The One Restaurant Review That Still Leaves a Sour Taste...

120+ reviews penned in national print and only one sticks out like a sore thumb for us, where we considered walking out moments after walking in. Let's talk about it for the first time...

“It took you long enough — we have been open months!” was the first thing uttered, the first comment, disposed upon us straight after we walked in the door. In fact, the very first words ever exchanged. We had never met this particular restaurant owner before, well known in the area they operate in but not well known to us.

“What? What did that mean?,” we both thought, “what were they getting at?”

An indication we were late to the party? Insinuating that we held out too long and missed the boat on new opening buzz? Or was it a pinch more pointed?

It wasn’t so much what was said but how it was said, as what it sounded like was: “finally you bothered your arses to come”.

Neither approach felt particularly valid though — we don’t owe any restaurateur or chef coverage just because they open a new restaurant. In fact, as critics, we don’t particularly chase new openings if we’re being entirely honest. If anything waiting six months, rather than six days (or six minutes, as some do) is more beneficial — and far more benevolent — than a flurry of reviews in the first few weeks when the paint is still wet, service is a bit shaky and the initial cracks aren’t filled in or smoothed out.

If we put ourselves in restaurateurs’ shoes we imagine the dream scene would be: all the small, merry band of national critics cover within the first year, but each piece is spaced a month or two apart, to give the best, longest-term, blanket coverage. The TikTokers and Instagrammers will easily fill in the rest. But what would we know.

Taken aback in that initial first meeting and first moment we’re not sure we even had a response. Disbelief, incredulity, we still had our coats on for God’s sake — give us a second to get in the door. Later, after the meal, we disclosed to one another that we shared the same thought telepathically in that very moment: ‘we might just turn on our heel and walk right back out, if that’s the attitude from the get-go’. Thing is, it was the attitude throughout the whole meal.

Restaurant owners, take our word for it: don’t treat critics any different to other diners. Honestly, that’s what they are, just another table. We certainly don’t expect special treatment or red carpets. However, a free piece of advice, if you have ears to hear it: maybe don’t make an aside at a restaurant critic before they have even sat down — just like we are sure you probably wouldn’t diss or make a snide comment to any other table or guest. Never a great start when the critic is coming in good faith armed with the benefit of the doubt.

See, we approach our job as - more often than not - an opportunity to spotlight and champion, uplift and celebrate, rather than to dim, damn or diminish. We often say ‘everywhere starts with 10/10, or 100 available points’, and then the numbers dwindle if things go awry or the experience doesn’t feel like it lives up to the stall set out. The traditional view of restaurant critique stems from pantomime, feared critics who perform routine disembowelment in full public view, but the needle has moved in the last decade or two and we class it far more as opportunity than threat.