Getting a Michelin Star, Explained
If you are a foodie and love trying new restaurants, you have probably heard of the Michelin star. It is considered the highest praise for any chef in the dining industry. Yet in Bulgaria there are no restaurants with a star. The closest table you can book is over 500 kilometers away in Athens and Istanbul. Why would you travel so far just for a meal? Why is having a star such a big deal for the restaurants? Let’s see what’s the hype about.
What is a Michelin star?
It is a mark of great quality food. It is awarded to restaurants across the globe every year in a Michelin guidebook that is published by The Michelin Group, a tire manufacturing company. A restaurant can receive up to three stars. It can also lose stars if it is not meeting the standards anymore.
Who came up with it and why?
It all dates back to the 1900s when the world was developing quicker than ever before. Important inventions were taking place and one of them was the automobile. In 1889, two brothers called André and Édouard Michelin founded a tire company in Central France. At the time very few people were in need of new tires as the cars were not a common mean of transport.
To increase the demand for their product, the brothers came up with an idea to print a guide with instructions on how to change a tire as well as road maps and gas stations across France so people would get interested in travelling more. The car enabled people to reach places where the railways could not, to explore nature and be adventurous. If people drove more, they would change their tires more often, boosting the sales of the Michelin company — a curious marketing strategy.
The first edition of the small red guidebook was distributed for free in 1900. The brothers published a new annual edition gratis for 20 years. One day, André Michelin saw the books stacked to prop up a bench in a tire shop and noted that in order for people to perceive the guide as valuable it should be paid. So, the brothers decided to include places to rest and to eat. They hired a team of anonymous food critics to tour France and rate restaurants. They are known as the Michelin inspectors.
In 1926 the Michelin guide began to award one star for a fine dining establishment and five years later the hierarchy of three stars was formed. As the tire company grew its reach, so did the guide — extending to Europe and beyond. Currently, it covers 41 countries in four continents and inspectors travel around the globe in search of novelty.
What do inspectors look for?
They rate the restaurants following an established five points criteria — quality of the ingredients, mastery of flavor and cooking techniques, the personality of the chef represented in the dining experience, harmony of the flavors and consistency between inspectors’ visits. A combination of the five is essential to award a star. The interior design of the place and the service is not taken into account — only important is what is on the plate. One star is given to “a very good restaurant in its category.” Two is for “excellent cooking, worth a detour.” Three is the rarest case, awarded for “exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey.” People would travel to this destination from another country or city just to dine there.
Once a restaurant earns a star, the inspectors continue to visit the place and evaluate it every year to make sure the quality remains. It is key to note that the guide awards stars to the restaurant and not the chef. That is why when a chef changes their location, the stars stay with the restaurant. Upon inspection, it can lose the stars, of course, if the quality has dropped. The inspectors write down reports on every change and discuss them in a grand Star meeting that results in the updated guides.
What else is in the guides?
The same requirements have persisted through time ever since they were introduced to the public in 1936. Yet, the latest trends brought alternative recognition titles — Bib Gourmand, Michelin Plate and Green star, among many.
In a 2019 interview by Colin Ho for the guide’s website, Gaelle Van Hieu, vice-president of the Southeast Asia guide, outlined Bib Gourmand (named after the image of the friendly man made out of tires) as a value-for-money award. In other words, you can get a four-course meal that is simple yet skillfully made for less than a certain price dependent on the average of the country. Van Hieu pointed out that the Michelin Plate is more expensive than the Bib Gourmand and high in quality but not yet deserving of a star.
Following the global current, the guide also introduced the Green star in 2020. It stands for sustainability in gastronomy.
“The food industry can play a role in caring for the environment too. In the case of Thailand, we have now started to cherish local ingredients that were neglected in the past and search for substitutes for imports to reduce food miles,” shares an anonymous Thailand inspector with Colin Ho for the guide’s website.
More awards mean more restaurants get to compete and be featured in the renowned ranking system. Chefs spend a lifetime perfecting their dishes, inventing new ways of preparing and combining meat, sauces and desserts. And once they make the headlines of the guide, their future accelerates at new speed.
What changes when a restaurant wins a star?
Winning a star is similar to winning an Oscar.
Bright lights turn on the restaurant, and customers line up for a reservation. Restaurants get fully booked for months ahead. After the pandemic this gave new hope for the dining industry in Istanbul, Türkiye, according to an October 2022 article by Güldenay Sonumut for Middle East Eye. Istanbul was featured in the guide for the first time with over 50 places getting recognition. It drove business back to the catering and hospitality sector with locals and tourists visiting the restaurants. Yet, as Sonumut writes, it also turned up the pressure.
There is one important difference between the star and the Oscar.
If an actor gets an Oscar, they get to keep it even if it is a downward slope for them afterwards. They may be casted in many bad movies after that, but the Oscar sits on the shelf of their lavish dining room.
In the restaurant industry, one day you may receive a call saying you no longer deserve it.
This is a harsh business. Staff’s mental health suffers and there are cases of chefs ending their careers or even their lives because of the fear of a loss of a star. It is a high praise but a heavy load.
So, what is the deal with Bulgaria?
As of April 2023, only four Balkan countries delight in their Michelin stars — Croatia, Slovenia, Türkiye and Greece. Upon consulting the map, a curiosity emerges. All the restaurants awarded in Greece and Türkiye are located in the largest cities — Athens and Istanbul. In Croatia, you would find only one in Zagreb — the rest are spread along the Adriatic coast. In Slovenia they are equally distributed throughout the west part of the country.
Bulgaria does not have a star neither in the capital, nor in the countryside, and according to Anton Vasev, a culinary experimenter and former chef with 18 years in the kitchen, it is because so far there isn’t a restaurant that deserves it. Yet, Vasev is hopeful since the inspectors have already turned their gaze towards the Balkans. Maybe Bulgaria will eventually catch their attention and earn its spot on the gastronomic map of the world.
Nikoleta Stefanova is a foodie who recently discovered her passion for writing about food and the culinary world. Before writing this explainer, she thought she had visited two Michelin stared restaurants. Turns out none of them had stars, but had a Michelin plate. So, she decided to educate herself and others on what is inside the Michelin guide.
