A “fake steakhouse” that started as “an elaborate joke” between a group of tech industry friends has gone viral after putting on its first sitting, for 140 people and members of the media, in New York City.
Mehran’s Steak House, which had previously only existed as a Google Maps listing created by the roommates of Mehran Jalali, the 21-year-old founder of an AI startup, drew diners to its first – and last – night on Saturday.
The “restaurant” began after Jalali’s roommates, wanting to honor his steak-cooking ability, listed the steakhouse at their shared house on the Upper East Side, and left glowing reviews. That led to a sitting at a pop-up space, with a menu called “the Bovine Circle of Life”.
Journalists from the New York Times, the New York Post and apparently This American Life were present to report on the event – but some online have criticized the ruse as a poor imitation of a London-based fake restaurant which tricked diners into eating £1 ready meals on its one night of existence back in 2017.
The New York Times reported that Jalali and 16 others, all of whom worked in the tech industry, were living in a “hacker house” when one of them created the Mehran’s Steak House listing on Google Maps. Over the course of a year, the listing gained scores of reviews from friends, although in hindsight the ornate tone of some may have been a giveaway.
“Never have I tasted something so delicious and exquisite. As you take a bite, your entire being is transported to pure bliss and serenity. It’s evident that the steak was cooked by the hands of god,” one reviewer said.
Another wrote: “I am unwilling to say any more about the details of this excursion as it was a deeply emotional experience that I will remember for the rest of my life.”
Despite not existing, the restaurant began to gain traction. One day in 2022, two people showed up at the apartment asking for a table. The Times reported that they were turned away, but the roommates considered opening a restaurant and created a website with a waiting list that attracted more than 900 sign-ups.
By this year, most of the group had moved to the west coast. After a food writer began investigating Mehran’s Steak House, Jalali decided to hire the event space and put on the meal, according to the Times, to preserve the joke.
“If more people look into it,” Jalali told the Times: “The whole thing is going to come down.”
They booked an event space in the East Village in Manhattan, reached out to people on the waiting list, and Saturday’s extravaganza was born.
More than 60 staff members greeted diners, the New York Post reported, for a “subtle charade” that was “to be remembered”.
The event space was mocked up with doctored photos of Jalali serving food to people including John F Kennedy and Albert Einstein, and Jalali told diners: “I would recommend suspending your understanding of linear time.”
The menu included glasses of milk – apparently a reference to the bovine theme of the menu – cheese and steak.
Jalali and his friends are not the first to convince people they run a well-reviewed restaurant, however, as several people pointed out under a New York Times Instagram post about the evening.
“For people who never heard of The Shed at Dulwich, I guess these folks decided they would steal the bit,” one person wrote.
Another posted: “Will The Shed at Dullwich [sic] be pursuing legal action here?” and tagged Oobah Butler.
Those commenters, and others, were referencing the fake restaurant – “the Shed at Dulwich” – set up by Butler, a British writer, at his home in London in 2017.
Butler’s restaurant gained traction after he posted a listing for the nonexistent establishment on TripAdvisor, and encouraged friends and family to leave positive reviews.
Within six months, the Shed at Dulwich was ranked as the best restaurant in London, and Butler was being swamped by booking requests.
After declining bookings for months, Butler decided to actually put on a meal, and spent £31 ($40) on ingredients. When the dinner guests arrived at the Shed – essentially Butler’s back garden – he and a team of friends served ready meals and cans of soup.
After Butler published a story on the experience on Vice, he was interviewed by media from around the world, and wrote a best-selling book, How to Bullsh*t Your Way to Number 1.
“So there we go: I invited people into a hastily-assembled collection of chairs outside my shed, and they left thinking it really could be the best restaurant in London, just on the basis of a TripAdvisor rating,” was how Butler concluded his article.
“You could look at this cynically – argue that the odour of the internet is so strong nowadays that people can no longer use their senses properly. But I like to be positive. If I can transform my garden into London’s best restaurant, literally anything is possible.”
Even, it seems, replicating the scheme six years on.
