The conversation from the %26quot;Marais Don%26#39;t Miss%26quot; thread inspired me to start this one.
I hope Plantagenest (my apologies if I got that wrong) and Owlyn will repeat their suggestions...
Here%26#39;s what I%26#39;ve read (because I have no personal experience but that will change in March!!!)
I am gearing this for people like myself who can read %26amp; speak some French but are NOT fluent
Avoid
areas immediately around tourist attractions
menus translated into multiple languages
life-sized statues of a chef holding a menu
tour buses
mostly foreign customers
What criteria do you use (aside from reading the menu) to choose or pass-by a restaurant?
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Perhaps I should have said reading the PRICE on the menu... the menu itself is a clue I suppose...
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Avoid any place with pictures of the food in the windows.
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Good signs would be:
Lots of people in the place, a line up and not a tourist in sight.
Menu only in French and well composed.
Should have a feel to it, an ambiance.
Bad signs:
Tourists, menu in different languages.
Junky furniture, not clean, empty.
Uninspiring menu.
Place smells bad, literally.
Doesn%26#39;t look expensive but is.
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Good sign: food tastes good
Bad sign: food tastes bad
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Very concise, Jack! Unfortunately a bit late by the time you know that, tho...
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I am thanking my lucky stars that my daughter is fluent in french - who knows what I could end up ordering from a menu I can%26#39;t read!
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Not being a foodie nor having extra money to spend on bad meals, I do a lot of research first, make a list of potential choices and pretty much work my way through them. I typically avoid the most heavily, frequently recommended places because it will therefore have a high tourist ratio and be more expensive (even if the food is very good). We don%26#39;t sleep %26#39;central%26#39; and we rarely eat %26#39;central%26#39; either. We like informal atmospheres, non-fancy table settings, non-frou-frou cooking and where we won%26#39;t feel compelled to order 3-4 courses (b/c we just can%26#39;t eat that much).
I do look up places people mention in their posts or hotel reviews. I use several online restaurant review sites, and do some %26#39;googling%26#39;. If a restaurant interests me, I will put it on the list if I can find a few recent web posts but not a LOT of them. I also use Google map and do restaurant searches just to see what is nearby, then do more online research to see what might be ok for us.
Here are a few websites you can use for research:
http://www.restoaparis.com/
http://www.eatinparis.com/
http://www.oubouffer.com/
fra.cityvox.fr/restaurants_paris/Restaurants
Free French food glossary (.pdf file)
http://www.intimatefrance.com/glossary.html
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Rules we use
Nothing on the waterfront
Nothing that floats, moves or revolves
Nothing on the main square of a tourist attraction
Nothing with a tout outside saying %26quot;Come in, lovely restaurant%26quot;
Nothing where there are pictures or models of the food (except in Hong Kong)
Careful where the menu is in multiple languages; a translation can be very useful
Careful when the place is small but the menu is huge (some food will invariably be pre-prepared or frozen)
Nothing where there is no one eating (unless we are unfashionably early)
The place has to look and smell clean and inviting
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All the above suggestions are very good. My trick of looking at a menu, and intuitively knowing if it is a good menu or not, can%26#39;t really be taught as it something one learn through growing up in France and being exposed to all sorts of foodstuff, or, at the very least, from either having lived in France for a few years or going to France regularly just to try more restaurants and, in both cases, having a passion for food. It is similar to the ability of a USA baseball fan to watch a young new player for only a couples of games and being sure that this player will be a champion.
it is Plantagenesta by the way, as I didn%26#39;t wanted to be confused with the Royal Plantagenet family or people who bear this famous name. My apologies for the complicated name.
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hevachick,
I don%26#39;t feel qualified to give restaurant-finding tips for Paris, as we evidently did not do well there. I can give you tips for Philadelphia, and things that work in general. Most are just common sense, really:
* The place should be crowded at a time it should be crowded. A line is not neccessarily a sign of a good restaurant. It might indeed be good, but a line is just a sign that there is a wait for a table.
* The menu, if not posted on the outside, should be _cheerfully_ made available to you if requested, prior to seating. I%26#39;m iffy on whether or not it should be posted outside. Really good places don%26#39;t need to do that, but considerate places will. Sometimes it%26#39;s just the local custom
* Pictures of food. I agree, they should not be on the menu- except for Japanese food, where it is the custom to have pictures. The pictures better look good, though- not like plastic as they usually do.
* The staff should look happy, or at least not scowling.
* The customers should look happy. There should be food on the tables. Empty tables should be clean and/or set up. If there are several tables that have not yet been bussed, it%26#39;s a sign of bad service. Usually same thing if there are lots of customers but no food to be seen (although there could have just been a mass turnover- it happens).
* The host/hostess should not be otherwise occupied (with cell phone calls, talking to other staff planning the after-hours activities, etc.) while you stand there waiting to be greeted.
* This one can%26#39;t be done before you sit down, and I%26#39;m sure does not apply to Paris anyway: The waitstaff should have eaten in a restaurant before. In some places I%26#39;ve been to, I get the idea that the waitperson has never actually been a customer in a restaurant, as they have no clue how to wait on a table.
* Use your nose. If the place smells like good food, it probably has good food. (Note: This does not necessarily apply to Italian restaurants. Most do smell good. An Italian restaurant has to smell _really_ good.) If it smells like an exterminator was just there, well, at least the bugs are dead. The food _might_ be good, and at least the owner cares enough to hire someone to kill the bugs. But it should be done way before opening- so it is ultimately a bad sign (duh).
Speaking of Italian restaurants- if it has red checkered tablecloths, it is probably not good (there are exceptions, so don%26#39;t yell at me). Most seafood resturants with paper tablecloths are good. Or maybe it%26#39;s just that the people that eat there are slobs. This one is tricky.
Falafel places with a line have good falafel. The longer the line, the better the falafel. I aean, who%26#39;s going to wait in line for falafel unless it%26#39;s awesome? Sorry, couldn%26#39;t resist.
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