Tag Archives: Kitchen Nightmares

Kitchen Nightmares – Oceana in New Orleans

Here we are at the season finale of Kitchen Nightmares which of course for me is a bummer because I love this show and EMC are huge fans of Gordon Ramsey. Luckily though we go from Kitchen Nightmares right into Master Chef. We did not get a chance to review the first season of Master Chef last year so I’m looking forward to it this year. In addition I have a few more episodes of Kitchen Nightmares to throw on here as my dvr had mono for a couple weeks and did not record some of my shows. Grab a beer and your favorite crawdad and lets head to New Orleans to Oceana.

Oceana – New Orleans

Last week was twins, this week we got just plain brothers. Don’t worry folks these brothers are not only brining back the George Michael stubble look but they are also crazier than our main man Charlie Sheen. Sorry Charlie we had to throw you in the mix at some point. We also have a red cheeked angry head chef thrown into the mix creating a wonderful red cheeked, gold chained, stubbly, greasy haired anger tornado. Good luck Gordon!

The Ocean located on Bourbon St making it prime stop for tourist and locals. Owned by brothers Moe and Rami who bought it from their father they spend wonderful New Orleans afternoons yelling at each other, the staff, the tourists, the dogs, the Levies, the street lamps, and the food. I seriously can’t understand how they have a staff. There has got to be a better job than this place. I’d rather be a Wall mart greeter. I’d rather be in a Nicolas Cage movie. Hell, I’d rather be the guy who hoses down the streets after Mardi Gras than work for these guys. What’s really great is that the only things that aren’t angry in this place are the cock roaches and the rats that are living off the fact these guys can’t clean to save there angry lives. Continue reading

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Kitchen Nightmares – Capri in Eagle Rock

Gordon visit’s a double nightmare at Capri in Eagle Rock, Ca. Why is it a double nightmare? The owners are twins. Unfortunately for us and Gordon they are identical twins. You know already we are going to be forced to endure twin jokes, trading names, acting like each other, etc, etc.  The best twin humor however will be dealt of course by Gordon.  We will have twin insults, twins yelling and most important in any kitchen nightmare, twins crying.  So on to Capri in Eagle Rock.

Right away Jeff and Jim started us off with the lame twin humor. “You’re Jim.”  “No, I’m Jim.”  Then we, of course, need to speak in chorus.  I already want to beat them with a soggy loaf of bread.  So these guys had been going to Capri and loved it so much they decided to buy it.  Anyone who watches Gordon take on these projects knows these are the worst kind of owners.  They are clueless, lazy, and lazy.  Yeah I know I said it twice.  After all, they are twins and are twice the amount of lazy.  Luckily their staff respects them and showers them with praise.  Just kidding.  They basically say that they are lazy, immature, sloppy, loud, and can’t cook. Other than that they are fantastic.  Continue reading

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Kitchen Nightmares: La Frite

Gordon hits Ventura Blvd to take on La Frite, a french restaurant in the Valley.  38 years after La Frite was opened,
the owner is now trying to pass it on to his kids who get along as well as me and big words.  From what we learn
at the beginning, the son feels like he should be sitting in the driver’s seat running the joint and the daughter has no business being there.  It seems pretty much nobody wants the daughter there.

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Back with the Fast Food Round-up!

We are back. After what I think has been almost a year, we are back. At least my half will be. Brian’s half will depend on Brian. He is a busy boy trying to help Obama get his budget approved and working on a cure for Voltronioliosis.  It’s a disease affecting most middle aged guys who were big fan of the 80’s cartoon Voltron.  Every now and then they attempt to call the lions, to form up Voltron, to fight the forces of evil.  Most will contort into the shape of a lion and pretend to leave the volcano and join their brethren, yelling at the top of their lungs, ”And I’ll form the head!”.  It’s never the Voltron that was formed by the cars and planes because that Voltron was just stupid.  You’re either down with lion Voltron, or you may just be a communist.  Anyway enough Voltron, lets get into some food.

We will be doing some updates to the bios and such as both of us have undergone a few changes, mostly involving our places of residence or occupation.  I finally found a way to organize the week in order to continue the quest to sort the garbage from the great food and to also watch our favorite TV shows.  It will probably be mostly me for a little while, but B will chime in where he can.

 I’m starting our come back with a new blog I’m gonna call the Fast Food Round-up.  I love trying the new things that these joints come out with.  Always searching to top each other the Carls Jrs, Jack n the box, Taco Bells, and McDonalds of the world are always fighting it out with millions of marketing dollars.  So a couple times a week, or as often as new things come out, I will try them out and maybe save you a trip to the white throne.  As always here at EMC we are willing to take the fast food bullet for you cause well…….we love ya!

FAST FOOD SHRIMP?

Fast food very rarely goes the way of fish. The fillet o’ fish at McDonalds has been probably the one and only regular fish menu item from a straight fast food place.  We are not talking about the fish fast food places that deal with fish. The long John Silvers and Sonics and any fish and chip fast food places aren’t included in what I’m putting together.  I’m talking the big places like the golden arches, Wendy’s, Carls Jr, the Box, Taco Bell and Del Taco.  For this particular round up we are talking shrimp and the recent shrimp tacos at Del Taco and Taco Bell.  I’ve had both now and, as you probably guessed already, they are not great.  The surprise though was that they were better than I thought they’d be.  Would I buy them again? No.  I think I’d rather be in charge of living arrangements for the homeless people in the Ventura river bed. 

Shrimp in itself, at least to me, is an easy ingredient to make fantastic.  But if not done right, is also one of the most bland and flavorless of those that live underneath the depths. The great thing about the tacos at both DT and TB is that you can make them.  Go to your local store, get a bag of those tiny frozen shrimp, thaw them, put them on a tortilla with some cheese cabbage and tomatoes and then stick the whole thing in the microwave.  Fish is not meant to be a fast food.  I know it, you know it, your mom knows it.  Unfortunately nobody is telling the big-wigs or the small-wigs down at the big taco joints.  These bland, limp tacos are being pushed on the public and all we can do is order something different. On a good note, I do really like that Taco Bell is getting crazy with the sauces.  Their verde sauce is actually pretty good.  I always get extra in case I make a quick quesadilla at home.  It’s a great sauce.  The fire roasted sauce is not all that great, but I like that they are trying.  Sauce is everything in food, especially when your product is frozen then re-heated.

Carls Jr Turkey Burger

The fight to make fast food healthy continues at Carls Jr where they introduced their very own Turkey burger.  I understand the desire to make it healthy, but I think everyone needs to really ask what they are pushing.  McDonalds has really been trying to push the healthy stuff too.   Their oatmeal, which if you had it you’d know, might cause the president of McDonalds to be assassinated by the ghost of the Quaker.  Serve apples instead of fries, have juice available, but beyond that you’re just asking for trouble. The turkey burger I had at Carls Jr was dryer than a Maytag.  Maybe you’ve had a better one, but it was actually removing every bit of moisture from my mouth.  The other weird thing was the flavor of the bun.  It was odd.  It was wheat, but not.  It was kinda like it wanted to be wheat, so it dressed in a wheat shirt, but it tasted like wonder bread.  I’m hoping it was just the Carls Jr I went to.  I’m actually gonna try this one again because I wanna like it.  As someone who is dropping weight, but on the run a lot, I want healthy alternatives.  I’m just not sure its going to be from the star.

More to come later this week as we review the start of Deadliest catch, get back into Kitchen Nightmares, and dig into some Man Vs food. Also we’ll have some new places to eat and we will see what B can give us from San Diego.

It’s great to be back boys and girls.  Where have you been eating?  Send us some places you want us to check out!
Mikey

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Kitchen Nightmares – Cho Me Some Respect!

Mojitos

Hey guys and gals, EMC is back on track reviewing the best and worst food in Cali and the best and worst of the food shows on TV.  B and I took a much needed break and are back in action, doing our part to inform, and make you giggle like a little school girl.

We are jumping into Kitchen Nightmares with our pal Gordon Ramsey and are starting off with Gordon trying to help a Cuban restaurant in Brooklyn owned by a couple who are no longer able to tolerate each other’s existence.  They split up years ago but kept ownership of their restaurant as partners. Sort of… Continue reading

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Our Own Little Kitchen Nightmare.

by Brian

Mikey and I started this blog mostly because we were bored and unemployed.  Now we’re neither.  In the interim we’ve managed to eat some good food, some not so good food, and meet a ton of really cool people.

Thanks to one of our readers, Michelle of ThePeevery.com, we might even get our 15 minutes of fame.  You see, Michelle is an avid yelper and is just generally pissed off about a lot of things (probably because she’s about to pop out a kid any day now).  One of the things that really got her going was her experience at Mama Rita’s in Newbury Park and the producers of a certain Gordon Ramsey fronted show found her review and invited her to come to Mama Rita’s Grand Re-opening.  She was gracious enough to invite Mikey and myself to the fun and it was all down hill from there.  Continue reading

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Shows that make you wanna eat

by Mikey

I am taking a day off from throwing another food joint at you to go over something that I realized while watching the Sopranos. If any of you have ever watched the show, you know that Carmella spends half the show in the kitchen whipping up Italian dishes.  Along with her you have Artie cooking all the time and most of the cast is usually eating or drinking.  As I’m watching I look down and realize I’m eating the lasagna I just made the night before.  Everytime I watch this show I want to eat something.  They have such great food on the show that it actually drives something in my brain to eat.  I guess that’s better than the other vices on the show.  I haven’t started threatening the locals for protection money or working out of a strip club.  Though the latter has some appeal.

The top of my list is probably the Sopranos.  What else hits that impulse in your brain?

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