What Just Comes to Mind...When I try to Define a "Good" Restaurant

What makes a restaurant outstanding, one-of-a-kind? The sort of place that you would go back to over and over and over and over and would even consider moving into the cooler just so you could get your meals there everyday.

We got our Entertainment Book in the mail yesterday and I, of course, checked out the coupons/discounts for restaurants. As I flipped through, the repetitive phrases began to get a bit wearisome. "Best in Orlando", "From Scratch", "Favorite of the Locals", "Award Winning", "Most Unique", "Cooked to Order", "The Best Restaurant in the World" (ok, that one wasn't in there, but you get the idea). Now, I'm not saying that any of these phrases are wrong or untrue. But they are overused to the point where I am highly suspicious if a restaurant claims to be "the best", "most unique", etc.

So I figured I'd try and define what a really good restaurant is, or even, a good restaurant. First off, anything that claims to be the best is just plain, fooling you, unless they have some credentials to back it up. Here in Orlando, Foodie Awards are a pretty good measure of quality. Even a positive review in the paper helps. But the greatest proof of a "best" sort of restaurant (besides driving by and seeing a line out the door) is a referral from a friend. If I have a friend that tells me they have just seen the most glorious plate of food come out of "fill-in-the-blank" restaurant, I'd be more tempted to try it, especially if I trust my friend's taste in food.

But what about the enticing hook, "Favorite of the locals"? If you are brave enough, grab someone walking down the street, ask if they live in Orlando and have ever heard of the restaurant and whether it is their favorite. For the not so brave of us, for hunger's sake Google the restaurant before you decide to make you meal there! One of the restaurants that uses this phrase in the Entertainment book and shall remain anonymous, I visited for lunch a few years ago. Now it could have changed since then but what I was served was meat, with red sauce, on a toasted hoagie that I could have made myself. Flat out disappointing; favorite of this local? I don't think so!

"Award Winning" has as much authenticity as the "best" claim. Unless they have some food award that is recognizable and not some "Award for excellence in really fancy napkins", don't buy it.

"Most unique"? Really, who are we kidding? There is nothing new under the sun and though there are fun dining experiences and some really interesting means of food preparation, claiming "most unique" is a bit presumptuous. This is the land of Mickey and Minnie remember. If a restaurant has one of our gators as a head chef, however, I may rethink the "most unique" title.

Quite misleading as well is the "Made to order" phrase. Just about anything is made to order these days. Heck, Subway is made to order: they toast their bun, slab on your meat, cheese and veggies all while you stand there and look on. Any take-out pizza joint could be considered "made to order".

As I'm sure you noticed, I skipped the "from scratch" motif. This is one where, if it is part of the restaurant's description, I will sit up and listen. Not that it is entirely safe (Logan's Roadhouse has made form scratch yeast rolls and they are, well, Pillsbury is more impressive). But it takes a lot of guts to claim that you make food from scratch; if the restaurant claims to make most or even all of their food from scratch then it would be work checking out.

So we keep "from scratch". Fresh ingredients, perhaps. If there is an actual, real live chef in the kitchen firing the orders, that is always a plus (and a must in most cases). Never frozen, music to my ears. Local ingredients, now we are talking! Recipes that are created by the owner or chef, yessss; if it is the owner's grandmother, double points. Really made to order, like raw meat in the cooler, bread baked that morning kind of made to order; or better yet, sauces, breads, toppings prepared daily. Not mass produced, definitely. No microwaves, anybody can microwave. And of course, a friendly, welcoming environment is necessary. An ambiance where pride is taken in the great food but even more pride is taken in serving the customers. We all want the Olive Garden tag line "When you're here, you're family" to be true.

So I guess then my definition of a great restaurant is: "From scratch meals with food prepared daily with local ingredients using recipes from the owner's grandmother masterfully created by our esteemed head chef. We'll take care of you, just stop by."