THE GUIDES

Why aspire to have an entry in the guides? Depending on which guide you are in – preferably a non fee-paying one – it will add extra publicity and respect. The reader will seek out the best one suited to their needs in their own area or in other areas of the country they intend visiting for pleasure or work. But there are good, mediocre and bad guides. I simply list the ones that matter in the trade, the ones that restaurateurs aspire to achieve an entry in rather than the guides in which you pay to have an entry. Your customers are, generally speaking, a discerning lot and can sniff an advertising puff when they come across it.

Les Routiers is a case in point. The famous blue and red symbol, since its inception in 1935 in France, indicates hotels and restaurants of individual character. They are often managed by the owner and offer ‘good food, warm hospitality and excellent value for money.’

And in the twenty-first century? These are still the guiding principles, according to Nicholas Stanley, Managing Director. Les Routiers Limited is a network of independent restaurants, pubs and hotels located in the UK and Ireland but is also an ‘umbrella organisation marking their shared values and individual appeal through the Les Routiers brand.’ In short, you pay for the privilege and submit your own copy. Small restaurants are from £450, establishments with over 50 covers £600 for their marketing membership.

I wouldn’t wish anyone to spend a penny in some restaurants in the guide which I have reviewed as a restaurant critic. Not only has the food been bad but the service and establishment too. Paradoxically it also lists some very good restaurants, management having taken the decision to spread their restaurant’s publicity wings widely by having an entry in the guide. The choice, of course, is theirs and yours. If you wish to find out more about entry contact info@routiers.co.uk.

Top guides, as recognised by restaurateurs and customers, are without doubt The Good Food Guide and The Michelin Guide in the UK and Ireland. Other good guides include The AA Restaurant Guide, Harden’s UK Restaurants (although not a favourite of many restaurateurs), Time Out Eating and Drinking in Great Britain and Ireland, Time Out Eating and Drinking In London and Georgina Campbell’s Jameson Guide Ireland. The Zagat Survey can also be useful.

The AA Restaurant Guide

This hefty tome, nearly 700 pages in 2004, lists 675 stand-alone restaurants and 1,200 restaurants that are part of hotels. The AA has a mere 30 inspectors and awards AA rosettes. These go from one rosette for ‘excellent local restaurants serving food prepared with care, understanding and skill, using good quality ingredients’ to five rosettes, awarded to ‘the finest restaurants in the British Isles, where cooking stands comparison with the best in the world.’ Four restaurants achieved this accolade in the 2004 guide.

AA rosettes are awarded solely for the cooking and consistency, the standard to be achieved ‘regardless of the chef’s day off!’ Ambience, style, comfort, layout and presentation of menu, appearance, attitude and efficiency of service and the quality of the wine list ‘should all fit the ambition of the cooking’ too. There are other entries too for non-rosette winners.

My quibble with the guide is its layout, with very busy pages and some inconsistencies making it a bit of a challenge to negotiate and read. All that text, all those pictures, all those counties crashing into one another with nary a gap. Are the inspectors discriminating enough? There are some entries I would not have put in the guide but this is subjective. It is out of date too, with a number of restaurants that closed way before the guide was printed. Maps are not easy on the eye either.

There is no payment required for entry but pictures cost. The editor welcomes restaurants to submit their details for inspection and, hopefully, inclusion.

The AA Restaurant Guide has a competition, the AA Chefs’ Chef, an annual poll of all the chefs in the guide who vote to recognise the achievements of one of their peers from a shortlist. Michel Roux of the Waterside Inn, Bray, was the 2004 winner.

Website: www.theaa.com

Georgina Campbell’s Jameson Guide – Ireland’s best places to eat, drink and stay

Georgina Campbell, indefatigable writer on Irish cuisine and hospitality, conceived this guide in 1998, its main sponsor being Jameson Irish Whiskey.

It covers over 900 restaurants, pubs, country houses, hotels, cafés, guesthouses and farmhouses throughout the north and south of Ireland, and prides itself on highlighting the quality and the variety of Irish produce.

It is particularly interested in restaurants giving the provenance of their ingredients on menus, with the emphasis on quality from artisan producers.

The no-gimmick verbose guide, written with heart-and-soul, has a rating system with a quirky demi-star denoting a restaurant approaching full-star status. Three stars is the highest rating. It rightly celebrates the culinary revolution that has taken place in Ireland over the past 20 years.

There is a sister guide, Georgina Campbell’s Jameson Guide Dublin which lists restaurants by post code (as does the main guide in the capital) and by cuisine and speciality. Both assess entries independently and there is no payment for inclusion. No advertising is allowed by entries.

Website: www.ireland-guide.com

The Good Food Guide

The Good Food Guide was first published in 1952, then taken up and published by the Which? Consumers Guides in 1962. It is the one found in keen diners’ cars for searching for a recommended restaurant en route in town or country, with perhaps another copy at home for research or simply drooling over the descriptions of the food and places.

The unmistakable initials – GFG – are part of its unmistakable character. The idea to promote and find good food came about after World War Two as a club for those consumers unable to stand another plate of beige food and who wished to put quality back into meals.

Raymond Postgate, the first editor, created the first stocky little pocket edition in those post-war years. Inspectors recruited over 50 years included a future Chancellor of the Exchequer, three world-famous English conductors, a socialist bishop and John Arlott, the cricket commentator.

In those first editions you could also find a 1934 Chambertin for 18 shillings, dinner at the Lygon Arms for 18/6d and, sociologically, a fascinating study of past indignities including one of women, by order of management, forbidden to be served at the bar. This notice was prominently displayed in a Castle Combe hotel and would have been wrenched from its site by subsequent generations of both men and women.

The GFG continues to be very much a compendium of shared experiences by readers and inspectors. Andrew Turvil is the guide’s sixth and current editor and his illustrious predecessors have included Christopher Driver, Drew Smith, Tom Jaine and Jim Ainsworth.

This shared wealth of knowledge covers 1,000 main entries and 300 in a round-up section of the best on offer in England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and the Channel Islands.

‘We look for restaurants serving fresh food carefully prepared, as simple as that,’ according to Andrew, ‘and it can include anything from a small café serving perfectly fresh unadorned seafood to a smart restaurant delivering the finest haute cuisine. If it’s enjoyed by our readers and approved by inspectors, it will appear in the GFG.’

How the GFG works

There are currently 70 inspectors nationally and they are the eyes and ears on the ground, to say nothing of the taste buds being given quite a workout. They are freelance, keep the guide informed of what’s going on in their area and undertake official yet anonymous visits on behalf of the guide.

Some have professional experience in the hospitality industry as either chefs or restaurateurs, others are food and wine journalists and the rest are readers of the guide.

Each inspection is undertaken as a full meal, usually for two people so that the experience is the same as for a typical diner.

There have been a few changes over the years since my restaurant’s entries in the guide. The cooking marks are now from one to ten rather than up to five, giving it more scope for definition of requirements. It also has a new font and page format, but the original ethos is still there. A very readable, unfussy, user-friendly guide with easy to follow symbols and good layout. Published yearly in September.

Restaurants are not charged for inclusion in the guide. Contact the guide to let them know you exist, send in menus, wine list and information about your restaurant and staff and hopefully an inspection will follow. Good Food Guide, 2 Marylebone Road, London NW1 4DF.

Website: www.which.net Good Food Guide

Harden’s UK Restaurants

One of the simpler, easier to read guides on the market ‘where real people eat’. It includes restaurants, country house hotels, pubs, curry houses and chippies – and ‘pulls no punches’, according to its editors.

Published in October each year, Harden’s relies on a comprehensive survey of regular restaurant goers and analyses around 80,000 reports on 1,500 restaurants, including ones in Dublin.

Categories on the survey include ‘top gastronomic experience’, ‘your favourite restaurant’, ‘best bar/pub food’, ‘most romantic’, ‘most disappointing cooking’ and several other ethnic and cuisine categories. Their rating is one to five (one being excellent, five being disappointing).

Remy Martin, sponsors of the guide, award Restaurant Remys to new and up and coming restaurants, with ten each in London and outside the capital.

No fee is payable for inclusion in this guide or its sister guide, Harden’s London Restaurants (published in September), nor is any advertising or hospitality accepted.

In London, all 1,200 restaurants are visited by its editors. The UK restaurants are inspected only if they are notably interesting. All editors’ visits are paid for by the guide.

Also included in both guides are forthcoming openings of note with a brief, non-critical entry outlining contact details. The deadline for submissions is early July for the London restaurants and early August for UK ones.

Harden’s Guides were conceived in 1992 (the London guide) and 1998 (UK guide) by brothers Richard and Peter Harden, and have ‘an enviable knack of getting the verdict right in as few words as possible’ says Scotland On Sunday’s restaurant critic. The Irish Times goes one better: ‘Utterly and ruthlessly honest.’ But, as mentioned in the introduction to the guides, a number of restaurateurs have an aversion to this one.

Website: www.hardens.com

The Michelin Guide

The Michelin Guide, conceived in France in 1900 for hungry motorists, now has eight guides covering 21 European countries. The UK one was first published in 1974. It covers hotels and restaurants with minimal wording, its timeless symbols denoting facilities, features and categories.

The guide, published annually, employs only 70 full-time inspectors, who have training and experience in the hotel and catering industry for the whole of Europe. Each establishment ‘is visited and/or tested by our staff at least once in the year’, including many that don’t make the grade.

This is the guide many chefs aspire to, a Michelin star adding huge kudos firstly to the chef, the restaurant taking second place. If the chef decamps, the star is lost to both chef and restaurant.

Three Michelin stars: ‘Exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey – one always eats here extremely well, sometimes superbly. Fine wines, faultless service, elegant surroundings. One will pay accordingly.’

Two Michelin stars: ‘Excellent cooking, worth a detour – specialities and wines of first class quality. This will be reflected in the price.’

One Michelin star: ‘A very good restaurant in its category – the star indicates a good place to stop on your journey. But beware of comparing the star given to an expensive ‘de luxe’ establishment to that of a simple restaurant where you can appreciate fine cooking at a reasonable price.’

Other restaurant symbols include crossed knives and forks – one to five – which denote the degree of comfort, the latest addition being a fork and mug for traditional pubs serving good food.

The Bib Gourmand, with the Michelin man’s head in red, denotes good food at moderate prices (£25) at a less elaborate restaurant.

In the UK 2004 guide only three places were awarded three Michelin stars, with 11 two-stars, 96 one-stars and some 5,621 restaurants awarded entry.

Michelin updates

In the past, it was perceived that, in order to gain a star, lavish comfort was one irrefutable necessity. This has been relaxed quite considerably due to changing, more informal times. Two pubs have been awarded stars in the latest guide, unthinkable only a few years ago.

A Michelin inspector (now ex) recently wrote a controversial book about the guide, stating that the gourmet restaurant bible was understaffed, out of date and in thrall to big-name chefs in France. A number of restaurateurs and critics were not taken aback by these criticisms as they had felt the guide had lost some of its authority. Despite this, it is still seen by many as a true reflection of good restaurants (and hotels) in the 21 countries featured in the eight published guides. Inclusion is free. The UK Guide is published in mid-January. Website www.themichelinguide-gbirl@uk.michelin.com

Time Out Eating and Drinking in Great Britain and Ireland and The Time Out London Eating and Drinking Guide

The London guide, first published in 1983, was followed by the Great Britain and Ireland one in 2004, with 1,200 entries in each well-produced, independent publication. These are the books that are the most helpful and readable and come from the large Time Out stable of guides.

London Guide

In the London guide, restaurants are considerately grouped into types and ethnicity (brasserie, pubs, wine bars, Greek, Italian, Thai, for example), eating on a budget and by area. There is also a useful list of where to do brunch, Sunday lunch, late eating, eating alone, taking a date, taking the kids, spotting a celeb, finding the unfamiliar and loving the look. Innovative.

It includes too a list of new restaurants and closures, immensely good boxed information giving the lowdown on Sri Lankan, Thai, Indian food etc, with explanations of words and dishes you may find on menus.

A red star denotes a very good restaurant of its type, a green star helping to identify a more budget conscious eatery. Annual awards are given for best bar, pub, local restaurant, gastropub, family restaurant, Indian restaurant, cheap eat, vegetarian meal, design, new restaurant and an award for outstanding achievement. Excellent photography too.

Ireland Guide

The Time Out Eating and Drinking in Great Britain and Ireland, a small volume in comparison, is a very welcome addition to the national scene and uses the same star system and other helpful information. Regional listing includes London but I do question why some of the entries in both volumes have been included and others left out.

Around 50 ‘mostly’ freelance inspectors, mainly food journalists, are their writers. Good, clear maps in both guides. No payment to be included in either book. ‘Places are re-reviewed each year.’

Website: www.timeout.com

The Zagat Survey

Started by New Yorkers Tim and Nina Zagat in 1979 there has been a London Restaurant Guide for years. It is just one of the many guides in the US and Europe to have emerged via the Survey which invites diners to rate and review restaurants and many other leisure pursuits they have visited.

However, this quirky read can become tiresome. It does have a location index, useful ‘all day dining’, ‘breakfast/brunch’ and many more categories to look up. Not always up to date and not widely known except for aficionados of the genre. Website: www.zagat.com

Local lists

Your local tourist information office may have a list of restaurants to which you can add your premises. Also scout around the web to link your restaurant to your area. There may also be other websites you can be part of.

Do contact the local media via a press release if you are entered in a prestigious guide (see how to write a press release). Contact the national media if you have been awarded a Michelin star, an AA rosette or are given a high rating in The Good Food Guide.