Guy's American Kitchen - NY Times

This is the most negative review I have read in the NY Times in many years. It couldn't have happened to a more annoying "guy":
 
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/14/dining/reviews/restaurant-review-guys-american-kitchen-bar-in-times-square.html?ref=todayspaper

Seems like he's become a victim of his own success, coasting along in his red Camaro and his name. I quit watching DDD because the song never changes only the locale. I can only put up with so many of his vapid homilys ...like that's money dude.

Thanks for sharing.  That is perhaps the best restaurant review on the planet.

Seeing "super melty cheese" on the menu is enough to make me head for the door.
 
When did "melty" become an adjective, anyway?  For that matter, when did it even become a word?

So now the times is competing with the NY Observer?
 
http://www.roadfood.com/F...=714794&high=guy's
 
I find that as lame as the restaurant seems to be.

It[ sure does sound like the times likes Guy.
 
Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

I love that review.  It's so bad, it makes me want to find a terrible restaurant locally that I can review!
 
That said, it's a large restaurant in Times Square.  Expectations should be low.  Very low.

That was a fun read!

No love for a guy Guy, who for better or worse has been busy putting road food on the map ? I'll bet the chains are glad to hear rood foodies dislike Guy.

Guy is just a artificial food promoter creation out to capitalize on his celebrity while he can. He did not create Diners, Dives & Drive-ins or have any previous knowledge or expertise about that genre that I can detect. He was just a hired personality. I suspect the restaurant is a lot truer to his persona, but you can't drive around in red Cadillacs promoting chain-like schlock and hope to get viewers.

The bad review was just being discussed on Fox Business Channel.

Davydd


Guy is just a artificial food promoter creation out to capitalize on his celebrity while he can. He did not create Diners, Dives & Drive-ins or have any previous knowledge or expertise about that genre that I can detect. He was just a hired personality. I suspect the restaurant is a lot truer to his persona, but you can't drive around in red Cadillacs promoting chain-like schlock and hope to get viewers.

Maybe so but every time his show airs people get hungry, not for fancy but for road food.
Good or bad he's good for business. 

Like I said I don't watch the guy much anymore, but he did turn me on to a place that is probably one of the best roadfood places around. I have been working on and off at the Naval Station in Maypory for some years and it wasn't until he featured Singleton's Fish Market RIGHT OUTSIDE THE BACK GATE!!! So we've been going ever since. So I guess my point is that while bordering on obnoxious any more, he does visit some good places. He's featured some of the food trucks here in Austin put them over the top.

Sounds more like a rant than a professional review.  If I was going to ask that many questions, I would make sure somebody was there to give me the answers.  Unless I wanted to disguise my review, as an interview, to disguise my rant. 
 
Review:  Poor  Just another hack who likes to hears himself talk.
 
I get it, Guy is a very dislikeable guy.  And his restaurant is like a chain gone bad.  
 
And yes, like it or not, Guy promotes RF.

As I was reading the review, I became more interested in trying to find a sentence that was not a question than in reading the review itself.
 
Just as the reviewer never got his Vegas fries, I never found a declarative sentence.

Something tells me, Tom Wells didn't have an enjoyable meal at Guy's new restaurant. Ya, think?

I can't say I like him or dislike him because I don't care, I sure would love to visit all the places I have seen on his shows. One thing is for sure, both he and the food places featured benefited. I don't care about his new place because it isn't road food.  

By the way if I was the editor of that paper this crap would have never been printed. It was very unprofessional to say the least.

Guy responds!

Only one thing to do at this point.  Let's get BillyBoy to do a professional RF Type review.

I think he is getting to big for himself............he likes certain foods, but he hasnt and doesnt realize what these people are serving. He is simply putting his name on a restaurant.

joerogo


Sounds more like a rant than a professional review.  If I was going to ask that many questions, I would make sure somebody was there to give me the answers.  Unless I wanted to disguise my review, as an interview, to disguise my rant. 

Review:  Poor  Just another hack who likes to hears himself talk.

I get it, Guy is a very dislikeable guy.  And his restaurant is like a chain gone bad.  

And yes, like it or not, Guy promotes RF.

 
I agree with joerogo's post.   Like him or love him, Guy Fieri has put many roadfood places on the map for many people who would not have heard of those places.  Arguably, some of those places were saved from going under by giving them publicity.  I have found out about a few of those places myself because of the DDD show.   Yeah, his "schtick" can be a bit annoying, and it gets old.  But, the fact remains;  Guy Fieri has introduced roadfood type places to the many of the masses that would have not otherwise known about many places.   
As for the the review of his place in Times Square, it was done very unprofessionally.  The food might, in fact, be not very good at all.   That still does not call for such an unprofessional review.
 
You can bet that NY food snobs like Pete Wells would also rip on many of our beloved roadfood joints.  (NO, I am not saying that Fieri's new restaurant is a roadfood type place.)  I am saying that this reviewer is acting like an elitist snob.  You can imagine how he would rip on the "cleanliness" and "decor" of many roadfood joints.   Chances are that Pete Wells has never darkened the door of a real BBQ joint in his life.  He wouldn't want to be seen with all those "hicks and hayseeds". 
 
 
Glenn
 
 

Fieri was on the Today show and he defended his restaurant very professionally.  He felt like the reviewer had an agendae because he felt it was impossible for anyone to find every thing they served to be bad from the food, dessert and drink.  I agree.
 
If I were in NYC, I would want to try it and form my own opinion.  I believe I understood him to say that he had eleven restaurants with seven in CA and the other four in NY.
 
Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN 

The review clearly got people on the site. That's something the Times has been having a lot of trouble doing lately, so I suspect that the editors are very happy with the review.
 
Bart

bartl


The review clearly got people on the site. That's something the Times has been having a lot of trouble doing lately, so I suspect that the editors are very happy with the review.

Bart

I don't think that's true. They lost some traffic when they instituted a paywall earlier this year but they still have more traffic than any other newspaper in the world.

I find it absurd for anyone to suggest that Fieri doesn't do roadfood on his DDD show. That's all he's about on that program.

I like the man, I like his show, I wish he would come to my place. Since his show started, many folks have asked me if has been here, maybe someday, I hope!

A chef/restaurateur responding to a bad review by saying that the writer MUST have had an agenda, and that it couldn't possibly have been all about the reviewer's actual experience in the restaurant is, in my opinion, pathetic.  
 
 

What's pathetic is that the review was as much an attack to belittle Fieri as it was to review his restaurant.  It wasn't just about his experience in the restaurant, as the review was used to make Fieri look as stupid as possible. 

saps


What's pathetic is that the review was as much an attack to belittle Fieri as it was to review his restaurant.  It wasn't just about his experience in the restaurant, as the review was used to make Fieri look as stupid as possible. 

 
Well, that's just an opinion, and I disagree. The reviewer (who happens to have 5 James Beard awards for journalism) visited the restaurant 4 times to form his opinions.  He's a well known and respected journalist.  What evidence is there that he had any hidden agenda? I happen to think that the review was fantastically written.  Others think he's a hack.  To each his own.