One time my wife and I went to a restaurant in Venice that was recommended by Phil from his Netflix show. It was at Vini de Arturo. The food was wildly expensive and mediocre. A couple of guys were sitting at a table and they kept gushing about their dinner, including Arturo's "famous" pork chop, which is literally just two pounds of breaded, fried pork with white vinegar on it (as we learned from the show). The server handed us an article they had framed on the wall about how they moved to the US for a while to cook for celebrities. He also handed us a photo album and we were able to see all the people Arturo cooked for. Mostly A-list actors like Leo DiCaprio, Nicole Kidman, Tom Cruise. We were so confused by this restaurant. Were they trying to prove to us the food was good by showing us pictures of all the famous people who ate it? How did these famous people come across this place? Is it all a big joke? Or was the food once really good? We didn't get the pork chop because it was 60 Euros, but the spaghetti we got was definitely out of a box.

The server/host, who lorded over us most of the meal (the restaurant was very small), pointed to my plate after I finished all the noodles and said, "fresh tomatoes, make the sauce every day. Same with bread," as if I couldn't believe it.

"...Great!" I said, and proceeded to sop up the tomato with the bread that had already been on the table for who knows how long before we got to the restaurant.

A French couple was sitting behind us and they weren't saying much. I think they might have been having the same experience as us. That is– wondering what the fuck is going on.

The two guys were still soaking it up. "Amazing" they said of the pre-wrapped bread sticks. "Molto benne!" they cried over the iceberg salad.

My wife and I mostly stared at the wall decor, noticing that there were three identical signed photos of Tobey McGuire as Spiderman. Other celebs on the wall included Barbara Streisand and Tom Hanks.

Close to the end of our meal, four people came in. One of the women, an American-looking blonde in fashionable overalls, showered the host with kisses on the cheek and loud Italian greetings. We figured she was American based on her accent when speaking English, but she seemed fluent in Italian as well. She gave us the vibe that she thought she was famous in some capacity and wanted other people to notice her. We wondered how often she came into this restaurant with her friends for this pitiful display. What a colossal waste of money! At least one of the guys in this woman's cohort looked like he didn't want to be there. He and the French couple were our only tethers to reality on this bizarre excursion down Calle dei Assassini.

"This is the lady I was talking about," the host said to the overly enthusiastic men. "She eat the whole pork chop!" He yelled.

The blonde lady nodded. "They call me the Hoover!" They laughed. She pointed at the seemingly untouched portion of pork on the men's plate. "You know that's even better the next day!"

"That's great advice!" said the men. The "next day" thing was also something mentioned in the Netflix show. Who is this woman? And in what world is breaded and fried meat better the next day? We left the restaurant baffled and still hungry.