Well, it's more than that, I think - it's kind of why you never hear comedians lead off with "Here's a really funny joke", and it's because everyone takes stuff

Well, it's more than that, I think - it's kind of why you never hear comedians lead off with "Here's a really funny joke", and it's because everyone takes stuff like that as a challenge. I haven't seen the negative reviews, but I read the article declaring Alma best new restaurant, and the article is focused a lot on the humble origins and surprisingly very little on the food. The author talks a bit on how some of the pairings were surprising, but more so because the author wasn't expecting it to be this good. I'd like to see some of the actual negative reviews, but if that's the article that brought people in, it's not hard to imagine how some might take the declaration of "best new restaurant" as a challenge instead of as a claim.