Sauced

[Steve]

Was I with or without my two sons in tow?

[kevinpate]

Just a guess since I wasn't there. Your kids were probably with you. Afterall, metro did say it was supercool time
8^)

[metro]

Was I with or without my two sons in tow?

with, and if I remember right, your wife was there too.

[Joe Kimball]

I've seen shingles on the side of the road that were less black and crusty than a couple of the slices I've had from there. I await their restructuring---but not too much, as other pizza places have made themselves known since my absence from there.

[Debzkidz]

A couple of years ago our oldest son went there with a few times with friends. He kept saying how good it was, so he convinced us we should go. What at joke. We were really put off by the "we're too cool for you" attitude of the staff. It seemed to be taking forever for our food, so DH went to see what the holdup was. They had run out of some ingredient, I can't remember what. Perhaps cheese. I just remember it was something we were shocked that a pizza joint would ever be out of. They had sent someone to the store. Finally after about an hour, we got our pizza. It was burned on the bottom and tasted just blaah! I guess as someone else mentioned teens aren't concerned with service or quality. But then again, maybe our son was cool enough that he didn't get the attitude. Anyway, I hope that when they reopen it will be better. Maybe we'll give it another try.

[redrunner]

A little birdie told me the owners of Paseo Grill purchased Sauced and will re-open after expanding seating and tweaking the menu.

Nahhh, Steve has a new article out on newsok.

http://newsok.com/paseo-grill-owners...adlines_widget

[Doug Loudenback]

Here's an interesting story on Paseo restaurants that I read in this morning's on-line Oklahoman. I haven't looked to see if it was in this morning's paper version or not but I suppose that it was. For some reason, the Oklahoman scuttled the article before noon and when I came home from a doctor visit I noticed that it was present in Steve's blog, he noting that the Oklahoman's previous link was broken. I copied the article below from Steve's blog ... but don't bother to look for it because it no longer exists there, either. Guess the powers that be at the Oklahoman didn't like the taste of the sauce or something.

I left a comment in the blog version saying that I would copy it from there and paste it here, and so I shall:

The Story of Sauced in Paseo
Posted by slackmeyer
on September 16, 2010 at 11:14 am

Joe Jungmann and Lesley Rawlinson say they’ve spent most of their lives in the restaurant business and they’ve learned some lessons along the way to owning their own eatery, the Paseo Grill.

One lesson is on their minds a lot these days as the pair have watched Sauced – a popular pizzeria across the street – shut down and then become part of an expansion for their own business. The restaurant started with great fanfare in early 2007 – just months after the opening of the Paseo Grill – but online reviews reflected a drop in service and quality within the next two years.

The restaurant closed on Sept. 4, and that’s when landlord John Belt approached Jungmann and Rawlinson about buying out the restaurant from the prior owners.

“When you’re a small owner like us, and like they were, and when you’re successful, or not successful, the passion goes away,” Jungmann said. “And when the passion goes away, the quality goes away quickly.”

The pair, along with manager Elise Fischbein, say their acquisition of Sauced and the opening of The Whole Enchilada (next to the Skirvin Hilton) earlier this year are part of a grand plan designed to maintain their passion and prevent the sort of burn-out they witnessed across the street.

“Our goal is to have three or four concepts going,” Jungmann said. “That was our goal going into it. We believe we know how to run a restaurant. Now we’re learning how to own a restaurant. We have passionate people who care, who want to grow with the company, and they see we’re growing with Sauced, The Whole Enchilada and the Paseo Grill.”

Jungmann had a background managing the Red Rock Canyon Grill and before that was working at the Across the Border chain. He and Rawlinson dreamed of owning their own restaurant but found making the transition from management to ownership wouldn’t be easy.

“The hard part about going out on your own is not having A-plus experience that is expected by those who have space to rent along prime corridors,” Jungmann said.

They got their opportunity in the Paseo at the one-time home of El Charitto (later El Chicco). The building at 2909 Paseo was turned into a community center for several years before it was turned into a botique by owners John and Kathy Jacobson. One restaurant had attempted a short-lived go in the building when the space was offered to Jungmann and Rawlinson.

With the Paseo Grill doing steady business, the pair opened The Whole Enchilada several months ago in the ground floor of the Santa Fe Parking Garage – a space that had seen a series of restaurants come and go without success.

Rawlinson says the new restaurant is doing well, and they are testing out a kiosk and soon will add online ordering to handle the lunch-hour rush.

“Really, in that location we only have two to three hours where we can do business, so the more we can do to help people avoid lines, the better,” Rawlinson said.

The pair also are looking at tweaking the operation at Sauced.

Rawlinson said the years spent observing Sauced from their own restaurant have led them to conclude that killing lunch service, and opening just for dinner, is the right move starting out.

They also will be creating a glass enclosure for the patio and converting a room used for bands into more inside dining (previously inside seating at Sauced was limited). Such changes will expand seating to about 85.

Another perceived quirk with Sauced was its menu – part coffee shop, part pizzeria with a generous selection of handcrafted beers and wine.

Customers who complained about either poor service or inconsistent quality, Jungmann said, probably didn’t realize such situations arose from one of the pizza ovens being broken and the limited menu.

“We don’t want pizza taking forever,” Jungmann said. “So we’re putting more varieties on the menu so there will be other options.”

The changes, they say, play to their goal of keeping people happy.

“There is amount of time people have, and when you break that time they get upset,” Jungmann said. “And why upset people when they haven’t even had a chance to eat?”

Buzz up!

An on-line remnant of the article still exits at NewOK.com. You can go there and search NewsOK for "Paseo" and you'll get this (at least, right now ... tomorrow may be a different story, so to speak):



But when you click on the link, it no longer works. What we've got here, of course, is two stories in one: (1) The original article which struck me as interesting, as well as harmless; and (2) The continuing saga of contemporary censorship at the Oklahoman.

Ain't life grand living in a one newspaper town, particularly when that industry is unregulated.

[Doug Loudenback]

Here are a couple of pics of the properties mentioned in the article that I took on a sleepy Sunday in 2007. Click the pics for larger views.

First, Sauced



Second, Paseo Grill

[Larry OKC]

Fairly certain I read it in Thursdays printed paper....

[Doug Loudenback]

Wonder if the Oklahoman's on-line archives will carry the story ... surely it would not go so far as to zap the article from its on-line paper version. I'll check tomorrow and will report back. In fact, it might be worth a look to see what the Oklahoman's editorial position about censorship has been over its history ... should the topic have come up in its editorials. Might make for a good story, a "then and now" type of thing. Of course that would depend on whether the general topic every rose its head in prior Oklahoman editorials.

[Larry OKC]

here's a link, think it is the same content as Doug posted

http://www.istockanalyst.com/article...icleid/4507793

[Doug Loudenback]

Well, if that isn't interesting. A secondary news source, in this case istockanalyst.com, picks up the story and reports it on-line despite that management at the Oklahoman refuses to make it available in its own on-line version. The internet is changing the rules, if anyone (like you, Larry) wants to pay attention. Good find, my friend. It may be that the internet might prove to be the best way to keep the Oklahoman honest, or, at least, report when it is not -- even though the istockanalyst.com source probably had no idea and was unaware of what was going on behind the scenes at the Oklahoman today.

Thanks to your link, Larry, I've been able to compare what Steve earlier posted at OkcCentral, now disappeared, in side-by-side columns with the content posted at istockanalyst.com, and the comparative content appears to be identical.

Something in what had all appearances to me as being just an interesting and harmless article clearly must have been seen by someone in the Oklahoman to contain parts that should not be reported.

Of course, the question is, what parts? Steve's article has all appearances to me of being harmless -- just a story of how one set of restaurant owners (Paseo Grill) was persuaded by John Belt, Paseo property owner, to acquire the interest of the former tenants of the failed Sauced restaurant.

Can we, on the outside, figure out what torqued the Oklahoman to remove this article? I'll be trying. Perhaps some of you might enjoy the sniffing, especially you, Larry (you've already established your credentials for this sort of critical analysis), and perhaps such a group could look at and help sort out what might have gone on behind the scenes at the Oklahoman today, as an example, but not the only one. An army of citizen investigators would not be a bad thing.

Maybe a standing army of local citizens, an Oklahoman watchdog group, might make a good contribution the city since only ad hoc threads like this one seem to be doing such a thing. I'm thinking that you, Larry, would be a natural to head up such a group. If you are willing, I'll be glad to help. Its easy and free to set up a blog, don't you know? Are others interested? Perhaps the time has come.

[ljbab728]

I have no idea why the Oklahoman link didn't make the full article available but I have the newspaper and can read it over and over again as many times as I please.

LOL

If that's censorship, I'm not sure what the purpose would be since it's easily available for all to read.

[Doug Loudenback]

I have no idea why the Oklahoman link didn't make the full article available but I have the newspaper and can read it over and over again as many times as I please.
LOL

If that's censorship, I'm not sure what the purpose would be since it's easily available for all to read.

You are missing the point, ljbab. The article WAS originally on-line because I read it early this morning. Then, mid-morning, it was gone. After that, it was re-posted in Steve's OKC Central blog, where I copied it from, and now that blog post is gone as well. The fact that you can save and read your paper version as many times as you want suggests that you have no concern or inquisitivty at all as to what went on behind the scene today when the Oklahoman flushed its on-line version, then, in 2nd step, deleted the article in Steve's blog so that none could see it, at least not at NewsOK.com or its associated blogs.

Do those facts give you no cause for concern? Does this type of behavior not raise any red flags in you, ljbab? And if it occurs with respect to a relatively mundane article about restaurants on the Paseo, do you not see that it might recur about much more important things in the city such as convention center location or whatever else might come down the pike? Or are you content to give the Oklahoman a pass on whatever it might chose to do and you'll be happy with it?

[ljbab728]

You are missing the point, ljbab. The article WAS on-line because I read it early this morning. Then, mid-morning, it was gone. After that, it was re-posted in Steve's OKC Central blog, where I copied it from. Now that blog post is gone as well.

Does this type of behavior not raise any red flags in you, ljbab?

I understood your point completely Doug. My point was that such censorship was pointless and could serve no purpose after the cat was already out of the bag and in every newspaper rack in the state.

[bornhere]

It could have just been a database hiccup or something.

[bornhere]

My own impression was that Sauced had changed from being a pizza place to a bar that happened to serve pizza.

[Doug Loudenback]

It wasn't a hickup, bornhere. What happened yesterday were deliberate acts on the part the Oklahoman, 1st in the on-line Oklahoman at NewsOK.com, and then in Steve's blog at OkcCentral.com which, of course, is also part of the Oklahoman's on-line resources.

[Doug Loudenback]

I understood your point completely Doug. My point was that such censorship was pointless and could serve no purpose after the cat was already out of the bag and in every newspaper rack in the state.

That's good, as far as it goes, as far as this story is concerned. But don't you see the significance of this vignette as to a more pervasive Oklahoman approach to news writing and reporting on significant events that concern our city which we well be seeing in the future concerning small and large matters which affect the city more pervasively? This incident is not important just because someone in the Oklahoman's hierarchy had some as yet unknown problem with something contained in the article, probably concerning named persons in the article. Rather, it is important because it illustrates what the Oklahoman can and will do, whether the item involved be relatively small, or relatively large.

We've got a lot of big stuff coming up for future reports in the Oklahoman. There aren't that many Oklahoman writers still on the payroll who are willing to report objectively without regard to Oklahoman ownership points of view. Its a dark day for the Oklahoman, as a newspaper to be respected, I think. No one doubts the power of the press. But not that many are willing to challenge whether the Oklahoman press has the time-honored characteristic of being worthy of that trust.

[bornhere]

I didn't realize this had been deleted from Steve's blog as well. That's where I read it earlier this evening. Your concerns are well-founded, Doug. I would have expected this from Ed Gaylord's Oklahoman, but I thought things were better now.

This is a concern of mine with online media in general. You probably read about Amazon deleting '1984' (of all things) from thousands of Kindles, after it was discovered Amazon had bought digital rights to the book from a publisher that didn't have digital rights to it. The whole book just disappeared from purchasers' devices.

It is also possible to edit a digital book post-publication and excise offensive material from e-books without users even being aware of it. This could have already happened, actually, without us knowing it.

[Doug Loudenback]

Update: The physical on-line Oklahoman has not deleted the article (which can only be seen through subscription services or via the Metropolitan library website). Hence, the visibility of the article is limited via the general internet and ordinary internet viewers cannot see the article via NewsOK.com even if they can read it from other internet sources.

The 1st page of the Business section of the September 16 edition shows the article as existing, as follows:



The article is not a figment of one's imagination, even if it no longer exists at NewsOK.com website or at Steve's OkcCentral blog, which have both been wiped clean by someone at the Oklahoman.

Who did that, and why?

[Larry OKC]

Doug

I am honored and humbled. While I have seen different versions of stories before, I have only run across one other instance where the Oklahoman pulled a story online (think it was published as well, but am foggy on the particulars). It was a story on Chesapeake and if I recall correctly, wasn't exactly a favorable one. It got yanked rather quickly too. I could see why it got pulled but the article in question here seems fairly harmless and I can't imagine why it would be pulled in multiple places like that. It does give me reason for pause, but I am not ready to jump on the conspiracy/censorship bandwagon...yet.

Does remind me of an instance where I was the editor of a school run paper and we were running a short series of a historical nature about the school. We had the papers printed and the administration decided to pull that issue (before distribution). My instructor decided to run a story about censorship in its place. The administration had no problems with that (no mention of the incident was made, so it was an inside jab).

ON EDIT: yep, that's the one I read all right....

[Doug Loudenback]

Thanks, Larry. I've known much too much that I haven't written about that causes my frustration point to boil and come close to boiling over vis a vis the Oklahoman. Much of that stuff I don't have the liberty of being more specific about. Some comes from vintage Oklahoman writers and some comes from some less so. I ain't got that many more years to live and perhaps its best that I devote that that time to ancient, rather than contemporary, history, since that sort of thing doesn't rifle up my basic health readings like crap like this item does. At this moment, though, I'm pissed, but I don't think that I want to go it alone, or even be the lead person. Given your articulate and long standing analysis, that's why I thought of you as the possible lead guy in some new venture. Call me or e-mail me if you are interested. I'll send you my cell phone by private message.

[Larry OKC]

I thought it was a glitch at first too when I clicked on the Recent Comments area of Steve's blog (Doug Loudenback on Private: The Story of Sauced in Paseo) on the link took me to a "Ooops, that page not found"...then a few minutes later, came here and to this thread.

[flintysooner]

I read the article on my Kindle subscription.