Michelin–New York Times Ratings Comparison

After the jump, you’ll find the list of all New York City restaurants currently open, that:
(1) Have now, or have ever had, at least one Michelin star; or,
(2) Have now, or have ever had, three or four New York Times stars.

For both Michelin and The Times, the list shows the maximum number of stars it has ever had (“Max”), and the current number of stars it has (“Curr.”). In the last two columns, you’ll find the name of the last Times critic who reviewed the restaurant and the date of the review. Click the link on the date to read the review itself.

The two rating systems are correlated. Most of the Michelin 1-star restaurants have two or three Times stars. Most of the Michelin 2-star restaurants have three Times stars. Most of the Michelin 3-star restaurants have four Times stars.

Given this correlation, you can find restaurants where the two systems disagree. For instance, Babbo has three Times stars but zero from Michelin. Danny Brown in Queens has a star from Michelin but has never even been reviewed in The Times.

Where there are such disagreements, I have totally subjectively indicated which rating I think is wrong. A green cell indicates a rating that is too low; a red cell indicates that it is too high. (Where The Times has never reviewed a Michelin starred restaurant, I count that as “too low”.)

There are quite a few restaurants with one Michelin star and two Times stars. I have not considered these cases as necessarily inconsistent, but I have flagged a few cases that I feel strongly about.

You’ll notice that I think The Times is wrong more often than Michelin. This is not because the Michelin inspectors are better at rating restaurants. It’s mainly because the Michelin ratings are updated annually, so they can correct errors more quickly.

A few examples will illustrate what I mean. Frank Bruni gave the Dining Room at The Modern two stars in 2005. The Michelin Guide gave it one star in 2006, and it has retained that star every year since. But it took until 2013 for Pete Wells to upgrade the restaurant to three stars. I don’t believe it took eight years for The Modern to get its act together. It just took eight years until a Times critic got around to paying the required three visits, so that the review could be updated.

Twice during his tenure, Wells has reviewed restaurants for the first time that had earned their Michelin stars a number of years earlier (Kyo Ya, Kajitsu). Both were restaurants that, for whatever reason, did not get full Times reviews when they opened; having missed the early review cycle, they had to wait for a critic to catch up to them.

Occasionally, the Times critic just gets a restaurant wrong, such as Sam Sifton’s strange affection for Colicchio & Sons, a view shared by no other critic in town. And sometimes there are major changes at a restaurant, such as the departure of “LT” from BLT Fish: it deserved the three stars Frank Bruni awarded in 2005. Michelin gave the restaurant a star in 2006 and promptly rescinded it a year later. It took The Times until 2014 to reach the same conclusion.

The Michelin people have blind spots too, particularly with Asian restaurants. The star for Jewel Bako, coupled with the lack of one for Sushi Yasuda, which has been the case since the first NYC guide in 2006, remains especially bizarre. Eleven Madison Park has had three Michelin stars since the 2012 Guide, but it has held four Times stars since 2009. There, it was Michelin who failed promptly to catch up.

Some cases are judgment calls. Craft had a Michelin star from 2006–07, but has been unstarred ever since. Sam Sifton re-reviewed it in 2011, awarding three stars. I’m not aware of any change at Craft that would have justified a demotion in 2008, so I’m classifying that as a Michelin error, but I’m sure there are people who consider Craft over-rated by The Times.

The full data table is after the jump.

Restaurant	Michelin		New York Times
	Max.	Curr.	Max.	Curr.	Critic	Date
15 East	*	*	**	**	Bruni	7-11-07
Ai Fiori	*	*	***	***	Sifton	4-23-11
Aldea	*	*	**	**	Bruni	4-7-09
Annisa	*	*	***	***	Wells	2-4-14
Aquavit	*	*	***	**	Sifton	7-21-10
Atera	**	**	***	***	Wells	7-18-12
Aureole	*	*	***	*	Sifton	11-11-09
A Voce Madison	*	*	***	**	Wells	6-17-14
Babbo	*	*	***	***	Bruni	6-9-05
Betony	–	–	***	***	Wells	8-28-13
Blanca	*	*	**	**	Wells	10-16-12
BLT Fish	*	–	***	*	Wells	6-17-14
Blue Hill	*	*	***	***	Bruni	8-2-06
Blue Hill at Stone Barns(1)	–	–	***	***	Bruni	7-28-04
Bouley	**	*	***	***	Bruni	3-25-09
Breslin, The	*	*	*	*	Sifton	1-12-10
Brooklyn Fare	***	***	***	***	Sifton	4-27-11
Brushstroke	*	*	**	**	Sifton	7-13-11
Brushstroke (Ichimura)	*	*	***	***	Wells	9-26-12
Café Boulud	*	*	***	***	Bruni	8-15-07
Café China	*	*	**	**	Wells	5-2-13
Carbone	–	*	***	***	Wells	6-5-13
Casa Mono	*	*	**	**	Burros	1-28-04
Caviar Russe	*	*	–	–	NEVER	NEVER
Colicchio & Sons	–	–	***	***	Sifton	3-17-10
Craft	*	–	***	***	Sifton	9-7-11
Daniel	***	***	****	***	Wells	7-24-13
Danji	*	*	*	*	Sifton	8-17-11
Danny Brown	*	*	–	–	NEVER	NEVER
Del Posto	**	*	****	****	Sifton	9-29-10
Dévi	*	–	**	**	Bruni	11-17-04
Dovetail	*	*	***	***	Bruni	2-20-08
Eleven Madison Park	***	***	****	****	Bruni	8-12-09
Esca	–	–	***	***	Bruni	4-18-07
Felidia	–	–	***	***	Bruni	8-30-06
Four Seasons, The	–	–	***	**	Bruni	4-4-07
Gotham Bar & Grill	*	*	***	***	Sifton	5-17-11
Gordon Ramsay	**	–	**	**	Bruni	1-31-07
Gramercy Tavern	*	*	***	***	Bruni	6-6-07
Hakkasan	*	*	*	*	Wells	6-12-12
Il Buco A&V	–	–	***	***	Wells	3-14-12
Jean-Georges	***	***	****	****	Wells	4-9-14
Jewel Bako	*	*	*	*	Bruni	6-21-06
JoJo	*	–	***	***	Grimes	4-17-02
Jungsik	**	**	**	**	Wells	2-28-12
Junoon	*	*	**	**	Sifton	3-30-11
Kajitsu	**	*	**	**	Wells	6-18-03
Kyo Ya	*	*	***	***	Wells	4-11-12
Kurumazushi	*	–	***	*	Wells	11-13-13
Lan Sheng	*	*	–	–	NEVER	NEVER
Laut	*	–	–	DB	Moskin	7-29-09
La Grenouille	–	–	****	***	Sifton	12-23-09
Le Bernardin	***	***	****	****	Wells	5-23-05
Le Cirque	–	–	****	**	Wells	9-19-12
Le Périgord	–	–	***	**	Grimes	10-11-00
Marc Forgione	*	–	**	**	Sifton	10-6-10
Marea	**	**	***	***	Sifton	10-21-09
Masa	***	***	****	***	Sifton	6-15-11
Minetta Tavern	*	*	***	***	Bruni	5-20-09
Modern, The (Bar Rm.)	–	–	***	***	Bruni	1-10-07
Modern, The (Dine. Rm.)	*	*	***	***	Wells	3-26-13
Molyvos	–	–	***	**	Asimov	7-17-02
Momofuku Ko	**	**	***	***	Bruni	5-7-08
Momofuku Ssäm Bar	–	–	***	***	Bruni	12-3-08
Musket Room, The	*	*	HC	HC	Mishan	12-18-13
Nobu	*	–	***	***	Reichl	9-8-95
Nobu 57	–	–	***	***	Bruni	9-28-05
Nobu, Next Door	–	–	***	***	Reichl	12-23-98
NoMad, The	*	*	***	***	Wells	6-20-12
Oceana	*	*	***	**	Sifton	11-18-09
Palm & Palm Too	–	–	***	*	Sifton	7-27-11
Patroon	–	–	***	**	Asimov	7-10-02
Perry St.	*	–	***	***	Bruni	9-7-05
Per Se	***	***	****	****	Sifton	10-12-11
Peter Luger	*	*	***	**	Bruni	9-19-07
Picholine	**	–	***	***	Bruni	11-8-06
Public	*	*	**	**	Grimes	12-17-03
River Café	*	*	***	**	Wells	5-20-14
Rosanjin	*	*	**	**	Bruni	3-28-07
Rouge Tomate	*	*	*	*	Bruni	1-7-09
Sammy’s Roumanian	–	–	***	***	Sheraton	5-21-82
Saul	*	*	**	**	Wells	10-7-09
Scalini Fedeli	*	–	*	*	Grimes	10-13-99
Scarpetta	–	–	***	***	Bruni	7-30-08
Seäsonal	*	*	**	**	Asimov	2-25-09
Shalezeh	*	–	–	–	NEVER	NEVER
Simone, The	–	–	***	***	Wells	6-3-14
Soto	**	**	**	**	Bruni	9-5-07
Spice Market	–	–	***	*	Bruni	6-24-09
Spotted Pig, The	*	*	*	*	Bruni	1-25-06
Sugiyama	–	–	***	***	Reichl	3-17-99
Sushi Azabu	*	*	*	*	Bruni	10-29-08
Sushi of Gari	*	*	**	**	Bruni(2)	3-2-05
Sushi Nakazawa	–	–	****	****	Wells	12-11-13
Sushi Yasuda	–	–	***	***	Asimov	11-16-11
Tamarind Tribeca	*	*	**	**	Sifton	8-4-10
Telepan	*	*	**	**	Bruni	2-15-06
Tori Shin	*	*	–	–	NEVER	NEVER
Torrisi Italian Specialties	*	*	**	**	Sifton	6-8-10
Tulsi	*	*	*	*	Sifton	3-30-11
Union Square Cafe	–	–	***	**	Bruni	8-5-09
Wallsé	*	*	**	**	Hesser	5-5-04
WD~50	*	*	***	***	Bruni	3-5-08

Notes:

(1) Blue Hill at Stone Barns and Thirty Acres in Jersey City, New Jersey, are the only NYT-starred restaurants outside of New York City. The New York Michelin guide, to date, includes only restaurants inside the city limits.

(2) Frank Bruni reviewed Gari; the paper has never reviewed Sushi of Gari, but the two are practically identical.

Comments

[Mike]

I thoroughly enjoy your blog and your general rating system. Great post - I know a lot of work went into it (along with eating at each spot). Ha.