What Happened To Mangia Mangia After Kitchen Nightmares?
Gordon Ramsay's "Kitchen Nightmares" highlights some of the worst restaurants in America, ones that are one raw chicken dish away from utter ruin. I have seen every single episode of the famous chef's hit TV shows and one restaurant in particular, Mangia Mangia, always stuck with me due to its being an Italian drive-thru restaurant. Whatever happened to the doomed restaurant?
Ramsay visited the restaurant in Woodland Park, Colorado, on Season 7 of the show, although you can find it under Season 6 on Peacock. The owner, Julie Watson, and her daughter Janelle frequently showed their bad temper as the chef tried to fix the undercooked noodle-selling hole. Ramsay and his team didn't fix much, leading the restaurant to close shortly after the episode aired in 2014.
The Michelin star chef ordered wild mushroom ravioli, chicken and wild rice soup, meat lasagna, veal piccata, spaghetti and meatballs, and fresh Pacific salmon, during his first visit. As is often the case, he hated everything, and it's safe to say things went downhill very fast.
What were Mangia Mangia's biggest issues?
Of course, the food at Mangia Mangia was only the first problem at the ill-fated restaurant. Gordon Ramsay was not impressed by any of the six dishes he ordered or the fact that the food was served on dirty plates. One server even said, "The food is not made with much love. It is made with stress and a microwave," which Ramsay called out in the episode.
As further shown, owner Julie Watson had no idea how to run a restaurant, as she was previously a realtor. At one point Ramsay said, "The way you are running this restaurant is incorrect." To make matters worse, head chef Trevor Peterson was dealing with a drug addiction. Although Ramsay had a one-on-one chat with him, he was fired and replaced during the episode. Problem after problem brought the restaurant into the ground, unfortunately, and it has since become a Jimmy John's according to Google Earth.
Don't be too shocked, as Ramsay hasn't saved a lot of "Kitchen Nightmares" restaurants; only 30 restaurants remain in business as of this writing out of the 95-plus that were featured on the show. "Kitchen Nightmares" was brought back in 2023 for Season 8 on Fox.
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