find a good restaurant in a strange city

I used to eat fast food when I travelled for work. 

It’s embarrassing to say the least, but it’s true.  I had no concept of how to find a decent restaurant, and therefore settled for whatever happened to be close to the hotel. 

Two things got me motivated to find a way of discovering better food in a new city; travelling to New York City for the first time, and getting into a long distance relationship with a delightful girl in Atlanta.

The NYC angle should be obvious; I knew I was going to be in the epicurean center of the country, if not the world, and refused to sacrifice such an amazing opportunity to eat well.

The long distance relationship piece might be a bit more ambiguous, so I’ll explain.  I’ve always considered myself a very romantic guy and one thing I was insistent on when travelling to see my girlfriend is that I would be responsible for a lot of our plans. 

This meant I needed a way to find intriguing restaurants to surprise her with.

THE TECHNIQUE

There are basically three resources you can count on for discovering good eateries in strange (i.e. not hometown) cities;

• Recommendation from a friend or relative
• Recommendation from a local
• Online resources

Recommendation from a friend or relative

Most of us have people in our lives whose opinions we trust.  These people sometimes travel.  If it so happens that your future travel plans include destinations your inner circle have visited, it’s never a bad idea to ask around for suggestions. 

The danger here is that everyone has their own taste and comfort level regarding trying new things, and therefore you should carefully consider the source when getting this kind of advice.

Recommendation from a local

If you’re the spontaneous sort, this can be a gold mine.  The advantage is it requires no pre-planning whatsoever, and you can count on the information being current. 

My favorite technique in this regard is to head straight for a bar near the hotel, or even in the hotel itself.  Be friendly with your server, tip well, and after a round or two ask them for advice on where to eat.   You should, at the very least, have a particular cuisine in mind.   The more specific your inquiry the better their advice will likely be.  Be sure to ask directions, write them down, and then double check them against Mapquest if possible before heading out. 

Another great way of doing this is to ask around at the office (if you’re travelling on business). 

Online Resources

The internet is an expert at everything, and choosing a restaurant is no exception.

For this piece, I will focus on one of the simplest and in my opinion, best site for this.

Citysearch is a site that features restaurant, event and shopping information for most major metropolitan areas in the country.  It also features yearly ‘best of’ lists for different cuisines, etc and these are based on user ratings of restaurants.

There are some definite do’s and don’t when it comes to getting the most out of Citysearch.

Do’s:

• Do take advantage of the “Best of Citysearch” section.  If you know the type of cuisine you’re looking for, this is perfect place to start your search.
• Do pay close attention to the Editorial Review of a restaurant.  These reviews are independent and should be relatively objective.
• Do call and confirm a restaurant is still open (even if they don’t take reservations) before heading out the door.  In some areas (NYC is a good example) restaurants come and go so quickly not even websites like Citysearch are completely up to date

Dont’s:

• Don’t be put off by a couple of negative user reviews if the editorial review, and the majority of user reviews are positive.  Here in Denver there are several lounges we go to and user reviews for these places will often include comments like “Snobby staff, couldn’t get a drink”.  Having never had a bad experience there myself, I can only imagine the person leaving that review was either under-dressed, acting like an ass, or felt out of place and therefore left the vengeful review.
• Don’t forget to pay attention to the dress code section
• Don’t overlook the payment types section.  Believe it or not, there are still some restaurants that only take cash.

Hopefully with these tips in tow, your next dining experience in a strange town will be an enjoyable one.