Here's What Happened To Mizz Juju's After Restaurant: Impossible

In July 2022, the New York Times had to ask whether or not the world was falling apart, or if it just felt like that. Between pandemics sweeping the globe, economic crises arising around the world, and Jelly Belly makers still producing the frequently-reviled Halloween staple candy corn, our beloved Earth seems like a grim place. Yet, that's just the way people like "Restaurant: Impossible" host Robert Irvine seem to prefer it. When everything is in chaos, he has something to fix.

For anyone who isn't aware of the "Restaurant: Impossible" phenomenon, the show began in 2011 and follows the same basic premise as "Kitchen Nightmares." In both programs, a shouting British chef who spends far more time in the gym than in sensitivity training goes to struggling restaurants and attempts to berate the owners into making their eateries better. These are similar to shows like "Bar Rescue" and "Restaurants On The Edge," in that the goal is to save a failing business, then rain success and dollar, dollar bills y'all on the proprietors. All while being entertaining, of course.

Sometimes these shows manage to turn flailing operations into major success stories, and sometimes they're just a lot of shouting for no reason. In the case of Mizz Juju's in Huntsville, Alabama, the end result was generally underwhelming.

The tale of woe surrounding Mizz Juju's is lengthy. It's a soul food restaurant down in Alabama, where that cuisine is pursued with fervent zeal. Chew Boom reports that it's run by a man named Daniel, who used to be a physicist for NASA. Despite Daniel's knowledge of matter and energy, his business acumen seems somewhat modest. According to the episode description on the Food Network site, he's endured "10 years of failures, including a broken engagement and spending his parent's entire retirement savings."

Chef Robert Irvine and team visited Mizz Juju's in November of 2021 and tried to set the wayward Daniel and his restaurant on the proper course. Irvine also attempted to counsel the owners in matters of family, which prompted this biting comment from Food Network Gossip: "Robert doesn't have a degree in psychology or marriage consoling yet he plays one on TV all the time."

Whether Irvine's advice helped or not is tough to determine. Mizz Juju's has remained open and is hosting seafood boils, according to its Facebook page. There are very few reviews of the eatery anywhere, and the ones that exist are generally middling. However, some offer hope for success, like this one from Restaurantji, which says "I loved it ... the food is great the people are great stay open more." Thus far, the business is at least making ends meet, and hopefully building ties in the community so it can keep surviving.