Hi! My Name is Shannon and I am a Food Critic -

Yes, it's finally happened. I've become one of those @#!!%$! snobby food critics.

1. Why does 90% of everything on the menu have to be something fried? Fried shrimp, fried chicken, country fried steak, french fries, fried fish, fried cheese, fried pickles.... enough!

2. What's the difference between a 12oz and a 14oz steak? 2oz of inedible rubber gristle that the cook left on instead of trimming it off.

3. Pssst! I have super powers just like in the X-Men movies. Really, it's true. Want to know what my mutant ability is?  I can taste how many miles what's on my plate rode in the back of an 18 wheeler truck to get there!

4. If everything on the menu comes to the restaurant prepackaged, then it's not a restaurant. It's a microwave with a waitress attached.

5. Not directly food related but, if you can't do basic math or understand simple English sentences then, you have no business waiting tables, running a cash register, etc.

6. There are plenty more, but I'll stop with five so this list doesn't degenerate into an expletive laden tirade.

Not all restaurants have all of these issues.  It's just that too many of them have at least some.  Some restaurants have great folks waiting tables who are working their tails off, but are overworked and unappreciated in whatever chain food ghetto their working at to pay the rent.  Other places, the cook is giving it his/her all but can't really do that much with the cardboard cutout ingredients shipped in from four states and two space shuttle flights away.

In short, there are too many so called restaurants where what's important is the theme not the food.  It's a chic bistro, or it's a slam'in sports bar, or it's a family dinning experience, or it's a trendy cafe, or it's a nostalgic trip to food like grandma used to make,  or it's one or another of a hundred other theme's.  But when you look at the menu, surprise, it's all the same stuff out of can or freezer bag, just un-thawed and dressed up a little different for each theme.

So here's to more focus on food and less on themes.  Better food might not fix all our problems, but it's a start.