Floors and Ceilings - Michelin Stars and Stories

Note: Any reference to a restaurant alongside physical stars on this page are in BLSM units, not Michelin units.

What better way to kick off the posts in this section than by humbly bragging about all the Michelin star food I have had. I could write this article without specifically covering places I have been, but it wouldn't be half as good. Please reserve judgment on this until you have finished the piece, but discussing "Michelin stars" is one of the most common topics that comes up for me when talking about restaurant-going more as a concept and less as commentary on a given restaurant. When people talk about what going out to eat means to them - even those people who are especially interested in the hobby - you can generally bucket them into two simple categories: people who don't care for the "fine dining" lean that Michelin tends to favor and people who do care. In there somewhere are a lot of talking points about picky eaters, status chasers, affordability, and more. I'll cover some of that here, but not in much detail.

If you read the eating "manifesto," you will find a bit of writing about my time in New York, how and why I spent so much time and effort looking for places to go, and how dining in New York shaped my affection for and understanding of restaurants. Without repeating myself too much, I was in a new city with only so many new friends and frequently unsure of how to spend my time outside of work. I knew I liked food, though, and I had heard the city had some decent offerings. Deciding where to eat was an obvious first step. And that first step was probably the most time consuming part of this journey. How was I to know which recommendations to trust, which restaurant review websites were legit, what was popular and good vs what was just popular, etc.? You could go practically anywhere for any type of food in New York, and the concept of making this a huge part of my social life terrified me. What if I spend thousands of dollars exploring restaurants in the city by just winging it? I could skip that step and lean on general internet reviews and shitty blogs like this, but who are these people to know? Did they pass some sort of special palette test? Sites popped up that seemed exclusively geared toward reviewing restaurants with ratings and commentary that demonstrated some level of thoughtfulness, but again, I couldn't figure what made Joe Food Consumer special. (In time, I learned that Joe Food Consumer and his friends did pass a special palette test, and the test was simply trying and experiencing more shit than anyone else and comparing it to all the other shit, but I didn't know this at the time. Frankly, I think my level of ignorance was incredibly rewarding, and I'm not certain I would have the same concept and understanding of the entire restaurant industry without it). Of course, in all my reading, I read about Michelin-starred restaurants, too. Though I still had no idea what the fuck any of it meant, this seemed marginally more legit, even when accounting for the fact that the reviewers were unknown and the reviews were associated with a tire company. Most notably, I was intrigued by how people talked about these restaurants, the clear celebrity of the chefs, the glitz, the glam, and admittedly (or embarrassingly) the price associated with them. These might not be my cup of tea, but surely the food must at least be good and I must prefer to spend more to eliminate the risk of spending anything at all for food that isn't, right?

Surely the food must at least be good and I must prefer to spend more to eliminate the risk of spending anything at all for food that isn't, right? Pretty much, yeah. In my head, this naturally felt like "the Michelin floor." My personal familiarity with the concept of something's "floor" or "ceiling" comes primarily from my consumption of sports. People use these fucking phrases all the time. "He's got a much higher ceiling, but his floor is pretty low." Or, "he's got a high floor but a low ceiling." More fancy than saying "he might suck ass, but he could be really good." Easy enough of a concept to grasp, and I assume it doesn't need much of an explanation. As far as Michelin star dining goes, it's not particularly complex either. The main question and answer here just about say it perfectly. But I started this blog so I could bore you to death with my own elaborate explanation of this bullshit. Cooking at these restaurants can't be every chef's dream, but you probably don't cook at one because you crushed an interview. Now, the ratio of chefs who want to cook at or own a Michelin star restaurant instead of the alternative must be far lower than the same for people who aspire to be professional athletes. (You never hear some dude say, "the pros are legit, but I much prefer to play minor league ball," unless they don't want to admit they suck or they are in year 8 of getting NIL money better than any pro contract they could get). You don't just stumble upon cooking at one by bringing your blog to the restaurant to show them how much you love food. You probably aren't cooking at one just because you used to make dinner with your Mom growing up. You are, more likely than not, cooking at one because you spent years training to cook, asking and answering the "why" through those experiences, and then you spent an inordinate amount of time doing it under the leadership of other people who did the same and eventually as a leader.

And therein lies the floor. There is no question that the food is being made by people who excel at cooking it, but there is also an inspiring attention to detail. And that attention to detail holds true of the entire meal - food, service, and otherwise - from the moment you walk in the door. Knowing that you are going to have very good food, be well taken care of, get in and out on a schedule, and generally have your experience maximized by those people responsible for providing it is meaningful. Whether that is a cause or an effect of the Michelin star(s), my experience has been that the outcome is usually the same. Food and an experience that you rarely regret spending your time and money on.

Look, having a "high floor" is fine, but it's not that big of a selling point. It was great for me, particularly in my exploratory phase, but it's not going to move someone much who has mostly figured out how to find good food around them. The real value of these places comes from their ceiling. If you go to enough of them, you will consistently experience some of the best food you have had in your life. Even more, that food - or at least how the ingredients make it up and the manner in which it is provided - will be relatively new to you, no matter how many of these places you go to. Is that valuable on its own? Nah, not really, but again, the food is really fucking good.

How we think about the ceiling itself is somewhat context dependent. Michelin doles out 2 and 3 stars primarily to restaurants doing tasting menus, the stuff more commonly thought of as "fine dining." There are plenty of 1 star restaurants that would fall into the same bucket, but there are plenty that wouldn't. Though the simple distinction of great, interesting food and a wonderful experience remains the same, the appeal of the Michelin restaurant offering an a la carte menu differs meaningfully from those offering the tasting menu. The a la carte restaurant offers you food that you can relate to and understand but more complex, more interesting, and frankly, better than you remember foods like that tasting. These are the gems.

I have been to most of those restaurants at least a few times, partially because they are more affordable than your average Michelin-starred restaurant, but mostly - beyond all that I have said above - because they are incredibly approachable. The other side of the coin are the tasting menu restaurants, typically more extravagant, more involved, set eating times of 2 hours or more, far more expensive, and more likely to challenge your food preferences. These excel in the opposite way of the a la carte and prix fixe menus. Where those give you food for which you have a reference point, these give you food that you cannot even pretend to convince yourself you could have at home. Instead of, "I have never had chicken that good," you are more likely to say, "what the fuck did I just eat and why was it so good?" You might have to open your mind to new possibilities and you definitely have to close your eyes when you pay, but you will leave far more inquisitive about food than you came, time and time again.

I couldn't write this piece without covering some topics about what it is not meant to represent. If you are a picky eater, either don't go or focus on those with an a la carte or prix fixe menu that you are aware of in advance. I'm not going to try and sell you on the concept of eating an expensive dinner filled with stuff that makes you uncomfortable. Obviously, you should grow up, but I'm not stupid enough to hope that this food changes your mind about a lifelong fear of peas or some shit.

This is also not a piece to suggest that these will be the best value restaurants you experience after adjusting for price. For me, in some ways they are and in others they are not. I have absolutely no interest in getting into a discussion about the value of a Michelin-starred restaurant as compared with the place in the hills of Italy where someone once got a pasta, a steak, two glasses of wine, and free limoncello shots from the owner, all for 31 USD. Those places are incredible, and finding them is like discovering oil underneath your land, but there doesn't exist a singular guide for those places. You know why? Because if there did, they wouldn't cost 31 dollars anymore.

Lastly, this is not a blind endorsement of the Michelin process or reviews. There is presumably as much political bullshit involved in them as any other organization on earth. Look no further than France, a country with something like 250 more restaurants with stars than the next closest country. Give me a fucking break.

It's a piece about my explorations of Michelin star dining and a point from which to view it. It's an opportunity to inspire folks to read these stories and give some of these places a try. I would be lying if I didn't also admit that this is an opportunity to perform my Curt Cignetti "look me up" moment. A way for me to give some credence to my reviews going forward and elaborate on how I contextualize eating. Some additional ratings below.