A Handy Guide to Understanding Restaurant Awards

World's 50 Best Restaurants, James Beard Foundation Awards, and Michelin stars — explained

by Ryan Sutton and Eater Staff Jun 6, 2024, 11:10am EDT

Illustration by Eric Lebofsky

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This story was originally published on May 1, 2017 and has been updated to reflect current information.

Who runs the world’s best restaurants? It depends upon whom you ask. Here’s a quick look at three of the most prominent domestic and international gastronomic awards organizations — the World’s 50 Best Restaurants list, the Michelin Guides, and the James Beard Foundation — and why they matter.

WORLD’S 50 BEST RESTAURANTS

Who is behind the list? William Reed Media, a business-to-business media company that grew out of a grocery information service in 1862. The World’s 50 Best List, which debuted in 2002, is by far William Reed’s most high-profile brand.

How are the winners selected? By a panel of about 1,080 judges composed almost equally of food writers, chefs, and well-traveled gourmands. Those judges, who are asked to remain anonymous (save for regional chairs and vice chairs, published on the World’s 50 Best website), cannot vote for restaurants in which they have a financial stake and they must have dined at restaurants they vote for within the last 18 months.

How many restaurants make the list? Fifty (it’s called the World’s 50 Best Restaurants, duh), but recently more attention has gone to the “consolation” portion of the guide, the 51-100 slots. The so-called back 50, released a week before the full awards, clues readers in on who’s fallen off the proper list (as was the case in 2016 with Thomas Keller’s Per Se and French Laundry) and which venues might eventually graduate to the top 50.

What’s the geographic scope of the list? Global. Having no assigned geographic scope has allowed 50 Best to, historically, bring international attention to restaurants from Australia (Attica), South America (Central, D.O.M.), and Russia (White Rabbit), areas that Michelin has either avoided or only explored after the success of 50 Best.

What does the list celebrate? The winners are largely a collection of high-end tasting menu spots. Many of the top 10 venues boast a hyper-focused sense of place. Osteria Francescana, which has twice taken the No. 1 spot, serves a tasting of five different Parmigano-Reggiano cheeses, native to the restaurant’s Emilia-Romagna locale. And Noma, which long occupied the top spot, was famous for its New Nordic cuisine, a movement that rejected imported ingredients like olive oil and foie gras in favor of indigenous, foraged, and occasionally entomophagical luxuries.

How is the list flawed? The winners are generally a collection of high-end tasting menu spots largely run by men. When Lima, Peru restaurantCentral took the title of No. 1 in 2023, it was the first restaurant in the top spot with a female co-chef, and the first from outside Europe or the United States. Despite the list’s nominal geographic open-mindedness, it has lacked diverse geographic representation in the past, though this has improved in recent years to include more restaurants from Central and South America, Africa, and the Middle East. And the list is a zero-sum game; any entrant to the list involves another restaurant getting kicked off.

How have the awards changed in recent years? In 2018, director Hélène Pietrini announced that the academy would shift to have an equal male/female split going forward, and that voters would be encouraged to “explore a diverse mix of restaurants.” In 2019, the awards decided that any restaurant that reaches the top slot will no longer be eligible for the list in future years, allowing for much-needed turnover in a list with just 50 slots.

Can the list be bought? While judges are asked to remain anonymous, there are no prohibitions against taking free trips by tourist boards or free meals from restaurants.

Should I use this list as a travel guide? Not unless your idea of travel is jetting across the globe and spending three to four hours of your limited time abroad consuming 15 to 24 courses and listening to tableside speeches in a restaurant where dinner for two costs upwards of $700 (and where you might have paid for the full cost of dinner months in advance just to secure the reservation).

JAMES BEARD AWARDS

Who is behind the awards? The James Beard Foundation, a New York-based not-for-profit group that provides scholarships to culinary students, hosts guest chef dinners, and holds annual awards ceremonies that celebrate both the American hospitality industry and food media. The restaurant and chef awards began in 1990.

How are the winners selected? By a panel of about 500 judges who vote online. The foundation made its list of judges public following a 2021 audit that was conducted to make the awards process “more inclusive and transparent.”

How many restaurants make the cut? There are 11 national categories, including Best New Restaurant, Rising Star Chef, Outstanding Pastry Chef, Outstanding Restaurateur, and Outstanding Restaurant. The Best Chef awards are broken down regionally into California, the Great Lakes, the Mid-Atlantic, the Midwest, Mountain, New York State, Northeast, Northwest & Pacific, South, Southeast, Southwest, and Texas. Each category typically has five finalists and one winner.

What is the geographic scope of the list? Any restaurant anywhere in the U.S. is eligible. International restaurants are not considered.

What type of restaurants does James Beard celebrate? All sorts of venues. The Best New Restaurant in 2023 went to Portland’s Kann, Gregory Gourdet’s nationally celebrated Haitian restaurant, and the award for Outstanding Bakery went to Kansas City, Missouri’s Yoli Tortilleria, which brings the agricultural traditions of Sonora to the Midwest. This year, candidates for Best New Restaurant include the Mexican Oro by Nixta in Minneapolis; the Thai and Chinese Shan in Bozeman, Montana; and the Senegalese Dakar NOLA in New Orleans.

How is the list flawed? The Beards focus on regions over cities for the Best Chef categories. These groupings have been particularly unfortunate because picking a single winner in an arbitrary region comes at the expense of championing local nuance. Or as a separate Eater analysis puts it more bluntly: “Most winners come from large cities, shutting out small-town chefs.” Still, these regional groupings have been subject to change, and the foundation has made steps toward recognizing regionality — California and Texas were established as their own regions as recently as 2019.

And while the Beards represent female chefs and hospitality professionals better than 50 Best (really, anyone represents women better than 50 Best), the Beards, like Michelin, still have work to do in this regard, with historical data showing that women are much less likely to be nominated, or win, than men.

How have the awards changed in recent years? Since the ascendancy of the #MeToo movement and the food world’s racial inequity reckoning, Beard voters have showed signs of moving away from the industry’s white male dominance. In 2020, the awards were canceled following allegations against nominees and revelations that the awards had no Black winners, which prompted an audit of the awards and its rules. As a result of the audit, the foundation set a goal of 50 percent BIPOC committee members and judges in 2023.

Following reports of sexual harassment by Mario Batali, Ken Friedman, and others, voters were instructed to avoid nominating restaurants or chefs of concern. In recent years, the foundation has established a Code of Ethics that involves a vetting process conducted by an independent Ethics Committee before any semifinalists or nominees are announced. Practices that disqualify candidates include: inhumane, exploitative, or unlawful workplace practices including wage theft; sexism, racism, or other discriminatory behavior; violent or abusive behavior; and misrepresentation of material facts, including fabrication, plagiarism, or false claims of ownership. The new Code of Ethics has also proven to be controversial, however.

Can the winners be bought? The rules are stricter than with the World’s 50 Best Restaurants list. Judges cannot solicit free meals nor can they vote for a restaurant or chef from which they have received a complimentary meal. The foundation also now asks all entrants to include an Impact Statement that details how their work aligns with its values of equity, transparency, respect, integrity, and community.

Should I use this list as a dining travel guide? Not really, and to be fair, the Beards, unlike Michelin or 50 Best, do not market themselves as such. Generally speaking, there are too many rules regulating who qualifies for what category in a given year to make the Beards a useful travel guide (i.e. a restaurant that wins a previous year can’t win again the following year). That said, some of those same rules can give the casual reader a different and more interesting starting point for research than local publications, which often focus on newer venues. Awards like Outstanding Restaurateur and Restaurant, for example, focus on establishments open for 10 years or longer.

THE MICHELIN GUIDE

Who is behind the stars? Michelin, Europe’s largest tire maker. The Michelin brothers founded the guide in 1900 as a way to get chauffeurs to drive more — and buy more tires. The guide’s modern starred system debuted in 1936. One star indicates a “very good restaurant in its category.” Two stars means “excellent cooking, worth a detour.” Three stars, the highest Michelin accolade, conveys “exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey.”

How are the winners selected? By anonymous inspectors whose meals are paid for by their employer. The inspectors reportedly fill out comprehensive reports following their meals. Michelin has been cagey as to precisely what’s in these reports, but they’ve stated recently that for a venue to receive three stars the decision of the inspectors has to be unanimous.

How many restaurants make the guide? Unlike the 50 Best list, there is no limit to how many venues can qualify for stars or Bib Gourmands. If a restaurant is in a qualifying city, and if it makes the cut, it gets the star.

What is the geographic scope? Michelin is more constrained globally than 50 Best, only awarding stars for cities in which the guide publishes. The deepest coverage is reserved for Western Europe and Japan. France is home to 29 restaurants with three stars, while Japan has 22. Together, that’s about 35 percent of the world’s 146 or so restaurants with Michelin’s top accolade. Michelin also publishes in New York, the San Francisco Bay Area (the U.S. region with the most three-star spots), Chicago, Washington, D.C., Shanghai, Seoul, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Macao, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Bangkok.

Michelin has been expanding its areas of coverage. In recent years, it has added guides in Dubai, Latvia, Lithuania, and Mexico, as well as expanded its presence in the United States with guides in Atlanta and Colorado.

What type of restaurants does Michelin celebrate? Most restaurants at the two- and three-star level are expensive tasting-menu spots, though Michelin has been making an effort to show off more diverse and affordable fare at the one-star level. The anonymous inspectors have awarded stars to three separate ramen spots in Japan, and (infamously) a beloved street stall in Bangkok, which its proprietor Jay Fai noted disrupted her business enough that she wanted to give the star back. In May 2024, it bestowed a star to a taqueria in Mexico City, the first Michelin star to go to a casual taco stand.

Michelin also does a decent (if not stellar) job at representing women. It’s hard to think of too many critically heralded female chefs without a star, though the ranks of women with three stars (Elena Arzak, Anne-Sophie Pic, etc), is thin and European-heavy. In 2018, Michelin finally awarded Atelier Crenn in San Francisco with its highest honor, making Dominique Crenn the only female chef in the U.S. to hold three stars.

How is the guide flawed? There are some exceptions, but the starred ranks largely exclude more casual fare. Michelin has also failed to recognize two of America’s signature cooking styles with stars: barbecue or pizza.

The staccato writing style in the guides themselves makes it almost impossible to tell why one particular venue has received a star, and another, two or three. Michelin also rarely offers compelling explanations as to why they take positions that are contrary to that of local critics (in New York, Olmsted and Cosme have been long overlooked). Inspectors are among the most diligent and well-eaten food writing professionals; it’s a shame the guide doesn’t give them more latitude to make a cogent argument for why they celebrate the restaurants they do and why they omit the restaurants they leave out.

Can the winners be bought? No; the inspectors are almost impossible to spot.

Should I use this list as a travel guide? Not exclusively, but if Michelin covers the city you’re visiting, the starred restaurants will likely reflect a decent crop of the region’s more expensive and celebrated venues. At the very least, the Michelin guide is essential reading for scouting purposes; knowledge of the restaurants the red guide covers will give you a solid starting point for filtering through local reviews and opinions. And say what you will about the stars, but they’re a solid international standard for technically-competent food, if not necessarily interesting food.

Disclosure: Some Vox Media staff members are part of the voting body for the James Beard Awards. Eater is partnering with the James Beard Foundation to livestream the awards in 2024. All editorial content is produced independently of the James Beard Foundation.

Eric Lebofsky is a visual artist and musician who lives in the suburbs of Chicago.