Hotel food is inherently different from destination restaurant food; the latter is a meal to be savoured, maybe a once-a-year or even once-a-lifetime event. Hence the emphasis on creativity and theatre. By contrast hotel food is to provide sustenance for the weary traveller. It is meant to be nutritious and healthy, rather than creative and astonishing. I ate at Michelin 2 star restaurants for 5 consecutive days once -- and my liver couldn't take it any more! It is not food that you can eat every day.

My PA judges the quality of a hotel's food by a simple test: order a club sandwich. It has never failed to indicate the true quality of room service at all hotels that I've stayed. I'm no fan of club sandwiches, but it can really hit the spot and cure jet lag.

So my reaction to this thread is that it is pointless, trying to rate hotels as destination restaurants when that isn't the food most of us eat at those hotels (or want to eat). The R&C approach (where it is a destination restaurant, and the hotel operation is merely a convenience for the diners) is telling, and of course results in fine dining. But most of the time I don't want fine dining when traveling, but comfortable and convenient dining.