Consistency is Key

Possibly as a result of Zagat's ubiquity, restaurants are often rated by professional and amateur critics alike on food quality, service, value, and atmosphere. Rarely, do I see food quality consistency taken under consideration. This topic has consumed my food-related thoughts lately, and I fear I'm about to go off on a diatribe.

Outside the LTHForum universe, most amateur reviews consist of: "I went to <insert restaurant name>, ate some food there, and it was <good/bad>. Therefore, <insert restaurant name> is <good/bad>." To me this is a fallacy. If you consider eating at a new restaurant to be an experiment, then there are too many variables to allow you to draw your conclusion from a single test (or even two). One bad meal only confirms that you had a good meal, it does not necessarily confirm that you ate at a bad restaurant.

There are two types of consistency that I like to consider when recommending a restaurant to someone. These types can be considered in terms of consistency width and consistency length:

Consistency width concerns quality across the menu. Is the quality level consistent in different menu items? Can I close my eyes, throw a dart at the menu, and come up with a good meal? If so, you've hit 100% consistency width (very rare). On the opposite end of the spectrum, if there's only one item on the menu that I'll touch, then the restaurant sits at a full zero consistency width. A good example of a zero in my book is Kow Kow: Great old-fashioned egg rolls, but that's all; I avoid the rest of the menu like the plague. I would estimate that most places I really enjoy will hover around the 90% range. A lot of good stuff, but always a couple items that I'm not into.

Consistency length concerns quality over time. Is the quality level of a particular dish going to remain consistent over time? If you are a regular at a restaurant, as most of us are at many, you know what I

One thing I think about this kind of website is that I don't have to pretend to Phil Vettel-like comprehensiveness in my experiences of a restaurant; I can simply go, say I liked X Y and Z, and others can pick it up and run with it from there and have their own experiences. I don't have the time, and don't have to feel the need, to offer the definitive assessment.

I suppose at its worst this approach ends up being like the Metromix reviews, where so many restaurants' listings are just "**** This place is awesome!" side by side with "* This place sux!" But generally speaking I'd rather see two or three reviews by different people over time than any one person's reviews, and feel consistency, among other things, will be most accurately assessed that way.

Mike G wrote:One thing I think about this kind of website is that I don't have to pretend to Phil Vettel-like comprehensiveness in my experiences of a restaurant; I can simply go, say I liked X Y and Z, and others can pick it up and run with it from there and have their own experiences. I don't have the time, and don't have to feel the need, to offer the definitive assessment.

Mike, et al.,

Please do not read my diatribe as a criticism of the reviewing on this site. That was not my intention. I am in no way asking people to alter their recommendations or style. My intention is to transcribe some of my thoughts, relate the way that I tend to look at the world sometimes, and garner some reactions based on the questions I posed at the end.

EC

EC -- Interesting that your consistency criteria don't address service, which seems to be the number one restaurant concern among nonfoodies. Even as food obsessed as I am, I can understand why people would return again and to places that treat them well, even if the food is sometimes subpar.

In professional reviews, consistency of any sort is hard to judge, because the critic isn't able to visit often enough or over a long enough period. With the exception of the New York Times, most publications pay for two or three visits, tops -- if that many -- and it becomes increasingly difficult to sort out how great a role the advertising department may have had in the selection of the restaurant for review.

As for how to ask that things be put back the way they were, all you can do is send the dish back, with a polite, "Gee, I've been coming here for years, and this wasn't what I expected." If the first part of the statement is true, then you have a chance of convincing the restaurant to revert to its previous recipe.


MG -- What I like here is that the reviews here come signed, which allows me to assess whose tastes agree with mine and whose don't, while still having a broad spectrum. I was disappointed when Chicago Magazine stopped using the little tags that identified their critics in the short listings.

LAZ wrote:Interesting that your consistency criteria don't address service, which seems to be the number one restaurant concern among nonfoodies.

My little analysis can certainly apply to service very easily (and should, if rating the restaurant as a whole). Generally, I find myself quite a bit more lenient on service issues than most of my dining companions, and quite a bit more strict on food issues.

LAZ wrote:Even as food obsessed as I am, I can understand why people would return again and to places that treat them well, even if the food is sometimes subpar.

Not me. I can far better understand the opposite: subpar service with fantastic food.

LAZ wrote:In professional reviews, consistency of any sort is hard to judge, because the critic isn't able to visit often enough or over a long enough period.

Without a doubt. It is helpful when pro. reviews at least pay some lip service to the fact that they made 2 or 3 visits over a month. My general concern has more to do with amateur reviews / recommendations. People are often surprised when they recommend a restaurant to me and my first question is "how often do you go there?" or "was this your first visit?" The LTH crowd does a very good job of identifying places where they are regulars, or new finds. And the message board format really helps identify serious inconsistencies.

LAZ wrote:As for how to ask that things be put back the way they were, all you can do is send the dish back, with a polite, "Gee, I've been coming here for years, and this wasn't what I expected." If the first part of the statement is true, then you have a chance of convincing the restaurant to revert to its previous recipe.

That's a good tip. It will take a delicate approach.

Best,
EC

LAZ wrote:EC -- Interesting that your consistency criteria don't address service, which seems to be the number one restaurant concern among nonfoodies.

According to surveys reported by the National Restaurant Association, customers deem rest rooms as the most important thing in a restaurant.

Seems kind of a$$ backwards to me, but there you go.

Steve Drucker wrote:According to surveys reported by the National Restaurant Association, customers deem rest rooms as the most important thing in a restaurant.

Seems kind of a$$ backwards to me, but there you go.

Interesting.

It makes a tiny bit of sense. One of the many things I learned from Anthony Bourdain's book "Kitchen Confidential" was that the first thing that he checks out in a restaurant is the bathroom. His reasoning: If they can't keep their public bathroom clean, imagine how dirty the more private kitchen is.

A bit stringent in my book, but I understand where people are coming from.

Eat Chicago wrote:The LTH crowd does a very good job of identifying places where they are regulars, or new finds. And the message board format really helps identify serious inconsistencies.

I recall when I first came to CH and met some of the regulars, Rob/VI in particular was pressing me to post more than I did. (In my case, the horse is not only out of the barn, she has run into the next county) I initially felt compelled to post on a place I either regularly attended or visited several times. Rob advised to write about an experience even if it was the first and only time. To consider what I am observing is a snapshot, a moment in time, which if I am mistaken or experienced a service lapse, then this would be corrected by the next poster. Eventually there would be a body of information to ascertain whether a restaurant is beginning a negative trend or my experience was an anomaly.

&&&

Consistency is an expectation I gauge to the situation. Consistency is a hard act to pull in a family owned restaurant where the chef is a talented home cook. Often our charming, ethnic restaurants are manned by non-professionally trained cooks. If the cook is not present or has an off day, then the meal is not as fine. Often these cooks don't want to or are unable to train their staff (if any) to cook their recipes, which makes the chef-owner practically a slave to the restaurant. I know one place where the "secret is in the marinade," which is unknown to the staff. So the restaurant must close when they want a vacation.

I know when I am cooking for me-myself-and-I, I don't really think I make the same thing twice in precisely the same way. Variables are often what do I have on hand and can make-do with. As much as I like to cook, I find it mind numbing to consider working in a restaurant kitchen preparing the same things every day. Of course they suffer the same variable of ingredients, then must offer the same dining expectation to their customer regardless of the circumstances. So maybe that's their fun and challenge.

I guess depending on the scale and price-level of the restaurant, then my expectations of consistency rise.

Cathy2 wrote:I know when I am cooking for me-myself-and-I, I don't really think I make the same thing twice in precisely the same way. Variables are often what do I have on hand and can make-do with. As much as I like to cook, I find it mind numbing to consider working in a restaurant kitchen preparing the same things every day. Of course they suffer the same variable of ingredients, then must offer the same dining expectation to their customer regardless of the circumstances. So maybe that's their fun and challenge.

I guess depending on the scale and price-level of the restaurant, then my expectations of consistency rise.

I'm not interested in consistency. I'm certainly interested in a minimum standard of quality -- but I would hate to think that, every time I wandered into a restaurant and ordered something, it would taste exactly as it always has. What's the point? May as well go to Mickey D's, where that is their guiding philosophy. I would hate to think that I'd never be able to say honestly to the waiter or chef, "I've had that before, but you were really on tonight. It came together like I've always known it would." The best stuffed pork chop I ever had, I had at Johnny D's in Somerville Mass., on Sept. 30 1993. I'd had theirs occasionally before and have had stuffed pork chops many other places, but that night they nailed it (and other tables were raving about it too). Strive for consistency and that kind of memory just isn't ever going to be enjoyed.

Cathy2 wrote:I guess depending on the scale and price-level of the restaurant, then my expectations of consistency rise.

I tend to agree. I certainly have different consistency expectations based on the style and scale of the restaurant. But, I do consider that when a home-style restaurant may be inconsistent in taste, I do expect a reasonable consistency in quality.

For example, at a restaurant like Bhabi's Kitchen, in which the kitchen is one woman and her sister, the food tends to be a little inconsistent in taste. Some days, the sauces will be spicier, other days richer. It varies, but it's always good. The quality is consistent even if the taste is not. I do not hold this against Bhabi, in fact I consider it part of the charm of dining there.

I also cook a lot, and I am at my best when improvising. I rarely write down my regular recipies, and many of them never taste the same twice...but they're always good

Inconsistent taste is acceptable...inconsistent quality damages the overall experience.

Bob S. wrote:I'm not interested in consistency. I'm certainly interested in a minimum standard of quality

I agree.

I try to ask the question, "Is the quality level of a particular dish consistent over time?" rather than "Does the food taste the same every time I order it." The same dish can clearly taste different every time and still be excellent.

This topic seems to have branched out to cover some issues I have spent some time thinking about.

Much of this has been discussed elsewhere at some length (some of it might even qualify as eternal questions in the world of food), and though I am not as good at archiving things as Mike G, I am going to try to recap some of these discussions here, and what I have personally concluded.

I see this as three separate issues. The first is how most people evaluate restaurants, which is more a point of curiosity than any relevance, as I see it. If you take the time to read and post on LTH, the following is not how you evalutate places. Most people look for familiar food, reasonable (to them) value, and fawning service. Geographic convenience also enters into it. Besides geography, I think this has to do with the way we associate being fed with being nurtured, and most people get stuck there. In some way, the restaurant becomes a surrogate family, or even mother, and they feel betrayed when the restaurant somehow shatters that illusion. Just my theory, that.

BTW, I do have a problem with stinky bathrooms. You know, that link between smell and taste - it puts me off.

The next issue is how food and restaurants should be properly evaluated.

EC, there is a person on another web site who can and does go on for days on the proper, objective, way to evaluate a place. To some degree, it can be broken down like art criticism - raw materials, technique and composition. Are the ingredients of good quality? Was the preparation done well? There are a lot of components to that, including how things were cut, and then cooked. Lastly, did they come together harmoniously on the plate? This last is wholly subjective, IMO, but it can be made less subjective by breaking it up. Can one taste all the ingredients? Do the ingredients and preparation enhance and bring out the flavors, or mask and obscure them? How does it compare to the perfect version of that food that one has in mind?

At some point, a true professional critic (if such a thing exists in the world of food) must be able to say that a place is doing a very good job, whether they personally would like to eat the food or not. For instance, I am not a fan of Monte Cristo sandwiches, but if I were a professional critic, I should be able to recognize and report that a place produced a perfect Monte Cristo, even if I would prefer to eat almost anything else.

My sense of the argument about the proper way to objectively criticize food is that it is of great interest, but fundamentally useless unless one is going to be a professional food critic (which may mean working for Michelin or the New York Times). As LAZ said, I am primarly interested in whether it will taste good to me, and the only way I know to determine this without sampling the food myself is to get the opinion of someone whose taste seems similar to mine based on my experiences.

Lastly, to get to EC's point - Consistency.

This is a thorny one, which has come up many times in many guises here and elsewhere. Let me try to separate out different forms of consistency.

- Is everything on the menu of the same quality?
- Is the same dish the same over time?
- Is the experience the same each time I visit? (This is the service issue again)
- Is the quality of the food, however I judge it, the same each time?

I could go on for pages about each of these, but I will try to limit myself.

Consistency across the menu

This comes up often when one person posts a thrilled review, and the next person pans the same place. How often have we seen the argument then turn into a discussion about how the second person ordered wrong? This is particularly an issue in Asian places that have two menus, one in the asian style, and one Americanized. My thinking is that it happens, not everything is going to be as delightful for me, and so long as I can get a good meal if I order right, it is totally acceptable. But if someone else really likes Pad Thai noodles and my favorite Thai place does them badly, then they have the right to dislike the place. The key conclusion here is that it is so important to provide detail in one's review, so others can determine whether what you ate is likely to be what they would eat.

Consistency of the preparation (a dish is the same each visit)

If you really like something and go back to have it again, and then it is different, this is a problem. Usually, it is a disappointment of some significance. I do not know whether I would send back my food, but I would say to the manager that I really enjoyed the way they used to prepare it, came back just to get that, and do not like the new version as much. The reply would be interesting, and I would certainly update my post on LTH. But a restaurant, or cook, has every right to update their dishes whenever they want. In fact, I would sort of hope they do that, just not on the things I really like .

Consistency of the experience

As EC said, I am interested in the food, not the service. Sure, I can get annoyed if I am in a hurry and have to wait 30 minutes for the check, or if I am tired and hungry and they do not seat me until an hour after my reservation. But stuff happens. So long as the place seems to acknowledge their error, this is okay for me, and even if they do not I can accept the places that treat me like crap and provide really good food (though I have crossed CT off my list because of such a reservation issue, I admit). It can even be a form of entertainment. Many years ago my brother taught me that a key in a fine French place, Le Perroquet, as it happens, was to establish up front that you knew what you were doing and deserved to be treated with respect. This is always true, and while I do not believe in abusing restaurant help, I also think one needs to signal in any way one can, that one is knowledgable, engaged and interested (and will tip well). So the quality of service is an exchange in which the diner has a responsibility as well. So I do not pay much attention to complaints about service, as I expect them to be isolated events that are unlikely to affect me, unless lots of people echo the experience.

Consistency of the quality of the food over time

There are two schools of thought on posting - the first is that you must visit a place at least twice to post, while the second is that, "if you liked it, share it." I lean toward the latter, because it then solicits other opinions and visits, and the strength of this site and others like it is the shared knowledge, not the individual's opinions. So I do not expect postings here to give me a sense of consistency over time.

With seasons, I expect variation in quality of ingredients, so that is okay in most places (excepting top tier establishments who should not have tomatos on the menu if they cannot get excellent ones, for example). Particularly in more inexpensive places, one should try to focus a little on seasonality. If you cannot imagine how you would get a decent strawberry at a certain time of year, the odds are that your corner diner will be serving strawberry shortcake made with frozen strawberries, so don't get huffy about it.

But I do expect consistency in technique. If I order a pan roasted fish, and it has a perfect brown crust that delights me one time, and comes out mushy and over done with no crust the next, that is not acceptable. Still, the type of place does enter into it. The food stands at the International Plaza in Westmont, as an example, seemed to employ very recent chinese immigrants as cooks (my impression, anyway), and they turned over every 6 to 8 weeks. This would result in a change in prepararion about that often. Once I figured that out, it was acceptable given the price and variety of the food on offer. Haven't been lately, but that was my experience when I worked there some years ago.


Hope these thoughts are of some interest, or even (gasp) useful to some of you.

I don't expect reviews on a board frequented by fans (as opposed to professional reviewers) to deal with consistency or to be comprehensive. If they can, that's nice. What I find informative, enjoyable to read and more realistically do-able for most restaurant diners is a detailed description of whatever you ate. If it's detailed and specific, I feel as if it will give me some idea whether I would like the place.

Food is paramount with me, but I do like good service and it can tip the balance as to whether I would go back to a place. If people are snotty or engage in constant upselling, and things like that, I will eventually decide the place is not worth my while even if the food is fine.

Interesting thread. As Dickson said, a lot of this stuff has been discussed before, but it is also a topic that (at least to me) never seems dull or banal.

The one thing I want to throw out, which has only been barely covered above, is the twin notions of knowledge and insider-ness, or the whole secret menu thing.

The fundamental fact of dining (I strongly believe) is that all meals are different. I think there is no such thing as the blank diner or the invisible critic or whatever that one can measure against. Even in last week's Per Se review in the NYTimes, Bruni accepts the fact that he was outed, but that he could still review. So many factors that the diner brings to the table effect the meal. Someone with knowledge of the cuisine may ask questions and get something different. A regular or someone purchasing a very expensive bottle of wine may get treated differently. How YOU treat the restaurant staff affects your meal. I think we have to accept that we will never have the exact experience of the person reporting (professional or not).

Great posts, great reviews whether professional or not, capture what made the meal, and especially what made the meal different and why the meal was different. Me, I like to hear about secret menus and expense account blow-outs and 20 course Cabrales dissections. I learn and I yearn.

Rob