What is a Michelin Star and Who Decides If You Get One or Not?

A Michelin Star is a prestigious award given to restaurants that offer a culinary experience of the highest calibre. It is like the Academy Award of the world of gastronomy, a symbol of excellence that every chef aspires to achieve. Stars are awarded by the Michelin Guide, a restaurant guide published annually, and are a symbol of culinary excellence. Restaurants are evaluated by the guide's inspectors based on a series of rigorous criteria, such as the quality of ingredients, preparation technique, taste, the personality expressed in the cuisine, value for money and consistency of performance.

Here's what the different Michelin Star awards mean:

• 1 Star: A very good restaurant in its category, offering high quality cuisine, but without particular complexity. It is worth stopping.
• 2 Stars: Excellent, worth a detour. The restaurant offers exceptional dishes, well thought out and worth a visit.
• 3 Stars: a unique cuisine, that deserves a special trip. This is the highest recognition, reserved for restaurants that offer extraordinary and unforgettable culinary experiences.

Let's see together all the secrets of the macaron and what the Red Guide suggests to obtain it.

The Michelin Star is Awarded to Restaurants, Not to Chefs

The Star is awarded only to restaurants that offer excellent cuisine. And mind you: the restaurants, not the chefs. To assign the recognition, the guide takes into account five criteria that are identical in every part of the world: the quality of the ingredients, the harmony of the flavors, the mastery of the techniques, the personality of the chef expressed in his cuisine and the coherence over time and of the entire menu. This last point is often underestimated but is very important: it means that the inspectors take into great consideration the consistency of the proposal over time.

The Stars are annual awards , which means that every year all the restaurants are re-inspected and every year it is as if it were a "new" Star. The recognition maintained is worth as much as the one earned even if then, net of what Michelin says on the official website, it is evident that it is more difficult to get in than out. There are restaurants that wait years before having the recognition and others that no longer have certain standards that take just as long to be "demoted".

Remember that Michelin does not award recognition for the decor or style of the restaurant, this does not affect the rating in any way. Only the dish counts and not the type of restaurant. Among other things, the website explicitly states that any "restaurant of any style and cuisine can get a Star" (but apparently this does not apply to pizzerias). Service does not count either, as long as it is polite, because for the inspectors only the food on the plate is important. Restaurants, at least officially, do not need to be chic to get the recognition: "One of the big misconceptions about our guide is that our inspectors have a preference for more formal restaurants. This is absolutely not true. This is probably a legacy of 30/40 years ago when, in most European cities, the best cuisine was often found in formal restaurants. Fortunately, we now have Stars awarded to restaurants of the most diverse styles, from Asian to street food! And this is a great step forward for the hospitality industry" we read on the official website. The wine list doesn't matter either, but "restaurants that aim for excellent cuisine generally make sure they also have an interesting wine list, to complete their offerings. So, generally, there are no surprises."

There is therefore no secret formula for getting the macaron, "we are just looking for truly excellent cuisine," the guide continues, "Some Michelin Stars are innovative, others traditional; some offer set menus, others an à la carte choice; some are informal restaurants, others formal. No one will like every single starred restaurant, and rightly so. It is then up to the reader to choose the one that best suits their needs and/or preferences." A restaurant can request, via a form on the site, to be considered for entry into the guide and even individual users can report their favorite addresses so as to "facilitate" the inspectors' task: it is not always easy to be widespread so it is good to have "sentinels."

Who Are the Michelin Guide Judges and What do They do Specifically?

The Michelin inspectors, famously anonymous, all full-time Michelin employees and former restaurant and hospitality professionals, make the decisions. Each restaurant is visited by several inspectors, who then discuss and compare their experiences to make a final decision. There may be several visits or just one, the restaurant is assessed" as often as we consider necessary. Consistency is very important when awarding Michelin Stars, so we need to make sure that customers find the same high-quality cuisine on every visit. Different inspectors will visit the establishment at different times of the year, day and week."

The inspectors try to eat as many dishes as possible during the year "because we need to know the chef's cuisine as best as possible. We need to be sure that all the dishes made in the restaurant have a high and consistent standard". Sometimes they show up alone, sometimes in pairs but it can also happen in a group. It is almost irrelevant because in any case the decisions are made collectively. The inspectors are professionals with great international experience and who are sent around the world every year to eat in all (or almost all) of the countries where the Michelin Guide is present. This guarantees uniformity of judgment because for the Red Guide "a Michelin Star must have the same meaning and the same value, regardless of the place where it is awarded".

The article on the official website ends with three pieces of advice to be given to young chefs by the Michelin Guide:

1. Good cooking starts with great ingredients, so use the best produce you can find, whether it’s tomatoes or chicken.
2. Take pleasure in cooking for your guests, rather than working with the sole goal of reaching the star.
3. Go to other restaurants as well, but also eat what you cook yourself: sometimes we realize that there is something wrong with a dish only when we have already eaten half of it.