Cellar Rat

My Life in the Restaurant Underbelly

By: Hannah Selinger

Narrated by: Hannah Selinger

In this brutally honest memoir, Hannah Selinger chronicles the rise and fall of her career in the restaurant business, unraveling an emotional journey through the joys of fine fine dining, the allure and danger of power, and what it takes to walk away from a career you love when it no longer serves you.

As Hannah Selinger will tell you, to be a good restaurant employee is to be invisible. At the height of her career as a server and then sommelier at some of New York’s most famed dining institutions, Selinger was the hand that folded your napkin while you were in the bathroom, the employee silently slipping into the night through a side door after serving meals worth more than her rent.

During her tenure, Selinger rubbed shoulders with David Chang, Bobby Flay, Johnny Iuzzini, and countless other food celebrities of the early 2000’s. Her position allowed her access to a life she never expected; the lavish parties, the tasting courses, the wildly expensive wines—the rare world we see romanticized in countless movies and television shows. But the thing about being invisible is that people forget you’re there, and most act differently when they think no one is looking.

In Cellar Rat, Selinger documents her journey, beginning with the gritty hometown pub where she fell in love with the industry and ending with her final post serving celebrities at the Hamptons classic Nick & Toni’s.

Town & Country's Best Books of Spring 2025 | Kirkus Reviews's Most Anticipated Nonfiction of Spring 2025 | Amazon's Best Books of the Month | American Writers Museum's Staff Picks What happens when a career you love doesn’t love you back?

Critic reviews

“A brutally honest, courageous, and powerful personal look into the dark side of the restaurant world. Hannah shows us how the imbalance of power rests on a manipulative system that willfully neglects the people it employs and makes you question if the industry truly can and wants to change for the better.”—Nik Sharma, Author of Veg-Table and The Flavor Equation

“With unflinching candor and clear-eyed wisdom, Hannah Selinger compresses the thrill, toxicity, and terror of working in restaurants into a remarkably open-hearted memoir. Cellar Rat should be essential reading for anyone who cares about this industry and the people who keep it running."—Mayukh Sen, author of Taste Makers

“If you're going to write about the reality of working in restaurants in a way that's anywhere near accurate, you need two things: The courage to burn bridges and keen social observation skills and the ability to translate those into engaging prose. Hannah Selinger has both, as she demonstrates with finesse, humor, and sensitivity in Cellar Rat. I admire her commitment to truth-telling as much as I do her appreciation for the seemingly trivial but ultimately revealing details that are necessary for capturing the glamor, decadence, volatility, and abusiveness that define the dining industry.”—Charlotte Druckman, author of Women on Food

"In Cellar Rat, Hannah Selinger chronicles a time when chefs were thought to be rock stars and dining out was a show—but she tells the truth of living strange hours, dealing with misogyny, and encountering rage in an industry that never loves its workers back. Yet beauty is woven throughout, in prose that mimics the propulsive energy of a busy shift."
—Alicia Kennedy, author of No Meat Required

You can’t shush the truth

I have never worked in fine dining however I work in wine sales and have always appreciated the backbone of such fascinating machine. Her story captured me and I enjoyed the ride. Can’t wait for the next book.

Unresolved anger at so many people

The anger was palpable in the reader’s voice. While the narrative is compelling, I found I couldn’t finish the book as it made me feel anxious for the protagonist over and over again. I’ve lived in this crazy world of restaurant dining but I didn’t put up with the situations presented here. And I have just as tough a childhood. This was a downer.

Hannah tells it like it is

I was in food service during college and beyond, many years ago, and I could relate to everything in the book. She was very bold to write this book and I give her much credit. I relived my past only to realize that most of restaurant life has not changed. I learned so much and am nostalgic about my experiences, but it also was not for me. To stay in the business, especially as a woman takes not only grit, but compartmentalization of parts of the everyday routine.

Such a compelling narrative

This book has stuck with me, weeks after I finished it. I certainly appreciated it from the perspective of someone who also worked in restaurants in the mid-to-late aughts, but I truly think anyone could enjoy it. She pulls off the magical feat of writing a super juicy, compelling story in gorgeous prose.

Refreshingly not another romanticized recollection of restaurant life

I’ll start by saying that she is an excellent writer, crafting sentences and structuring the narrative in a compelling manner. I aspire to that level.
As well, I do not share the opinion of others who question her credibility. This was her recounting of her experience. So, story gets full marks.
I struggle with her reading of it. The level of detachment in delivery reminds us that she is reading a story, not telling it. The inflection seemingly dismissed her very own testimony.