There's big news on the Quebec restaurant scene with 9 Michelin Star awards in Quebec.
Michelin certainly has made a business of judging restaurant quality. They review 17,000 restaurants annually. There are 151 three-star restaurants globally. There are 26 Michelin-starred restaurants in Canada - 25 with one star and one restaurant with two stars.
Michelin ratings started out as a service offered by the tire company in 1889 for car owners in France - a guidebook for hotels.
Independently-reviewed restaurants were added in 1920 and stars emerged in 1926. A 3-star designation is the top level. Even today, the Michelin Guide supposedly does not make money. Instead, it is estimated that it "increases tire sales by 3%". And it sells Michelin Guides - about 250,000 a year. The Guide runs events and licenses the ranking system - e.g. TripAdvisor. And countries pay for coverage. That's what I found out when i initially asked Pearl Morisette about "star status" - their answer was they had to pay Michelin to make the trip and do the assessment. No promise of a star for that investment.
Most restaurants have 1 star. A star adds about 20% more traffic to the restaurant, 2 stars gets 40% more business and 3 stars gets 100% more business.
And how do the restaurants react after getting their star? The article I read says they increased pricing to signal new status, revamped menu language to more sophisticated terms and ingredients.
Would you like to be a Michelin guide "inspector?" You would eat around 250 anonymous meals a year which Michelin calls a table test. travel involves 150 nights in hotels, 600 total visits and 1,000 reports.
And then there are the chefs who "walk away" from their stars. Too much work, tired of making complex multi-course menus, get back to cooking simple dishes,
