“With each fresh review, a restaurant has to earn its stars again,” wrote New York Times reporter Pete Wells yesterday. “In its current form and at its current price, Per Se struggled and failed to do this, ranging from respectably dull at best to disappointingly flat-footed at worst.” Ouch. Thomas Keller’s famed Per Se restaurant in New York City is considered one of the best in the world, which makes the above two-star review all the more shocking. But as much as people love the food, the Internet loves taking down popular establishments even more, meaning that scathing remarks have been flying ever since the review went live.
Wells called out the “dismal green pulp of cooked romaine lettuce” that the “bacon-wrapped cylinder of quail” was set on, called a mushroom potpie a “swampy mess” and the yam dumplings “limp [and] dispiriting” and even wrote that the “lukewarm matsutake mushroom bouillon [was] as murky and appealing as bong water.”
There are 894 comments on the review so far (not to mention the response on Twitter) and some of them are hilarious, while others are just straight-up mean. Come on people, can’t a famed four-star restaurant have an off-day? Oh, not when you’re dropping $3k on your meal? Fair enough.
Check out some of our favorite responses below:
Per Se staff this morning. @pete_wells @nytfood ⭐️⭐️ https://t.co/5Lola54BIQ pic.twitter.com/0nO7eGG5Z4
— Mÿkl (@ChezWu) January 12, 2016
Thomas Keller will need a bong hit (probably several) after reading this @nytimes review for Per Se by @pete_wells https://t.co/LMT5XcuJBD
— Eddie Lin (@DeepEndDining) January 12, 2016
An hour in and @POTUS still hasn't mentioned that Per Se review. #SOTU16
— Robert O. Simonson (@RobertOSimonson) January 13, 2016
I bet President Obama doesn't even address the fact that Per Se has lost two stars on his watch.
— Jon Lovett (@jonlovett) January 13, 2016
Is there a special German word for enjoying a critic's pan of a restaurant you can't afford to eat at? https://t.co/NrOQs6te9W
— Michael Cooper (@coopnytimes) January 12, 2016
Someday I hope to be described as "grand, hermetic, self-regarding, ungenerous" https://t.co/KnXMO1amCv
— Richard Lawson (@rilaws) January 12, 2016
