."

The cook, Liu Chun, is the one who wielded a serious ladle and reached for a stool as well. That robber is lucky that the two of them didn't use the rest of their kitchen arsenal as, well, an actual arsenal. "We don't only have knives, but we have hot oil," she told the news outlet. "If I had thought about it, I would have poured the oil on him. I don't want to hurt anybody. But don't come (back)."

The hoodied robber has yet to be caught and is believed to be the suspect in a number of other robberies in the same neighborhood. In December, the NYPD believe that he robbed a combination KFC/Taco Bell of $900 and picked up another $320 by holding up a Dunkin' Donuts. Less than an hour before his failed attempt at Chun's Garden, he allegedly robbed a Baskin-Robbins of $533.

The NYPD are continuing to search for him, but they have nothing but grainy surveillance video to go on. Until he's caught, be careful, restaurant staffers. And don't be afraid to carry a big ladle.