If you browsed any of the foodie websites last week, such as eGullet, Chowhound and Mouthfulsfood, you would have seen posts on all of them about Marilyn Hagerty. The 85-year-old columnist became hot news for a food review she wrote for the Grand Forks Herald, a newspaper in North Dakota. The review was of the Olive Garden, a US chain restaurant that serves Italian-inspired food - things like 'shrimp scampi', lasagne fritta and spaghetti and meatballs.
The review went viral and received more than a million hits. On a visit to New York City soon after the review was published, Hagerty was featured in newspapers such as the Village Voice and The Wall Street Journal (an article by her son, journalist James R. Hagerty), and she appeared on television programmes including Good Morning America, CBS This Morning and the Today Show.
Many of the blog posts about the review were mean-spirited and condescending, with comments that included, 'I found the story about Marilyn Hagerty charming on several levels ... In her life experience, she found many things to like about Olive Garden', and 'I feel sorry for anyone who lives in a place where Olive Garden is the best restaurant'.
Nowhere in her review did Hagerty say it was the 'best restaurant'. In the 400-plus word article, she writes that the chicken Alfredo was 'warm and comforting' and that the portion was 'generous', that the breadsticks were 'long and warm' and that the salad had 'crisp greens, peppers, onion rings and black olives'. Pretty neutral comments, if you ask me.
Hagerty saves her praise for the decor: 'All in all, it is the largest and most beautiful restaurant now operating in Grand Forks.'
That's probably not saying much, either: Grand Forks, North Dakota, isn't exactly a culinary hotbed, and the opening of the Olive Garden in that city was big news.