Can a Show Called 'Kitchen Nightmares' Effectively Showcase Local Restaurants?

I was watching a promo for Fox Television’s Kitchen Nightmares and it caught my eye because the May 6 episode will be on The Capri Italian Restaurant in Eagle Rock. I love to go out and eat close to home and I have not been to the Capri yet. But I did go to the Kingston Café in Pasadena and low and behold they were on Kitchen Nightmares a couple of weeks earlier. I’m really glad I ate there and had a good food experience before I watched the show.  Gordon Ramsey really lit into the place about the quality and flavor of the food. The owner got the 'stink-eye' edit and looked like a real villain, desperately in need of rescue.

Now, I edit videos for a living so I am well aware that reality TV is not real but I had to wonder—if I were in the business of selling food would I want to be skewered on TV by Gordon Ramsey? I’m pretty proud of my cooking skills so probably not so much.

I’m sure I was a bit sensitive because both my parents are from the Caribbean and I was born in England. Even though I did not grow up in Caribbean, my mother made sure I knew how to authentically cook all of her dishes from home. She would have been appalled if a foul-tongued English bloke came into her kitchen and told her that she did not know how to cook her native foods. Those are fighting words to a West Indian cook because our recipes are seldom written down but passed on through the oral tradition from generation to generation.

When I was in the Kingston Café (post-Gordon Ramsey) it was on a Friday night and there were not that many couples there. The food was well seasoned and good, not authentically West Indian, but more of a SOCAL Caribbean fusion. It did not seem to be experiencing the "Gordon Ramsey" bump but I can believe that it will be a good summer party spot if it can hang on.

I hope that the Capri Restaurant gets a lift and more business after the May 6 Kitchen Nightmares episode because I love being able to walk to a restaurant from my house and enjoy a walk home with a full tummy. I’ll be home in Eagle Rock, watching and rooting for them on Friday. If you watch, click on the comment section and tell me what you think about the story presentation. If Gordon Ramsey and the Kitchen Nightmares people offered to showcase your food business, would you let them?