For the last week, the food interweb has been going nuts over a dinner hosted by Downtown LA and Top Chef Masters participant, Neal Fraser. Articles were popping up left and right in the OC Register, Cosmopolitan, Huffington Post Taste, and many more. While most of these articles reeked of generalizations or were from writers who merely cut and paste from other articles (excluding LA Weekly and OC Register), I thought it would be best to clear up some things and say exactly what happened from start to finish.

Yes we were all lied to, but not everyone was fooled.

I was invited to the event by the PR company, Orange Palate, but it wasn’t just a simple “Hey come dine with us in three days” kind of invitation. Instead, it was a type of systematic experiment that began far before any plate hit a table. It started when myself and other foodies were emailed a flyer to a Neal Fraser dinner over a week prior to the actual event. We were told the private dinner would be at a secret location, which would be disclosed closer to the date of the event. It wasn’t until two days prior to the event that we learned about the location: Carondelet House. That means, for at least 5 days, any thought of the dinner was a consistent reference of things pertaining to only Neal Fraser and nothing else. Each time I thought of the event, I also thought of: Fraser, Redbird, Bravo, and/or Top Chef Masters, occasionally his red hair, but nothing else. My mind was slowly being conditioned to focus on the chef, so the thought of anything else never entered my mind.

Smart move PR people.

Once TJ and I arrived at the picturesque event space that is Carondelet House, it only solidified the exclusiveness of the dinner. Upon walking in, we were directed to have drinks and wait in the lobby as the culinary team finalized preparation. Minutes passed and friends arrived: “Hey Mallory (CouchPotaotCook)” or “Hiya Ben and Lisa (LA Foodie)”!  More minutes passed and other people arrived  “What up, Tanaya (Tanaya’s Table)!?!” It wasn’t until close to an hour passed that we were told we would soon be seated. That sixty minutes of standing in a room, starving gradually, staring at a bar decorated with fruit, resisting the urge to eat that fruit, and having no information as to what was happening made some of us question the evening. I started to wonder if it was the start of The Purge and that they were going to kill bloggers. I came back to reality and questioned if the staff was ill-prepared or if it was a mind game. The moment my baby ankles started to get weak I wanted to leave. “Nothing is worth skinny ankles swelling into cankles, nothing!” I quieted myself and a few more minutes later they finally let us into the dining room.

After waiting forever and a day we were taken into the dining area and it was beautiful! Lights hung across the ceiling, and two long communal tables were decorated with place cards to show us where to sit and introduce us to new friends. What stood out for a bit were the six video cameras, microphones along the table, and a camera crew. While the PR company let us know the dinner would be videotaped, I assumed it was for Bravo. Maybe it was another Top Chef show? I didn’t mind, so the cameras and crew became an afterthought amongst the entire decor. Once we all settled in, Fraser came out and introduced himself. He then let us know there would be a secret ingredient in each of the five courses. I thought maybe we were testing out a new menu and he was looking to gauge consumer reaction–like a focus group. That was fine because I have a Master’s degree in psychology and I’m familiar with focus groups. I was actually excited because this would finally be my turn to be in the hot seat! Fraser then said goodbye, made his departure, and wine started to flow.

We were ready to have a Fraser dinner!

In every media outlet that wrote about the event you’ll see a quote from me that read: “It seemed a little off from what he [Fraser] normally serves. We were thinking it was a weird secret ingredient.” (i.e. Esquire). By that, I meant that it didn’t taste like the food I’ve had before by Fraser. It just seemed different and my only assumption was that it was due to the so-called secret ingredient. I couldn’t figure it out, but I did know that I didn’t like it.

The five-course menu started with a Chilled Avocado Soup with sour cream espuma. I liked the texture of the soup and the thickness of it, but I felt that there wasn’t much flavor to the avocado and that it was too peppery. Maybe that was to mask the overall taste? Whatever the reason, TJ and I didn’t finish it but it was pretty.

Next was the Green Salad with tomatoes, bacon, garlic croutons, and a buttermilk dressing. In comparison to the first course, this dish wasn’t as visually appealing but it tasted better. There wasn’t anything stellar about it, but the combination of the simple ingredients worked well together. The standout pieces were the bacon and the dressing. But then again, you could put bacon and dressing on a ream of paper and I’m sure people would eat it—it’s bacon.

I love meatballs so I was excited about the Spicy Meatballs. Only problem was they didn’t taste like much of anything. They were served in a tomato sauce and topped with what could have been breadcrumbs. The quality was good, but they lacked flavor and definitely didn’t taste spicy–just bland. These meatballs would be fine if I made them at home or stole them from a coworker’s lunch bag at work. But if I went to a restaurant and bought them, I would contemplating skipping out on the check. I wouldn’t do it, but I’d think really long and hard about it.

After the meatballs, I was really rooting for the Bacon Wrapped Chicken with a corn and potato hash and Canadian bacon. I figured that if the salad tasted good with a majority of the credit to the bacon bits, then the chicken should be even better because it was wrapped in bacon like a Christmas present. A few bites in, and I was wrong. The dish was entirely too salty and I overheard someone say the chicken tasted processed, yeah that tasted about right. Unfortunately, I didn’t finish this dish either. I kind of just stared at the remaining meat and the hash I barely touched just eagerly waiting for the dessert to redeem the night.

Too bad it didn’t. The dessert was a Coffee Custard and it had blueberries and a maple crumble. I really wanted this dish to be delicious for three reasons: it was dessert (duh), everything else was pretty average, and I was still hungry. Only problem, it wasn’t good. The coffee flavor was too strong in the dish and I didn’t like the way the tart blueberries paired with the custard. The two were entirely too polar for it to blend in a delightful way. At that point, I didn’t bother to try the anything left in the bowl.

Did we have a favorite? Not really. But if we had to choose, then the best of all the dishes was the salad. Yep, the leaves covered in bacon bits and dressing wins. But if you think about it, a salad winning just goes to show you how weak the other dishes were.

After all the dishes were cleared, Fraser came out and told us the secret ingredient: McDonald’s.

This son of a (McMuffin) biscuit!

All the ingredients in each dish were from the supplier of McDonald’s. It made sense. Hearing that explained why the food didn’t taste the way it should have. My previous dinner at Redbird left a distinct feeling of pure elation that I didn’t get here, hence me saying it “seemed a little off”. But finding out that it was McDonald’s made me think that the quality of food McDonald’s is now using is better than what I get after the club on a Saturday night–or is it a Sunday morning? Whatever. It also explained the cameras. It wasn’t for a Bravo show, but for McDonald’s to use for research purposes and on their social media accounts. A southern California McDoanald’s franchise owner came out and talked to us about the whole experiment and why they did it. It was to show people that the quality of McDonald’s food is better now. I agree, what I had this night (even though I didn’t care for it) was better than what I’ve had before. However, you have to take into consideration that variables in this experiment were completely different from what  happen in real life at the fast food chain.

In this experiment, Fraser is cooking the food–in real life, it’ll be someone without a strong culinary background cooking the food. Therein lies a problem. If the McDonald’s team wanted to show that the quality of their food has improved and as a result it tastes better, then this night doesn’t show that properly. Reason being, the ingredients may be different but so is the execution of the food. It would have been better if they changed both the ingredients and the method of cooking.

This experiment was ok if it was just a way for McDonald’s to say, “Hey we have better ingredients.” I would have smiled, gave them a thumbs up, and kept on with my day. That kind of change only affects those who continue to eat at McDonald’s. That type of change doesn’t do anything for me, the person who doesn’t care for the fast food chain. If the PR team wanted to excite current customers, change the minds of lost customers, and show that the restaurant is making positive and significant changes, then they should have planned the event a little differently. Instead of Fraser being the chef for the night, he should have posed as the chef for the night. His name could have stayed on the invite, they could have kept us wondering, held it at a gorgeous location with a beautiful setup, and then Fraser would have given his “secret ingredient speech”.

But the part that would have blown our minds and made this a stronger experiment would be this part. After the meal was done Fraser would come out and say the ingredients were from McDonald’s and that he didn’t cook the food (boom), then a line of chefs would come into the dining room and Fraser would say the food was cooked by actual McDonald’s chefs (boom!), that he trained them to properly cook the food (BOOM!), and that he would implement a new cooking program nationwide so actual McDonald’s chefs would cook better quality food at higher standards of cooking (BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!).

Now that would have shown that McDonald’s has better ingredients and they are actively making long term changes in as many aspects of the restaurant as possible. In this revised experiment/focus group even if the food didn’t taste amazing, it would still be better than the original taste of McDonald’s by leaps and bounds and as a result, it would have been a complete success.

Not at all; I was hungry, but I wasn’t pissed. When it was all said and done, it was fun. I got to stick my pinky finger out as I drank wine, I faked a British accent because it made me feel classy, and I was around good people. Plus, it was the first time I got to be on the opposite side of an experiment. I’m not the happiest that I didn’t really have a Fraser dinner that night, but I picked up some Chic-fil-A on the way home and I got over it. However, I do think McDonald’s or the PR team should pay for a dinner at Redbird for TJ and myself. I mean, looking back on the entire night of waiting and not eating the food I wanted, I think it’s the right thing to do.