(keep reading to learn what happened)
Season: 8 | View All Season 8 Episodes
Original Episode Air Date: October 16, 2023
Da Mimmo Address: 132 Veterans Plaza, Dumont, NJ 07628
Episode Recap
Da Mimmo was a Dumont, New Jersey restaurant featured on Season 8 of Kitchen Nightmares.
Though the Da Mimmo Kitchen Nightmares episode aired on TV in October 2023, the actual visit from Gordon Ramsay happened in early June 2023.
It was Kitchen Nightmares Season 8 Episode 4.
In this episode of the new season of Kitchen Nightmares, Gordon Ramsay heads to Da Mimmo, a pizzeria in Dumont, NJ.
Da Mimmo is a bit unique in that it’s owned by a trio of brothers – the Gigante brothers – who also happened to be TikTok influencers.
Yes – “TikTok influencers” – I never thought I would write that sentence on my site, to be honest.
The brothers’ names are Vincent Gigante, Antonio Gigante, and Vito Gigante.
Because they’re public figures, I’ve linked the TikTok profiles for all three brothers above.
Beyond the brothers, their mother, Melissa Gigante, is also an owner in the business.
Melissa is a retired Hoboken police lieutenant who seems to have worked as a school resource officer.
She retired in 2022 after 26 years at the department.
Overall, Melissa and Antonio seem to be the most involved in the business.
Combined, they have over three million followers and hundreds of millions of views, so they are legit “influencers”.
It’s not like the classic Kitchen Nightmares DownCity episode with the “popular food blogger” who only had a couple of hundred readers – lol.
They’re very much “fogetaboutit” type accents haha.
It also seems like not all of the brothers seem to take running the Da Mimmo restaurant seriously.
Given that the Da Mimmo restaurant is working with close to $500,000 in debt, it seems like a situation that should be taken seriously.
The Da Mimmo restaurant has only been around since December 2022 when it replaced the previous tenant named Il Murino Ristorante.
Because of this, it’s not as well-established as some other restaurants on the show.
Remember – the actual Kitchen Nightmares visit happened in early June 2023, so it had only been open for around six months at the time of the Da Mimmo Gordon Ramsay visit.
More specifically, the visit happened from June 3rd to June 7th, which is when the Da Mimmo restaurant posted that they would be closed.
When Gordon arrives, he notes that it smells like “Snoop Dogg’s kitchen in here”, which Is pretty funny tbh.
However, the Gigante brothers are happy to dish it right back to Gordon.
In the preview, Vincent says that “if Gordon yells at me, I’m busting his balls right back. I’m not taking shit”.
The whole situation led to one of the funnier Facebook posts from Food Club Fox, which shows Gordon facepalming himself during the Da Mimmo Kitchen Nightmares visit.
Evidently, Gordon panned the pizza at Da Mimmo, as well as other dishes like the mussels, meatballs, chicken.
When he was there, Gordon Ramsay tried to push the brothers to promote the restaurant on their social media pages.
However, looking at their TikTok profiles, it doesn’t seem like they followed through on that.
As part of the rescue, Gordon seems to have revamped the decor at the restaurant, along with putting in a new menu.
The new menu is much smaller, slimming things down to just around 13 dishes.
He also tried to get through to the brothers and get them to take the restaurant more seriously.
Because I’m writing this post a day before the Da Mimmo Kitchen Nightmares episode airs on TV, I will update the recap with more information after the episode airs.
So was the Kitchen Nightmares Da Mimmo restaurant episode a long-term success?
Keep reading to learn what happened next and if this Dumont pizzeria is still open in 2024.
Da Mimmo Update - What Happened Next?
Now that we’ve recapped the Da Mimmo Kitchen Nightmares episode, let’s talk about what happened to the restaurant after Gordon Ramsay and his crew left Dumont, NJ.
Spoiler alert – the restaurant already was briefly listed for sale.
But I’m getting ahead of myself – keep reading to the end to learn more about that.
First off, I always like to see if a restaurant hosts a Kitchen Nightmares watch party, because that’s usually a good indicator of how they felt about the show.
Da Mimmo did have a watch party.
Unlike other restaurants, they actually turned it into a paid event.
It cost $50 to attend, but that included a buffet and a special Kitchen Nightmares bingo card, which sounds pretty fun.
I wish they published the bingo card so that other people could play along!
Overall, that sounds like a cool way to celebrate the episode.
Closer to the episode airing, they also posted asking for people’s thoughts on the episode.
They said that people who participated would be entered to win some “Da Mimmo Swag”.
So – if you want to win some swag from a Kitchen Nightmares restaurant, you can comment on the post here.
However, you’re probably most interested in the following question…
Is Da Mimmo still open after Kitchen Nightmares?
As of 2023, Da Mimmo is still open and serving customers in Dumont, New Jersey.
The restaurant is very active on its social media profiles on Instagram and Facebook.
Unsurprisingly, there’s also a Da Mimmo TikTok page, though it doesn’t seem to be as active as the other social networks.
In addition to food specials, the Da Mimmo restaurant seems to also have live music and other interesting events.
The live music seems to happen pretty regularly.
For example, here’s a post about an upcoming live music event at the restaurant:
They also have interesting classes and other events.
For example, they had a “make your own mootz” class that teaches people how to make their own Mozzarella, which seems cool.
That’s pretty cool tbh – I could definitely see myself attending.
Here’s a full look at all of the upcoming events at the time of the episode, to give you an idea of what the restaurant offers.
Beyond the social media profiles, there’s also a Da Mimmo website that should have the menu and other details.
However, at this time, the Da Mimmo menu has not been added to the website.
I’ll talk about reviews for Da Mimmo next, but before that, I want to end this section with a look at the Da Mimmo Dumont NJ location in the most recent picture from Google Maps street view.
Unfortunately, it hasn’t been updated since September 2021, so it still shows the previous tenant (Il Mulino Ristorante).
I’m mainly including it so that you can explore the area around the restaurant.
Da Mimmo reviews after Kitchen Nightmares
Next, let’s take a look at some Da Mimmo reviews from after Kitchen Nightmares.
Overall, Da Mimmo has a 3.4 star rating on Yelp (but just on 24+ reviews).
On Google, which is usually more generous, Da Mimmo has a 4.3 star rating on 91+ reviews.
Both of those numbers include reviews from both before and after the Da Mimmo Gordon Ramsay visit, though.
On Yelp, there have only been five reviews written after Gordon’s visit, at least at the time that the Da Mimmo Kitchen Nightmares episode aired on TV.
Those reviews seem to be mixed – half positive and half negative:
- Three 5-star reviews
- One 2-star review
- Two 1-star reviews
The overall rating for those six reviews is 3.2 stars, which seems pretty similar to the reviews from before Kitchen Nightmares.
On Google, however, the reviews from after the Gordon Ramsay Da Mimmo restaurant visit are definitely more positive than negative.
I only counted a few negative reviews, while there were 15-20+ 5 or 4 star reviews.
I also noticed that a lot of people seem to be complimenting the new decor from the Kitchen Nightmares episode, which is good to see.
In the negative reviews, people seemed to mostly focus on the food, while still saying positive things about the service.
To give you an idea of what people are saying, here’s a sampling of a few real reviews for the restaurant…
5 star Yelp review from August 2023:
Pizza was excellent.
Calamari so fresh.
The waiters were so friendly and accommodating.
I absolutely love the new decor.
Such a beautiful classy place to host a party.
I highly recommend
5 star Google review from September 2023:
Pizza was excellent!
Calamari so fresh.
The staff so friendly and accommodating.
Love the new decor!
Such a classy place to host a party.
Highly recommend!
5 star Google review from August 2023:
Wow!
Dining at Da Mimmo was an incredible experience.
When you walk in the door, there is a sense of calm and warm welcome.
The new decor is inviting and creates an atmosphere of relaxation and feeling like your home or at your favorite Italian relative’s house for a scrumptious meal!
The food is delectable, the choices varied, and the service is unsolicited yet present when needed.
I would highly recommend Da Mimmo for any occasion!
5 star Yelp review from July 2023:
Tried this place for the first time last night and it was an amazing experience.
The staff was great.
Everyone was so welcoming and the service was 10/10.
The food was incredible.
Great date night spot.
We can’t wait to come back!
1 star Yelp review from September 2023:
I had such high hopes for this place since Gordon Ramsay made his appearance here.
Needless to say it was very disappointing.
The dough on the pizza was like a naan lacking flavor as well also had the pork ragu not terrible but not great!
They also made us a caprice salad and specifically asked for just oil and vinegar he brought it with balsamic glaze.
My 5 yr old in the party got chicken tenders and fries that were burnt all around a bad food experience.
Service was good and decor but food so lacking sorry Da Mimmo we won’t be back!
1 star Google review from October 2023:
Pizza was ice cold and we called for a pick up the gentlemen on the phone said 20 mins we got there exactly 20 mins.
The place was even dead on a Saturday night after hearing Gordon Ramsey was there.
The pizza wasn’t even worth $17.00 dollars.
I gave the gentleman at the register my money handed him a $20.00 he goes do I want my change back.
Like, of course I do, you do not ask a customer do you want there change back bad customer service.
I rather eat next door at uncle franks which there pizza was extremely delicious.
2 star Yelp review from June 2023:
We were very rushed.
The pizza was good all the other food was just ok.
The waiter practically had dinner at our table was trying to order for us and add items that we did not want.
They wanted us to pay for the entertainment.
They should of told us when we made the reservation that there was going to be a cover charge for entertainment even if we were just coming in for dinner.
Da Mimmo might be for sale – it was listed and then deleted
Around two weeks before the Da Mimmo Kitchen Nightmares episode aired on TV, a “for sale” listing appeared for Da Mimmo on October 2nd, 2023.
However, the listing was removed shortly thereafter.
At the time that the episode aired on TV, the listing was no longer available.
Unfortunately, the Wayback Machine didn’t have a chance to archive it, so I can’t share the live listing with you.
However, I was able to pulled up the cached version from Google.
Here’s the description from the listing, along with a screenshot:
Completely renovated restaurant for sale!
Perfect opportunity to open your own ‘Turn-Key’ business with approximately 2,000 sf. & seating for 92 patrons.
The combined brick oven & bar gives a relaxing atmosphere off your spacious dining area which compliments an additional section for events and private party venue.
The superior cuisine is constantly awarded by 4+ star patron ratings.
Long term lease available / CAM charges apply.
This is a ‘One-Time Advantage Buy’ for the experienced Restaurant owner.
Here’s a screenshot of the listing – I’ve blurred the picture for copyright reasons:
Here’s a link to the now-deleted Coldwell Banker Realty listing, in case it comes back.
As you can see in the screenshot, the asking price was $399,000.
The listing agent for the Da Mimmo Dumont property also says that Melissa and her sons are still “exploring the idea of relocating from the space”.
I will keep an eye on this because it will be interesting to see if the Da Mimmo for sale listing re-appears after the episode airs.
Final thoughts on Da Mimmo pizzeria
Overall, Da Mimmo seems to be doing fairly well after its Kitchen Nightmares visit.
While the reviews are still a bit mixed, I would say that they’re more positive than negative when factoring in both Yelp and Google.
People also seem to be universally complimentary of the new decor from the Kitchen Nightmares episode.
Reviews of the service are also generally positive, while the food reviews are a bit more mixed.
It will be interesting to see if this one is able to stay open for the long term.
Given that it was briefly listed for sale already, I have a sneaking suspicion that the for sale listing might come back after the episode airs.
Still, I’m keeping an open mind when it comes to the future of the Da Mimmo restaurant.
That wraps up my Da Mimmo Kitchen Nightmares update.
If you want to see some other nearby New Jersey Kitchen Nightmares episodes, you can also check out my updates for Campania in Fair Lawn NJ, Bazzini in Ridgewood NJ, and Fiesta Sunrise in West Nyack NY.
Or, if you want to see updates for other restaurants from the Kitchen Nightmares revamp (Season 8), you can check out my updates for Bel Aire Diner in Astoria Queens NY, BASK46 in Woodland Park NJ, and In the Drink in Wayne NJ.
And if you want to share your thoughts on the Gordon Ramsay Da Mimmo visit, you can do so using the comments section below.
Thanks for reading!
More Information
https://www.yelp.com/biz/da-mimmo-dumonthttps://www.facebook.com/damimmobrickoven/
What did you think about the episode? I'd love it if you shared your thoughts on the episode in the comments below!
You can also click the buttons below to share this post!
And don't forget to check out all of the other Kitchen Nightmares updates.
Last updated: 2023-10-16 07:30
This one has very “I cooka da pizza” vibes lol. They would probably get along with Peter from Peter’s Italian Restaurant.
Here’s a link to my update for Peter’s if anyone is interested – it’s another very Italian episode:
https://realitytvupdates.com/kitchen-nightmares/peters-italian-restaurant/
Her 2 “influencer” sons are the perfect example of why need to stop propping up social media “influencers”.
Whoever is running this website, props to you all for taking the time to update every single restaurant featured on the show. Keep up the good work.
Thanks for the kind words! Glad you find it helpful
Absolutely! Especially as the show is back with new episodes.
Her two social influencer sons are a couple of lowlife garbage. I feel sorry for a world where these dumb POS can get 800,000 followers, and they make money without working at all.
That’s insulting… to lowlife garbage.
Please drop antonio’s instagram. He’s not even flexing his physical appearance nor interested in social media, yet he’s hotter than those twins combined.
According to reddit, it’s closing in two days.
https://www.reddit.com/r/KitchenNightmares/comments/1frp5di/update_da_mimmo_is_closing_business/