Da Mimmo - Kitchen Nightmares Update - Open or Closed?

In this Kitchen Nightmares episode, Gordon Ramsay visits Da Mimmo in Dumont, New Jersey.

Da Mimmo is owned by Melissa, her husband and her three sons.

Melissa is a retired police officer and they opened the restaurant in tribute to her husbands uncle.

Melissa doesn’t know anything about restaurants and has no experience.

Her son Antonio is keeping the place together.

He was working construction but left the trade to learn how to make pizzas.

It was always his dream to own a restaurant and has passion for the business.

He and his mother are keeping the restaurant together and he doesn’t want to let down his family.

Francesca is the head chef and is not easy to work with.

She doesn’t take criticism well and communication is poor.

Sons Vito and Vincent are not serious about the business in any way.

They even admit that they do nothing and do social media and watch movies.

Her husband Vito Sr is still an active police detective and is working double shifts to support them.

He is still investing money into the restaurant and they are $500,000 in debt.

Gordon arrives at the restaurant but Melissa wants to speak with him before he goes into the restaurant.

He calls her and tells her that he is outside and she gets into his car.

They talk about the restaurant, it was supposed to be a family restaurant but only their oldest son is pulling his weight.

The other two come in to cause chaos and end up stressing out their mother and brother.

Melissa wants them to take over the social media and they won’t even do that for them.

She has been covering the payroll out of her own pocket for the last 2 to 3 weeks.

Gordon enters the restaurant and thinks the graffiti wall is a monstrosity.

He notices there are only around 12 customers in the restaurant.

Gordon looks at the menu and orders from Giuseppe, who glides around the restaurant.

Gordon orders the minestrone soup, the Ortolana pizza, calamari and meatballs in a bread bowl.

The minestrone soup is being made from scratch so Antonio is told to hold off on the pizza.

After 30 minutes, the soup arrives and the pizza is fired.

Gordon says that the soup is quite nice but the pizza has terrible mozzarella.

He can tell that it isn’t fresh mozzarella.

The calamari tastes like elastic bands and is bland, with uncooked cherry tomatoes.

The bowl for the meatballs is burnt and he calls it an implant gone wrong.

The meatballs are cold and he tells Giuseppe to put his finger in and it is ice cold.

Francesca isn’t happy with the feedback but she doesn’t like having to use frozen ingredients.

She feels trapped with what she has to use to create the dishes.

Gordon asks to meet all of the staff in the restaurant.

He calls it a nightmare with long waits for food and terrible food.

Francesca doesn’t like the food that she cooks as she usually cooks with fresh ingredients.

Melissa says that they don’t have the credit or trust with vendors for fresh ingredients.

Antonio buys the ingredients and with all his other roles he is drowning.

There is no money in the cash register and they are throwing food away.

Melissa admits that she knows nothing about the restaurant.

Gordon asks to meet with Melissa and Antonio and tells them they have their work cut out.

The restaurant stresses her out and they don’t have the people coming in.

The brothers will occasionally post on social media but they have millions of followers.

Antonio is there six days a week and can’t remember when he last had a break.

He is committed to the restaurant and is under a lot of pressure.

Gordon blames Melissa for the pressure that he is under.

She goes into the kitchen and hugs her son.

The evening service is busy after Gordon has invited the local.

Gordon wants to observe the service to see where their issues are.

Melissa phones Vito and tells him to come to the restaurant.

During the service, the customers are left waiting for food.

The kitchen is in chaos and there is too much smoke in there.

Steaks are burning on the grill and Francesca is shutting down.

She feels under pressure with Gordon walking around.

Vito and Vincent arrive at the restaurant, mid service.

They order food and drinks at the bar.

Gordon tells them to stop making their order as the customers are more important.

They tell Gordon that they are doing social media and collectively they have 3.5million.

The restaurant itself has just 800 followers and they claim it is hard to promote the restaurant.

Gordon lays into them about how they could fill the restaurant easily with promotion and instead they mess around.

Vincent is wearing a $35,000 watch and Gordon tells them the truth about the financial situation.

They are shocked to discover that their parents are $500,000 of debt.

Gordon goes into the fridges and finds old product.

Francesca claims that they clean the fridge every day but the mussels are dead and the produce is rotted.

Gordon also finds slimy, rancid chicken breasts.

He asks Francesca if she has given up and decides to shut down the kitchen.

After the service, Gordon sits down with the family.

He tells the youngest brothers to stop smirking and tries to get them to see how upset their mum is.

Gordon tells Melissa to either get the boys to help or they need to leave.

Gordon is going to train Antonio and create a new menu.

The restaurant will be given a revamp.

The younger brothers eventually come around to how serious the situation is and how stressed their mum is.

They are quite upset at being kept in the dark.

The next day, Antonio is taken to Razza to meet Dan, one of the country’s best pizza makers.

They learn that the best ingredients aren’t as expensive as they think they are.

The revamp is complete and the family are invited in to see the changes.

They think that the restaurant looks great and they see the new menu.

The family sample the dishes and are blown away by the taste.

On relaunch, the restaurant is busy with locals and former customers.

The food leaves the kitchen quickly and the customers love the food.

The food slows down and Gordon tries to turn it around.

Food is left waiting in the kitchen and Gordon sends Antonio into the kitchen.

He takes control of the situation and food starts leaving the kitchen again.

The customers love the food and promise to return.

The brothers promise to help more and will promote the restaurant on socials.

Gordon meets with the family and is pleased with the restaurants turn around.

What Happened Next at Da Mimmo?

Da Mimmo is open.

They regularly hold events in the space.

Their social media doesn't appear to have taken off as much as Gordon had hoped.

Reviews are mostly positive with praise for the pizzas.

Da Mimmo was aired on 16 October 2023, the episode was filmed in June 2023 and is Kitchen Nightmares season 8 episode 4.

Read About More Kitchen Nightmares

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Previous episode - In The Drink

This post was last updated in October 2023.