The \"valet\" in the parking lot was the first tip-off. I thought it would be an isolated part of the experience, but it was not. I'm all for valet, but when \"valet\" means moving my car 10 feet next to other cars that self-parked, that's a bit pretentious.\n\nSo, apparently is the whole restaurant. Don't get me wrong... not pretentious in a tuxedo-wearing-waiter sort of way. No, this is Arizona pretentious... overpriced dishes, mediocre quality, smallish portions, and staff that can't wait to jump out of their shells to tell you how their food is \"made with love\" and every other BS line they have. When the owner came by the say hello, he started with \"hey, man, I'm Erik and this is my place\". \"My place\"? What, is this his living room? If I'm buying a $19 salad with chicken, I don't want to be called \"man\" and greeted by shaky-wristed guys wearing graphic T-shirts delivering my salad (\"you did order the salad, right sir?\", before setting it down).\n\nIf you like the Vig or any of the other pseudo-pretentious \"hot spots\" that populate Phoenix these days, maybe this is your place. The atmosphere is nice from a decor standpoint, although I know that anyplace decorated that way is d-bag central. I'm all for nice service but not fake nice. Read my other reviews and you'll see I'm not into \"the scene\". My psychoanalysis on The Parlor, other than the food is very average and even a bit bland, is that it's the place soulless people go to convince themselves they're not soulless because they had a conversation with their waiter about hair pom and told the lifeless, dull-as-dishwater hostess they bought their girlfriend the same pair of jeans. For $19, I'll get a salad at the Phoenician and actually have a conversation with the young server about world travels. If The Parlor didn't have seven waiters all serving you different parts of your dinner so that you could have such a conversation, I doubt the paper-thin likability would last long.
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