Piling on the Michelin guide

Takedown of the new Michelin guide for Los Angeles began with Leslie Brenner in the L.A. Times food section back on Nov. 21. Sample:

In short, it's amateurish, confusing and barely credible....

What shocked me wasn't who did and did not get stars; rather, it was that the book that purports to be the bible of fine dining is so poorly researched and lamely written that the ratings have no credibility.

This week in the LA Weekly, Jonathan Gold delivers the coup de grace. He still uses his worn-out 1984 Gault Millau guide to L.A. restaurants, but doesn't intend to ever consult the latest French effort to define Los Angeles dining.

I’m not dismissing the Michelin guide because so much of it reads as if it were translated badly — from the French, I would say, except that whoever wrote the thing seems to be as ignorant on the subject of French cooking as he is about the Indian or Italian kitchen. And as somebody who has put restaurant guides together himself, I can forgive some of the errors; it is hard work pulling these things together, and something inevitably gets misplaced along the way. I even have to admit that I agree with most of the guide’s assessments: I would snatch stars away from only a couple of the establishments so honored (though I would certainly sprinkle stars more generously throughout), and with l’Orangerie gone and Bastide in flux, there probably is no obvious three-star restaurant in town.

What bothers me is that the guide was so evidently put together as a fly-by-night project showing neither knowledge of nor much respect for Los Angeles, that the usual Hollywood banalities are recycled like so much fryer sludge at the biodiesel plant, and that there is so little imagination at work.

In other food news, Eater LA notices the soft opening of Yamato in the former Eurochow spot, which is one of the most distinctive (and historic) buildings in Westwood Village.