Phil Vettel...Revealed (almost)!

Phil Vettel...Revealed! (almost)

Please don't read this if insiderish commentary turns you off. There are a lot of people who don't care about issues like this, but the "secret shopper" persona has been a traditional practice of food writers, and it has disputed value among the militantly anonymous (Mike Nagrant) and the widely recognizable (Steve Dolinsky) schools of restaurant criticism and food journalism.

I was kind of surprised that Phil Vettel appeared in very light disguise on the Today Show's Asian Carp piece with Phillip Foss: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/26184891/ ... 7#37435357. Based on this appearance, anyone who cares now knows he's somewhat short of stature (like me), has graying and diminishing hair (ditto), and eats out a lot (ditto ditto). Not exactly enough to pick him out of a lineup but helpful.

Add to this the fact that Vettel was spotted at last week's NRA show wandering about with a name badge clearly announcing his identity, and you have to wonder if A) he's going to do a Frank Bruni, retire and so does not care who knows what he looks like; B) is just being careless, which seems unlikely, or C) realizes that most restaurateurs/chefs know what he looks like any way (or have a pretty good guess) and so there's no point in perpetuating a charade of anonymity.

PS to Monica Eng...not sure if wearing Christopher Borrelli's nametag to the NRA threw anyone off the scent ( ).

I really liked that picture of him in the Tribune about a year ago wearing something like a gas mask and a burkha.

Katie wrote:I really liked that picture of him in the Tribune about a year ago wearing something like a gas mask and a burkha.

It was for this article about sleep apnea, but I can't find the photo anymore. He was wearing an eye mask and a CPAP. It revealed just about as much as his appearance on 'Today' did.

From what I've heard, pretty much every restaurant that Vettel would review already knows what he looks like (and he doesn't exactly take great pains to hide his identity from those serving him).

jesteinf wrote:From what I've heard, pretty much every restaurant that Vettel would review already knows what he looks like (and he doesn't exactly take great pains to hide his identity from those serving him).

So you're going with point C, above. You may very well be right, and for the higher end places that Vettel reviews, I wonder how much it really matters if the people in the kitchen know who they're cooking for. When you're already using the best possible ingredients, and have excellent chefs and staff, how much better can you make the experience if you know a big gun is in the house?

David Hammond wrote:I wonder how much it really matters if the people in the kitchen know who they're cooking for. When you're already using the best possible ingredients, and have excellent chefs and staff, how much better can you make the experience if you know a big gun is in the house?

Ruth Reichl rather famously answered this question in her NYT review of Le Cirque. Titled "A Tale of Two Restaurants," the review describes a vastly different experience for the unknown Reichl vs. the Reichl who had been "made". It's a terrific read, as is most of Reichl's book, Garlic & Sapphires, which is full of all the backstories involved in being an anonymous critic.

I got the "nobody" treatment at Le Cirque and it was certainly terrible. I went with my parents for dinner once. We were seated in a dark corner of the restaurant, with a pile of menus next to us on the banquette. My dinner of soft shell crabs consisted of 3 or 4 of the tiniest soft shells I've ever seen (to this day it's a family joke that I was served soft sell crab fetuses).

I can't think of a high-end restaurant in Chicago that provides two-tiered service at such an extreme. I've heard stories about Gene & Gorgetti but I'm not sure that's the same thing.

Kennyz wrote:

David Hammond wrote:I wonder how much it really matters if the people in the kitchen know who they're cooking for. When you're already using the best possible ingredients, and have excellent chefs and staff, how much better can you make the experience if you know a big gun is in the house?

Ruth Reichl rather famously answered this question in her NYT review of Le Cirque. Titled "A Tale of Two Restaurants," the review describes a vastly different experience for the unknown Reichl vs. the Reichl who had been "made". It's a terrific read, as is most of Reichl's book, Garlic & Sapphires, which is full of all the backstories involved in being an anonymous critic.

I enjoyed Garlic and Sapphires, it was a fun read, but lately it's seemed to me that it answers an almost rhetorical question: will you get better service if you are (or even look like) someone important? She's a good writer, so the way she answers that somewhat obvious question is interesting, but I'm not sure the experiment was a revelation.

Le Cirque may be an exception...but I take your point.

Parallel subpoint: Foss worked at Le Cirque during the period of Reichl's double-review.

Kennyz wrote:

David Hammond wrote:I wonder how much it really matters if the people in the kitchen know who they're cooking for. When you're already using the best possible ingredients, and have excellent chefs and staff, how much better can you make the experience if you know a big gun is in the house?

Ruth Reichl rather famously answered this question in her NYT review of Le Cirque. Titled "A Tale of Two Restaurants," the review describes a vastly different experience for the unknown Reichl vs. the Reichl who had been "made". It's a terrific read, as is most of Reichl's book, Garlic & Sapphires, which is full of all the backstories involved in being an anonymous critic.

I was curious and pulled up her original review (free registration required):
http://www.nytimes.com/1993/10/29/arts/ ... 65093.html

The things a restaurant can do if they spot a critic are to take extra care with the preparation and presentation, amp up the portions and refine the service. However, any critic worth his salt pays attention not only to his own dining experience but also to that at surrounding tables, and in these days of straitened budgets, when most publications do not pay for multiple visits, few professional critics comment extensively on the latter two characteristics.

Given the number of terrible meals I have eaten during food writers' conferences and at press dinners, I often wonder whether anonymity is overrated. In the UK, no one expects restaurant critics to be anonymous. It's far more important to be a good writer and a careful observer.

What does it take to be a good restaurant critic?

I think this is a constantly evolving issue: back in the days when Ruth Reichl was writing, all the people who had a crappy experience at Le Cirque didn't have a voice and most of them weren't going to be repeat customers anyway: there are enough people in the New York area, and enough tourists who go to places they read about that word-of-mouth wasn't important and print media held all the cards - and what Ruth Reichl did at the time was really important. I can't imagine what Le Cirque was thinking, but I can see where it was easy enough to get away with.

Things are different today in a number of ways: first of all, we can communicate our pleasure or displeasure instantly to large groups of people - one dissatisfied customer does have enough of a voice that he or she could conceivably make an impact on a restaurant's bottom line, and the experience of dozens of "unimportant" dissatisfied customers might cause a place to close down. I also think the time of the restaurant basing its business on a once-in-a-lifetime meal has largely passed: most places are focused on return customers, even at the higher end. These two things make me wonder if it's really all that important for critics to be completely anonymous.

That being said, of course propriety needs to be considered: announcing yourself by reservation is probably going too far, as is demanding off-menu items and special treatment and pricing, but I still think the days of hollywood makeup are over.

Re Reichl, I can't help but feel that there are many New Yorkers who feel validated by a demonstration of the class structure and their place on it; it confirms the existence of the greasy pole that drew them there, and that there is still room to climb upon it. Certain portions of LA, I suspect, work the same way (alas, I can't find the L'Idiot scene from L.A. Story online).

Chicago is less susceptible to that, except maybe in the realm of local politics and organized crime (but I repeat myself), which explains why a Gene & Georgetti's is the one universally acknowledged practitioner of it. Certainly, even in pre-internet-vox-populi days, when I dined at places such as Trotter, Trio (McClain and Achatz eras), even Le Perroquet, service was utterly of the what-could-we-possibly-do-to-make-your-experience-more-perfect kind, not the you-are-so-lucky-we-let-you-eat-here kind. I'm sure the latter exists, but it's much, much rarer here.

And I agree with LAZ, if you can't tell what kind of service the tables around you are getting and that it contrasts with yours, then you've let yourself be co-opted by the Man, and it's time to retire and give someone else a shot.

Mike G wrote:Re Reichl, I can't help but feel that there are many New Yorkers who feel validated by a demonstration of the class structure and their place on it; it confirms the existence of the greasy pole that drew them there, and that there is still room to climb upon it. Certain portions of LA, I suspect, work the same way (alas, I can't find the L'Idiot scene from L.A. Story online).

This was especially true pre-Guiliani, who took lovable, but tough and sarcastic New Yorkers, and the gritty sidewalks and streets that spawned them, and cleaned them up to make them presentable for the tourist masses. In the same vein, what Reichl did was reveal the culinary underbelly to NY's high-end restaurant culture that catered to a wealthy, merchant class society, which was open to anyone as long as they had oodles of cash (but not necessarily class). (Cite to Edith Wharton novels.) Unless you proved membership in the club, you were treated the way Ruth's review described. ("If I can make it there, I'll make it . . . anywhere . . . ") I recall this pre-Guiliani grittiness when I would go to Shea as a kid. The stadium was so filthy that the ushers who took you to your seats would swipe about 2 inches of soot off the seats before you sat down. The beer flowed, people swore like sailors, and got into fistfights. In a way, I miss that New York, but not so much the type of treatment middle-class folks would get at high-end restaurants when it was clear that they were springing for a special meal and not clothed in Chanel.

Another notable aspect of Reichl's reviews in general was that they truthfully discussed the food and service at any restaurant, regardless of pedigree, and existed not merely to provide glowing, white tower accounts of meals at places like Le Cirque that 99% of the NYT readers would never experience. Along those lines, she also gave some (probably not equal) publicity to lesser known, less high-end and/or ethnic restaurants. For the NY Times, she was revolutionary.

David Hammond wrote:When you're already using the best possible ingredients, and have excellent chefs and staff, how much better can you make the experience if you know a big gun is in the house?

Ask Steve Plotnicki (Sorry, I couldn't resist)

...Steve Plotnicki ...

Is this going to become our "Godwin's law" / shibboleth?

Watch out, I hear he's like Beetlejuice. Invoke his name once more and we're in trouble...

You know it's strange, I used to imagine he looked like Pat O'Brien. I know weird. He sorta resembles Steve Dahl (Mr. V not P). I'm just sayin'...it's hard to tell with that disguise and all.

David Hammond wrote:

Kennyz wrote:

David Hammond wrote:I wonder how much it really matters if the people in the kitchen know who they're cooking for. When you're already using the best possible ingredients, and have excellent chefs and staff, how much better can you make the experience if you know a big gun is in the house?

Ruth Reichl rather famously answered this question in her NYT review of Le Cirque. Titled "A Tale of Two Restaurants," the review describes a vastly different experience for the unknown Reichl vs. the Reichl who had been "made". It's a terrific read, as is most of Reichl's book, Garlic & Sapphires, which is full of all the backstories involved in being an anonymous critic.

I enjoyed Garlic and Sapphires, it was a fun read, but lately it's seemed to me that it answers an almost rhetorical question: will you get better service if you are (or even look like) someone important? She's a good writer, so the way she answers that somewhat obvious question is interesting, but I'm not sure the experiment was a revelation.

Le Cirque may be an exception...but I take your point.

Parallel subpoint: Foss worked at Le Cirque during the period of Reichl's double-review.

First off, I love my connection to this topic!
Second, I had no clue as to how Phil Vettel looked before the Today Show.

Third, I have been working on my own memoirs and recently recalled Ruth Reichl's review of us. Below is a sneak peak for LTHers with a tie in to this topic! Might as well throw this out there... Can anyone connect me with a literary agent?! I believe I have enough to at least make a go of a proposal. Anyhow....

.. it was around this time that we had been demoted from four stars down to three in one of the most controversial reviews that's ever been in print. Ruth Reichl - who had just begun her stint as food critic of the New York Times - wrote her first piece for the paper in two halves. One as an anonymous diner when she wasn't recognized, and one as a recognized critic. I recall her being in the dining room on both of the occasions in the article, and that we figured out her identity too late during her 'anonymous diner' visit. As it was, she waited 20 minutes to be seated despite having had a reservation. She had also requested the no smoking section, but was seated in smoking. The wine list she was meandering through was unceremoniously taken from her and disappeared for a lengthy time. Service was brusque at best, and 3 of the 5 course on the tasting menu were accompanied by potatoes and over-burdened by brown sauces. By the time she was finally recognized, the damage was already done and you could here a pin drop in our normally chaotic kitchen.
The next time she came in, she arrived twenty minutes early, wasn't asked if she had a reservation, and was simply led to an over sized table while Sirio boasted that the King of Spain was waiting patiently for his own table to be prepared. The kitchen knew right away, the wine and the menu were selected for them, and everything was flawlessly executed.
In the end we lost the star.The demotion was a big time lump on the collective Le Cirque noggin, but even though I felt that we were made an example of for something that could happen to any restaurant (albeit most likely on a lesser scale), I felt in my heart of hearts we got what we deserved. Sirio was very vocal in his criticism of the criticism, and I took it to heart one day when we were speaking and he said, "As long as they're talking about you, it doesn't really matter what they say."
Having a great respect for Sirio, I wore that mantra for many years. I knew there would be a backlash when I summoned it up in my criticism of Heather Shouse's review of us in Time Out in one of my very early blog posts, but I decided it was an avenue worth going down. Being new to the internet community, I didn't count on how swift the reaction to my post would be. My PR company called me up that morning and asked me if I had lost my mind. I still don't regret writing it. There were some extenuating circumstances to our opening that free standing restaurants don't have to deal with, but as I came to understand in an online forum with Heather, if business is open, it is fair to play ball. When guests are paying there really is no excuse for not bringing the advertised product to the table.
There is some validity to the opinion that my criticism was founded in wounded pride, but it was also written within the context of an article written by then New York Times restaurant critic, Frank Bruni. He stated that restaurant criticisms are much more subjective to circumstance than other art forms, and it struck a chord with me. A movie, piece of art, or a recording will always be the same from day to day, as for the most part are plays and concerts. A restaurant however can fluctuate with business levels, staffing, and even from one portion of a menu to another.
The bottom line is that I saw the opportunity to respond, and I took the leap. More than this, I believe strongly that we are ALL entitled to expressing opinions on anything in the public forum. I am as much a victim and winner of this as anyone through all of the public opinion forums on the internet. I'm certainly not the first person out there to call out someone critical of their craft, though I realize that I am obviously very biased.
Since then, I have back tracked a bit, and come to believe that Sirio may not have been entirely right on the any press is good press theme. Just ask Tiger Woods or Sandra Bullock how they feel on the subject.
Like my own criticism in it's own realm - Ms. Reichl's article was ultimately self serving and an exciting way to make a splash onto the New York Times restaurant critic scene. It wasn't exactly a revelation that VIP's received preferential treatment at Le Cirque and anonymous diners can get pushed to the side as a result, but it was a revelation to have a review written as such. I wholeheartedly commend her on taking the bold stance, and it would've been prudent for us at Le Cirque to take a good and thorough look in the mirror. I don't think that ever happened.
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That's it... please take it easy on me LTHers, less I take you to task as well for harsh criticisms of my writing.