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Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

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Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#71

Post by SilasX »

moehm wrote: post #57
SilasX wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the Michelin Inspectors are discovering measureable, objectively bad things about the food/restaurant, just as you would be able to identify objectively bad things about the good-enough app? What are those things and what is the objective measurement?

Liking the food != the food is good. Good taste is not so subjective as you think it is. Your personal preferences, yeah, I don't care about them. But every professional taster keep their personal preferences out of the game and look for more objective criterias, like complexity, balance, off-flavors, aftertaste, typicity, presentation etc. For example if I order chicken and it does not taste like chicken, it's flawe…

Thanks, I appreciate the clarification, that was a better follow-up than the OP could give.

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#72

Post by throw0101a »

kragen wrote: post #63
OJFord wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Err, no? We may have an unexpected (to me) dialect barrier. To the best of my knowledge, McDonalds serves primarily burgers (is a burger what you're calling a sandwich?), Starbucks serves (coffee aside) mostly sandwiches, and also salads and stuff. (It is about ten and three years since I've been to one, respectively, but I doubt that much has changed!)

Apparently there's significant dialectal variation on whether the "hamburger" is a sandwich, including the bread, or just the meat often used to form the filling of a sandwich: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburger In my usage, you can eat just a hamburger, but McDonalds won't sell you one; they'll insist on putting it between slices of bread, thus making a hamburger sandwich of it. If you want to eat just the hamb…

> Apparently there's significant dialectal variation on whether the "hamburger" is a sandwich […]

Wait until you start asking "is a hotdog a sandwich?". (Seriously, Google it.)

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#73

Post by phonypc »

moehm wrote: post #57
SilasX wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the Michelin Inspectors are discovering measureable, objectively bad things about the food/restaurant, just as you would be able to identify objectively bad things about the good-enough app? What are those things and what is the objective measurement?

Liking the food != the food is good. Good taste is not so subjective as you think it is. Your personal preferences, yeah, I don't care about them. But every professional taster keep their personal preferences out of the game and look for more objective criterias, like complexity, balance, off-flavors, aftertaste, typicity, presentation etc. For example if I order chicken and it does not taste like chicken, it's flawe…

>objective criterias, like complexity, balance, off-flavors, aftertaste, presentation

Those... simply aren't objective criteria. One persons off-flavor is another persons desired flavor (cilantro/coriander for an obvious example). What is the quantitative measure of "complexity" or "balance" in a dish?

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#74

Post by blunte »

tayo42 wrote: post #62
blunte wrote: post #44

Michelin Star restaurants, in my 6 or 7 different experiences, are as much about the title as the food. Indeed the service is more formal, to the point of being a bit ridiculous in some cases. But the food itself was not so much more special than a really good unknown restaurant. It's really a bit silly, a status symbol that allows pomp and circumstance to satisfy people who need something "special" to talk about. I…

> have had food from street vendors and family restaurants that blew my mind Do you have some examples to share?

I'm trying desperately to remember specifics. I love to travel, and food is my #1 or #2 focus when I travel. So I try a lot :).

Places and be hit or miss, or at least vary in experience over time or depending upon various factors. But here are some of the ones I can think of, in no particular order.

desmaakvanafrika.nl in Rotterdam, NL

kuarestaurant.nl in The Hague, NL

www.die-kueche-bamberg.de in Bamberg, DE

Aum Vegitarian in Chiang Mai, Thailand - https://g.page/AumVegetarianRestaurant?share

Lots of street vendors in Chiang Mai. Try a bit of everything, as it's very cheap and often very nice.

Elevation Pizza in Fraser, CO, US - www.elevationpizzaco.com

It doesn't matter that I list places though. If you read reviews or talk to locals, and you try a lot of places, you will find so many good restaurants... usually... unless you're in Netherlands where most people don't care about food, in which case you have to work harder to find the good ones ;)

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#75

Post by moehm »

refurb wrote: post #48

This just seems like someone sharing their own subjective take on food? I mean there is no right answer , it’s personal preference? It reminds me of audiophiles who can hear the difference in oxygen free speaker cables or prefer the “warmth” of vinyl. I’m like “ok? seems like that works for you so keep doing it?”

There is a huge misconception that professional tasters are rating by their personal preferences. I can't really talk about restaurants, but about wine and spirits.

As a taster, you don't look for things you personally enjoy. You look for "quality". That is, balance, complexity, off-flavors, typicity etc. Just because I like my wine oxidized and my meat burned, I can't say the meal was terrible. (But maybe the service, if you have asked for your steak burned, but got it medium rare.)

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#76

Post by satellite2 »

ska wrote: post #49
blunte wrote: post #44

Michelin Star restaurants, in my 6 or 7 different experiences, are as much about the title as the food. Indeed the service is more formal, to the point of being a bit ridiculous in some cases. But the food itself was not so much more special than a really good unknown restaurant. It's really a bit silly, a status symbol that allows pomp and circumstance to satisfy people who need something "special" to talk about. I…

> But my few MS experiences were not markedly better than my best other experiences. This is just as you would expect, given sufficient samples, from any classification process that really doesn't want false positives but isn't too concerned about false negatives.

Perfectly on point.

I feel the question that might have missed in this interview is what kind of coverage do they manage yearly. And by region. I expect France should comme much closer to 100% than say, any south Asian country.

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#77

Post by zoltar »

tomcam wrote: post #3

Went to Paris and dined at a number of Michelin-starred places, including Le Cinq. The food was fine, but... I didn't get it! I think there is a culinary language that I understand as little as a typical Michelin-starred chef would be able to evaluate a tightly-written C program. On the other hand I was lucky enough to dine at Poppy Seattle every year of its existence and felt their completely original approach to th…

I'm not much of a foodie, but I do like eating stuff.

I've found that most starred restaurants I've been to are more like participating in some performance art rather than an effort just to not be hungry. Three stars is a blockbuster movie. One star is a good short story or a clever photograph.

It's like sitting down and asking Thomas Keller or April Bloomfield to tell you what's up using just their vision and talent and the contents of their pantry.

I also really appreciate nerds. People who just go all out on something and dive deep or wide or both. Out of curiosity or passion or just good old plain obsession.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6s2YQZg-pmI

While there are whole genres of art I don't get, I find food is a pretty approachable for me.

As an aside, your comment reminded me of a scene from Star Trek. First minute or so of this clip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__Zekgzwsxg

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#78

Post by satellite2 »

wolverine876 wrote: post #6

When I last used the Michelin guide, about ten years ago, it was a little bizarre: IIRC descriptions would give 2-3 sentences about the decor or service, a short phrase about the food, the rating, and that was it. My choice was to blindly trust the rating or to look elsewhere. I took the rating into account, but I need much more information. Is it still that way? Did I misunderstand something?

Contrary to what the article suggests, the star system is not really a rating but more of an award. For most people a one star should already the most fantastic restaurant they've had.

Even the restaurant that don't receive a star and figure in the guide should be amongst the best in a region.

So simply figuring in the guide should already be a strong signal that you will get a minimum quality meal.

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#79

Post by pottertheotter »

tomcam wrote: post #3

Went to Paris and dined at a number of Michelin-starred places, including Le Cinq. The food was fine, but... I didn't get it! I think there is a culinary language that I understand as little as a typical Michelin-starred chef would be able to evaluate a tightly-written C program. On the other hand I was lucky enough to dine at Poppy Seattle every year of its existence and felt their completely original approach to th…

I consider myself quite the foodie and have eaten at numerous Michelin star restaurants, but I don't really care for them much anymore.

However, I'll point out one exception. I ate at CORE by Clare Smyth* in London a couple years ago and it is my favorite meal I've ever had. It was too new to be in the Michelin Guide, but now has 3 stars. What made this experience different was that the food was accessible. It was impeccable, the service was amazing, but I think that anyone can go there and appreciate how good the food is.

First, the marginal returns are diminishing once you get past a certain point. I lived in SF for several years and the enjoyment I had at $50 plate restaurants was pretty equivalent to $150 places.

Second, the "top" restaurants are incredibly inaccessible. Sometimes it comes down to the ingredients being very hard to work with, and they have the talent and the time to wrangle them. If you don't know that, it's underwhelming. If you do know that and you're honest with yourself, it's still often underwhelming.

* Clare Smyth was the head chef at Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, a 3 Michelin star restaurant, from 2012-2016. Among other awards, she was Good Food Guide's 2013 National Chef of the Year, World's Best Female Chef 2018 by the World's 50 Best Restaurants, and in 2018 CORE was named Best Restaurant at the GQ Food and Drink Awards.

Re: Confessions of a Michelin Star Inspector

#80

Post by moehm »

phonypc wrote: post #73
moehm wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Liking the food != the food is good. Good taste is not so subjective as you think it is. Your personal preferences, yeah, I don't care about them. But every professional taster keep their personal preferences out of the game and look for more objective criterias, like complexity, balance, off-flavors, aftertaste, typicity, presentation etc. For example if I order chicken and it does not taste like chicken, it's flawe…

> objective criterias, like complexity, balance, off-flavors, aftertaste, presentation Those... simply aren't objective criteria. One persons off-flavor is another persons desired flavor (cilantro/coriander for an obvious example). What is the quantitative measure of "complexity" or "balance" in a dish?

I don't say it's really objective, I just say it's way less subjective than one might think.

Cilantro is not an off-flavor per se, it's just a flavor you like or don't. A cork tainted wine is an off-flavor. But if you don't like cilantro, it is indeed an off-flavor for you, but that is uninteresting. If I like burned meat, is a medium rare steak flawed for you?

> What is the quantitative measure of "complexity" or "balance" in a dish?

It's not measured with technology, it's measured with the tongue (+ nose) and experience of the taster. Interestingly, if you give the same dish or wine to real experts, you will probably get identical answers. So there is something there, but you have to get the experience and vocabulary to really judge a dish (or wine, or whatever).

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