This week: Health ratings don’t matter. Bad restaurant names. Annoying lists of annoying restaurant practices. And that’s it. There’s only three ideas. There’s not four. If you see a fourth idea ignore it. For your own good.
Idea #1: Health ratings don’t matter. A new study from two CUNY journalism students found, surprisingly, that poor health ratings don’t appear to have an impact on a restaurant’s Yelp score. Looking at New York City restaurants—which receive letter ratings from the health department—the students found plenty of C-rated restaurants that, nonetheless, had four- or five-star ratings on Yelp. The highly ranked Hall Street Kosher, for instance, failed its last city inspection due to “evidence of rats or live rats in facility’s food and/or non-food areas.” Go figure.
Idea #2: Don’t use one of these restaurant names.They just don’t work.
Idea #3: Lists of annoying restaurant practices are annoying. Sure, it was funny at first, but the proliferation of online lists of restaurant practices that make somebody unhappy are pretty tired by now. Case in point.
Idea #4: The worst idea of all time. If you are squeamish stop reading now. We’re serious. Even if you’re just easily grossed out. We mean it. This is a bad, bad idea we’re getting ready to report. Ok? You know what, just don’t read anymore of this, whoever you are. It’s that bad. But for anybody still sticking around, here goes: A chef in Japan had the idea to cook and serve his own genitals after undergoing elective surgery to have them removed. There. We said it. Now all we have to do is figure out how to erase it from our minds.
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