Pete Wells’s last column for the NY Times as restaurant critic: I Reviewed Restaurants for 12 Years. They’ve Changed, and Not for the Better. “We feel increasingly alienated from the people who cook and serve our food.”
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I’m worried that Pete threw out his shoulder shaking his fist so hard at the cloud.
Sometimes the old man shaking his fist at the cloud has a point tho?
Yeah he has a point. I also hate QR code menus and Insta culture and the transactional feel of a lot of restaurants lately. Pete has every right to be upset by how inhumane some of these experiences feel. I get that. But to me his rant felt as cold and formulaic as the business practices he’s criticizing. Where’s the empathy for the restauranteur who is just trying to stay afloat, keep their no show rate down, keep their costs in line, and be where their customers expect them to be (on OpenTable or Tock or Resy)? And where was any mention of the actual food these restaurants he’s shaking his fist at are serving? Sure it sucks to use OpenTable, but after all those meals he’s enjoyed is there truly no joy in Mudville?
Sorry, I’ll stop before I throw my own shoulder out.
My fist shaking angst towards QR code menus was the first time I felt old.
Starting a meal with everyone looking down at their phones at barely legible restaurant websites is genuinely awful, though.
Those do feel super alienating and the points about everything being about reducing inconvenience and the uncertainty that having to actually call somewhere might bring are well met. This also sounds like he’s maybe tired of NYC/Manhattan (the disneyfication).
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