The World’s 50 Best Restaurants list.. and the challenges of staying relevant

One of the things that I loved about The World’s 50 Best Restaurants list is that it has always felt more relevant and more representative than traditional arbitrators of good restaurants like the Michelin Guide. It is geographically diverse and is much quicker at identifying great new chefs and restaurants than most other platforms. 

This year however, I felt that the list missed a chance to stay ahead of the curve in terms of relevance. Staying ahead of the curve isn’t just about recognising the need for diversity and representation but going a step beyond and understanding how that manifests itself on the list. This means going beyond ticking boxes on a checklist but transferring the gaze inwards and continually challenging our assumptions of what we seek from the restaurant experience and why, to seek to define and express what makes a truly great restaurant in today’s world.

To me, this year’s list continues to look at the food experience from the perspective of old, rich, white people and their idea of what it means to be representative or diverse. For me, the great restaurants today tell stories and connect in a way that captures emotion and stories, not just technique and perfection. Whether you look at Gaggan or Den or Disfrutar, eating at these places is a joyous experience, with a sense of authenticity, a cultural rootedness, a postmodern approach to dismantling all the rules that came before. The food, the service, the chefs... everything feels a lot more real and and lot more fun and a lot more human. While the list does recognise some of these restaurants we still see far too many restaurants that are grotesquely swollen by their own self importance, that are sliding down a white-linen clad slippery slope into complete and utter irrelevance. 

This isn’t to say that relevance only comes from exuberance. When I speak of breaking all the rules that came before, a restaurant can do so while continuing to be formal and serious. It can still create a sense of joy and wonder by having something original and fresh to present, that leaves you with a sense of being touched by something deeper than just consumption. Personally, I don’t like the food at Blue Hill at Stone Barns but I believe it is a great restaurant because it has something truly original to say, a philosophy that furthers our understanding of food. Eleven Madison Park and En Cellar de Can Roca are serious restaurants, but when we eat there we see the chef as an artists interpreting their nations’ history and culinary heritage and expressing it through their food in ways that are new and surprising, that are creative and deeply insightful. How many restaurants on this list can we say that about?

Being representative in terms of adding more female chefs and chefs of colour isn’t enough. This year’s list fails to capture the the unfettering of all constraints of the imagination that the best chefs and restaurants in the world have today. It is still burdened by the legacy of French food and the Michelin guide. It takes a few steps forward by recognising what separates an Eleven Madison Park from a Per Se. But then it takes several steps back by continuing to recognise the perfect and perfectly boring Nahm or the pretentious bombast of Atelier Crenn.  

There are far, far too many restaurants on the list that approach guests with an air of supercilious condescension, that haven’t gotten the memo to get over their outdated snobbery. It fails to recognise the emerging generation of eaters that seeks to break down any historical legacy that is based on the tyranny of a narrow and limited culinary tradition, and that represents very few countries and cities. If you want relevance, we need more casual brilliance like Burnt Ends and less over the top seriousness like Nihonryori RyuGin.

I understand that some of the challenges are structural. When the juror list needs people to have eaten and travelled as they do, then by definition you’re talking about older, richer jurors. However, the truth is that a juror cannot just be about how many flight tickets and restaurant meals at 300 dollars they can afford. You’re better off looking at a smaller set of jurors with an opinion that is based on intellect and insight rather than the size of their wallet or the colour of their credit card. 

The challenge for William Reed and The World’s 50 Best Restaurants is to set the agenda rather than follow it. It needs to not just reflect diversity but truly celebrate it, because the only way to continually be relevant is to define relevance rather than seek it.