If you enjoy the feeling of schadenfreude, then this story is for you. It’s a new twist on the old saying about old wine in new bottles.
Just as people who believe they have excellent and discriminating wine palates can be fooled into rating cheap wine as superb in blind taste tests, upwardly mobile diners can apparently be persuaded to spend up to $40 on instant ramen when they’re told it’s “authentic.”
Stanley Chen is a 23-year-old Youtube video maker from Sydney, Australia. Irritated at a recent experience at a pricey restaurant—he discovered the “fresh” meals were not, and weren’t even made at the eatery—he decided to see if he could deliberately fool diners.
Turns out it was easy. Hundreds of people, including so-called “influencers,” waited in line for hours to get a table at Chen’s new ramen restaurant. He rented a suite on a short-term basis and told prospective customers that the restaurant had been around for seven years, and that he had inherited it from his grandfather.
With his friends acting as waiters and “chefs,” the delighted patrons eagerly anticipated their steaming bowls of noodles. Laying it on even thicker, customers were told that chefs figured out what to serve by observing people’s “auras.”
To explain why the restaurant did not have a menu Chen claimed he was operating a “bold, experimental” ramen eatery. Those were apparently the right words to whet the appetite of people who thought they were going to be experiencing a rarefied culinary journey.
So, what’s the trick? The “authentic” and experimental ramen was nothing but instant pot noodles that can be bought from any grocery store.
Like the story of the Emperor’s New Clothes, where townspeople see a naked king walking down the street but tell him they can see his fine, beautiful clothing, some of Chen’s diners had high praise for his unique cuisine. One diner said “chef needs to make me another bowl,” while another said the noodles were so unique he’d have been willing to pay $70 for a serving.
