Marilyn Haggerty's amazing Olive Garden review and the subsequent viral shitstorm

i kinda loved my recent local front page coverage. they never once got the name of my store right.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/419887_10150570348707137_686202136_9026360_1907195104_n.jpg

dude i grew up reading restaurant reviews in the newspaper before the internet existed and i think even then ppl would question the utility of this column.

cute lookin' shop

like, iirc the way it broke down (to an extent) in papers of yore (and probably still!) is there were two kinds of restaurant pieces:

1. the quick news item - the drunken noodle, serving pan-asian food, is now open on 4th st. they will be serving lunch and dinner, blah blah blah.

2. the review - where someone goes to the restaurant as part of a group and they order a bunch of food and spent at least 60% of the review describing things they ate and how they tasted.

marilyn's work falls into some in-between zone that i have just never seen before.

haha love the lede in that article abut scott

I thought the review was fine if the OG is the kind of place her paper's readership wants reviewed. And the outright snottiness of the original Internet reaction was unnecessary. But acting like it's an especially well-crafted piece of writing also seems kind of condescending imo.

― boxall, Wednesday, March 14, 2012 1:31 PM (24 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah her reviews are not particularly helpful as reviews. they are sort of neither here nor there. i have no idea why that is. but she's obviously a good writer and there's no evidence she was especially impressed by olive garden or taco bell.

ya her articles more show just like a wry... awareness of them, and all of their features.

i mean if i was curious about olive garden, i'd have no idea what to order. she says what she had and doesn't say much more about it than, "it was warm and vaguely satisfying in the way food often is." which reads as "it wasn't very good." but if there _is_ something good (or better) at olive garden, we'll never know.

Aw, I wish the print was bigger so I could read that article. My eyes are going.

marilyn's work falls into some in-between zone that i have just never seen before.

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, March 14, 2012 2:55 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

That's because it's a 35,000 circulation paper in North Dakota.

hey 35,000 is not bad these days.

i am probably projecting here but she just seems basically midwestern, operating in that weird midwestern ironic earnestness or earnest irony, honed i guess from hundreds of years of passive-agressive niceness

http://www.theonion.com/video/boston-globe-tailors-print-edition-for-three-remai,17572/

she has said in interviews that she considers herself a reporter who describes restaurants and not a food critic.

she liked the chili at this place though:

"The chili looked good when I saw it delivered to another table. So, I ordered a bowl ($3.85). It was very good with lots of beans and lean burger. It was more than I could finish at one sitting. And I have been called “The Appetite.”

http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/230117/publisher_ID/40/

Marilyn "The Appetite" Haggerty

someone told me that when she was diagnosed w/ cancer she reviewed the hospital's cafeteria, which made me like her a lot

she has this thing with getting her server's full name into the review if she liked them.

this is like a knife in the heart from this woman:

"There are pluses and minuses. About the only minus I found was the breadstick with the spaghetti was sort of soft. It could have used a little more time in the oven."

http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/229427/publisher_ID/40/

raymond carver fan:

"Aggie had been in the restaurant business about 15 years before venturing out on her own. She tried working in an office once but said being confined to a desk made her nervous. She likes to study recipes and try new things."

i mean if you can't see the story possiblities in those three sentences then you ain't a writin' type.

lol scott, that article's opening quote:

"I grew up," Scott said, "In a family that..."

Worst place to break up that quote!

"I grew up in," Scott said, "a family that..."

"I," Scott said, "grew up in a family that..."

"I grew," Scott said, "up in a," he continued, "family that ..."

all less coherent, but still better i think that what they went with! (obv the best place to break it up would be at the end of the idea)

than*

okay now i'm hooked on her old reviews. and not in a condescending way.

"My idea of a club sandwich is turkey, bacon, tomato and lettuce in a toasted double-decker format. The Southgate version has all of that plus some bland cheese that seems unnecessary. It is good. It is excessive, and so half of it goes home to join other leftovers in the refrigerator. My check was $8.49."

for a lady nicknamed "the appetite" she sure take a lot of leftovers home.

it is a really weird place to break up that quote.

this review makes me happy. places like the olive garden make me very happy.

maybe "the appetite" is also ironic

maybe it refers to her legendary sex drive

;_:

My new favourite thread.

I thought someone was going to pull a Misery and kidnap Lex and tie him to a stove in a remote cabin and force him to make ravioli from scratch.

aahahahahahahahahahah

scott I didn't really think you were being condescending, sorry if it came across that way

i can make ravioli! just put in boiling water and it's done in 3 mins. my staple food to eat when returning tipsy from the pub

gauntlet thrown

Scott's store story deserves it's own thread/internet meme imho

Pics or it didn't happen, lex.

i can make ravioli! just put in boiling water and it's done in 3 mins

lol

Picnics or it didn't happen

lexcooks.tumblr.com

oh wait you mean MAKING THE ACTUAL RAW RAVIOLI?

it had never crossed my mind that people could do that :o

this is like when someone told me you could make your own pesto, my brain couldn't really process it. pesto comes out of JARS.

Making pesto is easy! Basil, pine nuts, olive oil, blender. Takes five minutes at most.

pre-filled jars that grow on trees

xp

might want to put some salt/pepper in that Ned

Making pesto is easy! Basil, pine nuts, olive oil, blender.Unscrew jar. Takes five minutesseconds at most.