how to insult an egotistical chef?

[origamicrane]

Hi

ever had a really bad dining experience? i'm sure we all have, unfortunately.

So did you do anything about it?

Did you go and harass the chef/waiter?

Did you write a letter to the manager or chef?

Did you camp outside the restaurant with a placard warning people not to go in?

If you did, do tell us the story

But basically i'm in need of a few biting gastronomic put downs for a chef or restaurant manager. The more insulting and traumatised i leave them the better.

I'm looking for a weapon of mass destruction type put downs something that will hit them to the core of their catering soul and leave them shaken

I'm sure it will be a useful addition to anyone's arsenal of put downs.

especially if you have a partner that is a chef hehehehe!

[jpdchef]

Hi

ever had a really bad dining experience? i'm sure we all have, unfortunately.

So did you do anything about it?

Did you go and harass the chef/waiter?

Did you write a letter to the manager or chef?

Did you camp outside the restaurant with a placard warning people not to go in?

If you did, do tell us the story

But basically i'm in need of a few biting gastronomic put downs for a chef or restaurant manager. The more insulting and traumatised i leave them the better.

I'm looking for a weapon of mass destruction type put downs something that will hit them to the core of their catering soul and leave them shaken

I'm sure it will be a useful addition to anyone's arsenal of put downs. 

especially if you have a partner that is a chef    hehehehe!

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The classic one would be to call them a Shoemaker,though you may want to reconsider insulting someone intimately familiar with sharp,pointy objects.(unless they deserve it,of course)

[Daniel Rogov]

Best I've heard was from one of my readers ("Debbie") whose put-down to a truly egotistical idiot was: "Are you aware that by being here you are depriving some village of an idiot"

Rogov

[Gifted Gourmet]

One of the best put-downs of a chef's cooking I read sometime ago but thought it hysterically devastating:

Vanity Fair's AA Gill on the shrimp-and-foie-gras dumplings at Jean-Georges Vongterichten's restaurant, 66: "fishy liver-filled condoms. They were properly vile, with a savor that lingered like a lovelorn drunk and tasted as if your mouth had been used as the swab bin in an animal hospital."

Couldn't have said it better myself!

[Carrot Top]

Vanity Fair's AA Gill on the shrimp-and-foie-gras dumplings at Jean-Georges Vongterichten's restaurant, 66: "fishy liver-filled condoms. They were properly vile, with a savor that lingered like a lovelorn drunk and tasted as if your mouth had been used as the swab bin in an animal hospital."

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You've got to be spitting mad to write a line like that.

Fantastic imagery!

[KatieLoeb]

One of the best put-downs of a chef's cooking I read sometime ago but thought it hysterically devastating:

Vanity Fair's AA Gill on the shrimp-and-foie-gras dumplings at Jean-Georges Vongterichten's restaurant, 66: "fishy liver-filled condoms. They were properly vile, with a savor that lingered like a lovelorn drunk and tasted as if your mouth had been used as the swab bin in an animal hospital."

Couldn't have said it better myself!

←

YIKES!!!

That has to be one of the most outrageous and outrageously funny descriptions of foul food I've ever seen.

[tanabutler]

Tell him, "I don't know what your problem is, but I bet it's really hard to pronounce."

[britcook]

I like coming to places like this once in a while. It makes me appreciate decent restaurants so much more.

[WHS]

We were dining at a particularly pretentious couple's house and the host served an obscure Japanese dish involving "yamaimo"--my partner said in a totally deadpan voice "Gee, that looks like puppy vomit". He capped off the evening by asking of their Venetian chandelier "Did that come with the house?" They shortly moved to San Francisco.

[StudentChefEclipse]

"Well. Someone has to be the poster child for the 'Don't' side of the poster."

[FaustianBargain]

or English.

You've got to be spitting mad to write a line like that.

Fantastic imagery!  

Edited September 6, 2004 by Lalitha (log)

[origamicrane]

britcook nice one :)

that reminds me of a quote from RED DWARF

Lister just started eating a pot noodle and says

"now i know why dogs lick their balls!!!!!"

[Gifted Gourmet]

or English.

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I really enjoyed reading that article! It is hysterical, yet insightful, on British food critics! Thank you for offering it up here!

[Carrot Top]

or English.

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It is true that the Brits have a way with a turn of the phrase that is fascinating to Americans...and also true that they have one of the most wide-spread great, lighthearted, odd, senses of humor of any nationality in general that I've ever met!

I once came across a list of 'The Best Languages to Insult In' and remember among the top winner was Arabic. You can say some vile things in that language that we don't even have concepts for! I vaguely remember some Balkan languages coming in near the top, too...

One wonders if the intensity of insult available in the native tongue is in any way related to the quality of the food available to the natives...

[Jaymes]

or English.

←

That was absolutely hilarious. Especially enjoyed this withering observation about what must have been the overly-chummy hostess at an Italian restaurant:

"To get in, you have to be kissed by a woman called Mara, who must surely have been around to do tongues with Garibaldi."

And a "Slow-baked cheese-and-onion tart" which the same critic called "snot in a box."

Edited September 6, 2004 by Jaymes (log)

[Chris Amirault]

That was absolutely hilarious.

I beg to differ. As much as I love potty humor, Gill's cheap shot about shrimp-and-foie-gras dumplings as "condoms" is just Benny Hill stupidity. It certainly doesn't say anything about what that dish was or wasn't about; it's just a dick joke that's intended to make the prim reader giggle at his outrageous reference to a rubber on a haute cuisine dinner plate. (Beavis: "Heh heh.... He said, 'condom.'")

I can understand why British chefs won't let these idiots into their restaurants. Why bother? They aren't writing about the food there anyway; they're writing about themselves and each other. To quote Giles Coren of the Times from the Observer article, "He admits that he can be influenced by his peers' columns. Take E&O in Notting Hill, for instance, which he dismissed as 'pretty terrible'. But didn't other critics acclaim the place? 'I gave E&O a crap review because Adrian Gill loved it,' Coren explains." Nuff said.

As for slamming the chef, it seems to me that "Your food sucks" said aloud in the busy dining room might work -- if you can then detail what is actually so horrible about the food, of course. If you can't, then make up a snap about his mother and be done with it.

[Jaymes]

Chris, I can appreciate everything you say. And even agree with it (especially about the 'condoms' bit). And even wince in sympathy with the targets.

But I still think that much of it 's darn hilarious and witty writing.

Edited September 6, 2004 by Jaymes (log)

[cakewench]

oh boy. I agree a bit that some of the writers seem to be stretching for outrageous insults.

But. "I didn't put a single thing in my mouth twice." just cracks me up. perfect!

[tomweir]

Does anyone else find the highlighted text harder to spot?

Off to post where I should.

[Chris Amirault]

oh boy.  I agree a bit that some of the writers seem to be stretching for outrageous insults. 

But.  "I didn't put a single thing in my mouth twice." just cracks me up.  perfect!

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Yeah... you're right on that one!

[browniebaker]

I'd tell the chef that his/her version was "almost as good as the one my Aunt Effie makes."

[winesonoma]

Did you learn that from Emeril? Taken from a put down that my cousin did when being introduce to Ginger Baker after a concert said "Did you learn that from Buddy Rich?"

[project]

I come here occasionally and for two reasons -- first, to remind myself of how much I should appreciate Escoffier and, second, to remind you not to try cooking anything else new.

Or, supposedly once violinist J. Heifetz commented on modern music by saying:

"I play it occasionally and for two reasons -- first, to remind myself of how much I should appreciate Beethoven and, second, to discourage them from writing any more."

How about:

"Did you learn that from Betty Crocker?"

or

"Gee, after eating this evening, we concluded that in the 8th grade you took Home Ec?"

or

"Now that the meal is over, there is good news and bad news: The bad news is that we ate it; the good news is that we are still alive."

or

"Be aware that seafood from the vastly deep can be from too deep -- the detritus on the bottom."

or

"If you keep working hard and making progress, then in a few more years you might qualify for admission to a cooking school."

or

"Bet there are some cooking schools in the South Pacific that would love to have you there on any day when they are teaching their traditional techniques of cannibalism."

or

"In all of culinary history, your cooking fills a much needed gap."

or

"Yes, it is clear that the town's restaurant inspectors do look for rat droppings on the floors but do not actually taste the food."

or

"Until this evening, we hadn't suspected that archeology could have found a cookbook written by Neanderthals."

or

"Congratulations: We can believe that in all of culinary history occasionally such food has been cooked before but that certainly you are the first to serve it in a restaurant."

or

"The several dishes we had this evening contained much that was new and good; the new, however, was not good and the good, not new."

or

"We have concluded that you are clearly a chef of unique talents and soon will be successful in burning water."

or

"Yes, we ate it -- that was the good news."

or

"Yes, this evening we have had a clear illustration that a major current theme in the culinary arts is a return to the simplest preparation of all natural ingredients and that this theme likely goes back at least to the Neanderthals."

or

"We did conclude that the soup this evening was unique, but we are not sure if it was what we were supposed to eat or what someone else already did."

or

"Your efforts really can be appreciated by the right audience; we might suggest, hogs?"

or

"Foods consist heavily of plants, animals, and fungi that were once alive: Some of what we had still was, and the rest we doubt ever was."

or

"This evening we were reminded that no one is perfect and that mistakes are inevitable."

or

"If your chef's career doesn't work out, you might try leather tanning?"

[FistFullaRoux]

Wouldn't it have been easier to just throw this away, and save the trip to the table?

Well, here's the bad and the ugly... Where's the good?

This steak still has marks where the jockey was hitting it. (Ala Rodney Dangerfield in Caddyshack)

This states and smells like foot and ass.

And in the immortal words of Steven King.. You can't polish a turd.

[nacho]

I once joined my friend's family for Sunday brunch at Fonda San Miguel in Austin, TX (one of Austin's finer restaurants and well known for their Interior Mexican cuisine). For the brunch, the chef prepares an elaborate buffet and describes all the dishes before the diners begin eating. He then assists his staff to serve the diners and answers any questions they have.

Well, my friend's stepmother (who had not had Interior Mexican food before, only Tex-Mex) was curious about one dish with a creamy orange colored sauce (if memory serves, it was an almond mole or something), so she asks the chef "Is there any velveeta in this?"!!! I've never seen a chef so insulted!

Good times.