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AI-distilled · expert-sourced

What we read.

Independent experts only — never crowd noise, never paid placements. A place earns its spot when the critics and guides agree, unprompted.

116
vetted sources
4trust tiers
From Michelin to Culinary Backstreets — the full spectrum of expert opinion
The method

Plainly stated.

Curation signal is recurrence. A restaurant that appears in Michelin and Eater and Culinary Backstreets — three independent sources with no relationship to each other — carries far more weight than one praised by ten thousand strangers on Google. Aggregated crowd opinion drifts toward the popular. Expert opinion, cross-checked, drifts toward the excellent.

We read every source in this stack. An AI distils the overlaps, weights by tier, and surfaces the recurrence. A human editorial layer removes hallucinated venues and traces every pick to a real citation. Nothing enters the guide without a footprint.

Curated by intelligence. Confirmed by taste. The threshold is high by design — most cities in the world have fewer than 10 places that clear it.
Trust tiers

How trust tiers work.

Recurrence across independent expert sources is the entire vetting signal. A place that appears in Michelin and Eater and Culinary Backstreets independently carries more weight than one praised by ten thousand strangers. These four tiers define the hierarchy.

Awards & major guides

Maximum curation weight

Global bodies with rigorous, anonymous inspection programs or peer-nominated expert panels. Years of methodology, not crowd consensus.

Michelin, The World's 50 Best, OAD, World's 50 Best Bars

Editorial & specialist press

High curation weight

Independent critics, long-form food publications and specialist beat reporters. Named bylines, editorial accountability, no advertiser control over editorial.

Eater, Monocle, Condé Nast Traveller, The Guardian Food, Noble Rot, PUNCH, Sprudge, Culinary Backstreets

Reputable directories

Supporting corroboration only

Established city guides and mainstream lifestyle media that maintain editorial standards. Useful signal when it aligns with Tier 1–2 picks.

Time Out

Context only — never vetting

Display context, zero curation weight

Live crowd data (Google ratings, TripAdvisor, Yelp) shown as contextual temperature checks. We display the number; we never let it influence which places make the guide.

Google Maps ratings, public review aggregators

The taxonomy

Five families. One standard: editorial independence.

Awards bodies that inspect anonymously. Critics with named bylines and accountable editors. Specialist press that covers a single beat with depth. Each family below is a distinct kind of authority — and the full index is open.

How we vet
The stack

Every publication we consult.

The full index — every source consulted across every city we have distilled. Local and regional sources are layered in per-city; the core global stack runs everywhere.

Specialist Press

The promise
Zero tourist traps. Zero filler. No ads. No paid placements. Ever.

The source stack evolves. As we distil more cities we add local specialist press, regional guides, and credible independent voices — each reviewed for editorial independence before it influences any pick. Coverage depth is always shown on each city page, so you can see exactly how many sources informed each guide.