12 ms·

> Roberts saw an opportunity not just to re-create those bygone red sauce joints, but to present the most exaggerated, over-the-top version of them, to create a

by apo 7y ago

> Roberts saw an opportunity not just to re-create those bygone red sauce joints, but to present the most exaggerated, over-the-top version of them, to create an environment where people could feel totally comfortable—as he describes it, "... I wanted a restaurant people could look down on.” > > He wanted the decor to be tacky, the portions to be enormous, the atmosphere to be boisterous. He figured it didn’t matter that he wasn’t Italian in the slightest. There were also almost no red sauce joints in Minneapolis at the time, so diners wouldn’t have anything to compare it to. This was a restaurant, he says, “that was intentionally in bad taste, but good-natured bad taste.” The kind of place where the average diner could feel superior, and not feel bad about being puzzled over a wine list, or not knowing what kind of fork is used for a salad. The concept of a restaurant that people "look down on" seems both bold and mean-spirited. It also vaguely reminds me of an article I read about the Old Spaghetti Factory. What are some other examples of American restaurants that followed this playbook?

djcapelis 7y ago
> What are some other examples of American restaurants that followed this playbook? I would argue Panda Express is spiritually similar in some ways.
- mc32 7y ago
  On some ways, but I think PF Chang’s is perhaps a better example because it’s more sit down like BdB, whereas PX is more fast food and it also goes a bit over the top with regards to iconography and imaging. For Americana, probably Armadillo Willy’s.
  - Shebanator 7y ago
    Armadillo Willy's is an awfully local reference. They only have a few locations relative to the other chains mentioned in this thread, and the furthest from the South Bay is in Dublin.
cowmoo728 7y ago
Cheesecake Factory? They're famous for having terrible decor, service, and food, yet somehow being an essential part of the American high school prom experience. https://www.barstoolsports.com/barstoolu/dude-goes-viral-for-tweet-storm-about-how-much-the-cheesecake-factory-sucks https://www.barstoolsports.com/barstoolu/dude-goes-viral-for...
- eBombzor 7y ago
  lol the chain of tweets and the reaction at the end was pretty funny.
- dragonwriter 7y ago
  > Cheesecake Factory? They're famous for having terrible decor, service, and food, I've always found CF to have decent service and good (but not outstanding) food, a ludicrously long menu being the main negative, plus the fact that it's always ludicrously crowded because they underprice for their appeal. The decor is gaudy, but not what I would describe as terrible (or even unpleasant, just incongruous.)
  - mixmastamyk 7y ago
    They've got cheesecake, who cares about decor?
- hopler 7y ago
  Being hated by hipsters who resent simple pleasures available to all is part of the appeal.
- ocdtrekkie 7y ago
  I get so peeved by the treatment of chain restaurants like this as "poor" or "terrible". Because you know what, Cheesecake Factory, Olive Garden, Red Lobster, Outback Steakhouse? These are some of the nicest restaurants the average citizen can hope to afford to go to more than once in their lifetime. It isn't going to impress folks who have a personal chef at home, but the food is pretty darn good, and you don't have to saw off your right arm to pay for it.
kevinmchugh 7y ago
It arose organically before the restaurants adopted it, but Taco Bell and White Castle have both embraced their reputations as food for the chemically impaired. Almost every time* I've heard someone talk about either restaurant, they have a glee as if sliders or a gordita crunch are a form of debauchery. *the exception is vegetarians who have a lot of completely earnest love for the bean burrito.
- mwfunk 7y ago
  Junk food is absolutely a form of debauchery, or at least can be a guilty pleasure.
larrydag 7y ago
It's actually a pretty American playbook for restaurants especially in the south. There are many BBQ, Southern Cookin, fried fish places that do this all over the place. I'm in Texas and my family frequents these types of places a lot.
hbosch 7y ago
Perhaps Olive Garden and Outback Steakhouse, maybe Texas Roudhouse or Hard Rock Cafe. Absolutely Hooters.
Dirlewanger 7y ago
Many American chains can fit under this guise. As others have said: Cheesecake Factory, Panda Express, Taco Bell, but also McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, Pizza Hut, Domino's, In 'n' Out, Whataburger...none of them pretend to offer a haute dining experience. Ones that I would argue don't want to be looked down upon (but are) are the likes of Olive Garden, Chili's, Applebees, Texas Roadhouse. They put on a facade of being fancy, but everyone knows most dishes served at these places were frozen and put in the microwave minutes before they are served. I could be wrong with the examples I gave though; it's been a long time since I've eaten out at any of them...
- newsoul2019 7y ago
  >> frozen and put in the microwave Seriously? I don't go to any of those restaurant anyway.
- taurath 7y ago
  Applebees and Chilis sort of skirts the line - they want the after-work crowd but also families at the same time. They don't really have an identity, but I think thats sort of the point - be as generic an option as possible to have as wide a market as possible, offend no-one.
- chipotle_coyote 7y ago
  Despite a lot of jokes and offended Yelp reviews I see accusing virtually every restaurant at every price level of that, I'd be surprised if any were literally microwaving frozen meals to serve. They use a lot of frozen and canned ingredients for dishes, and probably use mixes made for them in commercial kitchens and shipped to the restaurants. But a little cooking at the end can go a long way. Chili's, for instance, serves not only freshly made salsa but freshly fried chips. The tortillas are pre-made and pre-cut and just need to be dumped in the oil, and you can make salsa in batches by dumping pre-measured portions in a blender. Panda Express is cooking everything on site throughout the day, too. Take the right bags of pre-cut vegetable blends, the meat, the sauce, stir it all furiously in a big wok, put it on a heat table. No microwave. Most of the speed of "casual" restaurants just comes from doing a lot of prep work ahead of time, keeping everything from sauces to precooked vegetable mixes in warmers, and using the same ingredients across a range of dishes. (Prepare five grilled meats, six sauces, and put them on beds of rice, mashed potatoes, or pasta, and now come up with a name for each possible combination. Presto! You're a Cheesecake Factory.)
_red 7y ago
I don't think its mean spirited. "Dive bars" have always been popular. A friend of mine in college opened a dive bar, which quickly became very very popular. This was the type of place where you could smell the ammonia from the urinal when you walked in the door. Spending more than an hour in there, and you left smelling like cigarette smoke and stale beer. When opening his 2nd bar, he made the rookie mistake of "trying to finally do it right". His new bar was walking distance from the original, and had a beautiful wood bar, leather chairs, fancy plate glass windows with frosted lettering, etc (top notch plumbing too). His 2nd bar never caught on and he eventually had to close. The importance of "dive's" is that everyone feels comfortable. You feel you can do no wrong. Spill your beer...so what. Whereas if the place it too fancy, everyone becomes too self-aware. These types of places like BdB aren't about customers "looking down" on the place, its about being in a place thats comfortable and where the average joe doesn't feel looked down upon.
- dwighttk 7y ago
  everything in your description of a dive from "smell the ammonia", to "cigarette smoke and stale beer" to "spill your beer...so what" makes me feel uncomfortable.
  - tsunamifury 7y ago
    Some people feel comfortable in Dive bars and others in the King Cole Bar.
    - dagw 7y ago
      Where I grew up there where two bars basically next door to each other. One was a dive who's primary selling point was that the drinks where always cheaper than next door and the other was a nicer place who's primary selling point was that it didn't attract the sort of people who's primary concern was how cheap the beer was. Both did very well.
  - vorpalhex 7y ago
    Traveling a bit, I've noticed that regardless the language, customs, atmosphere or locality that all pubs offer a kind of simple baseline. Whether it's in a ship or a totally foreign country, you can get a beer and some food and ask pretty direct questions of your bartender to get an honest lay of the land around you. The best part of the crappy, touristy cruise ships is getting the hell off the ship and finding a local pub where you can chat with the locals outside of the tourist/vendor relationship. The second best part of those ships is finding the empty pub onboard where the crew will open up and share their own stories and experiences.
saikit 7y ago
The flair-era of TGI Fridays, as immortalized in Office Space.
- southphillyman 7y ago
  There is a movie called Waiting, that does a great job of illustrating that era and those type of restaurants.
sailfast 7y ago
Joe's Crabshack. Margaritaville. Texas Roadhouse. Chuy's is borderline.
dragonwriter 7y ago
> What are some other examples of American restaurants that followed this playbook? It's pretty common (perhaps dominant) with ethnic (or American regional, and some other strong themes) chains or single-location restaurants, because it promotes accessibility by making alien elements less off-putting. It's a way to make it so the restaurant doesn't seem to be looking down on the customers.
taurath 7y ago
I thought it was really interesting and enlightening that anyone could think about a restaurant this way - shows how little I know about the hospitality industry. I always pegged it to be going for different social classes sort of thing, but then I could never figure out why a burger and fries at a red robin is about the same as most steakhouses, and people were okay with that. It definitely does make you feel like you don't need to impress anyone to be there - the real value that comes from making a place people feel socially relaxed is something I haven't thought much about.
noer 7y ago
I'm not sure it's necessarily that people "look down on it", but that the authenticity is derived from something inauthentic.
protomyth 7y ago
It’s not mean spirited, it’s tacky and tacky is amazingly comfortable because it invokes humor. The Pope room is hilarious even for Catholics because it is not mean spirited but a tacky but well meaning room. It’s comfortable and you know it’s not snooty so you can be at ease with their quite good service. Also, the portion size makes it family or group ordering at not a “I’ll have” place.
m463 7y ago
I once went to the Ripley's Believe It or Not museum in Baltimore. The exhibits were both amazing and ridiculous. They had paintings of Bill and Hillary Clinton drawn in Hamburger grease. They had a giant picutre of Bill Gates, but when you got close, the "pixels" were different colored keyboard keys. Was it "high art"? I think not. Was I entertained? yes. and I have to say the whole article reminded me a little of this onion "article": https://www.theonion.com/european-men-are-so-much-more-romantic-than-american-me-1819594261 https://www.theonion.com/european-men-are-so-much-more-roman... (sorry)

by apo 7y ago

djcapelis 7y ago

> What are some other examples of American restaurants that followed this playbook? I would argue Panda Express is spiritually similar in some ways.

mc32 7y ago
On some ways, but I think PF Chang’s is perhaps a better example because it’s more sit down like BdB, whereas PX is more fast food and it also goes a bit over the top with regards to iconography and imaging. For Americana, probably Armadillo Willy’s.
- Shebanator 7y ago
  Armadillo Willy's is an awfully local reference. They only have a few locations relative to the other chains mentioned in this thread, and the furthest from the South Bay is in Dublin.

cowmoo728 7y ago

Cheesecake Factory? They're famous for having terrible decor, service, and food, yet somehow being an essential part of the American high school prom experience. https://www.barstoolsports.com/barstoolu/dude-goes-viral-for-tweet-storm-about-how-much-the-cheesecake-factory-sucks https://www.barstoolsports.com/barstoolu/dude-goes-viral-for...

eBombzor 7y ago
lol the chain of tweets and the reaction at the end was pretty funny.
dragonwriter 7y ago
> Cheesecake Factory? They're famous for having terrible decor, service, and food, I've always found CF to have decent service and good (but not outstanding) food, a ludicrously long menu being the main negative, plus the fact that it's always ludicrously crowded because they underprice for their appeal. The decor is gaudy, but not what I would describe as terrible (or even unpleasant, just incongruous.)
- mixmastamyk 7y ago
  They've got cheesecake, who cares about decor?
hopler 7y ago
Being hated by hipsters who resent simple pleasures available to all is part of the appeal.
ocdtrekkie 7y ago
I get so peeved by the treatment of chain restaurants like this as "poor" or "terrible". Because you know what, Cheesecake Factory, Olive Garden, Red Lobster, Outback Steakhouse? These are some of the nicest restaurants the average citizen can hope to afford to go to more than once in their lifetime. It isn't going to impress folks who have a personal chef at home, but the food is pretty darn good, and you don't have to saw off your right arm to pay for it.

kevinmchugh 7y ago

It arose organically before the restaurants adopted it, but Taco Bell and White Castle have both embraced their reputations as food for the chemically impaired. Almost every time* I've heard someone talk about either restaurant, they have a glee as if sliders or a gordita crunch are a form of debauchery. *the exception is vegetarians who have a lot of completely earnest love for the bean burrito.

mwfunk 7y ago
Junk food is absolutely a form of debauchery, or at least can be a guilty pleasure.

larrydag 7y ago

It's actually a pretty American playbook for restaurants especially in the south. There are many BBQ, Southern Cookin, fried fish places that do this all over the place. I'm in Texas and my family frequents these types of places a lot.

hbosch 7y ago

Perhaps Olive Garden and Outback Steakhouse, maybe Texas Roudhouse or Hard Rock Cafe. Absolutely Hooters.

Dirlewanger 7y ago

Many American chains can fit under this guise. As others have said: Cheesecake Factory, Panda Express, Taco Bell, but also McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, Pizza Hut, Domino's, In 'n' Out, Whataburger...none of them pretend to offer a haute dining experience. Ones that I would argue don't want to be looked down upon (but are) are the likes of Olive Garden, Chili's, Applebees, Texas Roadhouse. They put on a facade of being fancy, but everyone knows most dishes served at these places were frozen and put in the microwave minutes before they are served. I could be wrong with the examples I gave though; it's been a long time since I've eaten out at any of them...

newsoul2019 7y ago
>> frozen and put in the microwave Seriously? I don't go to any of those restaurant anyway.
taurath 7y ago
Applebees and Chilis sort of skirts the line - they want the after-work crowd but also families at the same time. They don't really have an identity, but I think thats sort of the point - be as generic an option as possible to have as wide a market as possible, offend no-one.
chipotle_coyote 7y ago
Despite a lot of jokes and offended Yelp reviews I see accusing virtually every restaurant at every price level of that, I'd be surprised if any were literally microwaving frozen meals to serve. They use a lot of frozen and canned ingredients for dishes, and probably use mixes made for them in commercial kitchens and shipped to the restaurants. But a little cooking at the end can go a long way. Chili's, for instance, serves not only freshly made salsa but freshly fried chips. The tortillas are pre-made and pre-cut and just need to be dumped in the oil, and you can make salsa in batches by dumping pre-measured portions in a blender. Panda Express is cooking everything on site throughout the day, too. Take the right bags of pre-cut vegetable blends, the meat, the sauce, stir it all furiously in a big wok, put it on a heat table. No microwave. Most of the speed of "casual" restaurants just comes from doing a lot of prep work ahead of time, keeping everything from sauces to precooked vegetable mixes in warmers, and using the same ingredients across a range of dishes. (Prepare five grilled meats, six sauces, and put them on beds of rice, mashed potatoes, or pasta, and now come up with a name for each possible combination. Presto! You're a Cheesecake Factory.)

_red 7y ago

I don't think its mean spirited. "Dive bars" have always been popular. A friend of mine in college opened a dive bar, which quickly became very very popular. This was the type of place where you could smell the ammonia from the urinal when you walked in the door. Spending more than an hour in there, and you left smelling like cigarette smoke and stale beer. When opening his 2nd bar, he made the rookie mistake of "trying to finally do it right". His new bar was walking distance from the original, and had a beautiful wood bar, leather chairs, fancy plate glass windows with frosted lettering, etc (top notch plumbing too). His 2nd bar never caught on and he eventually had to close. The importance of "dive's" is that everyone feels comfortable. You feel you can do no wrong. Spill your beer...so what. Whereas if the place it too fancy, everyone becomes too self-aware. These types of places like BdB aren't about customers "looking down" on the place, its about being in a place thats comfortable and where the average joe doesn't feel looked down upon.

dwighttk 7y ago
everything in your description of a dive from "smell the ammonia", to "cigarette smoke and stale beer" to "spill your beer...so what" makes me feel uncomfortable.
- tsunamifury 7y ago
  Some people feel comfortable in Dive bars and others in the King Cole Bar.
  - dagw 7y ago
    Where I grew up there where two bars basically next door to each other. One was a dive who's primary selling point was that the drinks where always cheaper than next door and the other was a nicer place who's primary selling point was that it didn't attract the sort of people who's primary concern was how cheap the beer was. Both did very well.
- vorpalhex 7y ago
  Traveling a bit, I've noticed that regardless the language, customs, atmosphere or locality that all pubs offer a kind of simple baseline. Whether it's in a ship or a totally foreign country, you can get a beer and some food and ask pretty direct questions of your bartender to get an honest lay of the land around you. The best part of the crappy, touristy cruise ships is getting the hell off the ship and finding a local pub where you can chat with the locals outside of the tourist/vendor relationship. The second best part of those ships is finding the empty pub onboard where the crew will open up and share their own stories and experiences.

saikit 7y ago

The flair-era of TGI Fridays, as immortalized in Office Space.

southphillyman 7y ago
There is a movie called Waiting, that does a great job of illustrating that era and those type of restaurants.

sailfast 7y ago

Joe's Crabshack. Margaritaville. Texas Roadhouse. Chuy's is borderline.

dragonwriter 7y ago

> What are some other examples of American restaurants that followed this playbook? It's pretty common (perhaps dominant) with ethnic (or American regional, and some other strong themes) chains or single-location restaurants, because it promotes accessibility by making alien elements less off-putting. It's a way to make it so the restaurant doesn't seem to be looking down on the customers.

taurath 7y ago

I thought it was really interesting and enlightening that anyone could think about a restaurant this way - shows how little I know about the hospitality industry. I always pegged it to be going for different social classes sort of thing, but then I could never figure out why a burger and fries at a red robin is about the same as most steakhouses, and people were okay with that. It definitely does make you feel like you don't need to impress anyone to be there - the real value that comes from making a place people feel socially relaxed is something I haven't thought much about.

noer 7y ago

I'm not sure it's necessarily that people "look down on it", but that the authenticity is derived from something inauthentic.

protomyth 7y ago

It’s not mean spirited, it’s tacky and tacky is amazingly comfortable because it invokes humor. The Pope room is hilarious even for Catholics because it is not mean spirited but a tacky but well meaning room. It’s comfortable and you know it’s not snooty so you can be at ease with their quite good service. Also, the portion size makes it family or group ordering at not a “I’ll have” place.

m463 7y ago

I once went to the Ripley's Believe It or Not museum in Baltimore. The exhibits were both amazing and ridiculous. They had paintings of Bill and Hillary Clinton drawn in Hamburger grease. They had a giant picutre of Bill Gates, but when you got close, the "pixels" were different colored keyboard keys. Was it "high art"? I think not. Was I entertained? yes. and I have to say the whole article reminded me a little of this onion "article": https://www.theonion.com/european-men-are-so-much-more-romantic-than-american-me-1819594261 https://www.theonion.com/european-men-are-so-much-more-roman... (sorry)