Dear Frank Bruni: Help Us To Help You
Fed up with reviews that sometimes have little or no basis in reality (is Masa really worth sacrificing your rent? Need we really imagine a Back to the Future scenario to understand Bistro du Vent?), the downtown foodies at Verbose Coma drop the science on Times restaurant critic (and part-time blogger) Frank Bruni:
Frank, your reviews skew snobbish while lacking the crucial information found in, say, your average Time Out quickie. If you re out to rip a place, let us know why. We know you take a gonzo approach, but we want reviews based on merits, not your expectations. Yeah, criticism is a subjective sport, but just because your driver talked too much on the way over to V doesn t make it a one-star restaurant. What s that? It wasn t all you hoped? Well fine. But given the service and the quality of the cuts, it s still at least a three-star place. Hunh? No, no Frank. Three-star is a type of restaurant, not a rating. You ain't Jeffery Lyons. Let us explain, newbie: stars are guides to the levels of service and quality one might expect from all eateries of that type. It s up to the reviewer (that s you) to flesh out the details and tell us if it s a good three-star restaurant. We know that s a lot of work, but you re a big boy.
