The Worst Michelin Starred Restaurant, Ever.

[Wondering Beard]

Linked from Instapundit (https://everywhereist.com/2021/12/bros-restaurant-lecce-we-eat-at-the-worst-michelin-starred-restaurant-ever/)


Some words to tease your palate:

"There is something to be said about a truly disastrous meal, a meal forever indelible in your memory because it’s so uniquely bad, it can only be deemed an achievement. The sort of meal where everyone involved was definitely trying to do something; it’s just not entirely clear what."

"dinner played a role, the same way Godot played a role in Beckett’s eponymous play."

"What followed was a 27-course meal (note that “course” and “meal” and “27” are being used liberally here) which spanned 4.5 hours and made me feel like I was a character in a Dickensian novel. Because – I cannot impart this enough – there was nothing even close to an actual meal served."

"Everything tasted like fish, even the non-fish courses"

[WobblyPossum]

That was the funniest thing I’ve read in weeks and I shared it with a bunch of people.

[Totem Polar]

Outstanding!

[ccmdfd]

Like the Stanford Prison Experiment, but with less Prison and more aspic.

Love it!

[Crawls]

That was hysterical! Thanks for sharing this. I emailed that to a chef friend.

[Joe in PNG]

This is like something you'd see in a sitcom episode about a pretentiously snooty restaurant.

[mtnbkr]

Things like this make me glad I'm too stupid, poor, and uncool to go to a restaurant like this.

Chris

[ccmdfd]

This is like something you'd see in a sitcom episode about a pretentiously snooty restaurant.

Yeah, I could definitely see Seinfeld making something fun out of this.

[Joe in PNG]

Stuff eaten by rich idiots to impress other rich idiots.

It makes sense if you consider that this is a sort of upper class hazing ritual/ initiation- like modern art gallery openings or other unpleasantly tedious slices of essential 1%er life.

[Erik]

Two of the best meals I ever ate were at Michelin starred restaurants in Paris, so in concept (and so far in execution) I'm a fan. That place though...

I got intrigued and googled. It's a real restaurant and the chef published a reply that can be found here:

https://www.today.com/food/brutal-review-michelin-starred-restaurant-bros-goes-viral-t242696

[Shoresy]

Two of the best meals I ever ate were at Michelin starred restaurants in Paris, so in concept (and so far in execution) I'm a fan. That place though...

I got intrigued and googled. It's a real restaurant and the chef published a reply that can be found here:

https://www.today.com/food/brutal-review-michelin-starred-restaurant-bros-goes-viral-t242696

It's hard to tell which one (review or response) provides a more compelling argument to avoid that restaurant.

[Paul D]

The only Michelin starred restaurant I've ever been at was the Ritz in London. It was a layover stay on my way back from Africa. It was nice and the food was good. I had to pack a freakin suit and tie so I could eat in the dining room. The only bullshit was that while eating, I saw a sheik wearing a fucking track suit! Granted, he was going to his own private dining room, be still....

[Yung]

Author's redirect to chef's rebuttal:
https://everywhereist.com/2021/12/what-we-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-food/

[Joe in PNG]

Author's redirect to chef's rebuttal:
https://everywhereist.com/2021/12/what-we-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-food/

Ah, the classic "you just don't understand art, you philistine!" reply loved by all bad & pretentious wannabe artiste everywhere.

[Paul D]

Ah, the classic "you just don't understand art, you philistine!" reply loved by all bad & pretentious wannabe artiste everywhere.

Maybe those tire guys in France won't understand either, and dump their lone star. That would be an artistic masterpiece.

[JRB]

Seems like just the place for a bunch of insufferably sanctimonious skinny rich folks who hate food *and* hate money to take a bunch of selfies.

Guess that keeps me off their guest list. Oh Darn.. Shucks. Dangit. Gosh.

[4RNR]

Seems like just the place for a bunch of insufferably sanctimonious skinny rich folks who hate food *and* hate money to take a bunch of selfies.

Guess that keeps me off their guest list. Oh Darn.. Shucks. Dangit. Gosh.I wouldn't rule out places like that. Obviously this one sounds bad but I've been to one locally where it was a similar idea but with middle eastern food and it was GOOD!

MY sister and I took our parents there for my mom's birthday a few years ago. The basic idea was the same. You get small meals but a lot of them. Each meal was nice and tasty and enough to try but not enough to be a main course, or even an American appetizer yet we were stuffed long before the last meal came out. There was a lot! And a lot of variation. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20211220/2762cf5ea8505e75c3357726c7a20bda.jpg

And that's just a small %. I think we had like 25 meals

Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk

[HeavyDuty]

I wouldn't rule out places like that. Obviously this one sounds bad but I've been to one locally where it was a similar idea but with middle eastern food and it was GOOD!

MY sister and I took our parents there for my mom's birthday a few years ago. The basic idea was the same. You get small meals but a lot of them. Each meal was nice and tasty and enough to try but not enough to be a main course, or even an American appetizer yet we were stuffed long before the last meal came out. There was a lot! And a lot of variation. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20211220/2762cf5ea8505e75c3357726c7a20bda.jpg

And that's just a small %. I think we had like 25 meals

Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk

That reminds me of a great little hole in the wall Korean place I used to go for Teeokguk - the banchan were over the top, and so, so good. This was about six and a half bucks:

81608

[4RNR]

That reminds me of a great little hole in the wall Korean place I used to go for Teeokguk - the banchan were over the top, and so, so good. This was about six and a half bucks:

81608This was way more than $6.50 but same idea. Lots of small dishes

Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk

[hufnagel]

Somehow, reading both the review and the "chef"'s response, has me feeling the same as after a couple beers.

[JRB]

I wouldn't rule out places like that. Obviously this one sounds bad but I've been to one locally where it was a similar idea but with middle eastern food and it was GOOD!

MY sister and I took our parents there for my mom's birthday a few years ago. The basic idea was the same. You get small meals but a lot of them. Each meal was nice and tasty and enough to try but not enough to be a main course, or even an American appetizer yet we were stuffed long before the last meal came out. There was a lot! And a lot of variation. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20211220/2762cf5ea8505e75c3357726c7a20bda.jpg

And that's just a small %. I think we had like 25 meals

Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk

Looks like my attempt at humor was a swing and a miss. :) My quip was pointed at that particular establishment and the nonsense experienced by the writer of that article.

I've dabbled in 'foodie' high dining, and I totally get the tons-of-courses format for a dining experience that carries on over several hours. Lots to enjoy there. But properly executed the server will explain everything and be happy to do so, sometimes even the Chef(s) will come out and talk to the table as well, suggest pairings and get a feel for what people like, and overall it'll be a belly-filling good time just as you say.

But none of that would involve the sanctimony or defense of weird shit that doesn't taste or look good shown in this article or that response. I've seen situations like that defended by tasteless rich assholes that just smugly love to be one of the people that 'gets it'. They do the same shit with art, food, music, hell pretty much everything. Obviously trash, but it's expensive and elicits a response and they just love to be contrary.
And to them, well, I hope they enjoy every moment of their vulgarly expensive time eating goofy catfood served on drugs-and-astigmatism pottery.

[Joe in PNG]

As per Uncle Screwtape*, getting people to do things they don't really enjoy to impress those they don't really like is a taste of hell on earth.

And this is pretty close to the old joke about Soviet Hell- where they have to drink two buckets of raw sewage every day... but there's never enough for everyone to have the full ration.



*cf CS Lewis's book "The Screwtape Letters"

[ccmdfd]

I went to a restaurant like this when I went to a conference down in Miami back in the early 2000s. It was somewhere between twelve and fifteen separate courses.

What blew me away though was the fact that would each course you would get a glass of wine. In each glass was different, paired to the specific course that was being served.

I'm a pretty lightweight Drinker to begin with, and by the time I was midway through glass number 2, they were serving me glass number four.

I had to have my partners take over the alcohol part of the meal. If I had kept that up I would have quit breathing.

I know some people have a very high tolerance with alcohol, but damn! 12 glasses!

Overall a bit of a fru-fru meal, but it was certainly edible and I left the restaurant full. Nothing like what was described in the original article at the beginning of this thread.

[RoyGBiv]

Two of the best meals I ever ate were at Michelin starred restaurants in Paris, so in concept (and so far in execution) I'm a fan.

No star at this place, but, if you're in Paris and like wine and Vietnamese food, this place is memorable. Tan Dinh (https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g187147-d719923-r439115701-Tan_Dinh-Paris_Ile_de_France.html). Cash only, last time I was there.

One of the best meals Wife and I ever had was at a Spanish tapas place that is no longer in business. We sat and kibbitzed with the managers and other diners for 3+ hours, drinking Tempranillo (mostly) and being served whatever small plates the chef felt like making us. Helped them put up the chairs at the end of the night. Memorable and delicious.

[Erik]

Thanks!

[HeavyDuty]

I actually really like tasting menus for special occasions…

[Stephanie B]

Deleted. Thought a little more about what I wrote. It was wrong.

My apologies to the MOT.

[FrankinCA]

Reminds me of Brazil..the dinner scene