Small confession: I occasionally check in on Guy Fieri's show on the Food Network, not because I'm a particular fan of the spiky-haired, wear-the-sunglasses-on-the-back-of-the-head cooking personality, but because the places he checks out of "Diners, Drive-ins and Dives" are the kinds of local eateries it's fun to stumble across. But I have to doubt his food judgment after reading this savage New York Times review -- hell, it's an evisceration -- of his new Times Square Restaurant. It's also savagely funny:
What exactly about a small salad with four or five miniature croutons makes Guy’s Famous Big Bite Caesar (a) big (b) famous or (c) Guy’s, in any meaningful sense?
Were you struck by how very far from awesome the Awesome Pretzel Chicken Tenders are? If you hadn’t come up with the recipe yourself, would you ever guess that the shiny tissue of breading that exudes grease onto the plate contains either pretzels or smoked almonds? Did you discern any buttermilk or brine in the white meat, or did you think it tasted like chewy air?
Why is one of the few things on your menu that can be eaten without fear or regret — a lunch-only sandwich of chopped soy-glazed pork with coleslaw and cucumbers — called a Roasted Pork Bahn Mi, when it resembles that item about as much as you resemble Emily Dickinson?
When you have a second, Mr. Fieri, would you see what happened to the black bean and roasted squash soup we ordered?
Hey, did you try that blue drink, the one that glows like nuclear waste? The watermelon margarita? Any idea why it tastes like some combination of radiator fluid and formaldehyde?
And on and on, in that same vicious vein. Everybody in the building seems to have been reading this review today. One comment I heard was, "I bet the Times critic had been salivating over the chance to take down the Food Network personaility a notch or two, but I also have no doubt that every word is true." Ouch.
