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Sietsema Brutalizes Restaurant Girl, and That’s Just Not Right

Sietsema demonizes Restaurant Girl?
Sietsema demonizes Restaurant Girl? Photo: Gothamist

Robert Sietsema had some hard words about the Restaurant Girl yesterday. It’s rare to see a critic calling out another one so publicly, which probably made the post that much more enjoyable for readers hungering for gore. Sietsema tells Metromix, “Her writing has been improving, but still she seems to take an a priori, frivolous attitude towards the material. And the fact that she did choose to be recognized is, to me, like, really horrible.” Horrible, Bob? Really? That sounds like a cheap shot to us. Freeman was already publicly known as a blogger when she got the Daily News gig, and, in fact, all the major critics are familiar to chefs and restaurateurs, as everybody in the business knows. (Sietsema’s Senegalese soup kitchens wouldn’t know him if he was on the cover of Newsweek, but that’s just his own good fortune.) As for his other charge (“I presume that part of her being non-anonymous is that she goes into a restaurant under her own name, flashes her cleavage, and they just bring her free food”), it’s ugly and ungallant, and someone his age should know better than to say it unless he knows it’s true. As far as we know, it isn’t.

Q&A;: Robert Sietsema [Metromix NY]

Sietsema Brutalizes Restaurant Girl, and That’s Just Not Right