Wednesday, June 02, 2010

controversy

I posted a while back on BAR's savaging of Esquire Grill, which garnered a lot of local attention. They now have a silly correction at the start of the review. It's a review, not a deposition. He didn't enumerate the differences between the visits exactly because the reader wouldn't care.

And then the Bee caved to pressure and let Paragary respond.

The whole first part is immaterial, here's the meat of it:

Now back to Robertson and his visits to the Esquire Grill. To put it mildly, he was not nice to my restaurant in his review "Esquire Grill in need of … most everything" (Living Here, May 16).

I defend the right of Robertson (or anyone) to write negatively about his dining experience. My restaurants have been reviewed countless times, good and bad.

I have accepted this opportunity not because I want to refute the review. To argue with a critic is pointless.

The point I would like to make is a reminder to readers. Whether a critic is reviewing restaurants, movies or an opera, the reader should separate fact from folly and understand everybody is different, with different tastes.

A review may be filled with entertaining sentences that have no relationship with the restaurant's goals and concept. The critic may arrive with unreasonable expectations.

The intelligent reader and the intelligent restaurant customer are the same person.

They know the difference between the steak and the sizzle.

To remind readers that everyone is different, with different tastes is asinine. That's what reviewing is: one person's subjective opinion. It's not the reviewer's fault if people think reviews are handed down from God. I don't even think there's anything wrong with reviewing a restaurant after you've only been there once, not that that's what BAR did. No restaurant owner would complain about that if it's positive, but they expect you to give it another chance if it's negative. A review is a snapshot. Everyone has a different experience on every single visit to every restaurant. It's the luck of the draw for the business owner.

Ok, "the critic may arrive with unreasonable expectations"? What is a "reasonable" expectation for a 30 dollar steak or a 20 dollar chicken breast entree? It better be damn good. It better be damn good if it's ten bucks if you want a positive review.

Also the sentence "The intelligent reader and the intelligent restaurant customer are the same person." makes no damn sense to me at all and seems to insult BAR's intelligence.

Then that last sentence. Well, a review pretty much talks about both the steak AND the "sizzle" (ambiance, service, etc.) and he found both to be lacking in his review and is clear about that.

I like Cafe Bernardo, although I've pretty much stopped going there since Magpie opened, so I don't have an ax to grind against Paragary. I think he should pay attention to that review, and even more to the fact that the Bee's commenters mostly agreed with it and do a little soul-searching about his restaurant. Or to the fact that his restaurant only has 3 out of 5 stars on yelp, which is a pretty low rating.
Or he can just continue on the path and forget about it if Esquire is successful.

29 comments:

Josh Nice said...

the review is based on several trips to the same restaurant, which is almost never the case. as they would say at my work, the evaluation benefits from a bigger sample size, and is therefore more accurate.

not only that, but the reviewer bends over to be fair and offer context and detail when he's critical.

the bee did a serious cave; pathetic really. i guess it helps randy to have friends in high places.

Anonymous said...

This makes Paragary & the Bee look so bad.

JD, what restaurant was it that you gave a bad review to in SNR where they gave the back page to the chef to rebut the review a week later??

-miller

Anonymous said...

I strongly doubt that Paragary "accepted the opportunity" to write his retort. He probably demanded it, perhaps even with a threat of pulling his advertising dollars.

Having worked in the Esquire building for years, I ate at the Grill well over a dozen times. And, it was most definitely more "sizzle" than "steak." It serves, quite well, as a watering hole and meeting space for legislative and Cal Chamber folks, who aren't there to be food critics.

DKK

Anonymous said...

The irony here is that this just brings more attention to the original bad review.

I missed the review when it first ran, but have run across many links to it since. RP's fussing succeeded in making sure I didn't miss this one.

-omf

Dillon said...

Why would anyone eat a thirty dollar steak when they could go se Snow Buddies for practically nothing and be so much more satisfied? Yep that's right I'm exploiting your blog for some shameless promotion. It's playing this Thursday (tomorrow) in Santa Cruz, Friday in SF and on the 27th in Sac. Just trying to get word out.
Here's the site to download the soundtrack for free.

http://subparguitar.com/snowbuddies.html

Bring a steak

Anonymous said...

a. Esquire is not good. And BAR is hilarious!
B. I am having the Legend of Snow Buddies: the frontloading at my house on the 27th. I think there will be some music, but i don't know what. I'll bet you like it.
gbomb

beckler said...

No threadjacking!

Anonymous said...

Miller,that was this place Bamboo. Yeah, they did a profile on the chef like a week later.

Paragary's response here is pretty embarrassing. He should have kept silent, as he's clearly not skilled in rebuttal. I'm annoyed by the "not nice to my restaurant" thing particularly. Poor RP!

There was nothing wrong with the original review at all. I consider myself an intelligent reader and restaurant customer, and thus I have no interest in going to Esquire Grill.

JD

Dillon said...

Sorry bout the threadjacking, just couldn't help myself. In response to the issue at hand, I would say that writing a rebuttal to a bad review, and pointing out to readers that they may in fact have no critical thinking skills of their own, casts extra attention to the bad review. A dumb move for Paragary. It reminds me of this time when Blubbin oil company attempted to hush a slough of negative media by attempting to sell his son to a local indian chief for a canoe. He also spent a good portion of his wealth taking out full page ads calling reporters a bunch of "no good bums!" Luckily for Blubbin a rash of Yeti sightings overtook headlines and his whale oil pipeline slipped into the side-notes of most papers.

Anonymous said...

I would love to know what RP thinks the "concept" behind Esquire Grill is, and what about it he thinks BAR didn't grasp.

-miller

Patrick J. said...

Esquire is pretty good as long as someone else is paying the bill.

beckler said...

As an aside, I think the roster of movies out right now, including art house, has to be at an all time low. I just want to go see a movie with my mom and there is literally not a single movie which the theater wouldn't have to pay me to see, rather than vice versa. I'm not including the Argentinian movie that is only playing at 5:30, because I want to see that but can't make it.

Let's see Dillon try to threadjack that! Impossible.

Dillon said...

Has your mom herd about Snow Buddies? I'm sure she'd love her daughter to take her on a road trip to sunny Santa Cruz tomorrow night. Did I mention they will be serving crepes at the showing? I mean there's something you just don't find on every corner in Sac. Crepes, always cheaper than a steak!!

Count Mockula said...

I totally, totally agree. Also, I eat out a lot, and I have been to Esquire Grill exactly once. It's not at all vegetarian-friendly, and when 95% of the places in town are (including Cafe Bernardo), I'll go elsewhere.

Snufkin said...

If you can figure out a way to catch El Secreto de Sus Ojos on the big screen it's totally worth it. The basic concept is Law & Order Buenos Aires, but there's an amazing chase scene that should be seen in a theater, not on DVD. Plus Ricardo Darin es un Zorro Plateado.

Otherwise it seems like everything is either depressing 3D crap or depressing Sex & the City. No wonder I get nostalgic over the Showcase.

Anonymous said...

Esquire is a scam and BAR is an unbearable hack cum show pony. Blog up in his kool aid all you want but he's still fatally predictable, longwinded and ultimately boring!

Liv Moe said...

OMF says, "who the eff is this troll?!?!?!"

archbishop said...

Wow, Paragary starting up the Streisand effect. I don't know if you remember when she sued a guy for 50 million bucks for publishing photos of the entire California coast (one included her house and she flipped out). It got her house a lot of notice.

Speaking of Yeti films, I had dog soup a couple weeks ago. Not bad. Weird that I'll eat dog, but not shark fin soup. This wasn't the usual dog Koreans eat, this was a pet dog that ate a couple of their ducks at the family farm. We didn't order it, the restaurant is friends with my friend, so they gave it to us as "service".

Josh Nice said...

this movie looks rad:

http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/sony/micmacs/

Anonymous said...

Um, Dillon is the troll. His name is right at the top of his comments. duh.

gbomb

beckler said...

hey troll-own up to who you are!

Anonymous said...

How about this for a threadjack...I think it's going to rain tomorrow and that can only mean one thing...Wet Ladies Day Rage!!!
jamattack!

Anonymous said...

Wear t-shirts, everybody!
g

Charles Albright said...

"Wet Ladies Day Rage"

The most confusing phrase ever uttered in the English language.

Charles

beckler said...

wet tshirt lady dayrage!
i'm going to wear thin white pants as well.

Liv Moe said...

brang it!

Anonymous said...

kool aid on wetty white

Anonymous said...

Dear God, I will eat at Esquire Grill once a week for the rest of the year if you promise not to let it rain tomorrow. Amen.

BlairRobertson said...

I'm concerned that someone thinks I'm predictable.I hope he or she meant reliable. I'm also no hack. I'm actually a scratch golfer -- when I'm not eating greasy fish.