Nice Guys Finish Bland

Ithaca Eats is directly inspired by our local freebie, the Ithaca Times. Now, we've read the Times for years, and pick up a copy almost every week. By and large, they do a commendable job covering the local community with a positive twist. The ultracynical posturing of so many "alternative weeklies" becomes quickly tedious, and this is where the Ithaca Times comes across most genuine.

Yet, we have one major bone to pick with these earnest folk -- their "Dining" reviews are softer than an undercooked omelet. Each review sticks closely to the same formula, gushing and fawning over each lettuce leaf ("so crisp it was like biting into an autumn day"), too afraid to bite the hand that feeds them, ultimately concluding in the footnote that the whole meal was a complimentary gift and the reviewers were waited on hand, foot, and rear by the restauranteurs.

That the Ithaca Times shelters local restaurants, and presumably its advertising revenue, so provincially is an unfortunate vestige of small-town thinking: in fact, there are enough good, very good, and not quite good restaurants in Ithaca to merit real, honest-to-goodness reviews. If we want to be taken seriously as an eating town -- and there are enough establishments per capita to indicate that we do -- we have to evaluate ourselves without the soft focus lens.

Where to Turn?

The Ithaca Journal doesn't see fit to take the time to review local restaurants, for whatever reason. Ithaca College's Taste of the Town reviews have offered some refreshingly honest, albeit limited, opinions.

Philosophy

Ithaca Eats hopes to offer fair but honest evaluations of our restaurant experiences around town and around the Ithaca region. We don't support smarmy bashing, those other types of reviews where the critic simply revels in stroking their sword.

These are not formal reviews, in the New York Times sense of the word, where specific items are dissected and measured against Escoffier standards. Rather, the intent is to inform the reader's ultimate and simple question -- "is this place worth a try tonight?".

We'll start off the site by writing up our own experiences, and we certainly invite submissions of your own!