Guy Fieri Fires Back At Scathing Restaurant Review

NEW YORK (CBS) - Bay Area restauranteur and Food Network celebrity, Guy Fieri is not going to take criticism sitting down.

On Tuesday, New York Times' food critic Pete Wells published a scathing review of Fieri's new Manhattan restaurant, and now the celebrity chef has fired back in an interview with "Today" show host Savannah Guthrie.

Wells reviewed Fieri's new Times Square restaurant, Guy's American Kitchen and Bar, labeling it "poor" and calling the food "inedible," "greasy" and "ruinous."

"I just thought it was ridiculous," Fieri, 44, said Thursday. "I've read reviews. There's good and there's bad in the restaurant business. But that, to me, went so overboard. It really seemed like there was another agenda."

Fieri said he had a problem with the tone and the question-style nature of the piece. Practically the entire article was posed as a series of questions, beginning with: "GUY FIERI, have you eaten at your new restaurant in Times Square? Have you pulled up one of the 500 seats at Guy's American Kitchen & Bar and ordered a meal? Did you eat the food? Did it live up to your expectations?"

Fieri maintained that Wells came in "with a different agenda" -- particularly having visited the establishment four times in the two months it's been open, Fieri said, adding, "That's tough times, especially this size of a restaurant."

Guthrie then pointed out that his new spot had 2.5 stars out of 5 on Yelp, noting, "So it's not knocking people's socks off.

"At two months? Not really expecting to," Fieri responded.

The Food Network star said he will continue to stand by his food and his team.

Fieri, winner of the second season of "The Next Food Network Star," has been in the restaurant business for 25 years with two Santa Rosa restaurants, Tex Wasabi's and Johnny Garlic's, which by the way, has three and a half stars on Yelp. He launched the series, "Guys Big Bite," on the Food Network, followed by "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives" in 2007.

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