Announced today.
New ones:
Diavola, Farmhouse Kitchen Thai, Farmstead, Izakaya Rintaro, La Perla, Millennium, Orchard City Kitchen, Poggio, Ramen Gaijin, Trestle, Wonderful and Zola’s.
Dropped off the list:
Flour + Water, Kin Khao and Perbacco in San Francisco; Iyasare and Ramen Shop in East Bay. Others: Bellanico, C Casa, Domo, Donato Enoteca, Fey, Hot Box Grill, LaSalette, the Girl & the Fig, Troya and Willi’s Wine Bar.
Rintaro and Zola are recently discussed here:
Thoughts?
I would imagine Kin Khao and Perbacco got dropped from the list because of their price. Flour + Water perhaps for the same.
I have no love for Fey or Troya. That’s too bad about Bellanico— I used to eat there a lot when I lived in the East Bay, and learned of them from the Michelin list! Any recent reports?
Wonderful serves great Hunan food.
Farmhouse Kitchen Thai is from the owners of the super popular brunch spot Kitchen Story. Any reports?
Fey’s flavor is rather muted. They were arguably better when they were in San Mateo. The Menlo Park location seems to tone down their dishes.
It’s also time for them to reconsider the $40 threshold given the considerable inflation in the last few years. If they want to maintain the same buying power, change the threshold. Or just come right out and say they are moving the price bracket down indirectly.
It’s also possible some restos got dropped from Bib Gourmand because they got a star. It’s a week of purgatory for them.
From what I’ve been hearing, Wonderful also is a candidate for the Edsel Ford Fong prize for rude staff.
$40 for an app, an entree, a glass of wine, tax and tip ? Brrr, few make the cut at that price.
I just ordered my yearly test of Fey. Still want it to be good. Sigh.
Iyasare might well be getting a star.
If Iyasare drops off the list and doesn’t get a star, and Rintaro makes it onto the list, I would have to question the list and their judgement. They are about the same $$$ and Iyasare’s food is in a different league.
You’d have to question Bon Appetit’s judgement, too. Rintaro made their list of the 10 Best New Restaurants for the entire US.
My opinion of BA wasn’t too high to begin with, but yes I saw their top ten and rolled my eyes.
Maybe they (BA) are trying to boost their street cred by showing how diverse their tastes are
Personally, they all mean nothing to me because I don’t go to fancy places. But have you been to all 10?
It’s $40 BEFORE T&T, it sez here.
No I haven’t tried all (not even close). I think the list is about what’s trendy and hot, which no doubt Rintaro fits that bill. But for me, there is nothing noteworthy about a list of new restaurants when there are so many old restaurants that are better. Lists like those are not meant for me. Same reason I don’t pay attention to where Anthony Bourdain eats. Thanks to people on this board I have better info.
Bringing it back to the topic at hand, I do pay attention to Michelin, especially if I’m traveling. So it’s good to benchmark their opinion vs my own in my home region. Bon Appetit benchmarks have yielded little correlation for the handful of lists I’ve seen over the years.
The only dish which stood out for me at Al’s place (on BA top 10 new list) was their grilled black cod “mullet” (collar) special ($12).
Can you describe the black cod collar a bit, perhaps in a new thread? I tried black cod collar for the first time recently and thought it was inferior to hamachi collar. But there can be big differences in prep and execution.
I love hamachi collar and agree it is better than black cod collar. The black cod collar I had was more like the underside of a hamachi collar; I had to pick at it a little to ferret out the meat, unlike the topside of a hamachi collar. It also didn’t have the beautiful uniform fine grain (reminiscent of sturgeon) and melt in your mouth texture of the topside of a hamachi collar. But it still had some of that prized salty/fatty/crispy skin.
So that’s like a $8 app, a $20 entree, a $12 glass of wine?
They best be adding more chinese places !
Don’t think I’ve ever spent more than $40 of my own money for a meal.
Questioning Michelin ratings. Unbelievable.
