The World's 50 Best Restaurant Awards, 2021

[10023]

Originally Posted by montréaliste

If you put up pictures of yourself with significant other eating at Chili’s; I’ll believe you…

Why in god’s name would I do that?

All of those restaurant chains - every single one - serves completely inedible food.

[mousquet]

Since we've been speaking of high-end cuisine in this thread, I got to say I'm quite shocked by the snobbish attitude of some wealthy people in restaurants sometimes.
For instance, one of my cousin has worked in upscale restaurants in the Paris region for long. She always told us some wealthy people had a disgusting, scornful and despicable behavior.
Like some Russian nouveaux riches (means "new rich") that order a whole bunch of expensive dishes for a single meal, but barely taste them. They just want to show how wealthy they are, then most of the things they order have to eventually go to the garbage.
Those people are ultimate douchebags. They are the worst.

We were raised in a legit Catholic family and our grandparents taught us about 2 good things when it comes to food.
1 - you must sometimes thank the Lord for it and pray for everybody in the world to have enough stuff to fill their stomachs.
2 - you do not waste it, ever. You eat it all to the last bite, especially when it's creatures that they had to slaughter to feed you (meat and fish).

I'm proud of these values they were good enough to teach us, because I think they are very fair.
And people stupidly showing off their wealth because they're basically frustrated by their sorry lives may go fuck themselves.
That's what I got to say about exclusive food, exclusive everything and related pitiful attitude.

Not all wealthy people act like that, though. Some are much better cause they remained simple and natural in their behavior.

[10023]

^ You are not describing a problem with wealthy people, but with Russian nouveau riches (NB: this phrase is also commonly used in English) show-offs. Some wealthy Arabs in London are the same.

Anyway, I’m not a Catholic or religious and I don’t pray for my food.

You should also realize that the requirement to clean one’s plate is cultural (and mostly born out of poverty for the generation that survived the Depression and/or WW2 (at least in the US/UK). In China for example, one never cleans their plate especially if invited to dinner in a private home. It is an insult to the host, as it is traditionally taken to mean that you weren’t given enough to eat (whereas leaving some food implies that the host was very generous).

Personally, I stop eating when I am full and this usually means leaving something, especially when starches are involved (like potatoes), and especially in America where portion sizes are too large. More people should probably do this - maybe not so many would be obese.

[montréaliste]

Originally Posted by 10023

^ You are not describing a problem with wealthy people, but with Russian nouveau riches (NB: this phrase is also commonly used in English) show-offs. Some wealthy Arabs in London are the same.

Anyway, I’m not a Catholic or religious and I don’t pray for my food.

You should also realize that the requirement to clean one’s plate is cultural (and mostly born out of poverty for the generation that survived the Depression and/or WW2 (at least in the US/UK). In China for example, one never cleans their plate especially if invited to dinner in a private home. It is an insult to the host, as it is traditionally taken to mean that you weren’t given enough to eat (whereas leaving some food implies that the host was very generous).

Personally, I stop eating when I am full and this usually means leaving something, especially when starches are involved (like potatoes), and especially in America where portion sizes are too large. More people should probably do this - maybe not so many would be obese.

I think that the “sinfulness” of throwing away food is older than the sorry episode of WWII and located wider than the US or UK. The “sin”, religious or secular, is erased if you doggy bag it, instead of throwing it out.

I was addressing “bigstick’s post, not yours, about frequenting fast food emporia. I think it is pretty obvious by now that you breathe a very rarefied air.

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by 10023

Why in god’s name would I do that?

All of those restaurant chains - every single one - serves completely inedible food.

Those are horrible. In Brazil, Outback is very popular (and expensive). There is nothing good about it. Bad food, high prices, bad ambience.

And we have a local that became popular, called Coco Bambu, focused on seafood. A couple will spend easily R$ 500 (US$ 100) and they serve everything, even rice, out of a microwave oven (!!!).

You would spend R$ 300 at Casa do Porco, 18th on the list.

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by 10023

^ You are not describing a problem with wealthy people, but with Russian nouveau riches (NB: this phrase is also commonly used in English) show-offs. Some wealthy Arabs in London are the same.

Anyway, I’m not a Catholic or religious and I don’t pray for my food.

You should also realize that the requirement to clean one’s plate is cultural (and mostly born out of poverty for the generation that survived the Depression and/or WW2 (at least in the US/UK). In China for example, one never cleans their plate especially if invited to dinner in a private home. It is an insult to the host, as it is traditionally taken to mean that you weren’t given enough to eat (whereas leaving some food implies that the host was very generous).

Personally, I stop eating when I am full and this usually means leaving something, especially when starches are involved (like potatoes), and especially in America where portion sizes are too large. More people should probably do this - maybe not so many would be obese.

You seem to display every elitist dog whistle one can think of.

No chain food is any good (almost any absolutism like this is wrong)
Awareness of an alien culture is a sign of worldliness when applied at home
America is simply never up to European standards of sophistication
A little gluttony applied to a food favorite is a sign of plebeianism.

I think you’re missing a lot of life’s pleasures in your social climb.

[muppet]

Originally Posted by Crawford

If there's a list with restaurants in Panama, Iceland and Panama at/near the top, it probably isn't a legit list. Sorry. There's no market for haute cuisine so there's some form of virtue signalizing or general narrative-building. That doesn't mean these locales can't have fantastic restaurants, but that's not what's being measured.

Haute cuisine requires a deep reservoir of free spending cosmopolitans, which is why most of the world's most renowned restaurants are in the biggest meccas of said demographic. The ingredients and staff for such a business can only exist in a few geographies. I'm not buying that Vietnam and Morocco have sommeliers, pastry chefs, management teams and back of house operations superior to those in Paris.

Michelin stars in Iceland:

https://guide.michelin.com/en/is/restaurants


No Michelin guide to Panama (it would need to release a road guide first), but here's the haute cuisine scene:

https://www.panamaequity.com/explori...try-in-panama/


Likewise, Vietnam which is the biggest shame as it has the world's best food imo. The fact triple starred Michelin chefs have restaurants there but with 0 stars because Michelin doesn't yet have a guide, says a lot -and the fact many of the high end restaurants do East Asian and European (rather than Vietnamese), is a mark as to how easy it is to get amazing Vietnamese food at any foodie market, rather than a fine dining penthouse -that market's constantly undermined. Anyhoo this is Ho Chi Minh City alone:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaura...Minh_City.html

Same again, Morocco (click on the Fine Dining page):

https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restau...kech_Safi.html

[10023]

Originally Posted by montréaliste

I think that the “sinfulness” of throwing away food is older than the sorry episode of WWII and located wider than the US or UK. The “sin”, religious or secular, is erased if you doggy bag it, instead of throwing it out.

I was addressing “bigstick’s post, not yours, about frequenting fast food emporia. I think it is pretty obvious by now that you breathe a very rarefied air.

“Doggy bagging” food is a strictly North American phenomenon, and exists because portion sizes are too large. At many places the portions are intended to provide leftovers to take home, and people go there with this in mind, but that is very weird.

America (and probably Canada, I don’t know) is almost unique in its focus on quantity over quality when it comes to restaurant food. All-you-can-eat buffets and things like Olive Garden’s “never ending pasta bowl” are examples of this. I remember my German family coming to visit when I was growing up in Chicago and being really fascinated by TV commercials for casual dining chains that basically pitched “look how much food you get for $9.99” with no mention of whether it’s any good. It’s about how much food, not the recipes, the ingredients or the cooking. Americans need to quantify value for money.

[10023]

Originally Posted by Pedestrian

You seem to display every elitist dog whistle one can think of.

No chain food is any good (almost any absolutism like this is wrong)
Awareness of an alien culture is a sign of worldliness when applied at home
America is simply never up to European standards of sophistication
A little gluttony applied to a food favorite is a sign of plebeianism.

I think you’re missing a lot of life’s pleasures in your social climb.

Gluttony is fine as an occasional indulgence. I’ll eat as much as anyone at Thanksgiving. The problem is when it becomes an almost nightly activity.

It is possible for a chain to be good but only if it is very narrowly focused on doing one thing well. In-N-Out burgers or Chik-Fil-A fried chicken sandwiches, while obviously not as good as the best of either, are decent enough because of this. The better examples are food trucks (and this is probably why they’ve become so popular). But there’s no sit-down casual dining chain that does anything well, because they’ve all got bloated menus that try to tick lots of boxes and don’t do any actual cooking.

I suppose I’m elitist because I prefer arugula to iceberg lettuce, too?

[muppet]

One I've always wanted to do is Noir in Ho Chi Minh City, where you dine in almost pitch blackness (to concentrate all senses on the food)

https://www.noirdininginthedark.com/menu.html

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by 10023

“Doggy bagging” food is a strictly North American phenomenon, and exists because portion sizes are too large. At many places the portions are intended to provide leftovers to take home, and people go there with this in mind, but that is very weird.

America (and probably Canada, I don’t know) is almost unique in its focus on quantity over quality when it comes to restaurant food. All-you-can-eat buffets and things like Olive Garden’s “never ending pasta bowl” are examples of this. I remember my German family coming to visit when I was growing up in Chicago and being really fascinated by TV commercials for casual dining chains that basically pitched “look how much food you get for $9.99” with no mention of whether it’s any good. It’s about how much food, not the recipes, the ingredients or the cooking. Americans need to quantify value for money.

Establishments vary but it generally isn't done as a demonstration of quantity over quality but rather as an extra customer satisfaction measure (look what amazingly generous hosts we are!) Compared to a grocery store, in restaurants - at least over here - the biggest costs involved are the value-added restaurant stuff (preparation, service, ambiance/space) rather than the food food itself, meaning that you can increase the amount of food provided with very little additional cost. In other words, a restaurant can impress patrons with something very visible and easily quantifiable to them at little cost to the establishment.

[10023]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

Establishments vary but it generally isn't done as a demonstration of quantity over quality but rather as an extra customer satisfaction measure (look what amazingly generous hosts we are!) Compared to a grocery store, in restaurants - at least over here - the biggest costs involved are the value-added restaurant stuff (preparation, service, ambiance/space) rather than the food food itself, meaning that you can increase the amount of food provided with very little additional cost. In other words, a restaurant can impress patrons with something very visible and easily quantifiable to them at little cost to the establishment.

This quite obviously depends on the food itself. If we’re talking about high quality ingredients, or sauces that take time and skill to prepare, then that isn’t true at all.

[bigstick]

Originally Posted by 10023

No one believes you.

I am thrilled that you know my lifestyle, get a life ..

[bigstick]

Originally Posted by muppet

One I've always wanted to do is Noir in Ho Chi Minh City, where you dine in almost pitch blackness (to concentrate all senses on the food)

https://www.noirdininginthedark.com/menu.html

What a ridiculous assortment of Rabbit food.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by 10023

This quite obviously depends on the food itself. If we’re talking about high quality ingredients, or sauces that take time and skill to prepare, then that isn’t true at all.

You're right that some ingredients are very expensive, but sauces that take time and skill to prepare would be a perfect example of the value-added component (labour/technique) outweighing the actual food substance. So making bigger or smaller batches may not be that different in cost.

[10023]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

You're right that some ingredients are very expensive, but sauces that take time and skill to prepare would be a perfect example of the value-added component (labour/technique) outweighing the actual food substance. So making bigger or smaller batches may not be that different in cost.

But you are wrong to assume that “bigger batches” are a possibility. They do prep before service and would make what they need for the day, but for a restaurant doing 40-50 covers with a tasting menu, that may be as many portions as can be made by one person even if portions are small. It’s not like they’re reducing stock pots full of demi-glacé (let alone more complex or unique sauces).

[MolsonExport]

take a deep sniff