Secret Garden Cafe to be featured on new Food Network show

[copperfiend]

Celebrity chef and Food Network host Robert Irvine is coming to Jacksonville to film an episode for his upcoming reality TV show "Restaurant: Impossible" â€" and you're invited.

On Dec. 4-6, Irvine and his design team will be in Jacksonville at Secret Garden Cafe to fully renovate the restaurant at 10095 Beach Blvd., #600 â€" and do so in just 48 hours with only $10,000.

On Monday, Dec. 6, the restaurant will have a grand reopening. That's where you come in. If you'd like to be part of the show, call Secret Garden at (904) 645-0859 to make dinner reservations. Irvine will be on hand, and a film crew will be taping the results of the makeover.

A month ago, calls went out for a restaurateur whose establishment is “at risk of closing and is in need of a boost of customers, good reviews and overall revenue.”

The episode will be sixth of the new show, set to debut next year on Food Network, said Erin Hilgedick, an associate producer for the show.

Irvine is also host to the network's "Dinner: Impossible" series, now in it's eighth season.

http://jacksonville.com/opinion/blog/423471/gary-mills/2010-11-22/jacksonville-restaurant-be-featured-new-food-network

[ProjectMaximus]

This sounds like a cross between Kitchen Nightmares and the aforementioned Dinner: Impossible show. Irvine has never struck me as a quality chef or a terribly interesting lead for a cooking show, but I'll be curious to see this episode.

[copperfiend]

I will be there tonight for the reopening. We have reservations at 645. I will be interested to see how everything is.

[copperfiend]

For anybody interested in watching the show, it is airing next Wednesday (02/23) at 10 pm and will re-air multiple times.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/restaurant-impossible/secret-garden/index.html

[77danj7]

I will be there tonight for the reopening. We have reservations at 645. I will be interested to see how everything is.

How was it?  Are you allowed to say before the show airs?

[copperfiend]

Yeah, it was good. Probably the best fried green tomatoes I have ever had. Some of the stuff was just ok, maybe a little bland.

It was odd though because the salads and entrees were served on a buffett, The servers only had to deal with apps, drinks and desserts.

[77danj7]

strange...we watch that show and had heard they would be on there.

Robert Irvine, the food network chef, is pretty hardcore on some of the restaurants

[copperfiend]

My wife and I got to talk to him for a few minutes the night he was filming. He honestly could not have been nicer.

[77danj7]

Thats cool...I bet he is nice, he just is intense on his shows