Okay, I just read through the latest post that one of my favorite food bloggers www.amateurgourmet.com has put up about what we do. I believe very much what he writes, mostly because I've eaten at a lot of the restaurants that he's been to, at least while he was still living in Atlanta. There's a realness that can only be gained by experiencing what he has experienced. Why should you care about what he has to say, or what we have to say, or for that matter what anyone in the ethos of the internet has to say? Well....you shouldn't, or at least you don't have to. There is something about maybe the writing style, the voice, that you like and maybe you've experienced some of the same experiences that we have and what we're saying seems real and true.
Well, I believe that the restaurant reviews and the writing in general on this site is very truthful. The restaurant reviews are a big deal to me, mostly due to my 11 years in the industry living the lifestyle of one that lives and dies by reviews and critiques.
Within the industry you constantly preach to your underlings that they are only as good as the last dish that they've served. You constantly end up telling people that work themselves into the ground on a regular basis that they need to be doing more, that they need to be working harder, that they have to be more perfect. 'There are thousands of other restaurants here, we have to be better than all of them'. I've lived that quote, I've told that quote...and if you have the right staff that is working for you this is absolutely true. At the same time, occasionally you just aren't 'on', you just can't get everything just perfect.
For the true reviewer you always go to a restaurant more than once. Maybe you got there on a night that things just weren't perfect? Maybe the cook that was working on your meal was not on? Everyone makes mistakes, and occasionally restaurants do too. If after more than one occasion things don't seem any better, then you can write an honest review of a place.
Since I was working on the receiving end of these reviews for years, I know what it's like to get a review from someone that just didn't get what you were trying to do. You take the information that the reviewer did provide and try to distill it down to exactly what that person's experience was like and make improvements based on that. Being on the other side of that writing reviews I know exactly what is going on that has thrown something off, or has just created a concept that is so lackluster that everyone must know about it. Sometimes the reviewer just hated you and isn't going to get what you were trying to do with the concept that you're working within. Sometimes it's just simply that expectations weren't met...and there's nothing that can really be done to fix that.
Just so that you can gain a bit more perspective on food blogging and chefs, please check out these pieces from famous chefs. http://eater.com/archives/2007/06/why_i_hate_food.php
http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/story?section=sci_tech&id=5388017
http://nymag.com/daily/food/2007/05/batali_and_bourdain_argue_over_adam_platt_the_egg_thief_and_much_more.html
Please, keep in mind that in the end, there are people behind all of the work that you're either witnessing(eating at a restaurant, or reading on a blog), or experiencing(at a restaurant, being entertained somehow). Take all with a grain of salt, and try to find your own truth in all that you experience.
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