You walk in the door and are ""greeted"" by a doorgirl in her early 20s who stands behind a podium with a reservations book. She immediately asks if you have a reservation. Being that it is only 5pm and the door just opened 27 seconds ago, you will tell her no. She casts a disdainful look upon you and says superciliously, ""Let me just go see if a table is available."" You wonder why. The place is so empty, you can see tumbleweed blowing down the aisles.
Once you are seated, you are brought a basket of French rolls and a plate of olive oil with cracked black pepper. The bread is chilled as though just taken from the fridge. But you stop yourself short. This is Lolita! you tell yourself. This is a Special Place! So the bread is a little cold, so what.
""Something smells funny,"" your brain says when your pizza arrives. ""No,"" you tell it, ""This is Lolita. This is a special place. This is gourmet."" You are well into chewing when you realize the funny smell is, in fact, your pizza. You force yourself to swallow, and chase it down with a large swig of ice water.
You try to talk yourself into taking another bite. You grimace at the prospect. A young, mild, creamy Fontina would have been perfect on this pizza. Too bad that whoever's in the kitchen couldn't be bothered to do that. Instead, they used a very, very aged Fontina that is about as pungent as that old wet rag you found in the bottom of the laundry chute last week. Your eyes water. Your mind wanders to that scene in the movie Big where a mentally-young Tom Hanks, having just eaten a mouthful of caviar, gags and coughs it up, then grabs his napkin and wipes his blackened tongue down to remove the taste. You wish you could do likewise. ""Everything okay?"" your partner asks. You nod your head yes. ""This is a special place, isn't it?"" you say.
Your dining partner, sensing your displeasure, informs the waitress that your food is not up to par. The waitress makes no attempt to offer amends or even ask what the problem is. Your partner asks to see the menu so as to order a different item. You order a different pizza.
While waiting for pizza #2, you decide to try the lemon poundcake. It arrives and is only slightly bigger than an Entenmann's Little Bite muffin, about 2 inches across. Squirted jauntily across the plate is a bitter, bitter lemon coulis. Too bad someone in the kitchen didn't know better than to include anything other than lemon zest in there. You and your partner eat the cake in three bites, and you realize you must pay $6 for those three bites.
Feeling quite ridiculous, you ask for your check. Pizza #2 arrives, thin as a matzoh and topped with a smear of sauce, four paper-thin circles of melted mozzarella, and two cherry tomatoes cut in half. Pizza #2 is $12. And then you see that your waitress did not remove the charge for pizza number one, and you must pay for them both. You wonder if you are the victim in an episode of Punk'd, but, alas, no cameramen come out from around the corner. You pay, and you walk out, vowing never to return.
Pros: Oooh, it's Lolita! Oooh, it's Michael Symon's joint!
Cons: Too bad everyone's rude and can't cook.
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