Fine Dining - BONUS EPISODE: 20 Restaurants: The Current Scoreboard

Episode Date: February 22, 2023

Michael & Garrett look back at 20 (+1) restaurant visits and analyze if their scores look correct on the Tchotchke of Mediocrity JUB will help you fill your life with regrets Garrett comes clean about DMing with Gatti's Pizza A full rankings recap at the end We're now on Patreon! Get a monthly free episode, merch discounts, download access to our music including the 7 singles from our Olive Garden musical, the opportunity to get your face immortalized on the Tchotchke of Mediocrity, and more!   Get our 5 Survival Tips for Casual Dining at www.finediningpodcast.com!   Send us your fan questions at [e-mail].   Follow us on TikTok and Instagram @finediningpodcast   Let us know where we should go next by leaving us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, or wherever you get your podcasts. We read every one!   Next time on Fine Dining: The Cheesecake Factory. If you have ever worked for The Cheesecake Factory and have a story to share, or if you'd like us to hear your child's review of The Cheesecake Factory kids menu, send it to [e-mail].

Your table is ready. Follow me. Have you tried our chicken breast? Serving pancakes and ritz, I recommend the spaghetti. We're here to satisfy not to impress. Your table is ready. Complementary butter and bread. These walls have growth signs.

Knit-knack, cowboy hat, good luck at Altigraph guitar, some grab from your city. Behold the Chotchky of mediocrity. Fine dining. Just by adgers on the sign are shining, Neal flickering irregular timing, identify the perfect vibe. Hello and welcome to a special edition of the Fine Dining Podcast, the search for the most mediocre restaurant in America.

I'm your host, Michael Ornellis. I'm your host, Garrett's Work, and we are special boys. We're special boys, as in we're giving you a special. We're special little boys. Should we get a song for that? No, probably not. We'll just say we're fussy. We're especially fussy.

We are especially fussy. In our fussy little boys. Both of them are fussy little boys, babies. Both of them are fussy little boys. Both of them are fussy little boys. In our discovery of self-fussiness, we have put ourselves through the ringer 20 times now. 21 times, if you want to include Patreon, we have gone to 20 restaurants. We have a Chotchky of Mediocrity filled up.

I think you want to say we've survived 20 restaurants. We've survived 20 restaurants in this middle tier. And we just want to take a look back. We want to look at the Chochie of Mediocrity because not all of you have access to it. You can see it if you go on our Instagram or our Patreon. But we want to kind of address where things lie and maybe reflect a little bit. Did we get it right? There are some that looking.

back like Buffalo Wild Wings. Yeah. How would this be different today without a giant leak from the ceiling? Yeah, I feel like Buffalo would be better, but I mean, I've been in other Buffalo Wild Wings since we went. Buffalo Wild Wings is sitting at a 3.56. It's our second lowest rating on the entire Chachke. That's one coming into this.

We never would have guessed this was going to happen. I thought it would be out of the zone of mediocrity. I thought it would be above a six. I historically have liked Buffalo Wild Wings. As of I. I think if we ever did a Buffalo do-over, I mean, maybe I'm, maybe it's a fool me twice, shame on me sort of situation. But I have to imagine that Buffalo Wild Wings would benefit from us revisiting them. Definitely.

Yeah. Like, I'd want to go to the Hollywood Boulevard location, which it's always been excellent for me. Yeah. And one of the biggest problems we had with B-dubs, the noise. Yeah. I think that could easily be fixed. The noise, the temperature, it was really cold. Yeah.

The leak and just kind of like the apathy. We were on like a Keith come down. Keith from our Outback episode set the bar real high, straight out the gate for what a good waiter looks like. And we didn't have a bad waiter. No, we just had wings. I'd say she was average. I would say she was average too.

But, you know, I think we just, we came in expecting a little bit more. Now, if we do talk about Keith, Outback. Outback is kind of still on the higher end of the Chotchkey. What's it sitting at, Garrett? That is a 7.45. Yeah, Outback, it's 7.45. It's in the top five. It's the fifth highest ranked restaurant that we have.

Great experience. I mean, it's got the pinnacle of appetizers. The bloom and onion, you're not going to find a better appetizer at any. We still have it. I don't think we ever will. I don't think we ever will. It's a perfect creation. It's seasoned to perfection.

I know Chili's has the awesome blossom. It is an embarrassing facsimile. Yeah. Outback still stands out fondly to me. Keith, Keith is, hey, Keith is the top memory from Outback. But Keith has moved on. We would like to think that Keith scored his pilot, something right now. Oh, that's right.

Yeah, we went back to that Outback and we were trying to be like, can we get in touch with Keith? We want him to know that we talked about him glowingly on a podcast. And they were like, he's moved on to better thing. It's like, oh, good for him. Someone there passed your phone number on to him and he hasn't gotten in contact. with us because he probably has better things to do. I'm trying to think, is there anything they could have done to bring that rating up?

I think if their stakes were better. Yes. Because you had the steak. They are a steakhouse. And they're a steakhouse to where, you know, they're not a top of the line. They are a chain steakhouse. So, you know, I went with the option of, well, let's not try to go for the thing that they're going to fall short on, despite it being their best foot forward, quote unquote.

I'm going to go with the burger and I love their burger. I've always loved their burger and fries. Pair that with a bloomin onion, you put the bloom on it and some bloom sauce. It's one of the better burgers out there that you can get. So, yeah, Outback, I don't know if it can reach much higher, but it had a very good foot forward. Oh, here, actually, one simple way outback can get better.

Yeah. Put a good, strong char on your steaks. That's it. Charr your steaks, they'll be better. Now, you know what steak was really bad. The chicken fried steak at Denny's. Oh, God, I refuse to eat that. That was disgusting.

Denny's is, uh, I mean, it's fourth from the bottom, but I feel like it's still performed where it should have. Denny's, I feel very confident calling a 4.50 out of 10. Do you? I think it scored a little lower than it could have. Now, then it could have, sure. I'll say this, we're reserving breakfast Denny's. We have not done breakfast Denny's.

You did order some breakfast food, but we went at 2 a.m. That is a different restaurant than your Sunday morning early bird special. Yeah, like you got that chicken fried steak. Come on. How can it have a good rating? Slathered in gravy. So I think Denny's is appropriately rated, however, has room for improvement. But I bet breakfast Denny's is a good five and a half at least.

Yeah, I think breakfast Denny's, you know, it's in its element. We're keeping it where it is supposed to be. So, and then we also had five different instances of what's going on over there happened in that Denny's just because, I mean, come on, what was going on over there? There were just, it was the wild, it was a Wild West saloon. And that's why we went. And I think that makes an amazing experience at 2 a.m. Yeah. No, it was fun.

I have fond memories of that Denny's, but if you want to hear some wild stories, go check out that episode for sure. Now, Denny's competitor, direct competitor, not IHOP, we haven't gone to IHop yet, but Waffle House, has currently set the bar for us as the most mediocre restaurant. That was such a weird experience. The food just blew us out of the water, frankly. It had no right. No, it didn't. But it was such a small menu that you could tell they kept it to the things that they knew they would excel at. The difference between them is Denny's had an atmosphere that was chaotic but felt like a roller coaster.

Yeah, it felt like they were on a track. Yeah. Yeah. Waffle House just felt like a tornado. It was that kind of chaos where it's just like, if anything happens, you better get out of the way. Denny's is your safe normal amusement park ride. Yes. Waffle House is the carnival ride where the seatbelts don't work and the bars don't go down.

And you're like, is that bubble gum being used as an adhesive? Like, I'm pretty sure that there's supposed to be a screw in that opening. It literally reminds me of the time I was a child and had to hold on for my actual dear life at a carnival when the lap bar wouldn't go down. Oh, for real? For real. If I were to let go, I wouldn't be here today. And that's Waffle House. Yeah.

Now, close to mediocrity, just a week before, Bob's Big Boy. What are your feelings on Bob's Big Boy? Definitely the worst service we've had still, I would say. I would love to do that again. Bob's Big Boy was a pure aberration. The rating was tanked because of the service. But the rating was tanked to a 4.92, so it's still, you know, it's still in the realm of very close to mediocre. So even with a bad showing, it's still not terrible.

And that's also with the strength of your mom's nostalgia rating. That's right. My mom did come with us and she gave it a little bit of a bump. She went over six, I want to say. Yeah, something like that. Yeah. Yeah, I'm really curious what that rating looks like without the outlier of your mom's rating on it. I think on a good day you could get above five.

Yeah, I agree. I've always had good experiences at Big Boy. It's close to five now, but yeah, it's very much being ballooned up by my mom's rating. Which, by the way, my mom came with us to that one. She was our first guest, but not the only guest that we've had that was related to me. We took Emma, my second cousin. Once removed, up in San Francisco, to Chuck E cheese. And she was the reason we were not kicked out.

Thanks, Emma. I had a blast at Chuckie cheese. I was surprised. I mean, the food, it had some items that surprised me that they were good. Nothing was great. And a couple things were, as you would expect, trash. Yeah, those fries were trash. But it's sitting at a 5.48.

You know, it's, it's honing in on mediocrity. Strongly decent pizza. Yeah, I would get that pizza again. It wouldn't be my first choice, but I would not complain if I had some Chuck Echise Pizza again. Jumping back to a different pizza place, one of our earlier episodes, you and I got into a fierce debate over the validity of a certain dessert at Pizza Hut. Still one of my favorite conversations we've had, but a lot of moodiness on the Pizza Hut episode

between me calling the employees like almost 20 times to try and ask if. they're a dine-in restaurant and then you wanting to order a Cinnabon property for dessert, which I maintain is not a valid dessert because it's not a Pizza Hut item. But I ordered it at Pizza Hut off the Pizza Hut menu and it was made by someone at Pizza Hut. It was received from a factory by someone at Pizza Hut. Sent by Cinnabon. Was it? Yeah.

We actually literally don't know if the Cinebon factory made it. It's in the Cinebon packaging. It is Cineban ingredients. It is not even an altered Cinebin. It is just the size is different. We're going to settle this debate once and for all, Garrett. Don't you worry. We will get to the bottom of it.

But Pizza Hut sitting at a 4.65 just above Denny's. It is our fifth lowest scoring place, but not as bad. Another pizza place as our worst scoring place, Gattie Town. Oh, God, I'm never going back to that place. It was an arcade, and it was the saddest buffet. you could possibly see. It was a pretty excellent arcade. It was a...

I don't want to say excellent. Yeah. It was a pretty passable of the arcade. Yeah, I had fun in the arcade. And dude, this thing is our lowest score with a fun arcade. Can you imagine... Trash. Can you imagine where it would score if we went back and skipped the arcade?

I'm thinking sub two. What did I give it? Let's see. It's a 2.70 right now. I rated this as 1.97. Yeah. This Gattie Town did not put forth a strong effort on their buffet. No, and it's funny.

Gray pudding. Ugh. Gray pudding. Their social media team liked one of our posts. Yes, we're like, we're going to Gattie Town. They're like, oh, hey, here, do you want a gift card for some free pizza? Did they? Yeah, they asked me.

I'm just like, hey, hey, hey, hold up. Listen to the review first. Wait, did you actually? Yeah. Oh, God, did they ever respond to that? They responded the next day. Let me see, I'm going to pull it up. Oh, no.

Here we go, yeah. They asked if they could send us a gift card. And they're like, that's the right thing to do. I was like, hey, we appreciate it. Thank you. But wait until you listen to the review. It's not the most flattering, but we're a comedy podcast, and it's all in good fun. Oh, God.

Did they respond to that? They're like, oh, boy, it's really hit or miss in the buffet and gaming locations. but our pizza is legit. Oh, did they say that? Yep. What an acknowledgement. And then, well, the episode dropped. I sent him a link.

Uh-huh. They respond eight hours later with nothing but, oh, man. Really? Yeah. I didn't know any of this. Why wouldn't you have told me this? I forgot. But it's just like, oh, ma'am's like, yeah, that did not go well, but we did have a good time.

That is so funny. And then I felt bad. Just like, they're like, wait, that location's been recently renovated. Like, wait,

that was this location, right? And then I'm like, yeah, it was this one at that time. And then after that, they said nothing. Like,

I hope no one lost their jobs. Because clearly, their corporate was aware of what happened. Yeah. Woof. Oh my God. The revelations that are made. Yeah.

Like, that made me think, Like their social media person's got to be a millennial. Oh, a boomer wouldn't have handled this interaction well. For sure. 100%. I mean, it's our lowest ranking place.

Yeah. They are the first restaurant that's like engaged with us on here too. Now, speaking of low ranking places, we have Gattie Town at the bottom, Buffalo Wild Wings next up at 3.56. But our third lowest experience, I think was quite a bit partially our fault.

And not the restaurants as much. Cheddar's Scratch Kitchen. Third from the bottom. Cheddar's Grease Kitchen. At 4.15. A very greasy meal. Oh, God. A very greasy meal.

Both of them are greasy little boys. Both of them are greasy little boys babies. Both of them are greasy little boys. Both of them are greasy little boys. My dad. What are you doing? We went with my dad. dad. And he stops another waiter to go, do we even have a server? Keep in mind, we've seen this guy a bunch of time. What are you doing, dude? He's bringing the aggressive into passive aggressive. It is. And I talked to my mom about this and she's like, he's doing it on purpose. Like he knows what he's doing. And I believe that. Yeah. But it's very much to like make a point. And I'm like, you know what? This guy has tables in the other section. Just chill.

Just enjoy your time with us And if it happens to be a little bit more Of a slow-paced meal But hey, I don't blame him Because I don't think he could have enjoyed his time with us Because I was rhyming You had to speak to your waiter in rhyme Oh hey, it's a piece of chicken

Oh, that's what it was Our waiter was apologizing Because this was after your dad had blown up Yes So I'm just like, hey, we understand It's a piece of chicken in my hand And he was just like, okay he talked to you with like the same tone that you give like the birthday boy yeah like i got

humored like a five-year-old boy yeah i'm okay with that yeah i wonder how often during this podcast servers just humor me because you are definitely an awkward person to interact with it i can be i lean into it my awkwardness i think is funny yeah now despite being the third lowest ranking place on our list i do want to try cheddars again knowing that every place cooks from scratch and that it is kind of based on the strength of the chef. I felt like we got a bad location and everything was too greasy, but I feel like another cheddars could kill it. It could be especially the amount of awards they've received.

Yeah. They were like top rated amongst chain restaurants for multiple years. Now, speaking of top rated, number one, I think is a point of contention between you and I. Rainforest Cafe clocks in 8.5. seven. That's a little crazy. That's insanely high for a chain restaurant. I think it is too. It is a well-executed

gimmick. The atmosphere, undeniably, the most fun we've been to. Yes, I think it was definitely a toothed-em-up atmosphere. This was a 10 out of 10 tooth-em-up atmosphere. Yeah, it's like you compared Waffle House to a carnival ride in a bad way.

You could compare this to a carnival ride in a good... You could compare this to like Disneyland. Like this is Animal Kingdom. The strength of the animatronics, the strength of just the magic around you. Plus, we had the balloon animal makers who made me a flamingo inner tube that matched the one that the you must bowl required you to blow up over the course of your meal. Plus they accommodated us. They gave us a table when they said they didn't have any space. You pulled the card.

I pulled the card. We're food reviewers and we're here to review you. And they could have just been like, well, you're going to have to do it a different day because we're closed to walk in. But they didn't. And the manager came over. She spent a lot of time with us. The service was, again, two thumbs up. Excellent service.

Yeah, and the atmosphere. Two thumbs up, excellent atmosphere. But the strength of the food to me was just... That's where we divert. It was so mediocre overall. It had great desserts. I just feel like, I don't know, I feel like Rainforest Cafe scoring too much higher than an eight. And I gave it above an eight.

Like, I'm complicit in this, but you gave it above a nine, which is just I don't agree with. But, hey, these scores. are the aggregate of my opinion in your opinion. I gave it a 9.01 and I didn't expect to give it a 9.01 but just looking down at 10 out of 10 atmosphere, I'd say like a 9 and a half to a 10 out of 10 service. I actually, I don't think our server was great. I think the whole staff was great.

And I rated overall. And my food, my entree was excellent. I fully believe if I had your food, my rating would have been about. what yours was. Yeah, I feel like mine was even a little high. I would be curious to revisit it at some point in the future, just because it's our number one. If it stays there for a while,

I think a recalibration might be an interesting episode. I think it's fair to go back with them having no knowledge they're being reviewed. Yeah. Maybe even a different location if possible. Yeah, because I think atmosphere is going to be a two thumbs up, no matter what. I think I have heard it varies from location to location in terms of like how well executed it is. Oh, wow.

I've never seen anything. I have never seen a bad one. Yeah. But I would be curious to find one where it's like, it doesn't wow us on the atmosphere. What is that going to be like? Is it haunted? Is it what we expected Chucky Cheese to be? Exactly.

Is it a bad rainforest cafe what we thought Chucky Cheese would be? And this was probably the top, top, top, best rainforest cafe experience possible. Yes. Now, from a great service experience to no service experience, but still rated highly, our Patreon exclusive episode, Rudy's. Rudy's barbecue. Oh, yes, Rudy's. I want some of that right now.

I do too. Why do we live in L.A.? I know. Rudy's is a gas station barbecue joint. It's a meat market. It gave you your nickname, Garrett, the meat market's work. You just go up to a counter and order,

which fast casual, not typically my jam. But I did actually perform a song about how I feel walking into a fast casual restaurant, especially after our Pizza Hut experience where we were trying to get an answer of is their table service just because that is the tier of restaurant we review. That's just what we've set out to do.

It's not like an entitled, we need to be served type of thing. It's just. Them's the rules. Yeah, it's just the parameters we've set out for ourselves. Yeah, but we made them early. Yeah. So, but I will say at Rudy's, I felt like we almost got a full service experience. The woman at the counter was so helpful.

Very nice, very knowledgeable, helped us make decisions. to get a full experience of the menu. The manager behind the counter even came by and offered to like bust some stuff as we were eating, asked if we could get us anything. So it was actually the first unanimous score that we've had. And it was a round number unanimous score. We both gave it the perfect 8.00. If that's what we were looking for, the podcast would be over.

Yeah. But we are looking for the perfect 5.00. We are looking for perfect mediocrity. We are looking for adiocrity. We are looking for Adiocrity. Is that a word? Perfect adiocrity.

Yeah. I mean, we are looking for perfectly adequate. Yeah. Like perfectly adequate are Olive Garden musical. Olive Garden, an experience so generic, we decided to make a musical about it. Don't give me just one star. Even if it's Michelin. I want to point five on yeah.

I'm in Devon, Michigan You have ten points to give I only won't half of them Your search for mediocrity is over Before it has begun Middle of the road most travel One simple truth has unwraved It's not too good or too bad at it

I've got to be your perfect Perfect. As unexceptional as you can get. Tell me reason. Service food and ambient. Che for a reason. That's making me feel so depressed. So approach me with a better option.

I'm so nervous. Let's get down to it. Score me that is... I want to be 11. Higher than a perfect. It was very close.10 average. The high passionate. You're exactly what it means to be fun.

It was very close to middling. What, 5.10 for Olive Garden. Super close to the center. We thought it would be our standard bearer for a while. And then four weeks later, we end up at a Bob's Big Boy and it shatters the mediocrity record by 0.2 closer. And then we're like, well, that's going to stay for a while. And then the very next week, Waffle House.

But, hey, it's held strong. Waffle House has held strong as the paragon of mediocrity. But Olive Garden, you know, if you're looking for Italian food that you don't want to be impressed by, olive garden's the place for you. But remember, go with your family. Only your family. That's the only way you're allowed in. Yeah.

And if you don't agree with that sentiment, go listen to the Olive Garden. We'll confirm it for you. But another Italian place we went to very early. on haunted. Ooh, the old spaghetti factory. Haunted my dreams.

Yeah, the old spaghetti factory where such wonderful characters were introduced as juicy junior, my son, and milk Steve the cream lord, my all-time

favorite experience of the podcast. Just the guy sitting across at the table next to us who ordered milk with his spaghetti alfredo

with extra alfredo on the side and his date took her salad and just doused it into her ranch. Like she literally had a separate bowl for her dressing. And I have never seen wetter lettuce. It was like she was

scraping the sides to get every last bit of ranch juice on her salad. It was just a very creamy table. We have never seen creamier eaters. Just a more interesting tablemates, so to speak. Yeah. Yeah. It was still a good experience, though. 6.26 on the Chochee of mediocrity, pretty high up there.

I actually ended up giving that one a 7.33. Yeah. I gave it a huge ghost bump. We had a big discrepancy because ghosts are spooky to me. And I love ghosts. Yeah. Someday I'll become one. You will definitely die with unfinished business.

Oh, of course. And now a word from our totally not made up sponsor. Oh, hi there. It's your favorite sponsor job. and I am back with a brand new purpose in life to help you become a ghost. It's my understanding that dying with unfinished business is the key to becoming a ghost,

so I'll help you do that. One night with me in Atlantic City is like spending a whole year rushing a fraternity. You'll be full of regret. So Joe, what kind of things do you offer that are gonna eat at me? Well, I'll tell you. You ever sit down at a slot machine

and the guy next to you's drinking sour cream? And you wish you would have gotten his name and asked him, hey, what's your story? Then you didn't. I can arrange that to happen. You ever respond to the person who scans your boarding pass at the gate? You too. When they say have a nice flight when clearly they're not going anywhere. I still think about it years later. You ever go on a date with someone who's 20 years older than you? And you're not really feeling it, but you see them anyways because you assume they're too fragile to handle a breakup. So you spend over five years with them. And now you've technically entered into what can be considered a civil union. Because you just don't have the guts to let them down.

You can tell that they'd be disappointed. You're all they've got. It's you and it's their crocheting club. And those ladies are real judgmental. I don't know why. She's real nice. She doesn't gossip. She just listens to the gossip.

And then she comes home and tells you about the gossip. And you're really starting to follow along with it. You're like, oh no. Did Ashley sleep with Tom just for the promotion? And she tells you, no, I don't think so. I think Ashley really has feelings. I just don't know if Tom has them back. And in the bit of your stomach, you're like, I don't know if I've got him back.

But you're nice, and I want to be supportive, and I don't want to hurt you. And just wish you were strong enough to go on without me. Come on. You don't need me. And now you're crying. It's going to make me cry. Anyways, that's a type of regret you could have two. Call me.

J-U-B. I'll help you live a life of regret, and then when you die, you can become a ghost. Hire me for my services. Just leave two stacks of pennies out on your table. and if you come back in the morning and one of the stacks has been knocked over, you'll know I was there. Okay, bye.

Now, speaking of interesting tablemates, let's talk about the place where we had the most of them, Gukaku. Oh, wow. For my birthday. Party of 11, I think. That was kind of a mess. But it ranked real high.

The food was excellent. Yeah. It was just kind of so many plates and platters just sitting out on our table and on the, we were lucky to have, like, a shelf behind us, like behind the booth that we could put stuff on

that our waiter very early on was like, hey, life hack, if you are done with something, you know, put it up there. Because they're bringing out a lot of plates. It's just kind of that. 11 people. Yeah, it's just one of those places. Very enjoyable experience.

Very high rated. It's our third highest score on the Chotchke. I will say, I think that score could go up if it was a smaller group. If just you and I go, I think that's eight and a half maybe. I think also a different location.

For some reason, just the atmosphere of the one we went to, I thought was the weakest of the, I mean, of the two I've been to. You know, I like it to feel a little bit more intimate. And the one in Burbank does. The one we went to is in Pasadena. And still a good experience. I mean, it's a 7.95, our third highest ranked place. Our waiter, we thought his, we misheard and thought his name was corn. He liked D&D.

He was a cool dude. Yeah. I really enjoy it. it. Now another place with a bunch of plates everywhere, Lubies. But this was more of a plates to choose from because it was our first and so far only cafeteria line that we had to go through. I think I had a lower expectation of lubies and it surpassed what I thought I was going to get. Because when you hear cafeteria, it just doesn't sound glorified in any way. Yeah. I had slightly higher expectations,

maybe not of quality, but just of excitement, because all I knew about Lubies was from King of the Hill going in. Yeah. So I'm just like, oh yeah, go to the King of the Hill cafeteria place. Yeah, that sounds fun. I enjoyed the experience there. It was very much shaped by the you must bowl punishment that I had. I had to eat with a cone of shame around my,

which, by the way, you can check out all of our you must bowl punishments by going to our social media. That's right. We're on Instagram at Fine Dining Podcast. We're on TikTok at Fine Dining. Dining Podcast and you can email us whatever you want. Find Dining Podcast at gmail.com. We might regret that, but I don't know.

Maybe we won't. You can see me eating speed corn because I'm I'm trying to get the food to my mouth before it falls out into the cone of shame and then funnels down into my neck. Oh, yeah. That was a problem I was dealing with. I was trying to quickly get food past the cone into my mouth. It felt like I was running drills trying out for a football team. But yeah, Lubies was good.

It actually fell just outside the zone of mediocrity. 6.01. While I was figuring out my rating, I made a revision that made it just a notch higher. Oh, man. And had you not done that, you wouldn't have had a you must bowl punishment the very next week at Cheddar's

and had to rhyme to your waiter. It's okay. That chicken fried steak there was amazing. Yeah. Unlike your Denny's one, this one was like a crisp golden brown. Despite the fact that the entire rest of the place felt like a nursing home.

It did, but like... The cherry pie, though. Oh, it was so good. I think about that cherry pie still from time to time. The jello. The jello? Best jello I've ever had. It was solid jello.

I found out something. Loobies used to have green jello. They only had red and blue when we went there. Interesting. They also used to have a lollipop tree near the exits. So when you go there, kids could just grab a sucker on the way out. And then too many adults were doing it or pocketing him and like, running off with it.

them. Luby's got rid of a lot of things like their kids menus. Oh, that's right. They gave up on kids menus. They were like we asked for one and they were just like, oh yeah, we ran out about three weeks ago and I think that's it. But hey, I think we're done. This is not the only restaurant where something like that happened. Yeah. Over at Chewy's. Oh, yeah. Are their kids menu situation was wild. Paper, blank paper. It was just a blank piece of computer paper and some crayons. We asked for a kid's menu. They're like, uh, we're out. Just take this. And then when we did our munchkin menu musing, our featured reviewers said it was dog shit. Completely unprompted.

Yeah. Which, hey, good adjective. Yeah. Chewy's was kind of a weird situation because I went back to get an employee story later and had a truly wonderful experience. Top to bottom, great service, great food. I do like the atmosphere of a chewy. You really didn't get to notice it when we went there. You had to change your outfit three times.

Yeah. But there were some conversations that were a little less than savory that you had to overhear. Okay. Birth is a natural, beautiful thing. But I don't need to hear about it while I eat. Yeah. And then a woman coughing into her tortilla for like a solid 10 minutes violently. Which she was trying to cover her mouth.

I guess with a tortilla. But okay. Yeah, Chewy's 5.52. So not the most mediocre place, but safely mediocre, I would. say. Now, a more mediocre example of Mexican food, just last week, Chevys. Yes. Chevys' fresh mex. I can't believe they cheese lit you. They did. We pointed at cheese inside of the flautas and we said, hey, we asked for no cheese and the waiter just goes, that's not cheese. I know what cheese looks like. I know what cheese tastes like. I've seen it before.

What are you doing, man? Just be like, oh, sorry, I'll take it away. The thing that really bum me out is I just wanted the dish without cheese. And he said that that was possible. Haddy just said it comes pre-mixed. Okay. And it's not possible? Great. I don't get it. But you get my hopes up. You get my hopes up for some restaurant-style flautas and then you can't deliver because of the pre-mixed cheese. It's just a bummer me. It's just a bummer. They're such a cheese teas. Cheese teas. Yeah. Now, Chevy's came in very mediocre. 5.08. More mediocre. than Olive Garden. Point two away from our pinnacle, our standard bearer of Waffle House. So as far as Mexican food goes, I feel like I could safely say, Chevys is the bar for mediocre.

Yes. But we've still been to one more place that falls within that zone of mediocrity. Bubba Gump's shrimp. Now, Baba Gump got a big boost just based on the strength of the server. We had a blast with their team there. Brandon was amazing. Brandon was great. The food? Not so much.

No. A lot of boiled stuff. A lot of like the smallest crab legs. I was like, these are pathetic. They were really stingy on the sausage. They, oh, God, yeah, they were. And that was really good sausage, too. An atmosphere that felt appropriate for being on a beach, on a pier, but still too sticky for my liking.

The Santa Monica Pier is kind of sticky. Oh, but Santa Monica Pier. Churros. Oh, man. We went to this Bubba Gump because of the Churro. vendor that we both have nostalgic memories of next to the Bubba Gump. And we just brought it up independently of each other. Yeah.

We've never talked about these churros before. We had never been together to these churros. We just both knew about it. And we were so excited to go and it just wasn't there. No. It was sad. It was dry. 5.88 for Bubba Gump feels about right, honestly.

I feel strongly that I could say Bubba Gump is appropriately placed. I would say that. Honestly about most of these places so far. The only ones that I wouldn't agree with are the ones that I've literally made a point to say so so far. Speaking of seafood, I mean, the best seafood we've had so far. Papadou. Papadou really impressed me. I didn't know what my expectations were for it.

Never been to one. I've only vaguely heard of the franchise. Yeah, and it's not the most prevalent place. Walking in, this is fancy upscale fine dining. It was elegant. It was elegant. Although you do have a big like crab chotchky piece. Like literally a giant probably what, four and a half, five foot crab.

We got to see a guy smuggling a swimming pool. Bucket by bucket. Bucket Bob is what I'll call him. Yeah, he was literally just pulling buckets of water out of the fountain outside and then going to who knows where. But yeah, the food at Papadou impressed. I got the Alaskan king crabling. that I, but with mariner, you know, and I still liked it. I still liked it quite a bit. I didn't love it, but I did like it. The crab meat was, I mean, when we're comparing it to Bubba Gump,

come on, like these are crab legs, for sure. I only regret that the butter spilled on my hand at the end of the meal. Oh yeah, you got borderline scalded. Papa dough, our fourth highest rated place, 7.70. I think that's very appropriate. I think, yeah, I think that's, That's about where I would put it again just off of memory. And speaking of memory, let's talk about some mammary. Hooters. We went to Hooters. Booboops.

We went to Hooters for our Super Bowl-themed episode, the Hooter Bowl. And we made a video episode. We made a video. You can check it out on our Patreon. But more importantly, let's talk about the experience at the place itself. I liked it more than I expected to. The food that I liked, I loved. It's at a 6.16.

So it's out of the zone of mediocrity. But not by that much. You know, it's bottom of the good spectrum, I would say. We had the best server that we've had. Yes. Amy, she was awesome, very accommodating to our questions. And I know that there is, I mean, there's got to be just a defensive barrier. Every waitress there puts up around the guys.

I think she didn't have that with us. I think maybe the first interaction there was just kind of a feeling us out sort of vibe. But, you know, once we passed the creep test in that we weren't, I felt she was very much on our side and wanted to tell us some stories and give us some perspectives that we don't have. She made us feel we were just like hanging out with some friends. Yeah.

She was a natural. It was truly one of the more fun experiences. The people around us were definitely entertaining. Oh, yeah. You know, we had everyone from all age groups shooting their shot. We had kids there for birthday parties. The old divorced dad. Oh, yeah.

It was boomers gone wild. Oh, you know what? Boomers gone wild. Islands. Yes. We went to islands and there was just a couple at a table with 10 empty drinks, just sitting there. And they seemed real loosened up, real lubricated by the alcohol.

They were about to go home and they were about to make their mark on a holiday in executive suite. Islands still a burger that I love. Islands is a strong contender for the best casual restaurant burger. Yeah. Now, Red Robin also is, I mean, we haven't been to there yet, but, I mean, looking ahead, Red Robbins on the horizon. I don't think Red Robin has a chance at hitting islands. You don't think so? Red Robin could be a 5.0.

I've had some good burgers at Red Robin. I've never had a great burger there. I've had decent burgers. It's the unlimited fries there, though. Oh, that's fair. That excites me. Now, Islands fries, I mean, if we're talking to fries, their fry salt plus the bottomless fries there.

Phenomenal. 6.53 was our score for Islands, and I think that's appropriate. Yeah, that's very appropriate. So, just to recap the entire Chotchkee for you. Last place, Gattie Town, 2.70. Second to last place, Buffalo Wild Wings, 3.56. Third, cheddar, 4.15 for cheddar scratch kitchen. Fourth, Denny's 4.50.

Pizza Hut, 4.65. So far, I feel like we're getting this right. Buffalo might move up a little. Yeah, but that was a situational thing. But yeah, these are feeling right. Let's keep going. Bob's Big Boy. At 4.92.

Then our standard bearer of mediocrity, Waffle House, 5.06, which Honestly, I crave more than any of these places. I want to go back to a Waffle House. Our next one is Chevy's at a 5.08. Olive Garden, the subject of our musical at 5.10. So we've got a bunch. We've got four restaurants that are soundly within 0.1 of the perfect five. I think we are figuring out how to do this right.

Yeah. Chucky Cheese, 5.48. Feels deserved. Yeah. Feels deserved. Honestly, could have been higher. if they didn't abandon animatronics. It would be higher if they would have treated us

like the birthday folk. Yeah, oh, there was a... The birthday one percenters. There was a class war. Next, after Chuckie Cheese, it goes up to Chewis at 5.52. Feels right. Bubba Gump's shrimp at 5.88.

Now we're out of the zone of mediocrity. Barely with Lubies at 6.01. Then hoot-hoot. It's Hooters at 6.16. Then it's getting spooky at the old spaghetti factory at 6.26. Islands rocking a 6.53. Outback has a 7.45. Papadou at 7.70.

Yukaku 7.95. Rudy's the perfect 8.00. And number one. Rainforest Cafe with 8.57. How did we do, guys? That's the full Chotchky. Obviously, we have not been to every restaurant so far. but we just read you 20 plus the one Patreon exclusive.

Later this month, you'll be able to hear Fuddruckers get added to our Patreon. So go over, subscribe. It's just five bucks. You'll be able to hear our exclusive episodes. And then you get to watch the entire Hooter Bowl. Yeah. Which we really did put a lot of work into. And you know what?

We've put a lot of work into this whole journey for you guys. So if you're liking it, please, if you haven't yet, leave us a review on iTunes. Leave us a rating on Spotify. even if you have done the Apple podcast rating, go over to Spotify and just select, you know, put on an episode, hit five stars. It really does help us out.

We want to keep doing this for you. We will be back next week with the previously announced cheesecake factory episode. Thanks, everyone for joining this special review. Yeah. Of the Chotchke of mediocrity. Thanks, guys. Like, we are doing this for you. Yeah, we're doing it because, I mean, honestly,

it's just, it's fun. It is. It's a lot of fun. We're making a product that I really love it. So I'm hoping you guys do too. Thanks so much. Obviously, we're not going to find the most mediocre restaurant right now because we didn't go somewhere to eat. But the search does continue. We'll see you next week. Have a fine day. and subscribe the search continues our journey did not conclude the mother weapon search continues write us in iTunes review and hey

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The search continue See you next week I heard my throat a little Have a fine day