There are probably many reviewers, food writers, etc, who have gone to a wonderful restaurant that truly moved them, truly grabbed them in the gut; and as a result, have put pen to paper (or more likely, fingers to keyboard) and cranked out their first review.
There are probably far, far more reviewers who have gone to a truly BAD restaurant and written a review out of pure spite.
I don't know how much of a delicate and unique flower I am, but my first review isn't really either. I went to a joint called The White Flamingo here in Spring, TX instead, and it's not wonderful. It's not awful, either. It's merely thought provoking, confusing, and incongruous.
My wife has been out of town for two weeks, and had given a standing order during her trip: "Hey, go try the local joints because they all seem to be awful and SOMETHING has to not suck." I decided on the Flamingo today. It's a weird conundrum of a restaurant; a "fine dining" look with a decidedly bi-polar menu consisting of sandwiches, pasta, seafood, steak, and really nothing unusual save oddly low prices (considering the napkin-in-the-water-glass table appearance). An $8 BLT and a glass candelabra centerpiece go together like two things that don't go together very well. $8 BLT or no, I figured that if the restaurant looked anything like the website, it was well worth going to see the dining room, which exuded grace and thoughtful care of the dining experience. Plus, live piano music and did I mention that they fold up napkins into the water goblets? High class dining presented to you with a delicate, elegant elan. Like you'd get in France.
So, at 1pm, I pulled up to the dead-empty strip mall, right between the Kung-Fu dojo and tug-joint "day spa" on one side and the--and I quote--"boo keeping" firm and generously-named "food store" sandwiching this elegant dining establishment. France it wasn't.
A quick word on "boo keeping": I have never felt the need to keep more than one boo at a time and I don't recommend it. When shorties are up on your jock, remember; the one boo that matters to you is your true boo, and if she ain't fly, she's just a hoe ass trick. At least, that's what Oscar Wilde always said.
I parked--rather conveniently--right in front of the restaurant and was greeted by a gentleman wearing a screen-pressed T-shirt. This was about 12:45pm, so, the lunch rush then. Such as it was, anyway; the place was empty. After a few moments, a person who was clearly a waiter--and equally clearly, either almost done with or just out of high school--came up and sat me at a table which was, to its credit, elegantly decorated with napkins folded and stuffed into water goblets and a crystal centerpiece.
The waiter gave me a menu and strolled off to go do... something else. I asked him as he tidied up (now just before 1pm) if there were any specials--there was a burger, he told me, on a pretzel roll, but not really anything else. I asked if he had any recommendations, and he said the burger was pretty good. The sandwiches were also all recommends, plus there's the chicken salad sandwich, which is apparently quite good--and, I quote--"for the girls". The ladies-only options appeared to be a common theme on the menu, as there was also a rather interesting stuffed chicken breast with asparagus, ham, and swiss which I couldn't order because it was called the "Princess Chicken".
As I am unlucky enough not to own a vagina, I decided to go with the apparently more genitally appropriate burger; and since I was kind of intrigued by their appearance, the bacon-wrapped quail legs which were on the appetizer menu. And a Coke. It was a bit early for wine, and I've never been a wine-and-burger kind of guy. And a beer would have seemed like I was trying to make up too much for my momentary femininity in considering the chicken salad sandwich.
After a few moments the waiter apologetically strolled up to the table and said, "Sorry, man, but we're out of the quail. One of our freezers failed last night. It's okay though, you probably wouldn't be able to eat all them quail legs and a burger too." He then cheerfully deposited a pile of french bread slices which had been melted over with garlic butter and cheese on my table and retreated back to the kitchen.
Some minutes later, my burger came bustling forth from the kitchen, served with a side of something halfway between potato chips (in shape) and home fries (in cooking method and texture). Quite good, and the sort of "hey, this is new" item I like to experience anytime I go to a restaurant. The halved burger, with all its traditional accouterments, was also tasty--the pretzel roll held together nicely, and despite the obvious prefrozenness of the patty itself, the toppings were all crisp. It wasn't the best burger I'd had, but it was far from the worst.
Somewhere in the middle of that burger, as a woman who appeared to be the owner was sticking a head in from the parking lot and loudly conversing with the kitchen, I began musing to myself that if I were to make a stab at reviewing restaurants, this would be an excellent choice. They were certainly giving me plenty of material.
I asked to see the dessert tray, and it was brought to me. I zeroed in immediately on the crème brûlée, a favorite of mine. He indicated the chocolate lava cake as a popular choice, which I should have guessed in advance. While the key lime pie and Bananas Foster pie were both interesting options, I decided to stick with my instinct and order crème brûlée. He wrinkled his nose a touch and said, "Oh, the fancy one."
Typically a waiter at a restaurant promoting elegant dining would be expected to demonstrate a touch of condescension. I have absolutely no problem with a waiter's attempt to guide a diner in a direction best suited to the kitchen's strengths. I've just never seen it done with such a populist, down-home attitude. "What, you want the $8 BLT? What are you, bisexual?"
The crème brûlée was pretty good, even though the crust didn't go all the way to the edges and was a little tricky to tap my way cleanly through, so I paid my bill (which was higher than I'd thought--the burger was $12 and the crème brûlée a whopping $10) and left as a couple of women with a sleeping baby walked in and were seated. I wanted to recommend the chicken salad sandwich to them, as I'd heard it was excellent.
As I pulled my car (which the waiter had at one point said he thought was "pretty bad", but like, in the good way) out of the now only mostly-empty parking lot, I saw a digital scrolling sign next to the door flashing "OPEN:" followed by the restaurant's phone number. I'd seen it when I drove in and thought it was incongruous at a "nice restaurant" at the time. Now, on leaving, it seemed to fit in.
It really wasn't the waiter's fault. It probably wasn't the manager's fault or the owner's fault or anybody's fault except this tiny little good ol' boy town that wormed its fingers into a restaurant that was clearly trying to be something unusual--a good restaurant in a town that doesn't care. But over the last seven years, Spring has beaten it into submission, saying, "HERE IS WHAT YOU ARE, NOW ACCEPT IT."
There is something beautiful about Texas; the way the nights are somehow *darker* than a dark night, the way the daytime sky legitimately seems *bigger* in every direction, and the way that people can be so completely respectful of others' private property, space, and individualistic tendencies. It's odd to me that in a state that prides itself on fierce individualism, that the pressures of a "be boring" suburb like Spring could so thoroughly flatten a restaurant that clearly had the spark of greatness and simply... gave up.
