“I think we’ve seen a much clearer uglier side of her.” – Daniela Lava
Charlie’s Italian Bistro is located in La Verne, California, which is described as being “just 30 miles from Los Angeles.” While that’s more or less true, if you ran into anyone from LA and told them you live in La Verne, they are likely to let you know that you live somewhere in the vicinity of “way the hell out there.”
Also: sidenote that La Verne is just east of San Dimas, which of course was immortalized in Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure.
Charlie’s was bought in 2010 by the Lava family. Tatiana Lava had been a server at Charlie’s for many years, and then eventually bought the place by bringing in her mom and sister, Pat and Val, to help make the purchase. Pat and Val, who were both full-time teachers, put up their respective homes to make it all work financially.
When Val tells the camera, “My mom and I don’t know a lot about the restaurant business,” you can hear the red flags shooting off all over the place with regard to how much of a trainwreck this episode of Kitchen Nightmares is going to be.
“It didn’t pan out the way I wanted it to,” Tatiana tells the camera.
Business has plummeted in the meantime, and Daniela, the sous chef, feels that the main problem is that Tatiana is unable to change or adapt anything going on in her restaurant.
Also: the food is “disgusting” in her view.
Kelsey, another server, goes even further in saying that Tatiana’s management style consists of her walking around “with a glass of wine in her hand.” She also finds her to be rude and unprofessional.
Into this mess and a rare SoCal downpour enters our British chef, Gordon Ramsay. When he sits down with Tatiana and family, he lays out the core thesis quite plainly: “There’s a difference between working in a business and running a business.”
We also learn how much is at stake: mom’s retirement, two houses, and… the extra $1,000 that Tatiana kicked in.
Ramsay pokes at the dynamic by noting Tatiana’s relatively tiny risk against her sister and mother having everything on the line, “and yet you’re not even in control of the business,” he adds.
It’s clear that Daniela has had it with her sister: “I think we’ve seen a much clearer uglier side of her… she does not even treat us as equals.”
Ramsay then sits down to order a sampling of dishes from Genevieve the server, including toasted ravioli, frutte de mare, lasagna, and the chicken pizza.
It’s not a great sign of things to come when Ramsay notes that the bread served before the meal is “dreadful… a dough ball, web, soggy, horrible.
The toasted ravioli is not only not toasted, but they are also raw in the British chef’s view. And on the frutte de mare: “pasta’s mush.”
When Genevieve reveals to Ramsay that “I can’t really take complaints to the chef,” we see Tatiana glaring at her from the bar while shaking her head back and forth.
Daniela calls the lasagna “vile,” and she’s not wrong as visually alone it looks revolting. It turns out that part of the backdrop is that the “microwave is on the blink” and therefore it’s not reheating things properly. Which simply reveals layers of terribleness going on.
Ramsay concludes to Tatiana: “The meal was dreadful,” and soon tells the rest of the kitchen staff that “the food was hideous.” Sidenote here that we learn that head chef Casamira professes to speak no English at all.
This leads to Ramsay investigating how food is stored in the kitchen, which never goes well. In this case, it’s freeze-dried meatballs that are store bought, not freshly made, and endless plastic baggies filled with overcooked pasta.
When Tatiana professes to have had no knowledge about any of these goings on, Ramsay asserts, “You’re like an airhead.”
“I don’t even know why you bought this place,” he adds.
A tearful Tatiana wanders out of the kitchen in a daze shortly after this.
“I just feel completely alone and worthless, and I don’t know what to do,” she tells the camera between drags on a cigarette.
Beyond all of this though, the biggest problem of all may well be that head chef Casamira “doesn’t know what he’s doing,” at least by way of Daniela’s assessment.
Case in point: when Ramsay observes Casamira cooking meatballs, he quickly notes that no seasoning is used while they are basically boiled in some kind of thin red sauce. It’s like “cat food” in Ramsay’s view.
During dinner service, it’s clear that while Casamira works slowly – preferring to work “on ticket at a time,” as Daniela relays to Ramsay – Daniela herself is hustling and keeping the operation afloat on some level.
However, many of the dishes that do reach diners are shoddily prepared, prompting Ramsay to call Casamira a “f—ing donkey” at one point.
The language barrier isn’t helping much, and when Casamira starts giggling at Ramsay’s rants, the British chef melts down in a way that at least feels somewhat genuine. Meanwhile, Tatiana breaks down in tears, soon telling Ramsay that she allowed Casamira to do whatever he wanted to because she “put him on a pedestal.”
“It’s your f—ing business,” Ramsay tells her pointedly, letting her know that ultimately everything that happens at Charlie’s is ultimately on her shoulders.
When Tatiana laments to the camera that she’s mad at herself and takes on all the blame for what’s happened, it’s a telling point about small business owners who take on managerial responsibilities without having had any experience or training beforehand. In other words, it often doesn’t work out very well.
In any event, Tatiana soon pulls Casamira aside and tells him in Spanish that he’s fired, adding that “it hurts me a lot.”
The next day, Ramsay brings in a consulting chef, Jonathan, who will help out for a month while also taking on the role of finding and training a new head chef. Ramsay then takes Tatiana through a lesson in making lasagna, which is slightly odd as she’s not actually a chef, but it’s framed as part of her needing to “learn the business from the ground up.”
After being taught how cook pizza and lasagna, Tatiana suddenly seems super excited and ebullient. The next day, the new menu is unveiled, which in classic Ramsay fashion is a pared down, simple offering of dishes featuring fresh ingredients. And in this case it’s more simple than usual: pizza, straight forward pasta, and salads.
With Ramsay’s guy Jonathan running the kitchen and a new menu in place, relaunch night is really just about seeing how well the rest of the kitchen staff and the front of house operates. And… it doesn’t go very well at first, with bottlenecks causing some diners being served much later than others who are seated at the same tables.
This swiftly throws Tatiana into a tizzy once again, and she tells Ramsay that no one is listening to her and so on. After a stern, quick pep talk Tatiana seemingly takes command, and we see her saying things like “Let’s do this” with her team.
Dinner service ends successfully, and even Daniela tells the camera that she’s now proud that Tatiana is her boss.
“The foundations here – run with it,” Ramsay tells the staff as he says goodbye, seemingly running out of unique things to say at this point in the evidence.
🍽 Want more? Check out Pop Thruster’s Kitchen Nightmares episode reviews (there’s a lot).
Kitchen Nightmares, “Charlie’s”: is it still open?
No, Charlie’s Italian Bistro is closed!
Via Yelp, Charlie’s has a very solid 4.1 out of 5 stars rating on 61 total reviews. Karen K. notes: “Went back yesterday and ordered a meat lovers pizza. It was very flavorful with lots of cheese, pepperoni and sausage. I loved the hand made crust. Just the right thickness without being too crispy. My BF ordered the shell pasta with shrimp. YUMMY! I was eating it off his plate. The waitress suggested a bottle of Chardonnay from Argentina – I loved it. All in all, food remained great!”
Some stats and info about Kitchen Nightmares, “Charlie’s”
TV SHOW – Kitchen Nightmares
NETWORK/STREAMING SERVICE – FOX
GENRE – Reality TV, Docuseries, Food Shows
EPISODE DESCRIPTION – Chef Ramsay pays Charlie’s a visit. Located in La Verne, California, this Italian eatery suffers from a lackluster menu and outdated décor.
CAST – Gordon Ramsay