Ketchup | dinner

Or: What did letop5 say to the restaurant? (Ans: "Ketchup.")

Had friends in town who we'll call Lovejoy and Country (endearingly, I promise), and for their First Time in LA, I wanted to take them someplace trendy and known, someplace dripping with the egocentric honey of Hollywood. I asked them what kind of foods they liked, and Lovejoy told me, "Anything. Though one of my friends who watches 'The Hills'"--she then immediately barfed into a bag, and after an half-hearted apology, resurfaced to complete her sentence--"mentioned some restaurant called 'The Ketchup' where those non-stars of that non-show apparently don't really eat much. Have you heard of it?" That, I had. Not only is Ketchup (sans the "the") nearly consistently in the top five of opentable.com's weekly most requested, I also had a coupon for $15 off from work. So, manned with this coupon and a knee-length-but-still-somewhat-flirty dress, I took my out of town friends there to regale them with over-priced diner food via five types of ketchup: maple, mango, chipotle, ranch and regular.

Now...I'm not going to say that Ketchup was disappointing. In fact, I quite liked the joint. It's just that...for a place called Ketchup...one, they should have offered more ketchup than a quarter of a ramekin's worth, and two, the ketchups offered should have been better. That mango ketchup...no. And the ranch? No, no. Even the regular seemed sans pizzaz somehow. I vote Heinz above Ketchup's ketchups. And I don't even like Heinz. One thing I did like, however: the crab-lettuce wraps. Though messy, they were tasty. The Threesome starter was good, too (would have been "great," had I been smart enough to BMODK--bring my own damn ketchup), as were the sweet potato fries, which, deliciously slicked with cinnamon and sugar probably just after frying, were like dessert before dinner. Who doesn't like that? Actually, I usually don't. But for their attempt at originality, I'll salute The Ketchup this time around.

The one thing unoriginal about it all were their prices. Yeah, I know I'm dining in Hollywood, but for heaven's sake: you're on the edge of a shopping mall. And catch up, Ketchup: gas prices are really high right now. So cut it out, and give me my diner food for diner prices. Because I see you and your cheap, linoleum tables.*

Maybe Ketchup is scared if the prices went lower, the clientèle would get fatter. And what with all the short skirts slinking about in there...we wouldn't want that.

the food: I took my friends to KooKooRoo the day before. They preferred KooKooRoo. All I'm sayin.
the mood: Mod diner stuck in a lava lamp.
in five: 3.5/5 - Three, because you're not *that* bad, just unspecial, and the .5 because you've tricked us all into thinking you ARE special. Clever girl.

KETCHUP: http://www.dolcegroup.com/ketchup/

*=I'm mostly bitter about the prices, because I forgot to use my coupon. Blarg!