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An iconic New Orleans greasy spoon, the Trolley Stop Cafe, is the focus of Wednesday’s premiere of Gordon Ramsay’s latest television show, 24 Hours to Hell and Back.
The episode, airing at 7 p.m. on Fox, features the St. Charles Avenue eatery as the target of Ramsay’s attempts to rescue a troubled restaurant in 24 hours. According to press materials, chef and co-owner of CBD hotspot Johnny Sanchez, Aaron Sanchez, will join Ramsay “to lend his knowledge to the New Orleans cuisine.” Sanchez opened Johnny Sanchez with John Besh in 2014, having previously worked in New Orleans for Paul Prudhomme briefly in the mid-90s. Sanchez’s appearance can likely be explained by his role on Fox’s Masterchef, which he co-hosts alongside Ramsay.
Filming took place earlier this fall, which coincides with mid-October posts on the Trolley Stop’s Facebook page that it would be closed for renovations, was overhauling its menu, and retraining staff. In a reply to one customer’s complaint about the smaller menu, the Trolley Stop posted that it had been “months away from having to close our doors forever,” that its old menu of 96 items produced an “obscene” amount of waste, and that it had to “take drastic measures in order to stay open.”
Last year, an episode of Gordon Ramsay’s 24 Hours to Hell and Back featured French Quarter restaurant The Old Coffee Pot, in which the highlight was a dead mouse found in the bottom of a toaster. Another of Ramsay’s visits to New Orleans resulted in a lawsuit filed this past summer in which Oceana Grill alleges that its 2011 Kitchen Nightmares episode contained fabricated footage.
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