(keep reading to learn what happened)
Season: 3 | View All Season 3 Episodes
Original Episode Air Date: February 5, 2010
Bazzini Address: 28 Oak St Ridgewood, NJ 07450
Episode Recap
Bazzini was a Ridgewood, New Jersey restaurant featured on season 3 of Kitchen Nightmares.
Though the Bazzini Kitchen Nightmares episode aired in February 2010, the actual filming and Gordon Ramsay visit took place in July 2009.
It was Kitchen Nightmares Season 3 Episode 3.
In this episode of Kitchen Nightmares Chef Gordon Ramsay takes us to the Bazzini restaurant in Ridgewood, New Jersey.
Soon after arriving, we meet the owners, Paul and Leslie Bazzini.
You can probably guess where the name of the restaurant came from haha.
Since becoming a restaurant owner five years ago, Paul has quickly become overwhelmed by running the business.
When the restaurant opened, Leslie truly believed that the restaurant was going to be a success.
Now, the restaurant is supported financially by Leslie, and it is only open for limited hours in the evening.
Leslie claims that she is scared on a daily basis that they won’t be able to pay their bills.
All of these reasons explain why the Bazzini Kitchen Nightmares episode exists and why they reached out to Gordon Ramsay for help.
When Gordon Ramsay arrives, he walks around the premises and notes that there are many other restaurants around.
Gordon is confused to find that the doors to Bazzini are locked and the restaurant is closed.
Paul then arrives at the restaurant and invites Gordon in.
Gordon then tells Paul to cook him something special instead of him ordering from the menu.
Gordon notes that the restaurant is very cramped, narrow, and the décor is very depressing.
When the food arrives Gordon is not impressed at all, the fettuccine is cold and bland and the chicken is hard and dry.
Gordon is then served the mushroom risotto which was stuck to the plate.
Never once to mince words, Gordon states that the dish was disgusting and tasted mushy.
He also tried to hang it on the wall with some other plates – brutal haha.
Lastly, Gordon is served an almond crusted tilapia dish with rice, and once again, it is bland, greasy, and mushy.
Gordon asks for dessert and is served a slice of cheesecake and carrot cake which he loved.
He said that the cake was delicious and was made with passion by Sharyn, the pastry chef.
See, Gordon Ramsay does like the food on Kitchen Nightmares sometimes, even if it wasn’t made by Paul Bazzini himself.
Sharyn got a big thumbs up, but the rest of the food was the opposite.
After the disappointing lunch, Gordon decides to observe the dinner rush.
To Gordon’s dismay he finds out that the crab cakes are pre-cooked after being prepared the day before.
With tickets taking over an hour to get out the kitchen, customers are becoming impatient.
To make matters worse, they are still not satisfied when they receive the food, as the dishes they received were either cold or overcooked.
The next day, Gordon returns and tries to reignite Paul’s passion for cooking, as he believes this lack of passion is one thing holding the Bazzini restaurant back from being successful.
With Gordon and Paul working together, they were delivering excellent pasta dishes in very little time, resulting in a successful lunch and very pleased customers.
Later that night, Gordon and his team worked tirelessly to renovate the restaurant with a fresh, contemporary theme.
The menu was also given a makeover by eliminating a lot of the older dishes and featuring fresh pasta dishes and desserts.
The night of relaunch was an overall success.
Despite long ticket times and some issues with Paul in the kitchen, the customers were overall happy with the dishes when they did receive them.
Gordon Ramsay leaves feeling good, but with some worry about whether Paul Bazzini will be able to keep the restaurant moving forward.
So was the Kitchen Nightmares Bazzini restaurant episode a long-term success?
Keep reading our update to learn what happened next and if this Ridgewood, New Jersey restaurant is still open in 2023 and beyond.
Bazzini Update - What Happened Next?
Now that we’ve recapped the Bazzini Kitchen Nightmares episode, let’s talk about what happened to the restaurant after Gordon Ramsay and his crew left Ridgewood, NJ.
After Gordon Ramsay visited Bazzini, the restaurant did stay open for a time, but it never seemed to get any traction as there were only a couple of reviews on the Yelp page.
To make matters worse, Sharyn left the restaurant to start her own baked goods business.
If you recall, Sharyn’s desserts were the only thing that Gordon Ramsay liked about Bazzini.
When you hear these details, you’re probably not going to be surprised by what happened next…
Is Bazzini still open after Kitchen Nightmares?
Bazzini closed soon after the Bazzini Kitchen Nightmares episode aired.
I’m not sure about the exact date, but it definitely didn’t stay open for very long.
Gordon Ramsay did try to revisit Bazzini in one of the Revisited episodes from season 4.
It aired on February 11, 2011 and was the same episode where he revisited Mojito in New York and Flamangos in New Jersey.
In the revisit episode, Gordon arrives to see a dark, empty restaurant, so you can definitely tell that things aren’t going well.
He calls Sharyn and finds out that the restaurant is permanently closed, so he goes and visits Sharyn instead.
Of course Gordon Ramsay must’ve known that Bazzini closed – this is definitely a bit of reality TV staging going on.
You can see the revisit episode in this YouTube video – the Bazzini part start around the 38:50 minute mark:
As of 2023, the old Bazzini New Jersey location is now occupied by a restaurant called Lisa’s Mediterranean Cuisine.
The new restaurant seems to offer Turkish food.
The reviews on Yelp seem good, so it seems to be doing pretty well.
Here’s what the old Bazzini Ridgewood NJ location looks like in the most recent picture from Google Maps street view:
Overall, the Bazzini owners didn’t seem to be happy with the Kitchen Nightmares experience.
They told news media that they never really interacted with Gordon Ramsay when the cameras were off and felt like the show’s producers were always trying to stir up drama.
I mean, it’s a reality TV show, so I’m not sure what they expected, but I can still see where they’re coming from.
Why did Bazzini close?
Bazzini closed very shortly after the Kitchen Nightmares episode was aired.
Yelp reviews said that the service was not good.
I’m not sure about other reasons that caused Bazzini to close. If you know anything, please let me know in the comments.
What happened to Paul Bazzini?
For a time, Paul Bazzini was doing some consulting under the business Clairmont Enterprises Hospitality Consulting.
He was also the executive chef and co-creator at a restaurant called Hearth and Tap Co for a time, though he’s moved on from that position.
He ran the restaurant with his son, Andrew Bazzini.
You can learn more in this 2017 article.
As of 2023, he seems to be back to cooking, as he’s now the executive chef at Let’s Meat Steakhouse in River Vale for the past few years.
You can learn more about where Paul Bazzini is working on the Let’s Meat Steakhouse website.
Paul is listed as the Executive Chef on the About Us page.
The biography also mentions that Paul Bazzini has done catering for some very famous people/shows, including Sopranos, Law and Order, Oprah, and the Grammy’s.
You can also see an announcement about this in a local New Jersey publication.
Paul also shares a lot of food and cooking-related content on his Instagram page.
Even though the Bazzini restaurant closed, it’s great to see that Paul is still cooking.
I hope he found his cooking passion again and is doing well.
What happened to Sharyn from the Bazzini episode?
Sharyn was the dessert chef at Bazzini who made the desserts that Gordon Ramsay liked.
After the Bazzini Kitchen Nightmares episode, she left to start her own baking business called The Cake Lady.
Her business is located in Harriman, New York.
If you want to learn more, you can check out her Facebook page or The Cake Lady website.
Or, you can also find lots of pictures on Sharyn’s Instagram page.
Overall, Sharyn seems to be doing very well for herself after Kitchen Nightmares, which is great to see.
Final thoughts on Bazzini restaurant
Sadly, the Bazzini restaurant closed shortly after the Kitchen Nightmares episode, so it never really seemed to gain any traction after Gordon’s visit.
However, the people you saw in the episode seem to be doing well.
Paul Bazzini is working as an executive chef, so he’s still cooking.
Sharyn from Bazzini also has her own baking business and is known as The Cake Lady.
As of 2023, the old Bazzini Ridgewood NJ location is occupied by a new restaurant named Lisa’s Mediterranean Cuisine.
If you want to see some other nearby New Jersey Kitchen Nightmares episodes, you can check out our updates for Campania in Fair Lawn NJ and Grasshopper Also in Carlstadt NJ.
And if you want to share your thoughts about the Kitchen Nightmares Bazzini episode, you can use the comments section below.
Thanks for reading!
More Information
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Last updated: 2023-05-17 06:02
What happened to the wife?
I never knew until this episode that it was Bazzini all along. Tattaglia is a pimp, he never could have outfoxed Gordon.
Te salud, Don Stendhal.
What happened to Al the sous chef? He
really just left in the middle of service?
He accidentally fell into a meat grinder and was turned into a dinner. The producers understandably cut the scene from the episode out of respect for Al’s family.
I know it was you, Stendhal. You broke my heart. You broke my heart!
I felt sorry for his wife that was paying for all his mistakes. I wonder if they got a divorce? She looked like she was at the end of the line during the KN episode.
I checked Sharyn’s FB page and she had just posted a video of her cooking, and wow, 14 years later… it makes a difference. All white hair… At least she is still working her own business, and it has lasted a lot longer than Bazzini! She also has passion, and fire. She was the most interesting character in this episode.
A lot of these restaurant owners whose business failed blame Gordon Ramsay but at the end of the day some of the restaurants are still open so it proves that Gordon Ramsay did help. I believe the reason so many closed is because a lot of the owners just didn’t have the determination and will power to bother continuing and to save face they blamed Gordon Ramsay which shows how little grattitude they actually have.
And not only that it’s because they waited till the last minute to try and save their restaurant a lot of them were deep into debt I mean like half a million to a million dollars in debt and that’s a lot of money plus a lot of them were behind on taxes and the government doesn’t play about their money so it was destined to fail
Sharyn looks like the witch from Little Mermaid.