Who trusts guide books?
 

Every few years, Mrs F and I have found ourselves driving through, round or near Lyons. More often than not, that's involved eating at Leon de Lyon (04-72-10-11-12).

Planning to be in the area last week, but not having taken much of an interest in what's gone on in the area lately, we went online to check the phone no.

The restaurant's website needed some huge great Adobe addin to be downloaded. Which done, the addin proudly told us the site wasn't working.

So off to Google. Whose first reference was to what the New York Times claims passes off as a restaurant guide - but one whose content is outsourced to Frommers.

Main courses €43-€105, says the world's most self-important news medium. The waffle ("a terrine that incorporates farm-raised pork") is the pap you expect from writers who clearly expect their pork top be grown in flowerbeds.

But a few phone calls reveal the New York Times is making things up again. Leon de Lyon - long established as a centre of eating in the world's food capital - closed as a Michelin star-chaser last year, reopening as a brasserie.

The food was as wonderful as it was when we first started eating there quarter of a century ago before it started whoring after the tyre salesmen. But mains now average €20-odd: a blissful dinner from the carte for both of us came to less than the New York Times claimed a single main course costs. The stunning, sensible service was - as always - free.

No doubt the NYT will say it can't keep track of every restaurant. But if Lyons of all places is outside its purview, what credibility can this hapless rag possibly have as a food guide? Might it improve if, like the WSJ, it got bought by a professional newspaperman?

And it's not just Leon de Lyon. The NYT's review of the city's Cafe des Federations tells us gratin dauphinois is potato croquettes.

Is it just that New Yorkers can't get their heads round any food that's not deepfried, or any restaurant east of Coney Island?

Perhaps you got the English edition.

padraig-- good one!! LOL :-D

I had a look at the NYT webpage that I think you are referring to, and their overall list of suggested restaurants for Lyon is pretty poor, given the great range of restaurants for all budgets that the city offers.

Good to know that Léon de Lyon is cheaper now though - it was always a bit over our budget when we lived in the city. Will check it out next time we are there.

Well, flanner, as someone who in the distant past did a fair amount of travel writing, including restaurant and other reviews, I can tell you stuff does get made up, or at least isn't carefully researched or verified. Imagine my surprise when a fairly well-respected Canadian food and wine magazine sent me off when I was barely out of college to innumerable locales in Europe to visit vineyards and markets and local watering holes and write feature articles on them. There I was in Trimbach testing Eiswein and on the banks of the Mosel getting tipsy at a local wine festival, and stumbling through Burgundy in a Montrachet haze, having had no previous oenophilic experience outside Lancer's and Blue Nun.

But I was a decent writer, so I developed a three-column list: one column for the nose, one for the aroma, and one for the throat. And I populated those columns with every adjective I could glean from library books on wine and The Wine Spectator. And I'd pick a word or two from each column and assign it to the wine I was purportedly writing about. And it would get published. At least I got my travel and food facts right, and I made sure I was totally sober when I wrote the articles. But in retrospect, these folks were completely mad to hire and pay me! I wrote for them for years, though, and no one (not even subscribers) ever called me on a single fact. Astonishing, really.

And then there's the fact that by the time things get published, the facts can be way out of date. A lot of magazines (not so much newspapers, of course) have lead times of months and months, so you can write an article in June and not see it in print until 9 months later. Lots can happen in that time, and no one ever checks, IME.

So no, I don't trust guide books, though I do enjoy reading and perusing them.

"Does it taste good" is often the only REAL thing we need to hear from food writers. Unfortunately, some of them seem to have forgotten that in their haste to win the next Pulitzer Prize.

No, we also need to hear whether the dish is really as described. I've had some meals where dishes bore no resemblance whatever to the carte. I won't even get into how professional chefs on food competition shows mangle and mispronounce dishes; it's too disheartening.

I like travel guides and enjoy reading them. I rarely use them to choose where to eat. They are written by generalists, not by food critics.

Food recommendations are virtually worthless in guides. I like affordable and authentic local cuisine. I get it by asking a local for a good place to eat and always throw in "nothing fancy".

Once a restaurant or cafe is included in a guidebook, it will change. The prices go up and the food changes to meet the demands of their new clientelle.

<<There I was in Trimbach testing Eiswein and on the banks of the Mosel getting tipsy at a local wine festival, and stumbling through Burgundy in a Montrachet haze, having had no previous oenophilic experience outside Lancer's and Blue Nun.>.

Sounds like great on-the-job training to me. Bet you had fun doing it.

I leaf through lots of guide books before travelling, rarely trust completely any of them. Once Rough Guide sent me to a non-existing B&B in a tiny town in Walse. How many times Lonely Planet list restaurants no longer opened? Even Michelin listed one not even opened the door yet.

Stcirq, I love your comments. Exactly what I often perceive from articles in papers or magazines.

'Word of mouth' information may be better sometimes than printed sources. The quality of the food served in any restaurant will depend on the chef. If the number one is not on duty...or he has moved? We also know that certain waiters or waitresses can make a good meal better. Today food in Naples is suspect. A USA military shop is not buying any local produce! The local mozzarella has been tainted with dioxin. Who said, "Trust but verify." ?

Oh, Flanner needed to have an excuse to rant about something American yet again. ;)

Why not use British reviewers?