Over at Eater, Mario Batali blogs (ahem!) about hating blogs.
If anything, Batali's rant makes me think the lady doth protest too much. First of all, he rails against "anonymous bloggers" but that strikes me as a "sky is falling" kind of dramatic overstatement. Yes, there are anonymous food bloggers, but any decent food blog isn't really anonymous, even if they don't necessarily post their name, address and telephone number in case Batali or anyone else might want to have a chat. For various reasons, there are several great food blogs that are, technically speaking, "anonymous" but they're generally developed to the point where they have a voice that readers grow to trust. We might not know their names, but that doesn't make them anonymous in any real sense of the word. And anyway, you could argue that food critics (the good ones, at least) strive for anonymity when they're working, whether it's a pen name to publish under, or trying to avoid being recognized while they're in a restaurant.
It seems Batali's big problem with food blogs is that they lack the "objectivity" and professional nature of traditional publications, and that once something appears online, people take it as truth "by virtue of the fact that it has been printed somewhere." While this no doubt happens, it seems to me that this isn't the fault of blogs, but the fault of people who consume things without even the slightest bit of analytical thinking.
Any jackass with an internet connection and some spare time can make a website; the proof of that is right in front of you at this very moment. That doesn't make that website factual or unbiased or worth your time. Anyone who doesn't recognize that by this stage in the game has bigger problems than missing out on a restaurant because some stupid blogger claims the food sucks. And anyway, the same argument could be levied against any food critic in the nation. Just because someone hates something and they write about it doesn't mean you should blindly take their word for it. I say this as someone who occasionally makes some coin giving my opinion about food.
I also find it amusing that Batali chooses to throw food-blogdom under the bus for their "snarky vituperatives" and then a few sentences later he jumps on "hapless NY Post real estate/food hack Braden Keil who has hated me for as long as I can remember, not that he has any value to journalism anyway". Snark on, Mario, snark on.
Anyway, I don't know. Misplaced blog issues or no, I still love Mario. Which is funny, because I always hated him on the Food Network. Then I read Bill Buford's Heat, and realized that the fake-feeling sweaty-Rachael-Ray-in-orange-crocs (personality-wise, I mean, not food-wise) is kind of a fake TV personality of Mario's. From what I've read in that book and elsewhere, he actually seems like a pretty cool guy.
Mario... if you're out there... get in touch. You can come over and cook for me any day, and if I think your food sucks, I'll tell you, non-anonymously and everything. But of course it won't, because you pretty much rule.
