Meeting the Challenge of Restaurant Critics

Years ago when I was a young chef working in Los Angeles, there was an infamous food critic named Lois Dwan. She had been working for the Los Angeles Times forever and was a formidable fixture

This was the early 1980's and food in California was in the midst of enormous change. Lois, who had been a practitioner of the old-school Los Angeles cuisine, was unprepared to review young crazy chefs like me. She was notorious for getting the ingredients wrong in almost every dish. Often she'd give longwinded praise or criticism for a dish she purported contained garlic, when in fact there hadn't been a clove of garlic within 20 feet of the food.

When a critic doesn't understand the concept of certain dish, the food experience and the resulting review are typically negative. On the other hand, if a critic is well informed and competent, suggestions made in a review can be of enormous help, providing the overall tenor of the piece isn't too destructive.