Social media sensation Keith Lee recently announced that he will be kicking off a redemption food tour for the cities he didn’t have the best experience in the first go around.
Last August, the viral food critic kicked off his first Keith Lee and Family Food Tour, which featured 10 cities. The first leg of the nationwide tour included the regions of Atlanta, New York, Detroit, LA, Las Vegas, Chicago, Houston and New Orleans. While on the road, the stop that caused a frenzy online and made headlines was Atlanta, which landed last on his rank list following the tour’s end, Blavity reported. The restaurants he and his family visited included popular spots like Old Lady Gang, The Real Milk and Honey and Atlanta Breakfast Club, along with other under-the-radar food spots like Jamaican Jerk Biz, Juci Jerk, The Bodega on Main St, The Dining Experience and The Seafood Menu.
Some of his complaints were the customer service, pricing on condiments, how hard it was to eat food, and the unfair special treatment he got at certain places that prioritized his visit over customers who had arrived before him.
“My biggest issue with Atlanta was that it was hard for us to get food,” the Detroit native said in a TikTok video where he ranked the cities on his 2023 tour. “I’m a normal person but I understand some people perception is different. But if other people perceive me as a normal person and I went to Atlanta just to get food, I wouldn’t have ate nothing, and I mean nothing. Even with people perceiving the way they perceive me, we still barely ate but when we did eat it was delicious.”
@keith_lee125 Familee Redemption Food Tour Talk 💕 would you try it ? 💕 #foodcritic
New Orleans took the No. 1 spot, Houston ranked second and Chicago took third place. On March 29, Lee shared that he’s gearing up for the Keith Lee Redemption Food Tour, and Atlanta will be the first stop. ATLiens will have the opportunity to redeem their reputation of offering foodies good southern cuisine.
“Last year, we went to 10 states on the family food tour,” he said in his TikTok video announcement. “This year, we went to about three so far and we discussed as a family that it would only be right to do a redemption tour because the states we did this year, [there] were different rules, different categories and different structures. So, just to be fair, we’re going to start at the bottom of the list. Atlanta, we coming back.”
He also shared the ground rules he and his team set for the upcoming tour.
“Now this is a redemption tour. It is separate from the food tour — meaning we [are] not doing a revisit, meaning we not going to the same spots that we went to last time. This is a completely fresh slate, clean slate. We going to new restaurants in new areas and we’re going to use the new categories,” he added.
According to FOX 5, during Lee’s last Atlanta visit, he faced backlash from business owners and other people in the city due to his honest feedback, which threatened his and his family’s safety. He addressed his concerns in the video as well and shared his solution for any chaos that may occur this time around. Although he wasn’t attacked, he decided to take extra safety precautions to ensure his trips going forward were danger-free.
“We come in peace. With that being said, we will be protected. It’s people with us who are legal and licensed,” he said. “We don’t want to have to use them, but we will. My family is going home safe, and I mean I with every bone in my body.”
Will you be tuning into The Redemption Tour?
