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No more free meals, please!

Early edition: Chris Sherman steps from behind the menu as he leaves after rating bay area restaurants for 17 years.

By CHRIS SHERMAN
Published December 26, 2006

The first time worried me. A few tables away in a downtown St. Petersburg restaurant, a man announced loudly, “I know who you are.’’

I blanched. Would he out the big guy with the handlebar moustache, thinning hair and spectacles by bellowing:

“You’re the food critic for the St. Pete Times’’?

Instead, the man said clearly, “I love those commercials you do for oatmeal.’’

Wilford Brimley, whew.

Truth is, that overfed, aging hippie eating around the area since 1990 was indeed the Times restaurant critic.

Chris Sherman was not the person who threatened a Gulfport cafe with a terrible review unless an unsatisfactory chicken salad was taken off the bill. Nor was Chris Sherman the ranting poseur so drunk in a beach restaurant she broke the toilet.

Nope. For 16 years the critic was me. I often sat behind you as you talked about me.

I tell you this now because the gig is up. I hang up my tasting fork and my expense account today. No more free dinners.

They weren’t exactly free. After two days in the hospital last month I went home with a stent in my heart and a diagnosis of Type II diabetes.

I won’t blame restaurants for too many calories or carbohydrates or my lack of exercise. I must eat more wisely at every meal, cook at home and not have a ready excuse for overindulgence.

 Those who think I now give up the best job at the paper don’t know the whole story.

I do not get paid to dine year-round in gourmet restaurants.  

Sure, the newspaper picks up the tab, but it’s not all gourmet. I eat in the same places you do, the bad and the ugly as well as the good.

Too often I’ve faced another choice of salmon, mahi or grouper (perhaps), accompanied by overpriced wine, soggy vegetables and a dessert menu of chocolate indulgence, creme brulee and, ta-da!, tiramisu.

As restaurant critic it was important that I not be recognized. I had a credit card in an assumed name, actually my birth name before I was adopted, so two-thirds of it was still legally me.

I made reservations in that name, my companion’s, or sometimes “Mr. Christopher.”

My disguises were never elaborate. Carrying a road map or a camera pegged me as a tourist. To “Where are you from,’’ I could say “Ohio,’’ and it was true.

Yet after almost two decades, many chefs and waiters did know me, but I usually knew when I’d been recognized.

Waiters hovered or shook so hard they almost dropped the plates. One completely missed a water glass and emptied the pitcher on the table and my wife’s lap.

Many chefs and restaurateurs have ignored my criticism, though some welcomed it. Chefs are notoriously picky themselves and can take apart a meal brutally. There’s debate backstage in any restaurant.

Once, I got an irate phone call from a chef in Tampa, followed months later by a lengthy letter from the owner, who attached a laminated copy of the review with each of my complaints underlined: she agreed completely.

And now: check, please.

And you, eat your oatmeal.

[Last modified December 26, 2006, 21:27:19]