What makes a good restaurant, a great restaurant, a Michelin Star restaurant?

I have spent a significant portion of my life eating at restaurants and over the decades initially becoming a hobby for me, eventually became a passion. Most of my trips and travels now are planned primarily with where do we eat when we get there. I like a variety of places from one extreme to another. From the best and most expensive fine dining place to the local food truck. Having just returned from a culinary Olympic trip to New York City, arguably one of the top restaurant destinations in the world I could not but think what exactly am I searching for and what exactly defines a good, a great, and an exceptional restaurant?

I have a good friend who turns out is a Michelin star restaurant expert. He and his family have eaten at most of the top Michelin restaurants in the world including a significantly high number of 3 star places. I have only eaten in a few 2 and 1 star Michelin places where two of them had previously been 3 star but then downgraded to a 2 star. So I asked why. In discussing this with my friend I was surprised to learn the many variables that go into grading a Michelin place and the vast majority at least to me have little to nothing to do with food that I call substance. There is a lot more going on in the grading scheme that I would call show. For example one criteria to be a 2 or 3 star Michelin restaurant involves changing table cloths, changing silverware, and having flowers on the table.

Remember the Clinton Presidential Campaign, “It’s the economy stupid!”. Well to me when it comes to restaurants “It’s the quality and presentation of the food, stupid!:”. I want the silverware clean of course, but who cares how often they change the flowers unless they are dying. Last year we had an interesting dinner at the pool restaurant at Pelican Hill at Newport Beach, California. On their menu they offer a section that says “Perfectly prepared meal”. The restaurant explains the food is not fancy, is not a work of art but they offer 1 chicken, beef, or fish dish and they guarantee it will be most perfectly prepared dish of that kind you will ever have in your life. Nothing pretentious just perfectly prepared dinner. Should that not be more important than flowers on the table?

I have had more than one dinner at a famous fine dining place where the chicken dish is served either underdone or raw, or where the sauce breaks down and becomes running or lumpy? This tells me the kitchen staff and chef are not paying attention to detail and my opinion is they assume because the decor is massive and beautiful and the servers are jumping to every whim that you won’t notice maybe the food isn’t that good. Well, I notice.

To me good food is well prepared, tasty, and usually comfort food. Think Cracker Barrell. Great food is a step above and fancier with white table cloths and the works. Anything above that is to me just fluff. I rarely look for or eat at Michelin stars anymore. For most they are overpriced and do not guarantee a perfectly prepared meal. As with anything there are exceptions, Les Climates a 1 star place in Paris right behind the Museum Orsay that I highly recommend. I am sure there are others. To me what the top places offer is food you simply cannot have except in a few places. Our recent most expensive meal at Le Pavilion in NYC served us absolutely perfect Epoisse cheese sauce that I have found in maybe half a dozen places in the world including Burgundy France where the cheese actually comes from. They also had 1 day old white truffles almost unheard of. Trust me try and buy white truffles that are less than weeks old.

I say again it is the food that is what is important and not the show and fluff, though when paired with exceptional food preparation makes for an unforgettable dining experience.

The Holidays in the Big(Grand) Apple, New York City

We just returned from a week in New York City celebrating the Holidays and it was our first trip back to NYC in decades. It turned out to be one of the best trips we have ever taken and from day one everything was wonderful. We could not have asked for anything more. What follows are some of my observations regarding NYC and restaurant recommendations.

1. The city is saturated with young people. 30 years ago when we came and were young we thought the city was saturated with old people and it probably was then, but today no matter where we went we were, in fact, the oldest people there and frankly, I did not see a lot of older people. This tells me that the young people are taking over and I'm happy to say I was fine with it.   Everywhere we went everybody was courteous, kind, and helpful. On the Subway people automatically got up to let us sit down so they had high respect for their elders. Unlike Socrates who 2000 years ago said that young people were ruining the country and had no respect for their elders, I would say I saw the exact opposite. It made me very hopeful optimistic and proud.  They were also obviously employed and making and spending money despite the current inflation.

2. Speaking of the Subway truly there is not a better way to get around in New York City. Don't get me wrong we love Uber and we took Uber on many occasions but Uber is now twice the price it was a year ago and more importantly, the traffic in New York City is pretty bad and it takes some time, 2 to 3 times the time to take an Uber anywhere. Of course there are times when you want to take an Uber, late at night, you're tired of walking and you can't walk another foot, so there is a place for Uber but again we were able to get anywhere in town pretty easily using the Subway. They now have a system where you just lay your credit card at the gate and it automatically takes it and In a week after 12 uses the rest of your trips are free until the next Monday. In most cases, there are elevators on the platforms and in many cases when we had to change trains we got off the train and stayed in place and got on the next train to get to where we wanted to go. We did not have to walk up more than 1 or 2 flights of stairs but again when we could we used the elevators.   We felt very safe on the Subway as everybody was courteous and helpful and It did not hurt that there was friendly New York City policeman at most every stop.  Overall we spent $34 a day on Uber and $10 a day average on subways.  With routine parking $80 to $100 a day Uber is a bargain.

3. We did not see much homelessness. There were a few but it was significantly less than in San Francisco. Of course if you're gonna be homeless why would you want to go North where it's cold when you can go South where it's warm. It's also possible we did not go to any of the areas where homelessness was a problem. Having said that there were plenty of newspaper articles where New York City is one of the more progressive places trying to solve their homeless problem and building affordable housing as much as they can. Though it was interesting one article we read said they were building a affordable housing project where each condo is gonna cost $800,000 a piece, not what I would call real affordable housing.

4. We stayed at the Mint house at 70 Pine Street one or two blocks from the New York stock exchange. It's hands down one of the best places we have ever stayed. We were completely comfortable and left totally relaxed and refreshed. The décor is very modern, the room had plenty of electronic hook ups and I really should not say room because it was a 700 or 800 ft² one bedroom apartment that could easily sleep 2 couples privately. You could easily have all of your meals as it had a complete full size kitchen. Everything was super convenient and within 1 or 2 blocks there were 3 Subway stations, grocery stores, pharmacies, high-end restaurants, pubs, and delis. You really could stay your entire trip in that one place and do fine. I could easily envision returning and staying a month here to really explore the city better.

5. Museums and comments on Broadway shows.  Another main reason folks go to NYC is to see a Broadway show and visit museums and art galleries.  We took advantage of the museums and art galleries and had a great time.  I cannot say the same for Broadway shows, however.  For any main Broadway show the price for most tickets in the orchestra area and not in the nose bleed section were around $500 a person, even for something as long standing as "The Lion King".   I was frankly shocked and cannot see paying that for a 2-hour show I can eventually watch on TV in my PJs.  I have never been a fan of live theater so it made no difference to me but I will go once in while to take Clark as she does like the shows.  But we just could not justify those prices for a basic ticket.  If you want to stand in line for hours to get discount tickets by all means do but at our age, today standing in line is not an option.  We were pleased and surprised that the galleries and museums either comped us or charged a significantly lower admission price with me being a veteran.  I always show my veteran card as you never know but at least in NYC over 90% of museums fully comped me and Clark being a veteran.

6. Plenty of people like ourselves go to New York with the primary goal of eating well. There is no question some of the best food in the world is served in NYC. One area of disappointment is the pricing for fine dining. There were more than one article in The Times that we read going over how ridiculous dinner for two had become price wise. One article mentioned 2 restaurants La Pavillion and Saga. We had dinner at La Pavillion and Saga was at the Mint house. At both of those places dinner for two with wine is around $1000. Saga interestingly requires payment in advance with no refund for their basic prefix dinner which works out to around $700 a couple with nothing else added. Our dinner at Le Pavilion was in fact $1000. It was wonderful and overall we felt it was worth the price but again you simply can't afford that on a regular basis unless you're a billionaire. Daniel Boulard's other place we went to Le Gratin is clearly a better and more economical choice. Outside of fine dining the other reason to go to New York City is for great ethnic food and we were able to have truly authentic Chinese, Greek, and Italian and you really shouldn't miss these opportunities in New York City. We enjoyed going to Wu's Wonton King. When you walk up the duck and pigs are hanging in the window which immediately tells you it's authentic. We had Greek food at Milo's at Hudson Yard that was out of this world and we went to Morini for Sunday brunch which is authentic Italian as you can get in Little Italy. Of course in every city block, there's an excellent deli where you can get great sandwiches. Most of them have a hot bar and pastries, you really can't go hungry in New York. At 70 Pine there is a hole in the wall deli called Taz which you can easily miss it doesn't look like much but when you go in at the back is in fact a great deli and hot bar with extremely friendly owner and servers that will take great care of you and you will get good food.

Classic Lyon French Cuisine at a reasonable price, Le Gratin

Le Gratin by Daniel Boulard is a classic restaurant and makes you feel that you are in the heart of Paris or Lyon. The décor reminded me of Mollard up by the opera in Paris. We enjoyed a wonderful dining experience. The food is classic French and very importantly it is very reasonably priced compared to other fine dining restaurants in New York City. We had a delightful dinner with the usual classics and I had Pike Quinells which were quite good and something you almost never see. It is not a Bouchon restaurant as many think and why Daniel uses that name is beyond me but it is clearly a classic Lyon French restaurant. I highly recommend it, the only deficit if there is one is the wine list is somewhat small but the prices are some of the most reasonable in town. As an added bonus next door there is a hopping happy bar in I believe what is called the Temple Court, it looks like The library at Trinity College in Dublin Ireland it was very well decorated and a lot of people just a happening place.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d24007645-r872196439-Le_Gratin-New_York_City_New_York.html#

Classic French Burgundy, Batard

Dinner at Batard in New York City is a classic experience. It is basically a French burgundy restaurant and for the most part 95% of the wine list is French burgundy which is one of the main reasons we went. Our 1st dishes were Russian caviar and Country pate both excellent and paired with a Chassange Montrachet from the Drouhin vineyards. We also had classic duck and Dover Sole that were perfectly prepared and further prepared at the table side. We were pretty full so passed on dessert though the dessert menu looked good. We were pleased with our meal understanding that it was very expensive. In general, you can't go to a top restaurant in New York and get a bottle of wine under $250, there are a few but truly most ones that you would want are gonna be about $250 regardless of where you go which adds to the bill. Batards prix fixe menu was reasonably priced the only reason we had a higher bill is that we pretty much ordered everything with a supplement. I recommend Batard and would go back.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d6663091-r871895999-Batard-New_York_City_New_York.html#

Spectacular Seafood Greek Style, Milos Hudson Yards

I have always loved Greek restaurants and Milos is one of the best. Located in the New Hudson yard complex in New York City the view is spectacular overlooking the Hudson river. The place was packed when we were there for lunch and based on current restaurant pricing in New York City I highly recommend you restrict your restaurant visits to these types of establishments at lunch. Even then the price for many is cost prohibitive. We had a perfectly prepared meal. I have always loved the way Greek restaurants prepare their fish using an almost perfect combination of Olive oil garlic and lemon. I started with a hummus platter that had 3 different types of hummus that were outstanding. Dessert was a joy. They have an extensive menu of fresh fish and shellfish in fact they had fresh stone crab which I would think is fairly rare in New York but again all fresh. We had a great bottle of wine and I was familiar with the vineyard and knew the owner it was a French white burgundy from Chateau Fuisse and it couldn't have been better. Service was 5 star and the meal was just memorable and spectacular. I highly recommend this restaurant.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d17327191-r871894844-Estiatorio_Milos-New_York_City_New_York.html#

Best Epoisse sauce ever, Le Pavillion

Le Pavilion is one of Daniel Boulards many restaurants in the New York area. It is located at One Vanderbilt which is directly next to Grand Central Station. Interestingly the main entrance is right across from the entrance to the Campbell Apartments which has an old art deco bar that we have been to many times , we visited last night and it is the same as it's been since the 1920s. We were warmly greeted on arrival and throughout the evening staff was professional accommodating friendly and helpful. Overall the food was excellent there were some exceptional dishes one of which I had probably the best Epoisse cheese sauce I've ever had in my life it could not have been made more perfectly and tasty. I could not refuse shaved white truffles on Dover Sole. The wine list was extensive with plenty of great wines including cult ones to experience but be aware the prices were 300% retail so very expensive though I was able to find a reasonable White Burgundy that satisfied our taste buds for the evening. Overall the dinner was elegant and expertly prepared the chef was able to accommodate special requests and in general we thought we received value for our dinner understanding of course that this restaurant is an expensive evening out but it is also in line with what you would expect in New York City from a top shelf restaurant.

 
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d23423222-r871605664-Le_Pavillon-New_York_City_New_York.html#

Excellent Italian Sunday Brunch, Osteria Morini, Little Italy

An excellent place for Sunday brunch with great Italian food. They have a very good Italian wine list that though smaller than usual packs a lot of good stuff. I ended up having 3 different glasses of Italian white wine that one usually never sees like a Pecorino wine. The food was so good we order dinner to go as it was our last night in town and we needed to stay in our room and pack to catch the next day's flight home. Pasta is made in-house and I had an exceptional ravioli stuffed with ricotta in a white truffle sauce that was to die for. I am still tasting the finish 2 days later. Service was attentive and helpful. We came for one reason the chef or owner is also associated somehow with Ai Fiori which used to be our favorite restaurant in NYC but our lunch there this week was disappointing. But I am happy to say brunch at Morini was wonderful and recommended.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60763-d1995049-r872305798-Osteria_Morini-New_York_City_New_York.html#