Nobody knows nothing

Two items in the news prove yet again that there's no monopoly on stupidy when it comes to eating and drinking.

First of all, the welcome news, from the Puget Sound Business Journal, that the former Troiani space downtown is finally getting a tenant. It's only been five years, folks, but gee, that's a lifetime of dog-years in the restaurant business. (The picture is from 2007, when Troiani had a fine Happy Hour.) The space, in what's now known as the Expeditors International Building at Third and Madison, was originally a Fleming's Steakhouse. Good wine list, okay steaks, and way ahead of its time in terms of downtown location. Even with valet parking, who was going to go out for a fancy dinner downtown after dark?

That didn't deter Paul Mackay, owner of El Gaucho, who (before he turned the company over to his son, Chad) relied on his trusted general manager Rich Troiani. Bad idea, by the way, naming a restaurant for a longtime employee. Never works, and then you're stuck with a place named for a guy who's no longer with the company. So this 8,500-square-foot joint with a fully built kitchen has just been sitting there for half a decade. Can I put that in round numbers for you? Assuming the landlord had leased the space at $40 a square foot, that's close to $30,000 a month in rent, between $1.5 and $2 million over five years in foregone income. But landlords don't care. They'd rather see the space vacant than budge on their ask. They don't give a rat's ass about providing downtown amenities, about the cityscape, about the dining scene. Landlords are all, "Show me the money."

But now it looks like somebody has ponied up, although we don't know who. The construction permit has been filed, but by the landlord without indicating the tenant's name. Nobody knows nothing.

And while we're on the subject of misinformation, let's consider the latest Open Table fiasco. This predatory outfit, which we wrote about only a month ago, sucks the life out of unsuspecting owners and operators with endless fees in exchange for taking over personal relationships with a restaurant's customers.

Here's today's example: a list of the country's "Top 100" restaurants, as voted by the diners themselves. I wouldn't trust Open Table customers any more than I'd trust Yelp's customers, and this is why: I've never heard of the two "Top 100" restaurants in Washington State, and I just wrote a book about the history of local restaurants.

What are they? One is called Montalcino, in Issaquah. The other is May Kitchen, on Vashon Island. To give you an idea how carefully the Open Table folks must have vetted this list, they think Issaquah and Vashon Island are both in Eastern Washington.

As I said, nobody knows nothing.