NETANYA, ISRAEL: Amy Bouzaglo, Gordon Ramsay's 'Kitchen Nightmares' viral sensation, was the only restaurant owner on whom the chef gave up. Amy and Salomon "Samy" Bouzaglo Jr, the feisty founders of Amy's Baking Company in Scottsdale, Arizona, shot to fame after appearing on the British chef's show in 2013.
Amanda Patricia Bossingham is no longer recognized a decade after the catastrophic show taping. Despite Gordon's mockery and the closure of Amy's Baking Company in 2015, she continues to refer to herself as a "baking wizard."
@bakingwizard420 #vanilla #cupcake #buttercream #frosting #amybouzaglo #pastrychef #frostingflowers ♬ Dark Horse - Katy PerryAmy hasn't given up cooking. Infact, she often releases clips of her cakes and pastries on her TikTok account, and she has almost 30,000 Instagram followers who follow her recipes. According to her bio, she believes in the motto, "Make cake, not war."
The restaurant in Scottsdale became an immediate tourist destination once the episode aired and the full magnitude of the show's impact unfolded. It was utter pandemonium. The pair received a quite a bit of critical criticism on their Facebook page.
Amy and Samy's response, naming the people who left critical comments, sparked more of the same - not just on Facebook, but also on Yelp and Reddit. One Yelp customer said that they had to wait an hour for their order and were intimidated by the proprietors when they complained about the service.
Forbes later highlighted the replies as a poster example of how a firm should not respond to social media comments.
She told the New York Post about her experiences, "I literally just wanted to die. I was completely shocked and mortified. They portrayed us as being defensive, combative. They made it seem like I couldn’t take any kind of criticism. Like Samy didn’t know what he was doing in the front."
When Gordon and his team arrived at the establishment in December 2012 to begin filming, Amy stated that the restaurant had changed - for the worse.
The point-of-sale system was "sabotaged," and orders couldn't be processed or transmitted to the kitchen, she told The Post of her 'Nightmare' experience.
Although the production crew had considered bringing in regular customers, Amy recognised the same people who had previously threatened them with negative reviews.
"They wanted to do this for drama," said her husband, Sammy. According to the Arizona Republic, Samy has a criminal record, including paperwork indicating that he is barred from entering France and Germany, as well as a history of narcotics and extortion offenses.
Samy's immigration issue had been fought by the Bouzaglos since 2008, but he was finally deported. The couple moved to Israel in 2018 to start a new life.
They relocated to Netanya, Israel, where Amy is polishing her baking abilities and building a new bakery business on the seafront. Amy has written a cookbook and launched an entire line of cannabis delicacies.
Samy cheerfully notified The Post that he is retiring. "For me in Israel, the life is honey. I’m enjoying this beautiful town, beautiful country."
When did Amy's Baking Company first open?
Amy's Baking Company was founded in 2006 by Samy, who committed more than $1 million to realize Amy's goals.
It all started when the Bouzaglos invited legendary hard-ass Gordon to their restaurant while they were dealing with internet hostility.
The show was intended to offer establishments the harsh love they needed to reopen. Diners would purchase hundreds of dollars worth of food and threaten to submit poor reviews in order to win free meals from the Bouzaglos.
Why did Gordon Ramsay visit Amy's Baking Company on 'Kitchen Nightmares'?
Bloggers began submitting critical evaluations of the restaurant's cuisine and the owners' aggressive behaviors about two years before the incident was filmed.
During Gordon's tenure at the restaurant, it looked like a dinner service consisting of screaming and swearing. Food being returned, and a waiter being fired was the norm.
Amy had called the reviews "lies," but Samy revealed throughout the program that his wife doesn't handle criticism well.
Things rapidly escalated throughout the show, with the pair exchanging furious words with Gordon about the restaurant's poor quality.
In a series of odd incidents, the restaurant proprietors were caught cursing and violently threatening patrons.
They would pursue disgruntled customers out onto the street, saying, "F**k you! You piece of s**t!" On one occasion, a physical argument between Amy's husband and a client became so heated that one of the show's producers was forced to intervene.
The pair notoriously blamed everyone, including "haters" and "bloggers," for their problems, except themselves. They would also steal their waiters' tips, much to Gordon's chagrin.
"I make excellent food, you motherf***ers you all think you can come in here and say these things," she raged.
Even hard-nosed Gordon couldn't stand the heat and, for the first time in the show's history, walked away from dealing with the proprietors.
"It's not normal for a restaurant to go through that many staff, it's not normal for a kitchen that small to have 65 items on the menu, and it's not normal for the level of animosity that you've built inside this restaurant and outside," the irritated chef remarked.
"After about 100 'Kitchen Nightmares', I met two owners I could not help. It is because they are incapable of listening," he continued.
Why did 'Kitchen Nightmares' stop airing?
It may come as a surprise, but Gordon is the one who chose to cancel 'Kitchen Nightmares'. Normally, television networks decide whether to extend a show based on ratings and viewership, but in this case, the chef had complete control, and he had his reasons.
According to Delish, Gordon hit rock bottom when one of the restaurants on 'Kitchen Nightmares' made him want to quit the program totally, and he realized he was done.
Gordon didn't say which restaurant prompted him to leave, but he did say that he and the restaurant owner didn't agree, and he believed the owner was taking advantage of guests at his ski resort.
Dealing with someone in that position who wasn't paying attention to anything he said affected his choice to terminate the program. They videotaped for a week, and at the end of it, the chef had his game-changing revelation.
When will 'Kitchen Nightmares' Season 8 air?
'Kitchen Nightmares' and 'Hell's Kitchen' premiere in late September 2023, respectively. Gordon has returned to FOX with two additional prime-time shows.
After a nine-year hiatus, 'Kitchen Nightmares' returns for season 8 on Monday, September 25th, at 8 pm ET/PT on Fox.
