Whisperings
Oprah film crew reportedly filmed tuna sandwiches at Hugo's, via PPH.
Fire codes not met at the goldenSpotted Pig, Evangealine, via WoM. Not open tonight.
Sam and Don of Rabelais turned one.
Fire codes not met at the golden
Sam and Don of Rabelais turned one.
posted by Psst! at 12:29 PM
24 Comments:
The beauty of google's cache.
Here are Erik Desjarlais' since erased comments from his blog.
A local restaurateur seemed to have a problem with Evangeline opening across the street from him. He has verbalized it. He chose to tell his staff and patrons his disdain for evangeline. Christ, dude….it is a big town. We are here for each other.
In one of my previous posts, I mentioned the folks in town who are making a mark on the culinary bedpost. I have dined at these restaurants, (and believe me, I dined, and they cooked and provided some of the best service and food in NE.
But hearing about someone who re-heats sloppy food and charges too much $$ for his small plates written on a mirror. And to hear that he has a significant problem with the food I am putting out….what can i do? A guy with absolutely no idea about foundations? Cleanliness? Tact? Talent? Being a neighbor? Fuck that, my friends. This guy can continue to fool the public with a $6 plate of bad anchovies. The servers can continue to place food at the wrong tables. I had a piece of fish that smelled like……..FISH. Kill a human being, lay them out in the sun, and sear their skin with a blowtorch……that’s what his fish tasted like…Not what seafood should taste like.
The guy who ran a restaurant in the space that I rent now, chose to run his place in the WORST possible condition that ANY cook could do. For a LONG time. My plumber freaked out about the condition he left his pipes in. I mean, any normal cook would have to TRY to make a kitchen that messy and gross. I wouldn’t post this if I didnt feel strongly about the lack of culinary respect this guy had. Real cooks have a conscious choice to cook clean, or dirty. Real restaurant owners have the same choice. Delicious and clean, or, deceptively good and gross kitchen. He chose the latter. I spent about $20,000.00 to clean up the shit that he left.
Go ahead and enjoy his new nasty kitchen in Thebrook. It is called Chezdouchebagfrogandhampster.
Dogfight!
Three self-destructive chefs meet in a cage, only one exits.
I have had the same experience with 188.
Everyone has...I wonder if this is the reason that the Bollard hasn't reviewed them... Friends?...
unfortunate, but true.
They set the standard in horror, as far as, service is concerned.
Jay can't defend that. Not even when he is ranting in his own restaurant - to people he doesn't even know!
Read the From Away blog linked from this site, Chef J bashes the writer for not enjoying their experience. Obviously, he can't handle his food being questioned by the thin skin shown.
That links here.
1) The Bollard does not review high end restaurants.
2) Restaurants that are busy get dirty.
3) Evangeline and Local 188. Apples and Organges. I don't get it.
Ok.
Erik and Jay have patched things up over a couple of beers. Problem solved. Evangeline and Local 188 will live in harmony.
Ok. People. Everything is going to be just fine. Deep breaths, Deeeeep Breeaaths....
All Better.
And one more thing. There are no gastropubs in Maine. People don't even know what the fuck that this. A gastropub would be if Ruski's hired Rob Evans as a chef.
I'm as tired of the word "gastropub" as I am of seeing fuckfaces throw up the "devil horn metal sign" when clearly there is nothing remotely "metal" about them.
Although I am loath to contribute to the totally random comments about the bollard, I feel that Local has very little to recommend itself as a high end restaurant. High end, in my oppinion, is not determined by price point alone.
The content of the Bollard's food reviews consist of breakfasts, cheap food, and beverages - with alcohol and perferably cheap.
Local serves brunch on the weekends, damn good drinks, and two dollar schlitz cans.
So I wonder why the Bollard hasn't reviewed them as well.
Ahem...
For the benefit (or detriment) of this esteemed group of readers, I have, on good authority, that an announcement will be shortly made introducing "La Bollarde" - a new haute-cuisine magazine dedicated to Portland, Maine published by the Bollard publishing group Inc.
Highlights of future monthly issues will include:
- Restaurant reviews with an entree price point of over $250
- Sourcing Popular Maine Products such as Maine Coon-Cat hoodlets and Jonah Crab testicles
- Lifestyle Trend spotting - where do those handsome chefs get their tattoos anyway?
It appears Mort Viande and Mort Pesce have been sacked in favor of people who can spell, so I'm sure it will be a great success for readers and advertisers alike.
But on a serious note, congratulations go out to Don and Sam for clearing their one-year hurdle. May there be many more to come.
My ivory tower is taller than your ivory tower!
busy or slow, a restaurant should never be dirty. And hooray for the west end. Too bad 188 is losing their fantastic bartender/ mixologist to the grill room.
YAY! Sam and Don!
Read the Chef James Comment. Either he has the education level of a retarded third grader or he wrote his review in Japanese and then translated it to English. Wow, what a fucking idiot!
"Chef James" seems to be an obsessive reader and poster on blogs to defend and and inflate his restaurants. I used to think that English was not his native language as his grammar is similar to that of a 7 year old. However, I heard him speak a while a go and apparently he just lacks a rudimentary knowledge of grammar and usage. I do recommended reading his post on From Away- it is fantastic - and I really do like the name of his new restaurant:
Chezdouchebagfrogandhampster
good stuff
Seems to me people put waaaaay too much importance on chefs and restaurants in Portland. How lucky there are so many choices that live on every rung of the price/quality ladder! Why not just settle on that?
However, all this drama is getting so dumb and makes me feel better about having to move away from the city that is my hometown.
All these restaurant people who are so self-congratulating, but pretending to be humble to the public, fighting about the cleanliness of kitchens and trash talking one another's efforts...sigh. GOOD LORD people, get some real problems! Although, it would make for good, mindless reality TV on FOX. Wow!
I really respect men like Rob Evans who turn away from all this and just do what they love and do it quietly and elegantly. Without all the high drama and fuss. It's no wonder he's received all the national praise and attention he so deserves for all his lovely work!
Here's my problem--
Mr (or Ms or Mrs.) Anonymous decided to dig an unfortunate and DELETED post out of the GOOGLE trash can and post it in PortlandPsst's comment section.
The host of PortlandPsst then incites commentary with his "DOGFIGHT!" comment, rather than deleting the post.
It should have been deleted, not because the principals involved have since put their misunderstandings behind them(and they have) but because the original author deleted the content.
But Psst! won't let by-gones-be-by-gones.
Not only does he attempt to kick up the embers and get the pot roiling again, but he jumps right in as an active participant.
Until now, I was one of PSST!'s biggest supporters. As the one guy that hoped we would finally be saved from foodie-licious-crypto-journalism and Vegan reviewers, I was stunned to see that PSST! had succumbed to the easy charms of gossip and controversy like an 8th grader at his first slow dance.
I hope it was DUST IN THE WIND followed by OOPS UPSIDE YO' HEAD.
And that she had the gangly awkward allure that only freckles can improve.
I'm John Myers
And I stand by this message
Oh yeah, and before I forget:
Regarding the Bollard NOT reviewing Local 188:
You guys really should take a refresher course in journalistic ethics.
Ignoring a place (ie. not reviewing a restaurant) is NOT unethical.
It is, however, unethical when you review a place where there may be the appearance of conflicts of interest.
ToWit:
Local 188 has been an advertiser and supporter of the Bollard from day 1
Patrick Corrigan contributes to the Bollard and owns part of Local 188
I contribute as a columnist to The Bollard and have been in Local 188's employ since August of '07
Are these the reasons that The Bollard hasn't reviewed Local 188?
I honestly dunno.
But knowing what you know now, what would you think if they did?
I'm John Myers
And I approved this message
While there is no such thing as official blogger ethics - I believe there is an informal code of what is expected- and one of those things is that you can't just erase/fix/change crap that you regret writing.
I thought is was worth posting because even though a lot of what Erik said about local 188 was unfair- though the bit about the service and cleanliness I think is correct - what Erik said about Chezdouchebagfrogandhampster was spot on and needed to be said and heard.
I really don't care who the bollard reviews. I don't need to be told where to eat by them or any of the other publications in this town.
I think that the conflict of interest idea is interesting, considering that Portland is so small and it's food scene is tiny enough that we all pretty much know each other anyway.
Ethical or unethical? It's really neither here nor there.
Anonymous wrote:
"I thought is was worth posting because even though a lot of what Erik said about local 188 was unfair- though the bit about the service and cleanliness I think is correct - what Erik said about Chezdouchebagfrogandhampster was spot on and needed to be said and heard."
My point is that Erik no longer wanted his voice to be heard saying it--HIS voice, not yours.
If you've got an opinion or point that needs to be said or heard, by all means, sing it out--more voices are better than fewer...
But don't dig in the trash and use someone else's rough draft to serve your own ends.
"Use your words" is great advice when we're about to beat the snot out of each other on the playground, but "Use YOUR words" trumps it.
Myers again
Yay meyers! Well said.
It's not a rough draft once you hit "Post." Maybe this 'incident' will teach folks manners. Or that everyone should just take a deep breath now and then.
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