I have bad news for all of you power-tripping, I'm-a-real-food-critic-now Elite Yelpoids out there: your little tales of woe are totally and completely useless. All those complaints–when I do look at them I read them aloud in a neo-Valley Girl accent–don't actually mean a damn thing, because nobody except your fellow Yelpers is reading them.
I can't think of the last time I clicked past the first page of reviews on Yelp, because normally I only look at the information and the aggregate of ratings. Four and a half stars across 100 reviews? Probably pretty good. Five stars across three reviews? Three people went in, identified themselves as Yelpers, and spent two hours getting a culinary blow job from a staff desperate for any inkling of positive “press.”
Still, though, occasionally there are some real gems. I read sentences that make me grimace, assessments of good restaurants that make me roll my eyes, the occasional proof that someone knows what he or she is talking about, turns of phrase I wish I'd made. Here, then, are four brief reviews of local Yelp reviews.
Have you seen a Yelp review you love or hate and want reviewed? Leave a comment with the details!
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Lauren S.'s 1-star review of Goat Hill Tavern:
You made it first on the list because, let's face it, anyone who's ever set foot in Goat Hill Tavern can absolutely picture a tampon on the wall–and not necessarily new, and not necessarily in the women's bathroom, either. It went downhill from there, though–you had a really strong middle but needed to wrap it up. How sticky, exactly, was the seat? (And why, why, why did you sit down?)
Sarah A.'s 5-star review of Fonda La Meche:
Well, spank my ass and call me Charlie, an Elite Yelper who actually knows what to order in an actual Mexican restaurant! Congratulations, Sarah A.! You figure out that the best dish by far at this Stanton dive is their “Mexican beef stew in a pot” (mole de olla). You actually described the dish, and then gave pointers about it. Well done. Now can you teach all the other Yelpers, please?
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Victor W.'s 4-star review of Olive Garden:
This is an incredibly stereotypical Yelp review; contains almost no content, is totally unhelpful to the reader (What “2 for $25.00” special? Is it still available? Can you still buy it?), but gives the restaurant high marks. It made it to this list because for the rest of my life, I am going to call Clos du Bois wine, acidic plonk that would have to try hard to be worthy of 7-Eleven, “Clas du Bro.”
Mike C.'s 2-star review of Break of Dawn:
I was going to dismiss this as the usual over-entitled South County spack: a ten-minute wait at one of the busiest, most popular restaurants in Orange County? DAMN YOU, BREAK OF DAWN, DAMN YOU TO HELL. Then I read just a little further and came up with this little crime against food and the English language: “So I chose the mac and cheese for my meal. Comes with a fried egg on
top, with bacon and this special sauce made of gouda and other random
dairy products.” I've been racking my brain for ten minutes (while I wait for a table) trying to figure out what “random dairy products” could be in mac 'n cheese. I mean, it could be milk–most mac 'n cheese starts with white sauce, which any middle school home ec student can tell you is flour, butter, milk, and seasonings–but you never know. It could be that the chef is putting yak yogurt in there, or perhaps sour sheep cream. Good thing you warned us!
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