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Waiter, there’s a star in my soup
After an interlude between the retirement of longtime restaurant critic Dale Rice and my getting acclimated to the critic’s job, I’ve reintroduced ratings to our restaurant coverage, starting with this week’s reviews of Silver & Stone Restaurant and Wine Bar in Georgetown (above right, which earned 2 stars out of 5) and the Screaming Goat (above left, which earned 7.1 on a 10-point scale).
Here’s an explanation of that system:
The transition of the American-Statesman’s entertainment magazine from XL to Austin360 also marks the reintroduction of restaurant ratings.
We’ll use two systems, one for fine dining and one for casual restaurants, because their approaches to food, service, atmosphere and value are so different that to rate the best French cooking and the best french fries on the same scale would paint misleading pictures of both.
There’s no empirical definition of ‘fine’ and ‘casual’ dining (unless you count places that call green beans ‘haricots verts’). So my experiences at each place will guide that determination.
Fine dining: A five-star system
Michelin uses three stars. The New York Times uses four. Texas Monthly uses three. The L.A. Weekly, the Austin Chronicle and Westword in Denver forgo restaurant ratings altogether.
But we live in a five-star world, fostered and codified by the citizen soldiers of the Internet. We are accustomed to five-star systems on Yelp.com, Amazon and our own reader ratings on austin360.com. So I’ll rate fine-dining spots on a five-star scale.
My star ratings will come from weighted scores in four categories: food, service, atmosphere and value, with food and service carrying the most weight. Here’s what the ratings mean:
☆☆☆☆ Flaws across the board. Food, service, atmosphere and value suffer on every level.
☆☆☆ Serious room for improvement but with a few bright spots.
☆☆ A good overall experience. Clear mission, solid execution.
☆ Excellent across the board. Perfect in some areas, with only a few small distractions.
An extraordinary restaurant experience from start to finish.
Anything below the one-star threshold will require an additional visit. Without improvement, the restaurant will receive an ‘Unacceptable’ rating.
Casual dining: A 10-point scale
The 10-point casual-dining scale (10 being the highest) allows for more meaningful distinctions than simple up-or-down ratings. The system also is based on weighted scores for food, service, atmosphere and value — but with more weight given to food and value.
(Photo at top: Queso and Shiner at the Screaming Goat; cognac at Silver & Stone. American-Statesman photos by Mike Sutter.)
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