Diego Valdez – A 20 year old, Mexican-American citizen. Diego is a food critic for “The Sly Fox” Newspaper based in Chicago. He writes reviews for the digital version of the newspaper, as well as the physical copy that goes out every Saturday morning. His job is to go to local restaurants, big franchise or small, family owned, and taste test their food. Afterwards, he puts the word out to the nation about said restaurant.


Fresh


A new restaurant opened up a couple weeks ago. They call it “Fresh” because they say they get all their ingredients as fresh as possible; their motto is “If it ain’t fresh, we don’t serve it.” It’s a small business, owned by a couple from New York City, New York. It’s another American based place, with burgers, hot dogs, the works. However, a lot of people lately have been going crazy over this place. I’ve heard from friends, family, acquaintances, and all over the social media networks to go check this place out. Now, I don’t usually check out places that are requested to me, especially if the hype is this grand, because it leads my expectations high. But this one is different. I’m getting an overwhelming amount of requests to go there. I’m actually quite intrigued, is it as good as the hype makes it out to be? I plan on going there in a couple days when I have the time.

“Finally, I’ve arrived.” I said to myself. The place looks like a home in the suburbs, very welcoming and pleasant. It’s an abnormal design for a restaurant, compared to all the other ones I’ve been to. The parking lot is a moderate size, but it’s all full, some people had to park on the street or walked here. Why is this place so good? Maybe the hype is all good as it turned out to be. “Thank god I called in for a reservation, or else this would’ve taken at least an hour or so for me to be seated.” I thought to myself. I parked in a reserved parking space and pulled out my notebook and pen. “Alright, let’s see what all the hassle is about.” I got out of my car, and locked it with the button on my keys.

As I walked up to the front door, I could see through the window. The place was absolutely packed with customers. It was amazing that the workers could keep up with all this chaos, from what I could see, they all seemed happy and calm. I wrote that down into my notebook for later and walked through the doors. It was loud inside. The sound of chatter sounded as if I were at a live concert, I could barely even hear myself think. “Welcome Mr. Valdez!” I heard from within the crowd. A heftier man was pushing through the people and made his way up to me and shook my hand. “It’s an honor to have you Mr. Valdez!” he said.
“Why thank you. I assume you’re the owner of this establishment?”
“That’s right! My name is Edward Rombca. It’s so great to meet you. If you follow me, I’ll show you to your table and get you a menu right away.”
“Thank you very much Mr. Rombca.”
“Please, call me Edd.” He smiled at me.
“Alright then, my apologies Edd.”

Edd started to walk back into the crowd, signaling me into the abyss. I nodded and followed him, going across tables of people eating different kinds of dishes, from burgers, to ribs, to hotdogs. My stomach started to rumble seeing all this good looking food, I could hear the crunching from the meat as people bit into them. I’ve never had meat crunch like that unless it was crispy, and not even then was it that loud. We came across an empty table in the back of the restaurant with a reserved sign in the middle. The table was fit for one to two people, but sadly, I had no choice but to eat alone. I took my seat and Edd handed me the menu. Inside was a wide variety of different dishes, all containing meat. “Vegetarians be damned.” I thought to myself. “I’ll just take your special.” I told Edd.
“I’m very sorry Mr. Valdez, but we’ve been stumped on what to put as our special for quite some time. You see, all the dishes have been loved and we can’t exactly pinpoint the crowd favorite.”
“Alright,” I began, “Then just get me what you think I’ll love.”
“Right away, and what to drink?”
“Pepsi is fine.”
“I’ll be back momentarily.” He quickly ran off into the kitchen.

I searched around the room, looking at all the satisfied customers. Every single one of them was smiling, they all seemed to enjoy their food. Even the children, which in every restaurant were screaming and crying, were quiet and enjoying their meals with no fussing. “This place seems like heaven on earth.” I thought to myself. I pulled out my phone and checked all the social media sites again, searching specifically for ‘Fresh’ on the tagline. Just as suspected, it was still a trending topic. Not one comment was a negative one.

A thin woman in casual clothes and a bow in her hair started walking in my direction, holding a plate of ribs. She lightly placed the ribs onto my table along with my Pepsi. “Hello Mr. Valdez, my name is Mary Rombca. Thank you for choosing us for your review. It’s a big honor!” she smiled at me. Edd started walking down the aisle towards us and put his arm around his wife. She kissed him on the cheek and smiled.
“Hey there baby girl, I see you met Mr. Valdez.”
“Yes I have, he’s definitely a good looking one.”
“Hey now!” Edd replied with a hardy laugh.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you Mary. I bet this food is as good as everyone says huh?”
“It better be! If it ain’t fresh, we don’t serve it.” She repeated their motto. “Well, we’re going to leave you for now. Enjoy your meal Mr. Valdez.” The two walked off, leaving me alone to my meal.

I looked down at the steaming plate and grabbed a fork and knife. I carefully cut a small piece of the ribs and put it in my mouth. My taste bud exploded in a matter of seconds. The meat was full of different seasonings, flavor, and had a satisfying crunch to every bite. I swallowed the piece and started to dig in without hesitation. These were the best ribs I have ever eaten. It was absolutely amazing! I dug down for another bite, only to realize the only thing on my plate was the bones. I got carried away and didn’t realize that I sucked that dish down in minutes.

The Rombca’s came over to my table to clean up after me. Mary grabbed the plate and rushed over to the kitchen, leaving Edd all alone with me. “So how was it?”
“Absolutely amazing! These were the best ribs I’ve ever had in my life!”
“I’m glad you loved it!” Edd said with another hardy laugh. Mary came back and stood next to her husband.
“How was it?”
“He loves it darling!”
“Well that’s great! And don’t worry about the bill, this was on the house.”
“A-are you sure?” I replied.
“100% sir. You have a good day Mr. Valdez.”
“Thank you so much.” I said as they walked away, back to their duties. I grabbed my notebook and opened it, realizing I was too busy  enjoying the food, I forgot to write anything. ”Oh well, I already know what I’m going to write.” I thought to myself. I waved goodbye to Edd as I walked out of the restaurant, back into my car, and drove home.

It’s been two weeks since I written that review for ‘Fresh’ and I’ve become a usual customer. Everyday it seems like more and more people come to eat there. Edd and Mary have been grateful to me for writing a good review for them. In my honest opinion, they deserve it. ‘Fresh’ is one of the absolute best restaurants I’ve ever been to. Everytime I’ve been there, I’ve asked what meat they use, because it’d be great if I could make this at home. They keep telling me to forget about it, and tell me to stick to the grocery store meat. It bothers me why they just can’t tell me, I can’t handle secrets well. So…for the past couple days, I’ve been planning to go there after hours and see what they’ve been using. If I’m lucky, I could even take some on the road so I can cook it at home.

“Alright, the coast is clear, time to move in.” I thought as I carefully parked my car in an alleyway and locked it, running towards ‘Fresh’ and checking for any witnesses. I walked around to the side door and took out a long needle, and started picking the lock. I struggled for a couple minutes, trying to unleash it. “Come on damnit.” I said quietly. Finally, the needle broke and fell out, I checked the handle and the door opened. “Yes!” I celebrated as I sneaked in through the door, closing it silently behind me. The inside was dark, but I brought a flashlight with me, just in case. I pulled the flashlight out and turned it on, walking around the restaurant looking for the kitchen. “Ah, here it is.” I pushed in the doors and walked in, looking for the light switch and turning it on.

The inside was like any other dining kitchen. The floor was tiled, the whole room was almost all white, and everything was clean and sanitary. I wandered around, checking all the cabinets, till I saw the freezer room. “Must be in here.” I thought to myself. I walked to the freezer and checked the doorknob; it was locked. “Damn…” I searched around for a key, and noticed a key on top of one of the stoves. I walked over to pick it up and walked back to the freezer. The key fit, and the lock turned. I walked in and closed the door, making sure the key was still with me.

The smell from the inside of the freezer was horrible. “Come on, where’s my-Ah, here it is.” I said as I struggled to find my flashlight. I turned it on and pointed it in the distance. “W...what is…” I stuttered as I couldn’t believe at what I was looking at. Across from me were piles of corpses. Next to them was a bucket and a meat grinder. I dropped my flashlight and leaned onto my knees, puking  all over the floor. Afterwards, I thought about all the kids eating this food, and all of my friends and family eating this food, and…all of my ‘delicious’ meals here. “I’m going to be sick.” I said as I hurled all over the ground again. I ran for the freezer door and opened it, only to be smacked in the head with a metal object. I fell to the ground, unconscious as my vision slowly faded to black.

When I awoke, I was chained up in the freezer. The pile of corpses were next to me; the smell was even worse up close. A bright light flashed into my eyes and blinded me, along with the lights being turned on in the freezer. When my vision came back, standing there was Edd and Mary, the owners. “Well then…how unfortunate.” Mary said with a smile.
“You said it. You couldn’t have just taken our advice huh?” Edd said as he landed a hard punch to the face. I started to bleed and breathe heavily and struggle in my chains.
“W-why are you doing this?”
“To feed the people of Chicago of course! They all love our food, and keep coming back for more.” He pulled out a chef’s knife and came closer to me. “But you know, we are running low on ingredients. I hope you don’t mind if I borrow this?” he said as he grabbed my foot and chopped it right off. I screamed bloody murder as I felt all the blood squirt out like a fountain. Tears ran down my face as I tried to form words, but only screams could come out. “Hey Mary,” he said with a smile, “I think I found our new special!” Mary laughed and nodded with him, as he took his knife and aimed it at the left side of my chest. He yelled like a barbarian and impaled me right in the heart. The world slowly faded from me, and the last thing I could hear, were the laughs of two people who used to be close friends.