Thursday, January 15, 2009

a mess in the (gourmet) park

I've branched out a bit in terms of my work day lunching locales. At first, it was all about "Food Exchange"; it was safe. Then I got a bit more adventurous, took some recommendations, explored the region a bit -- I was rebelling. Now I have settled on a few go-to places. [Scintillating post so far, eh?] One of the eateries that has earned a coveted position on my Lunch Hot Spots list is this place called Gourmet Park. It's really a total copy of Food Exchange but it has a (marginally) less ridiculous name and you have to walk down this steep decline to enter which makes me feel like I'm entering an exclusive and swanky club (... the kind of club where you can make your own salad and everyone looks disgruntled).

There is one thing about Gourmet Park though that I find horrifying/fascinating. Every day they set a display of food outside on the sidewalk (see photo above). It doesn't look that bad from a distance, I guess? Orange drinks! With straws! It seems they're going for a Pavlovian response kind of deal where people will walk by, see the food and then immediately walk inside like brainless, trained monkeys. At first I thought the display table was totally the worst and then my friend was like "Every café in Miami does this" in a sort of nonchalant way and then I just sort of repressed my annoyance with the whole thing.

But today I took a look up close at the food and realized... it is DISGUSTING. I mean, I almost feel like I should tag this post with a NSFW or something because it's so offensive-looking (see below). I could try to like make some witty comparisons but this photo is too gross to even look at for long enough to do that. I mean, can you even figure out what these dishes are??! They kind of look like what would happen if someone gave a 5-year-old different random sauces and was like "Mix these together on a plate and then vomit in a taco shell!"

It's like, fine, you want to be all Miami up in here and put food out on this fancy table in the middle of Midtown, be my guest. But do me a favor and don't make me throw up before I've even starting eating my overpriced salad (which I am feeling sort of disappointed about anyway because I forgot to have the guy add in avocado). And c'mon G-Park, before you go all SmartWater on us, you gotta keep the tomatoes in line first.

1 comment:

TuRK said...

Dude, my must have a serious issues in first place to sit down take a picture of a display table regardless how disgusting it looks your fancy eyes, and write down all that useless sentesces to prove what.. I have been eating at that place since it has opened and it offers a great addition and value to our neigboorhood. Well your fancy .... does not want to eat or look at their food, there are many alternatives around in this town. I think you should get life and find better things to do, seriuously :)) Good luck :)