I love restaurant soft openings, but not for the food or even the drink. I like seeing the excitement in the eyes of owners who’ve worked their brains loose trying to get their vision from blueprint to fruition. I appreciate the risks required to move from a well-capitalized business to modestly liquid before a paying customer is served. I also love hearing the pre-opening horror stories and then congratulating them on getting to the starting line in one piece. Those are mighty fine feel-good moments.

Steve Coomes. | Photo by Nancy LaRocca

I like that everything is new and shiny and clean, that employee uniforms match—or at least are “correct to theme.” The feeling I get when eating at a new restaurant is akin to that of buying a new car, only the aroma of cooking food is far more pleasant and the meal less costly.

But I’m long past the dubious thrill of “getting there first” since the first experience can be the worst experience one may have in a restaurant. It is just a soft opening after all and employees are in training mode, so I expect some rough edges. It’s a rare “softy” that goes really well, which is why operators generally pick up the tab (save for alcohol, since Uncle Sam gets his star-spangled skivvies in a wad over untaxed drinks.)

It doesn’t hurt my feelings either to be invited to such events. I’m flattered each and every time. Be it passively implied or deliberately acknowledged, it says, to some extent, that what I will write about that restaurant matters to someone, even if it’s read by just one restaurateur and three to five people killing time at work.

But what I don’t love about soft openings is the lack of some guests’ flexibility. No one is a paying customer at a soft opening, they’re invited guests, which implies the use of certain social conventions, such as grace. This is especially troubling when veterans of such events quibble and quack over service being slow or having to wait a few minutes past their scheduled seating time or seeing their dish arrive with a less-than-camera-ready look. It’s just practice, people, so lighten up!

Some complain about the view from their tables or their server’s style or the operator’s suggestion that they order only certain things on the menu. Somehow it’s lost on such entitled sorts that this is staff training for the cooks, too, a scheduled fire drill designed to test the mettle of a new crew before the joint opens to the public.

Worse, some of these chronic complainers don’t know how to tip at soft openings. Just because the check reads “$0.00” doesn’t mean a tip of $0 or $5 or $10 is sufficient. The expected gratuity is 15 percent or more (I usually start at 20 percent) of the total of the items on the check, the food and drinks consumed by your table. Though it’s a training period, the cooks are on the clock, and the servers are working for tips as if it were an ordinary day. It’s as real as it gets to them.

I also don’t like the abundance of calories consumed at these events. Yet that’s not a criticism of the restaurant, it’s an acknowledged job hazard. ​Successful as I’ve become at just nibbling at this or that, too many tiny tastes still add up to more than I’d eat at home or during a normal restaurant visit. My body eventually signals, “Seriously? Another bite of dessert? Haven’t you learned yet?” and before I know it, I’m clutching my right side (this trade has ruined my gallbladder) and wincing a bit.

In all, I’m fortunate to do this for a living, especially when someone is so gracious to foot the bill. And as far as I see it, that leaves me no right to complain on a shakedown run.

During a recent restaurant meal, I saw the kitchen door swing wide to reveal pictures of two restaurant critics taped to its backside. Printed on separate 8 ½ x 11 sheets were the visages of The Courier-Journal’s Nancy Miller and Louisville HotByte’s Robin Garr, Louisville’s lone remaining restaurant critics. Clearly they were posted there to keep staffers mindful of their looks should either darken that restaurant’s door with poison pen in hand.

Steve Coomes. | Photo by Nancy LaRocca

This isn’t a new practice. Even when I served in that dastardly role from 2007-2010 at Louisville magazine, at least one restaurant I knew of had my pic pasted to a wall. And to that staff, I apologize. To this day you probably can’t un-see that!

But it’s also not a practice to which I object. It’s smart to be as careful as possible since bad reviews can hurt even the best restaurants—and the place where I was that night is among my favorites. (Notice I didn’t say “best,” because what I think is great may not align with your view of greatness.)

Still, it bothers me to think that great business people like many of our local restaurateurs live in fear of a visit by a restaurant critic. It implies that the opinions of people possessed with the power of a media channel matter more than that of a regular customer.

I’m not saying regular diners get short-shrift compared to critics. I’m saying it bugs me that critics of all stripes garner extra attention to ensure their dubious professional sensibilities aren’t offended.

I simply don’t care about the opinions of restaurant critics, and I recommend you don’t either. Everyone’s palate is different, as are everyone’s expectations of a restaurant visit. So why do so many care about the opinions of so few?

A big flaw in most restaurant critiques is critics attempt to judge all restaurants similarly in hopes of being viewed as fair to every establishment. But the result is usually an application of some vague one-size-fits-all standard that allows the critic to be questionably and confusingly graceful in some write-ups, while unpredictably savage in others. (The indecipherable way the Courier-Journal awards stars for restaurant reviews is the most confusing I’ve ever seen. And I’m not alone in that opinion.)

Too often the savagery goes well beyond the key elements of food and service. Some critics wax devilishly about dated drapes and furniture while others spend time correcting menu misspellings and server mispronunciations. We all appreciate well-decorated places and the effort to leave no menu stone unturned, but no one really gives a hoot about these things in a write-up or report on any restaurant. Readers want to know if the food and service are good. End of story, so report on those, not whether you think the wall colors scream 1980s.

Yet even nailing down the particulars of good food and drink is a slippery slope. No human tongue is alike, and what may appear too salty or sour or sweet to one tongue may be perfect in every way to another. Personally, I’m amazed at how much restaurant food I find bland and unimaginative overall is beloved passionately by others—the majority of others, in fact. So why does my lone opinion matter?

Or the lone opinion of critics?

I’ve spent 36 years either working in or writing about the restaurant industry. But just because I know more about that industry than most people doesn’t mean my opinion is more valuable than another’s. At the end of the day it’s about what people like and don’t like. Haughty critics’ opinions be damned.

In a recent article I wrote for Insider Louisville, I mentioned that Louisville’s food and drink festival isn’t any nearer to happening than it was two-and-a-half years ago when a committee was convened to make it happen. Seems a lot of problems abound, not the least of which is too many voices in the room, no single visionary driving it and no clear vision of how it best would become uniquely Louisville.

In my column, I sourced an email from the office of Mayor Greg Fisher says the event will not take place until 2017. Yet committee members I’ve spoken with call that number laughable since no significant plans have been made.

I’d agree, especially given the lack of talk I’m getting from committee members, people who usually throw me bits of information when they’re excited about different developments. Their reticence implies little to no progress.

Louisville’s restaurant scene is regularly getting national attention as an up-and-comer. And it’s widely believed that it’s ready to host a significant coming out party and bring people here to eat. And drink. Be it cocktails or our waves of bourbon, drinking is important also.

Yet it’s not so important that the current name under discussion, Bourbon & Beyond, bears no mention of food.

Bardstown has The Bourbon Festival, Lexington hosts The Bourbon Shindig and Louisville hosts The Bourbon Classic and The Bourbon Affair. Though there’s plenty to eat at all of those, none mentions food because bourbon is the star of those shows.

But any idea of a Louisville festival must be rooted in restaurants, and its name needs to include food.

Real nuts and bolts marketing sense, right? Yet apparently such a concept beyond some committee members’ grasp.

The very word “Beyond” begs the question, “Beyond freakin’ what!?!” The word drips with vagueness.

Event producer Danny Wimmer Presents has been hired to manage the event, yet according to its website, its core business is large-scale rock concerts, such as Louder Than Life, hosted here the past couple of years. The addition of a restaurant food and a bourbon pavilion into the fest was well received. Yet did that small success give Wimmer the gumption to believe it can scale up such an effort into a large festival? Apparently the Mayor’s Office is convinced it can.

But here’s where the whole thing can stall interminably: If you don’t get the cooperation of local restaurateurs, you have no festival. Right now there are several disgruntled chefs and owners who’ve lost their enthusiasm for this event. Some have said, “I already spend so much time outside my restaurant working for charity,” and “Am I really going to take time away from my business and family to get involved in something that doesn’t even mention food in the name?”

Their tension levels are rising, and as far as I can tell, there’s little to show for anyone’s effort so far.

That leads me to believe that Beyond in the name of this festival means well beyond a 2017 start date—if then.