HIPSTER HELL

A Review of The Flaming Buoy Filet Co.

And a Reply

THE REVIEW:

This place ended up reminding me of all the foibles of the "nouveau" hipster run joints in my old hometown of Puddletown aka Portland OR as depicted on Portlandia-a lot of hype like the uber-pseudo trad music of the Decemberists, but when you get down to the meat of it there isn't much meat there. Nor inspiration. Nor much effort. Hipsters just can't be bothered it sometimes seems.

I should have known better to try a place like this in a tourist town like Key West. The alleged famous "lobster mac and cheese" was pedestrian (I can whip up something much more inspired half drunk) and when I asked the waitress how much it cost she didn't know (it's a special not on the menu) and had to ask someone else (even though the price was on their website, $12 for a small bowl as an appetizer). The fresh catch of grouper was high quality (to be expected as this is Florida) but the corn on the cob was a lazy add on that was on both of the fresh fish dishes and the broccoli muffin (or cake as they call it) was just plain weird. The tropical curry was a complete disaster with all the curry flavor seemingly cooked out and with the local crustaceans added for a grand total of $24, absurdly overpriced-even a good trendy Thai restaurant wouldn't charge more than $10-14 for this.

Finally, I ordered a Belgian beer (Affligem) on the list I had never seen before (I've been to Brussels) and it seemed to be a steal at $5. However, when the bill came, I was charged $6 and showed the waitress the discrepancy. There was seemingly no explanation for the error in their computer system but these are the little things that add up when things aren't going well.

Luckily, the dinner went fast, dessert was ignored and we were out of there in less than an hour. Strolling down Duvall St. with a rum runner shortly thereafter was much more interesting.

A REPLY:

Dear Jaded for Living in Japan and Rio,

Thank you for your thoughtful comments regarding The Flaming Buoy Filet Co. If I may take a few moments to respond to some of your issues, rather, my issues. (I swear that was a slip.)

To the first: "Über-pseudo trad music?" Touché, sir, as I have no idea what that means. And with that, I head over to iTunes to investigate The Decemberists. I quickly glance through the reviews to see if anyone compares The Decemberists to a hipster restaurant in Key West. Alas, no such luck. (Could it be I found the one place on the internet you haven't cut and pasted your own reviews?) Before I leave, however, I add your review of The Decemberists to iTunes. I paraphrased a bit ("This album reminded me of all the foibles of The Flaming Buoy Filet Co..."), and I can't promise iTunes will post it. But, if they do, you're welcome. (The review is under "hipster hell" by logan154, since wolverine154 was already taken.)

Also, I didn't listen to any of The Decemberists.

I did, however, watch Portlandia.

While I am not entirely opposed to being reduced to a cultural stereotype—how else, after all, would the TV know I need to buy the No No Hair Removal System? How do you know, TV? HOW?—I must take exception to being called a "hipster", with no offense to hipsters. (Meh.)

To be fair, I was wearing a Star Wars t-shirt (non-vintage) on the evening of your visit. Believe me when I write, however, I wore it with no sense of irony. In fact, I find your lack of faith disturbing.

Fred (my partner of 13 years) and I must be the oldest hipsters on the planet, at least in North American urban cultural centers like Key West. I'm not sure what the appropriate cut off age is for being a hipster—a writer on Wikipedia suggests hipsters fall between 18 and 34. (If falling is all it takes to be a hipster, my grandma would be one. She falls all the time! She even had to have hipster replacement surgery.) Either way, at 35, the crystal in your palm starts blinking.

I do count as one of my friends a guy who is quite glad to wear that burdensome moniker, although I suspect it's so that he, when the lights are cooperating, can fool some younger guy with a handlebar mustache and a singularly shocking affectation of plaids under an inside-out Led Zeppelin t-shirt into sleeping with him. Sure, the lighting is expensive, but, fortunately, Pabst Blue Ribbon is not.

Yes, your server did not know the price of our Lobster Mac & Cheese. I, the "someone else" dripping with hip behind the bar trying not to work while reading worldsexguide.com—are you familiar with this site?—on my iPad in my cool Star Wars t-shirt (non-vintage), provided the answer. If I recall accurately, the conversation was as follows:

She: "What's the price on the Lobster Mac & Cheese?

Me: "Its a pretty obscure price, I doubt you've heard of it."

That was the extant of our conversation by proxy. In that time you apparently read me like a book. Or, the Cliffs Notes of a book. A children's book. That has no words.

It was also your server's first day on the floor by herself after two days of training and trying to memorize the names and ingredients and prices of every bit of food and drink on our menu. I'm pleased if, at this point, she could remember that the appetizer included lobster, macaroni, and cheese.

I noticed you noticed the price of the Lobster Mac & Cheese is noted on our website. If you knew this coming into the restaurant and still asked her the price, you are a dick. If you ran back to your computer to see if the price was listed on our website, you are a dick. Furthermore, the price for the Lobster Mac & cheese was not listed on our website. So...dick. (The price has since been added, so don't even!)

Thai Life's Green Curry Shrimp is $16.95

Thai Cuisine's Panang Curry Snapper is $18.95

Thai Island's Snapper Stir Fry is $20.95

Conclusion: Key West has no good trendy Thai restaurants.

I have doubts that you actually visited Brussels. Everyone I know that's visited Brussels has been able to rattle off every beer ever produced in Belgium with no problem. Alphabetically. I used to be able to. So, let's see: A is for...Affligem. B is for...uh, Beer. I forget the rest, but, then again, I've never been in Brussels.

(We get it, by the way: You've travelled everywhere everyone else hasn't; and, if everyone else has, you saw the things we missed and discovered several continents in the process and that there is never a place in the shower to place your bar of complimentary soap. Is it true NASA asked you where Curiosity should eat dinner her first night on Mars?

To paraphrase Shakespeare, "Methinks he doth protest too much." That's from Hamlet. I don't think you'd care for it. It's about a guy who spends a lot of time not putting too much effort into anything.)

I'm glad your server didn't take you by the hand and console your outrage with the boring details of updating the prices on the menu and the computer that afternoon. "I demand answers! This beer is a steal at $5! At $6 it only seems...priced appropriately!"

"Oops" seems an adequate response in this situation, for most people, anyhow. Plus, she doesn't like touching people and you are married, so that would have been awkward. Not so much for her, but for you, as, from what I understand, you're not used to being touched without first meeting in an internet chat room.

And, finally, here's the difference between your Lobster Mac & Cheese and our Lobster Mac & Cheese: While yours is an imaginary concoction of imaginary inspiration created half-drunk (on Belgium beer and self-importance, I imagine), we actually bothered to take the time and make it.

Luckily, the dinner went fast, dessert was ignored and you were out of there in less than an hour. Strolling down Duval St. with a rum runner shortly thereafter.

The irony, of course, is that, in the end, you were the pedestrian.

A REPLY TO A REPLY:

Wow, it took you almost a year to either getting around to finally composing this missive and responding to my incredibly tragic review OR based on it's "extreme" length (no pun intended) and verbosity you have been working on it all this time which is very reassuring as it may demonstrate you are more concerned with applying your clearly strong private east coast college English degree (just an educated guess-just getting out one inference on you since you amassed about a dozen inferences about me) at the expense of attempting to develop a good restaurant. So here's to timeliness!!!

Regardless, I will remain terse in my reply. Being a Libertarian and not a "flaming" liberal (don't worry, I hate conservatives equally as much and Libertarians are really the only party fully tolerant of the gays since Libertarians really don't care what anyone does in the bedroom, etc.), I will leave you a timely link posted this week from a very, very tolerate author, columnist, former Portlandian and all around smart and sweet guy as well: http://takimag.com/article/the_epic_failure_of_tantrum_politics_jim_goad#axzz233Ra3oNm

PS: It seems to be de riguer that almost all restauranteurs revert to excuses, excuses (ie: the new waitress excuse-never heard that one before, right) to explain away their lack of vision, business savvy, etc. Good luck-you will need it.

AREPLY TO A REPLY TO A REPLY:

I apologize in advance for the length of this missive and that it took me so long to reply.

To be fair, my first response was written at the time of your original review. Yelp never published it (probably due to several "dick" references) and it was all but forgotten.

Now, I do like to publish some of our bad reviews from time to time. We certainly don't shy away from them and many of them have constructively made us better. For instance, that disaster of a Tropical Curry you loved so much? Gone.

However, your review was brought to our attention as being particularly bad on several accounts. Meaning, no one who read the review recognized the owners of which you wrote. With hilarious results.

So, I dusted off the response, updated it (Curiosity? Holla!) and removed names, posted it, and, out of fairness, decided to re-send it to you, this time at Tripadvisor (where you seem to have cut and pasted your Yelp review and, inexplicably, decided to add another star to our review. Opinions, it would seem, are like nipples.)

So, no, it didn't take a year to respond, and no, it didn't take a year to write.

Here is what you did get correct:

Yes, I did get my English degree at a private east coast college.

What?

Ok, I've just been informed that Northern Kentucky University is not a private college. Sorry about that mistake.

Huh?

Does the east coast of the Ohio River count? No?

Sorry. Me again. Apparently NKU is not on the east coast. Repeat: NOT on the east coast. (Between me and you though, I think it could be argued that it is near some body of water.) So, English degree.

What? Good Lord...

Ok, so I'm told that in order to say you have an English degree, you have to have graduated or some bullshit like that.

What I can tell you with certainty is this: I had the Grand Champion Goat of the Clermont County Fair in 1984. Of course, Maggie (the goat) didn't really do anything to earn that achievement but stand there and chew her cud and be judged. There was no talent competition. No question and answer session. She was just born beautiful and objectified for it.

In retrospect, I imagine she felt she had a rather unfulfilling life; struggling to be taken seriously despite her exquisite DNA. For all we knew, she was the Hedy Lamarr of Toggenburg goats. Of course she took to eating the wood siding from the back of the house. It was a cry for attention.

In the end, Maggie had but one option to give her life meaning that no big trophy or blue ribbon could provide.

And she was the best damned goat I'd ever barbecued on the spit. Twenty seven years later I would open The Flaming Buoy Filet Co.

The point is, your straw man literally had a straw man out back.

But I digress.

Who are these people you know so much about? Nothing I wrote about you was inferred. A quick google search removed any necessity for that. So, neither can you count nor understand the meaning of "infer."

Rather, what you did was called "guessing." (You give yourself—and me—too much credit calling it "educated.") Worse, you built your argument around a false premise. In effect, distorting reality to fit your agenda. If you must lie (as in make shit up) or exaggerate to make a point, you probably don't have a point to make.

(I wasn't clear on what that agenda was until recently. Disparaging hipsters? The Decemberists? Thai restaurants in Key West? Wealth? Elite Schools? Liberals? Conservatives? Gay Marriage? I believe Jim Goad—who, I'm told, is an all around smart and sweet guy—might call this cultural scapegoating. You should read him sometime. Also, learn to speak for yourself.)

I don't mean to imply you are delusional, but one may infer as much.

And then you digress.

I'm not entirely sure what Chic-Fil-A has to do with me. Perhaps you misread the name of my restaurant. It's not, for future reference, The Flaming Buoy Fil-A Co., but Filet Co. You know, as in blow job. (Sound it out.)

Nevertheless, I'll bite.

From the article you kindly directed me to:

"I invest zero emotion in the ongoing gay marriage brouhaha. I question why the state claims the power to authorize any kind of marriage, as well as why an issue that directly affects—at most—one or two percent of the population as such enduring "legs" in the news cycle year after year."

There were 235,500 registered libertarian voters in the 2008 election out of a total of 169,000,000 registered voters in the 2008 election. Some quick math (not my strong suit), but that would mean 0.0013934911% of registered voters are libertarian. Can I start to not care yet whenever I hear the surnames Paul and Rand or any darling combination thereof?

(Never mind how stupid this paragraph is beyond that: gay marriage only "directly" affects 2% of the population at most? That number, I'm guessing—mostly because I don't feel like doing your research, is the percentage of men and women who self-identify as gay. Not unlike the 235,500 who self-identify as libertarian. Parents, children, and family members of gays are conveniently disappeared in this argument. Because, after all, who are they to be affected?

To be sure, no one accuses you of being a libertarian if you want drugs and prostitution legalized, but suck one dick and suddenly you're a fag. Time to come out of the closets, libertarians.)

PS: It seems to be de rigueur that all almost all the factually challenged like to change the subject when confronted. And luck, sir? Luck is when you're born a Grand Champion Goat.

EPILOGUE:

Back in August I responded to a review we received for the Flaming Buoy Filet Co. from Richard M. Williams of Albuquerque, New Mexico. Briefly: I responded to his review, he responded to my review; I responded to his response, only to find that he blocked my email; I, nevertheless, posted my response on Facebook. The whole correspondence can be found on my Facebook page posted August 9th.

Yesterday we received an hilarious email from Mr. Williams. To paraphrase Han Solo, we must have hit him pretty close to the mark to get him all riled up like that.

Please be free to share:

HIPSTER HELL, REDUX:

FYI-being yahoo and all, this is an "alt" e-mail I only check or use about once every 2-3 months.

Hey fag boys, you've been "cock-blocked" on TA. That must "suck". And what fag-hag came up with these pseudonyms???:

R. Scot (missing a "t") Forste

Fred C. Isch II (how was an original fag (Fred the I) able to have a II?)

and before you get all John Waters on me-understand that my three fav. directors of all time ARE Stanley Kubrick for a Clockwork Orange (rage is LEGITIMATE in some cases:)), Russ Meyers for Beneath the Valley of the Ultravixens (Smalltown USA!!!) and John Waters for Pink Flamingos (just Divine). Alas, the fags of PDX (and I know many of them and count them amongst mi amigos) are much more agreeable and tolerant than the fudge packers of FL it seems. Yet something tells me in another context we could be good rumrunner drinking friends. :)

Wow, it took you almost a year to either getting around to finally composing this missive and responding to my incredibly tragic review OR based on it's "extreme" length (no homo pun intended) and verbosity you have been working on it all this time which is very reassuring as it may demonstrate you are more concerned with applying your clearly strong private east coast college English degree (just an educated guess-just getting out one inference on you since you amassed about a dozen inferences about me) at the expense of attempting to develop a good restaurant. So here's to timeliness!!!

Regardless, I will remain terse in my reply. Being a Libertarian and not a "flaming" liberal (don't worry, I hate conservatives equally as much and Libertarians are really the only party fully tolerant of the gays since Libertarians really don't give a rat's ass what anyone does in the bedroom, etc.), I will leave you a timely link posted this week from a very, very tolerate author, columnist, former Portlandian and all around smart and sweet guy as well: http://takimag.com/article/the_epic_failure_of_tantrum_politics_jim_goad#axzz233Ra3oNm

I should have known better to try a place like this in a tourist town like Key West. The alleged famous "lobster mac and cheese" was pedestrian (I can whip up something much more inspired half drunk) and when I asked the waitress how much it cost she didn't know (it's a special not on the menu) and had to ask someone else (even though the price was on their website (hey a-hole-I learned that AFTER the meal when I went BACK to your website to find out-just exercising some due diligence), $12 for a small bowl as an appetizer). The fresh catch of grouper was high quality (to be expected as this is Florida) but the corn on the cob was a lazy add on that was on both of the fresh fish dishes and the broccoli muffin (or cake as they call it) was just plain weird. The tropical curry was a complete disaster with all the curry flavor seemingly cooked out and with the local crustaceans added for a grand total of $24, absurdly overpriced-even a good trendy Thai restaurant wouldn't charge more than $10-14 for this. (Let me elaborate, this was the worst curry-in Chiang Mai, they would shit on it-I have ever had in my life, just to be claro).

Finally, I ordered a Belgian beer (Affligem) on the list I had never seen before (I've been to Brussels-oh yes I have assboy, here is where I spent a LONG afternoon here-http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/8986/-it was pure delerium!) and it seemed to be a steal at $5. However, when the bill came, I was charged $6 and showed the waitress the discrepancy. There was seemingly no explanation for the error in their computer system but these are the little things that add up when things aren't going well.

Luckily, the dinner went fast, dessert was ignored and we were out of there in less than an hour. Strolling down Duvall St. with a rum runner shortly thereafter was much more interesting.

COCK BLOCKED. INDEED

This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC.

Richard Forste, Owner at The Flaming Buoy Filet Co., responded to this review

August 27, 2012