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Saturday, December 03, 2005
Noodles & Company. Yawn.
 The wife and I went to the new, shiny, and super clean "Noodles and Company" last night to see if we have a good new restaurant in town.Well, that's why she went. I went along to see if I was wrong about the Hub (careful clicking - bad techno awaits!) article I dissed a few months ago. You remember, the one with this stellar quote:  ...With a name sounding much like a cable-access children's show, one can just tell "Nooodles and Company" must be good.[...]Right. So ... the verdict? Boring, tasteless cuisine designed (apparently) to be completely unoffensive. My wife's penne pasta tasted like it has taken directly from the strainer and laid on the plate - no flavor at all. My Pad Thai (w/tofu) was the modern day equivalent of vanilla pudding. Zero flavor, no spice. It was a little greasy, I suppose. Having already eaten at a Chipotle in Chicago, and having determined it to be to the burrito what the Ford Pinto was to the automobile, I think we can safely assume that a wave of tan, or  vanilla, has descended upon campustown. As the well scrubbed college students file back and forth from class they no longer have to be bothered with figuring out what is "ok" to eat in our town. They can rest assured that a subway club, a plate of Noodles & Company, or a Chipotles burrito is only $7.00 away. Not the tastiest of choices, but safe. Definitely safe.Luckily, for the rest of us, Murphy's is still serving up the mushroom swiss burgers, Ari Ri Rang still has the best dolsot bi-bim-bop south of Chicago, and Zorba's still has jazz on Thursday evenings.  One would think these would be the kind of traditions a weekly like the Hub would want to promote. One would also think our town's weekly would at least be willing to foster a discussion on the future of our campustown, and our downtown. A  discussion that would include voices against the increasing corporatization of our community, not just the voices of the investors who write the paper's checks.I guess not. I have long claimed on this site that the "creative class" theory on economic development is, in fact, and attempt to suck the life out of a community. It is, in short, a convenient, modern excuse for a select number of investors and bankers to make a crapload of money while feeling good about themselves as "hipsters". Well, if the "creative" targets have no taste in food, or in coffee, then they are on the right track.  
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15 Comments:
Have you considered submitting an article for The Hub? You seem to have strong feelings and are able to write at an article length. In fact...your comments are interesting. And you have a good eye for relevant pictures. :)
I enjoyed this. The passionate writing helped me overlook the fact that it means that Campustown is in its "Empire Strikes Back" phase.
I couldn't get over how before I left town, the Campustown had been overrun by good places to eat--extremely diverse, non-"Whitified" (sorry, but for better or worse, we do really call them "white people" Chinese restaurants, etc.)
When I returned and found Potbelly, Starbucks and some other inferior, more expensive crap had overrun the place, it was pretty upsetting. I started shouting out the passenger window at the people going into Potbelly.
Is this really what's meant for humanity? Letting creative, individualized cuisine fizzle and die so we can pay large sums of money indulging our cowardices and need for the predictably mediocre?
I really like Noodles & Company a lot. I've eaten there, like, five times and enjoyed everything. The woman who manages it put herself through school at the University of Illinois (she earned a degree in business management) managing the Burger King on Green Street.
I guess Xian misses that down-home mom-n-pop restaurant, Wendy's, which used to be on that corner. And what was on the corner where Potbelly's is now located? That empty sporting goods shop which was never open. Yes, that was lovely.
Well, you always have the creative, individualized cuisine choices at Home of Gourmet or you can get a Kamburger. Nobody has driven those jewels of the C-U crown from the landscape.
What, prey tell, has been driven out? (Oh, PLEASE say something jackass, like, "Panera"...You know you want to). I loved Goulliard's, but that went by the wayside due to high rent, not chain restaurants.
I like Starbucks, too, as it provides a consistently good, quality product.
Jimmy John's started locally and is now a huge chain. La Bamba?
Starbucks, Noodles, Chipoltle, Pot Belly, et all all started as small, local businesses & went national. That is what happens when you make a quality product/service.
Ah, but you still have that burger they have at Murphy's. Uh, yeah...a frozen patty with some Swiss Cheeze and canned mushrooms on a bun served with pre-made fries. Alert the Cullinary Institute of America about that one.
However, thanks for more fodder for my future columns in the Hub. See you in the funny papers.
Maybe my terms are confuddled but I thought 'creative class' meant served by a filthy hippy?
I'd watch that Don Gerard for Mayor fella.
Culinary Institute of America = CIA
Coincidence? I think not.
Uh, wha?
Xian asks if this is the fate of humanity, I have to say NO! It is completely possible to have city leadership that is devoted to non-corporatization of a town. It is rare, indeed (think: Vermont) but it can happpen. We just don't have those kinds of thinkers in this town.
Instead we have folks who call other people "jackass" while bending over backwards to defend businesses like Starbucks (Seattle, WA) and Noodles and Company (Boulder, CO). Meanwhile Murphy's, a cultural institution in this town, is written off as crap.
I don't get this mentality, I really don't. I guess Mr. Gerard is defensive, but I honestly don't understand how someone can believe that corporatization of our campustown can be a good thing. There is nothing special about having a Starbucks, Chiptole, or Noodles & Co. It is not unique, not cool, and definitely not attractive to the all-important "creatives" who are looking for "authenticity" in their hipster neighborhoods.
Whether these businesses run local business out of town is irrelevant. It is the precedent that has been set. The more Champaign allows the coporate world into our campustown, the less unique, less interesting, and less appealing this town becomes.
btw, Mr. Gerard - if you are ever interested in actually having a debate about the positives and negatives of coporatization let me know. That, of course, would require you to provide facts and stuff - and you'd probably have to can the name calling. But you might give it a shot. There's first time for everything, right?
ps - do you really have a regular column in the Hub?
If I might stumble into this conversation as one who will be moving back home soon to C-U.
This is hardly an area of expertise of mine but I am having a hard time seeing a real conflict here. In terms of restaurants I mean. It seems to me that in the cities I have lived in (C-U included- for 12 years) restaurants find a balance fairly organically between local culturally interesting spots and the corporate entities. The market supports both. As humans we sometimes want reliable and bland when we are in a hurry (I myself enjoy Subway and Stbux for this reason) and sometimes we have a yen for more substantive cuisine. It seems folly to me to try and make the case that another McDonalds or 'Noodles and Co.' will permanently oust all the local joints, and it seems equally unlikely that C-U can or should try to bar successful food chains from setting up shop in the area.
Speaking personally I am far more concerned with urban sprawl, poorly planned neighborhoods, and the far more damaging effect that superstores such as Wal-Mart have on the entire economy of a city. These matters, when I return to C-U are ones that I will watch more closely and chew my fingernails over.
Foleyma...the hour draws nigh...have a pony ready for me at the city gate.
alohasucks,
seth
Sethers -
Just a point of clarification - I have not claimed that corporate restaurants create an atmosphere that squeezes out the little guy. My claim was that campustown has become more and more safe and less and less interesting in the last, say, five years since the corporates were shown the welcome mat.
There are statistics to prove that the well loved locals will most likely be closing up shop in the next few years, but that hasn't really happened yet and, indeed, it is possible that some of them may not.
But either way that doesn't interest me. What does interest me is the fact that in the last five years we have seen a Starbucks, Subway, Chiptole, Noodles & Co., Potbellys, and probably a couple of other corporate restaurants open in our campustown. Every day it looks less and less like Green St., and more and more like the mall.
Which would be fine if there had been a debate - ANY debate - about these changes. There has been none, and that is my point. Before we open up the next corporate box restaurant could we please have a conversation in this town about the merits of this choice?
It won't be in our local weeklies, so I try it here every once in a while.
btw - that donkey has been pooping in our garage for the last month. Get on the plane already!
Smooches! Give Laura our love.
foley
What an incestuous little community we have here! :) :)
I'm looking forward to responding to this thread more when I get a second to sit down, but I just wanted to say "hey" to Seth and Laura. And Mr. Don, it's good to see something from you. If you get a second, say hi to Brenner B. for me.
Ok, I can't help myself. Panera was driven out after driving out Coslow's (I'm probably misspelling it) but that was a great community hangout.
The obnoxious giant prison looking monstrousity replaced the Co-ed theatre which has help contribute to the growth of that massive trainwreck that is N. Prospect.
Gouliards was beautiful and probably wasn't going to make it regardless, but high rents are hardly unrelated to giant corporate suitors for property.
My point though was not the exact geographic location of a Potbelly, but that there are a finite number of people eating food in an area. People who daily frequent the same unhealthy, preservative ladel, giant chain stores ARE directly attacking the local store owner's livelihood with their free choices of poor quality.
Basically default choosing of brand-name over actually choosing the better sandwich, plate of noodles or whatever, is a breakdown of capitalist democracy. Some of us might say "Good riddance". Surprisingly though, even with my socialist lineage, I'm a big fan of the capitalist system when it is populated by critical thinking consumers.
before coslows was coslows, it was a hardees. i'm here to tell you that the chains have been all over campustown for decades -- since mcdonalds basically created plastic food in the '50s.
there was an abudance of local restaurants recently when green street had become so run-down that rents dropped. a lot of them went out of business pretty quickly. there are few things riskier than opening a restaurants -- look at the 4,000 owners of recent vriners
Which town in Vermont has a university with an undergraduate population of over 40,000 students?
Did you not start this entire line of conversation by besmirching my skills as a "reporter" without checking your own facts - e.g. - Espresso Royale (San Fransisco)?
Not to mention that whole "I don't know who Don Gerard is...".
Former Green Street Businesses - McDonald's, Wendy's, Baskin & Robbins, Taco John's...and a bunch of empty store fronts.
I didn't say Murphy's was crap, you did. I said it's "bar food" was not comparable to Noodles & Co. By the way, what exactly is in that gyro-meat at Zorba's (which hosts a great jazz night despite it's decidely "greasy" cuisine).
Oh, you forgot to skewer my article in the Hub about that massive chain store World Wide Gifts. I guess you only got around to reading that one article I wrote four months ago. I know, I use lots of big words and it makes people sleepy to keep looking them up in the dictionary.
Yes, I have a very popular bi-monthly column in the locally owned and published - and quite unique - news-magazine, the Hub Weekly. Many unique local people - Rose from Poster Children, Todd from June & the Exit Wounds, Lisa from FPM Records/Destroy the Expoding Aardvark - are readers and comment regularly.
You may find it by entering the key words "Don Gerard's Acoustic Blog" in the massively corporate search engine (owner of blogspot.com which you use for your own free blog) Google.com. You even made it into one installment (not by name, though...it is poor form to talk smack about somebody if you don't know who they are).
I do not debate.
Xian - Ben has a girlfriend and is far too busy to talk to a punk such as myself. However, I am sure he is a loyal follower of my popular column so perhaps I will try to work your regards into a future edition.
it is poor form to talk smack about somebody if you don't know who they are...
Gotcha.
Hey, btw - if you come back to read this, I'd love to get my hands on a Greedy Loves cd if you have one. I'll pay. I have a radio show on RFU (I know, I know me and half the town of Urbana) and I am trying to plug in local acts when possible.
We wouldn't have to meet or anything (to avoid you beating the shit out of me) - we could exchange in the post?
Let me know. Oh, and I read your column this morning in the Hub. I honestly didn't know you were writing opinions.
I hope someone would slap me if I was ever as self-congratulatory as some who "use lots of big words" and "have a very popular bi-monthly column" name-dropping their uber-important "readers [who] comment regularly".
I am SO impressed.
It's alright--We use words like "Mackadocious"!
I'm not saying I agree with much of this, but I can sure provide a list of restaurants no longer in campustown that I wish were still there....
Jade Spring - Chinese place that used to be in Johnstown Center. That guy used to make you stuff not even on the menu if he knew you well enough and it looked like you were having a sufficiently bad day to need comfort food.
Mykonos - Greek & Burger place used to be in the building at the corner of 4th & Green. Where oh where can I get a good dish of moussaka now? Not a Greek or Bulgarian resturaunt in town to fill this void.
O'Malley's - not a restaurant, but worth a mention because of it's community atmosphere - used to be in the basement of the building mentioned above at corner of 4th & Green.
La Salsa - Closest thing this town has ever had to a genuine Tacoria (although my experiences at the dive on Green between Wright and Sixth say that it comes close now). Used to be across from TIS.
Coslow's - Driven out only to be replaced by... Panera... which I gather has now closed as well.
The little Indian resturaunt where the new Kinko's is on Wright. Can't remember the name. The Sunday buffet was fabulous (although I can guess that the buffet caused them to leave just as much as corporate giants - having a buffet across from the engineering quad... not a good idea). The place where I first fell in love with Indian food....
The Asian restaurant that used to be just east of Murphy's. Crazy smells and weird people hanging out there, but man was it good.
Sing Ma on University (just barely in what I could consider the campus area). OK, it closed due to a family tragedy, not due to corporate giants, and the Golden something is there now, but it's just not the same....
Asiana - on Green between 5th & 4th. Oh sad days indeed without it.
The Daily Grind - coffeeshop in Johnstown Center driven out by Panera moving in next door.
Delights - and where else can you get an ice cream with real brandy or irish cream added?
Well, that's ten and I'm done thinking about it.
Interestingly, a number of the corporate newbies will end up campus community pillars, and as always, so will a few Ma & Pa shops. When Legend's first opened I rememeber a group of somewhat snobby types who made fun of it as a big new "corporate" bar. I don't even know if it has any corporate affiliation, but they were sure thumbing their noses. And now the Legend's fish sandwich has become a staple of the campus diet. Which of the new contenders will make the cut?
We should all somberly note that Zorba's is still standing, but the McDonald's that used to be across from it on Green is not. They hid in the Union basement, where their corporate arches are (thankfully) a little more hidden. We all won in that transaction.
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