Over the last half decade or so, we have witnessed the burgeoning role of food in our lives. We care more about how food is sourced and produced, and are more willing to try out new restaurants/cuisines than we did before. In the case of the latter, an increasing desire for quality dining experiences has sparked a quest to find the best restaurants.

Alongside the word of mouth, conventional guides like Michelin have historically served as the main reference points, though new age media has added a whole new dimension to the search. Critique no longer rests solely in the hands of professionals; the internet and social media has removed the obstacles from before, via food blogs, and crowd-sourced sites like TripAdvisor.

The question then arises: what roles do these different sources play?

Formal guides/lists

Although crowd-sourced sites have garnered the most attention in recent times, published lists and guides like Michelin and the World’s Best 50 (W50) remain a vital benchmark. They are my first resource whenever I wish to find a great option, in particular, the annual Michelin and Good Food guides are trusty companions in this never-ending pursuit.

There are a number of reasons why they are so valued. They provide immediate recommendations; the x number of Michelin-starred restaurants or winners in the W50 from a city can become a concise list of places for you to work through, removing the need to trawl through a multitude of sources.

Also, despite the controversies and debates over their relevancy in today’s world (more on that later), these guides/lists remain highly influential. A Michelin star or two is fantastic for improving the business, while the pinnacle of 3 stars is instant gold dust. When Noma was announced as the World’s Best Restaurant in 2010, their phone couldn’t stop ringing, and they had enough requests to fill the restaurant for the next 8 years.

The common key to this impact, is their reputation and branding. It can be argued that being included in them guarantees a certain level of quality. Michelin, being a long-established name in the field, boasts a team of professional inspectors working full-time. They remain anonymous, promising fair treatment in the course of their work, which is verified before publication. This argument applies to the national newspaper critics too, who are able to communicate in-depth and rounded stories to their readers.W50, on the other hand, features a trio of food writers, chefs and gastronomes as their judges, hoping to achieve a more representative view from people in the know. This promise of an informed process, coupled with expert opinion, fuels the influence that they have on the industry.

Of course, these publications do have their critics. Michelin has been lambasted as being out of touch, in favouring classical approaches to dining. Closely guarding its less-than-transparent process of awarding/taking away stars does it no favours as well, although steps have been taken to address these worries. Diners have also contested some of the guide’s choices, disagreeing with some of the awarded stars, while questioning why others like The Ritz have been constantly overlooked. Even the identity of Michelin has come under fire, case in point: Barrafina has been serving consistently brilliant Spanish tapas in its Soho branch for a good 6-7 years, but was awarded a star only recently. The decision came as a bit of a surprise; indeed, the food there is fantastic, but their no-reservations, casual style did not necessarily fit into the “typical” kind of restaurant that the guide seems to be fond of. Also, why only award the star now, and not before?

The W50 has received its fair share of criticism as well. Detractors slam the list’s penchant for trendy multi-course, boundary-pushing restaurants. The selection process has come under close scrutiny, prompting the collective, Occupy50best, which seeks to challenge them. Issues include the effect of national tourism boards being culpable of sponsoring “gastro-tourism” in a bid to attract judges to their countries, while luminaries such as Joël Robuchon have indicated that it is almost impossible to prove that these judges have indeed dined at the restaurants they voted for. Also, with individual listings for each continent published in addition to the main World rankings, inconsistencies have seemingly appeared. For instance, in the 2014 rankings, D.O.M was #3 in Latin America and #7 in the World. However, while Astrid Y Gastón was #2 in Latin America, it was #18 in the World. Does this make sense?

Additionally, since they are fixed at publication, updates only occur annually, and are thus unable to reflect any recent changes. They are also less applicable in smaller markets (cities which they don’t cover), and that’s where new age media can plug the gap.

New age media

The explosive surge in social media has allowed everyone to share our food experiences; from crowd-sourced sites to blogs, the balance of power has been tipped from restaurants to their diners. The value of these sites lies in them utilising the wisdom of crowds, with the intention of being a fairer representation of the masses, and not just, say, a couple of critics. They also function as (mostly) up-to-date directories, easily filtered by location via your phone. This has proved to be most convenient when travelling around new cities; I have used Tripadvisor and Yelp many a time to make quick choices if I hadn’t done any prior planning.

The major concern with online review sites, however, is trust. What’s to stop one from writing a good/bad review without even visiting the restaurant? Unusual restaurants have constantly occupied spots amongst Tripadvisor’s best rated with questionably exceptional reviews, while stories of competitors aiming dire reviews at each other seem to be regular occurrences. The latter was met with much dismay in France, where restauranteurs and chefs signed a petition hoping to end these negative reviews. Fake restaurants with glowing reviews have also been created, in Devon (2013) and Italy (earlier this year), by those looking to show just how unreliable these sites can be.

Negative reviews revolving around trivial details, ranging from rants about the state of the toilet (and not the food/restaurant) to even confessions of not even having eaten at the restaurant due to reservation hiccups, pop up every now and again. So, while you do get a great deal of quantity, question marks remain over the quality of the content.

Another commonly noted observation involves the fact that these sites are used extensively by tourists. Reviews are usually then based on a sole visit. Also, with fine dining and casual restaurants being listed together, these single visits may not be to places where locals like to eat at. Would their reviews lead to a true reflection of the city’s restaurant scene?

Now, on to food bloggers. There are certainly a number of well-respected bloggers, some of whom I admire and follow intently. Armed with a wealth of knowledge, they offer approachable, fair reviews of places they’ve been to. However, with restaurants, especially new ones, recognising the growing importance of social media in their marketing plans, the concurrent mushrooming of new bloggers has created a new problem. While some question whether these new bloggers actually know their stuff, there is a more pressing issue at hand: restaurants inviting bloggers to private and soft launch tastings is commonplace, but paying them in order to be reviewed positively? Is this ethical? Is there not a conflict of interest?

Gauthier Soho’s now-famous attack on food bloggers has highlighted a nasty consequence of this development: bloggers blackmailing restaurants for free meals in exchange for positive judgement, or even worse, negative reviews if they don’t comply. It is entirely possible that the wrong signals are being sent to the public who are reading these tainted reviews. So, is the true aim of bloggers meant to be independent “reporters”, or are they just marketing tools? And is it really that easy to differentiate the partial from the fair ones?

In light of these issues, here are some of the alternative solutions that I’ve come across:

– Originally a mobile-only social network for chefs and food lovers, ChefsFeed has transformed itself into a guide for dishes and restaurants recommended by top chefs. They home in on the positives, as selected by the people whom they believe are the best placed to do so.

– Itruereview is a platform aiming to deal with fake reviews by allowing diners to write them while still on site. The review is then verified afterwards by email.

– Zomato’s Foodfeed allows you to be part of a community of users you trust; by following them, you’ll get updates on the reviews they post.

– Saving you the trouble of having to comb through different guides, the AllinLondon Top 100 list aggregates scores based mainly on Michelin, AA Rosettes and Good Food Guide ratings, in addition to other ratings like the Sunday Times Top 100. It is updated at the end of every season.

– Steve Plotnicki’s Opinionated About Dining looks to find the middle ground between formal guides and crowd-sourced sites, by listing the top 100+ restaurants in the US and Europe. With a membership community of “highly literate connoisseurs” and ratings weighted by experience, restaurants without marketing budgets have a higher chance of being included, in contrast to the major publications.

The thing is, no source is perfect; using a variety to gather views from different people may be your best bet. However, no matter which source you use, it may not necessarily translate into a meal that you’d like. Have you ever had the experience of having an excellent meal at a particular restaurant, but then received bad feedback from your friends about the place after recommending it to them? Or been on the other side, and had a bad meal at a restaurant that was highly lauded in the press?

There are a number of points that I can think of, which I think can be noted while recommending a restaurant to a friend, or writing reviews:

– Preferences

Simply put, taste is subjective; we don’t all like the exact same things. Some people like light flavours, while others prefer bold ones; an enjoyable meal with clean, bright flavours might not be someone else’s cup of strongly brewed tea. I can go on and on about different cuisines, styles etc, but you get the point. This can often lead to wildly differing views on restaurants. Even the  national paper critics are not immune to this, as described in the recent article by Peter Preston, in which Jay Rayner and AA Gill disagree over Duck and Rice, for instance.

What can we do about this? If you have a plethora of places to recommend when friends ask for one, it might be helpful to first ask them what kind of styles/flavour profiles they like, and choose accordingly. While writing reviews, we can also talk about our own preferences, which can provide a context to what we like about a meal. We should also be doing a little groundwork while looking for restaurants: check out the menu, see if there have been any changes to management/kitchen staff, and find out what they are trying to bring to the dining scene.

– Expectations

Talking up a place excessively can cause expectations to skyrocket. Telling others “Oh my, the meal I just had at xxxx was the best I ever had in my life” could end up making their own experience fall flat on its face. While the food may be superb, if it couldn’t live up to the sky-high expectations, it may turn into a poor experience overall.

What can we do about this? Try to be as objective as possible, focus more on the details of the meal, rather than simply enthuse about it. A simple way of stripping away any bells and whistles would be to ask yourself one question: will you remember this meal after a year? (for the right reasons of course)

– Reference points

We are innately built to have reference points: we unconsciously (or consciously) compare everything in order in order to make better sense of them. For dining experiences, this reference point can be a past meal with a similar style, cuisine, price point, or maybe even a prior meal at the same place.

What can we do about this? Let people know about the other possible reference points you used in making your conclusions about a place.

In general, as Adam Goldberg (editor of Drift and Ambrosia) aptly said, there is a distinction between a bad meal and a bad restaurant, and it takes more than one meal to pass judgement. Also, in the words of Fay Maschler, restaurant criticism has evolved to become a source of entertainment, rather than simply serving a useful function. So, keep your reviews useful, balanced, and interesting!

What are your thoughts?

Would you reckon the following idea could work: a crowd-sourced site in different countries where people only list their 5 favourite places for fine dining and local gems separately. Your choices can be updated upon going to new restaurants, each reflecting the number of times visited, and you can follow friends and people you trust based on their preferences.

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Information from the following sources were used:

Opentable
Eater
Staff Canteen
The Caterer
The Guardian
The Telegraph
The Economist
The Straits Times
San Francisco Chronicle