Keith McNally brushes off criticism of his mean Lauren Sanchez Instagram post: ... trends now
Celebrity restaurateur Keith McNally brushed off criticism of his scathing late-night Instagram post about Lauren Sanchez.
McNally, who shared a carousel of recent pictures of Sanchez and Jeff Bezos and branded Bezos' fiancée 'revolting' earlier this week, insisted that his business had not been affected by the incident at all.
The lengthy post, which McNally claimed was a Balthazar dinner report written by the manager Zouheir Louhaichy, detailed an encounter with a reporter from the Daily Beast.
The journalist allegedly asked the restaurant manager and guests if the business had been slow because of McNally's post about Bezos and Sanchez.
'No one in NYC would stop coming to Balthazar because of a filthy rich Billionaire's girlfriend. Lots of other customers said the same thing,' says the post that went up late Thursday night.
Celebrity restaurateur Keith McNally brushed off criticism of his scathing late-night Instagram post about Lauren Sanchez
McNally, who shared a carousel of recent pictures of Sanchez and Jeff Bezos(pictured) and branded Bezos' fiancée 'revolting' earlier this week, insisted that his business had not been affected by the incident at all
The lengthy post, which McNally claimed was a Balthazar dinner report written by the manager Zouheir Louhaichy, detailed an encounter with a reporter from the Daily Beast
In the scathing and unprovoked late-night rant shared on Monday, McNally attacked Bezos and Sanchez, saying 'Does anybody else find Jeff Bezos' New wife - Lauren Sanchez - ABSOLUTELY REVOLTING?'
'What an ugly and F***ing SMUG - LOOKING couple they make. Is this what having 1000 Billion dollars does to people?'
He has since sparked fury on social media, with former TV anchor Sanchez sharing a very pointed message on Tuesday night and some of her high-profile friends coming to her defense.
In the latest post, McNally claimed that a reporter from The Daily Beast came to his restaurant as early as 5 pm on Tuesday and accused her of 'looking for a story that suits her narrative.'
'A lady came early on around 5pm to ask for a reservation during primetime. Because we were full at primetime I offered her a nice table a little later.'
'It turned out that she was a reporter (she later called herself 'a spy ') for The Daily Beast and she proceeded to ask our bar guests if they noticed that Balthazar wasn't busy because of Keith's Instagram post about Jeff Bezos's girlfriend,' the post reads.
'Mind you this was at 5pm!! Our lovely regular S. was the one who reported her to me after she tried to get him to give her a quote...
'He told her that No one in NYC would stop coming to Balthazar because of a filthy rich Billionaire's girlfriend. Lots of other customers said the same thing.
'She then came to talk to me to try to get me to give her a quote ..I told her that we couldn't comment but since she was asking if we were busy or not I simply told her to look around for herself.
'The room was packed at this point and she agreed that we seemed very busy then left,' the post reads.
The post went on to say that the night was 'very busy,' with both indoor and outdoor seating areas 'got fairly full.'
The former TV anchor posted two telling messages on her Instagram Stories on Tuesday night, urging people to be kind to one another
McNally, the owner of enduring New York City hot-spots Balthazar, Pastis, Minetta Tavern, and Morandi has previously picked several fights with well-known visitors to his restaurants.
In October of 2022, he started a weeks-long feud with then late-night host James Corden, who reportedly screamed at McNally's Balthazar staff over an all-yolk omelet his wife had attempted to order.
McNally posted a long statement to Instagram detailing Corden's alleged unpleasant encounters with the Balthazar staff and issuing a ban on Corden as a guest of his establishments.
Corden, who has on multiple occasions been pegged as difficult to work with, defended himself on-air and in a New York Times profile at the time.
