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

MARILYN WE NEED YOU

http://gawker.com/olive-garden-offers-7-weeks-of-never-ending-pasta-brea-1631889131?utm_campaign=socialflow_gawker_facebook&utm_source=gawker_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

Olive Garden doesn't salt its pasta, according to 295-slide presentation from a hedge fund getting in a proxy fight with Darden Restaruants' board

I am very disappointed that the $100 fuckfest gluttony pass was limited to the first 1,000 opportunists. I was really hoping for a repeat of darden's previous snow crab AYCE fiasco (see http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2003-09-26-crab_x.htm)

Also because my brain is cursed to come up with fucking dumb wordplay I think "Taylor Darden" whenever a darden restaurant news comes up, or just seeing an olive garden gift card in line at the grocery. It's a problem.

I always think of that bald OJ prosecutor, looking over his shoulder at a waiter with a pepper grinder and thinking, It could've just as well been this guy, you know.

there seems to be some sort of
uk version of this episode now
daresay it will turn up here in due course

from which review is that?

Denny’s is Denny’s. An everyday kind of place, I was thinking. That was until I noticed Denny’s offering Apple Danish Stuffed French Toast.

“This is interesting,” I told Jan Strinden (JS), as she and Earl Strinden (ES) were heading out with me to eat after church. I know Denny’s wasn’t claiming to have Danish abelskiver, but as a full-blooded Danish American, I had to check out the Apple Danish dish.

On weekends, there usually is a waiting line with little space for standing or sitting around the entry of Denny’s. But we checked in and had a wait of only around 10 minutes.

The Apple Danish arrived with a warm apple filling between two slices of French toast. And it was topped with a drizzle of cinnamon sauce. It cost $7.99.

Very tasty, we agreed. JS liked the fact it was accompanied by a small dish of fresh fruit — grapes, apple slices and banana slices.

Though it was a far cry from Danish abelskiver, it was good enough. And as close as a Dane can get in this Norwegian immigrant area where lutefisk and lefse have long been the holiday fare.

In two recent visits to Denny’s, I have found the service is good. I like the real water glasses and the fact they serve water without customers having to ask for it.

The menu is pretty lengthy. It is full of pictures that show customers exactly how things look. The menu is not as redundant and confusing as at some eating places. But like most chain restaurants, there are so many extras and specials and coupons that it boggles the mind.

The coffee is good at Denny’s. It costs $2.09 and comes in mugs that are rounded and easy to hold. Each cup has a pleasant saying on one side.

love those rounded mugs

that review's plainness is hypnotically appealing. found myself nodding and mentally saying "yes, you are right".

tho the last time I went to a Denny's it was f'ing awful.

I like the real water glasses and the fact they serve water without customers having to ask for it.

I ate at Denny's a lot in college because there was one down the street from me and it was cheap and open 24 hours but god is the food an abomination

I think there's a Rumpole where it turns out the motive for murder is that every single night without fail the murdered man, when he starts eating the supper his wife had prepared, says "Tasty, dear, very tasty."

i think people were really indulging in a lot of special pleading to make her reviews seem more knowing and clever than they are. that said, i do think it escaped people when she was damning a restaurant with faint praise.

though i still wonder at the utility of describing at length a restaurant that (a) most people have already been to and (b) is absolutely critic-proof.

also what are "real" water glasses? ones made of glass, not plastic?

smh @ restaurants serving fake water glasses

I need to know the pleasant sayings.

i mean, if i want to go to denny's, no critic is going to prevent me from doing so. especially if it's 3 AM.

also places where the menu is "redundant and confusing". I get the second bit but it's confusing yoked to the first part.

confusing confusing. fuckit im going to dennys to boggle my mind.

i like when i go to ethnic restaurants that have confusing, endless menus -- it's a good exercise for the mind IMO.

"this menu is redundant dammit"

Each cup has a pleasant saying on one side.

"It says 'Denny's' on one side."

the oddest part of that review to me is the phrase "eating places"

i mean, other than restaurants, what "eating places" have menus?

"eating places" would be a good name for a book about traveling around the midwest visiting restaurants

I think she just didn't want to repeat the word "restaurant" so much.

"eatery"

"food dispenser"

"corporate hole-stuffing location"

"dumpster"

"Denny's"

"feedlot"

I don't like how clicking on Haggerty's name means A BILLBOARD SIZED PHOTO pops up. I know she's the most famous Grand Forks resident but

Does the Montreal IHOP go through this too?

'''French Toast'? C’est un aliment toxique!"

The host sits at the head of the table along with any guest of honor. You don’t wear hats at a dinner table. Food is served from the right. Plates are cleared from the left.

Your napkin goes first on your lap, and it’s recommended you fold it away from you so that you can wipe your fingers surreptitiously, if necessary.

Basic manners for dining are good all year round. They are especially timely for review right before Thanksgiving.

That’s why I asked to join in a session on etiquette and networking at UND. It was offered by UND Career Services. Ilene Odegard, the director, said manners are still relevant. They make a statement as a foundation for good relationships. And they are a mark of a professional.

The advice for etiquette and networking is timely at Thanksgiving. The etiquette books say it is courteous for guests to offer help. Then back off if help is not needed. It shows good manners to bring a small gift — maybe something that can be shared by the other guests, perhaps a bottle of wine or a box of chocolates. Spending too much is ostentatious.

Lingering after dinner should not be too long. One suggestion is to make your departure about five minutes before you think you should.

God I wish I lived in North Dakota sometimes.

wow, I didn't know anything about this. Kevin and I are old friends; he's from Delaware.

I'm not going to read this thread (which got HUGE, wow) or weigh in on its subject for a variety of reasons. But I will say that I've been in these situations as a reporter at a weekly community newspaper where a) you write about stuff that is hyper-local and no-one outside of the coverage area will care about, or b) you approach hyper-local stuff with an outsider bias and get stung by the community for it. It's...an experience, that second instance, and an educational one.

I don't miss being a professional journalist, but on a lot of levels the year I spend as a general assignment reporter for a 30K-serving weekly opened my eyes to a lot.

this is the first time I felt the lulling quality of the prose:

There's a station where fries and burgers beckon. And there is a display of foods being offered to help customers make decisions. Food from the full dinner center is far more appealing when you see a plate with meatloaf, mashed potatoes and vegetables.

As the old saying goes, we eat with our eyes.

The five centers in the cafe are the deli, grill, marketplace, pizza and salad.

For me, it was far more inviting to pick and choose from the vast array of greens, fruits and vegetables for a salad. And when I got up to the cash register, my salad was weighed to determine the cost. With the cup of broccoli-wild rice soup and the salad, my lunch came to $4.57. There, I had a brief visit with Loretta Boehm, long-time cashier who knows most everybody in North Dakota.

The dining area is vast. And that is reassuring for people who come to the capitol in large groups.

Gone are the distinctive banners of rainbow colors that used to hang from the ceiling and high above the tables. Now the dining room is done in light tones of brown. The vast room is sectioned off with choices of seating at high tables, in booths or around tables.

While there is much to like about the Capitol Cafe, there are things that make you wonder. Some regulars at the cafe cannot understand why everything is plastic. Everything is thrown away in this beautiful cafeteria facility.

Of course, one would expect there are costs involved.

With its new decor, people who eat in the cafe carry their used plates to an exit where they dump them and all the plastic knives, forks and spoons as they depart.

I always misread his as Merle Haggard's amazing Olive Garden Revieq

Merle Haggard's Olive Garden reviews were serviceable but not quite as evocative, imo.

The Dinin' Side Of Me: The Collected Reviews

"Buffalo wings shinin' in the sunlight..."

"I'm proud to get some jelly from the deli."

I'm a breadstick man long as they're not cold.

Late period Hagerty reviews, unlike her more famous Olive Garden work, are tinged with a creeping awareness of mortality.

Sounds like every visit to Olive Garden I've ever taken.

You can have all the soup you can slurp, but you're still going to die one day.

Her review of Chuck's Yum Yum Hut was a splendid return to form, easily her best since Scary Monsters.

The breadsticks are unlimited, but your time is not.