I've known about Andrei's Conscious Cuisine — a lofty title for a promising restaurant if there ever was one — since last year. I knew approximately where they were going to be located, and I found their website, which for a long time had just these words: Coming Soon. Then, one day last week, I reloaded it.
“What's this?” I thought. “It's open?!” There were hours, a menu and pictures of their food. The site was completely done. The “Events” page even had a description of their “stunning 30 foot waterfall” and a blurb about the “professionalism and receptiveness of our staff”.
So then I drove there. Was it open? Um. Not exactly. There was, however, a banner that says “Opening in June” (something they've done away with on their website) which means they've got a lot of work to do, fast. The building's constructed, but not done. The entire area was fenced off. The only “staff” present were the kind with hardhats. Some areas were still bare dirt, unpaved. And the waterfall? Well, it's probably not quite that stunning, yet.
Before becoming an award-winning restaurant critic for OC Weekly in 2007, Edwin Goei went by the alias “elmomonster” on his blog Monster Munching, in which he once wrote a whole review in haiku.