The Restaurant Episode Rating Graph

Rocco DiSpirito is a kid from Queens who's made good. He's the chef of a three-star Manhattan restaurant, and he has a dream. He wants to open a new restaurant to get back to his Italian American roots. He's even getting his Mom to help him. The problem is he's only got seven weeks to build it and open it - and that usually takes seven months. Rocco begins to search for the ideal location and he encounters pitfalls along the way. He finally finds a space and the PR machine starts to kicks in. Following an announcement on the Today Show, two thousand people show up to interview for jobs. As Rocco trains his new staff, the old space is demolished. The building phase begins and quickly falls behind schedule. With three days left to go, the construction reaches a frenzied pitch, and tempers fray. The looming deadline looks like an impossibility, the staff has not had time to properly train, and the clock keeps ticking. In the frantic last minutes before opening, everyone pitches in. The re

The doors open for the restaurant's ""soft launch"". This is the night where friends and family test the food, but these guests are anything but sympathetic. As complaints escalate, a fire breaks out in the kitchen. Rocco extinguishes the flames, but the smoke drives away the food critic for the New York Times. Preparing for the official opening - the ""hard launch"" - Rocco fires a hostess and demotes a waiter to a runner. Paying customers arrive, and complaints about the food continue. Then one of the waiters falls and injures himself, but management doesn't care. The staff feels overworked, underpaid, under appreciated and abused. Mutiny is in the air, and Rocco doesn't have a clue as he dances with his Mama to an Italian folk song.

The morning after the official opening, one of the waiters shows up with his wounded arm in a sling and Rocco treats him badly. Reflecting the staff's unhappy mood, another waitress talks about quitting. After an apathetic pep talk - while his kitchen is going through hell, his hostesses are at war, his bartenders are understaffed, and his waiters are forced to give bad service - Rocco ignores the problems and focuses on schmoozing. Customers continue to complain, but now even Rocco and his Mama can't make them happy. The situation goes from bad to worse when a key newspaper critic is unhappy with her food, and Rocco unfairly vents his frustrations on the staff and leaves. At the end of the night, the entire front of house staff meets for a gripe-fest about Rocco. Completely oblivious, Rocco dances 'til dawn at a chic nightclub across town. The next morning, he reads the critic's negative review and realizes his restaurant is in trouble.