Mama Rita’s makeover airs Friday on ‘Kitchen Nightmares’
Ten months after celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay visited Newbury Park to tape his restaurant-makeover show “Kitchen Nightmares” at Mama Rita’s Authentic Mexican Cantina, the episode is slated to air at 9 p.m. Friday on FOX.
And while seeing herself in the previews has given restaurant owner Laura Papenfus a serious case of butterflies-in-the-stomach, it sure beats the alternative: not seeing herself on TV at all.
“We’re in a shopping center that has been taken over by a bank and just lost two more tenants last month. This is our last chance for exposure,” said Papenfus, who opened Mama Rita’s in the summer of 2008 at the then-new Paraiso shopping center nestled in the Dos Vientos Ranch development.
“It’s like I’m in quicksand and I’m down to breathing through a straw, and someone just threw me a vine. I’m hoping that vine is held by Gordon Ramsay — and that is a really scary thought,” Papenfus added with a laugh that belies the seriousness of her situation.
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