I went with the 10 course. I wasn't sure how the food will be, so I just dipped my toes in the first time. :D I will definitely go back to try the 19 next time though!

You are very welcome - I was really impressed and the price for lunch is an unbelievable bargain ( and not much different from what you get for dinner - just a few courses less). I didn't have wine so glad for your input on that.
How did u make the reservation for Kadowaki and what was the cost?

I would agree with that. I’ve chatted with maitred’s at several 3 stars in Paris and New York and they’ve stressed the importance of service.

I booked Kadowaki via my hotel about four weeks in advance. Total cost for two was about 74,000 JPY.

Agreed that there is no discernible rhyme or reason, but I have certain service expectations at a three star versus a two star. Often the food / product is not necessarily that much better, but the service should be pretty much seamless.

The last time I was at Osteria Francescana I was musing about the number of wait staff to diners and calculated it to be about 1:1. To be fair, kitchen staff to diners was about 2:1 based on the visit we had at the end of service. But gotta pay for all those heads somehow and maybe a few waiters more or less can tip the balance by a star.

Willie's Restaurant, Vilamoura, Algarve, Portugal [REVIEW:PHOTOS]
 

Our dinner, October 2016

Having informed ourselves about Michelin stared dining in the Algarve, Portugal my fiancé and I booked a table for two at Willie’s Restaurant in Vilamoura in October 2016.

The restaurant was interesting and convenient located – just ca. 10 minutes’ walk from the Hilton Vilamoura As Cascatas Golf Resort & Spa, where we stayed for 5 nights. Please see also review on FT: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/28810495-post97.html.

The restaurant is housed in a beautiful villa. There is also a small garden with blooming and fragrant flowers. It’s romantic and we loved the setting.

Wilhelm “Willie” Wuerger is a German chef, who holds 1 Michelin star since 2007 for the restaurant.

The interior of the villa felt like a living room with gold colors, green accents and dark wood. There were photographs of a younger Willie Wuerger with famous patrons.

Overall the relaxed atmosphere of the restaurant including the music and the cuisine felt like you were back in the 80s, which we very much enjoyed.

Our fellow diners were couples and small groups. There was also a single client, who was a regular.

The restaurant sees also a lot of celebrations incl. anniversaries and birthdays.

The Maître d’ welcomed us warmly and treated us like we were family members. He was entertaining and very knowledgeable, especially about wines.

We were seated at our table with white table cloth and offered the menu.

While we chose, the amuse-bouche was served. They were a pretzel mix, cream cheese on a wafer, which was salty and sweet, a fish canapé and pate with chutney and cracker. They reminded me of my childhood in Germany.

Our drinks to start with were a bottle of still Estrela water, one orange and one apple juice.

Unfortunately Willie’s doesn’t offer mocktails.

Our starters were chicken in sesame crust with pomegranate and crunchy salad leaves and Carpaccio of beef fillet with mixed salad leaves, aged Parmesan, quail’s egg and cherry tomato. Both dishes were delicious and the Carpaccio one of the best I’ve ever had.

The main courses were John Dory with grilled vegetables and potato mash with truffles and medium well tornedos of beef with Madeira sauce, roesti and grilled vegetables.

The tornedos were melt in the mouth and he still drools, when thinking about them. The roesti was the best ever.

The John Dory was luxurious.

With the desserts (Crepe with strawberries Romanoff and cinnamon ice cream and stewed peach, pistachio, green biscuit and Amaretto mousse) came my fiancé’s Quinta de Camarates D.O.P. dessert wine.

The desserts were divine. The dessert wine was a good match.

To round it up we had two cappuccinos.

We received petit fours with them. They included raspberry macaroons, Madeleines, chocolate truffles and a Mirabelle.

The bill was 167.10 Euro (ca. 200.50 USD).

When the maître d’ noticed my fiancé was interested in a white wine, he let him try it for free, which was generous and memorable.

Another great opportunity was to meet Chef Willie personally, organized by the maître d’. We were very grateful we had the chance and sometimes still reminisce about it. We were surprised we were allowed into the kitchen, because a couple before us had wanted to meet Chef Willie too, but they had been refused as the chef himself was very busy. More beautiful memories made at Willie’s.

We would return, because we have been treated exceptionally well, the whole evening felt somehow like a “blast from the past” and the excellent cuisine and service rounded up a beautiful evening in Vilamoura, Algarve, Portugal in October 2016 for us.

Here's a selection of our images we took during our memorable dinner in October 2016 including:

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4214/...f6af2123_b.jpg
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Would we recommend this restaurant to a friend? YES! ^
Would we want to enjoy dinner again at this restaurant in our future? YES! ^

Thank you and safe travels. :)

Last weekend we went to Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodles, the other 1 star hawker stand in Singapore.

Timeline:
9:50 AM Arrival to queue
11: 45 AM Ordered!
11:52 AM Our food was being prepared
11:58 AM Food on the table
12:20 PM We were on foot heading to Arab Street

We ordered both of the main big dishes and an extra side of the deep fried fish fins. It was all good. Freshly prepared. Size was a bit small for SGD 6 but not bad. But for the life of me, I cannot figure out what is special about this place. Those are two hours I will never get back.

If you find yourself in Singapore I'll be happy to take you to a place about 100 meters from my place which has just about the same dish and is just as tasty or perhaps more so. Only open 7AM-2PM and closed on Monday. And the wait will be maybe 10 mins.

L'Osier (3 stars) last night here in Tokyo. Everything was nice...and that was exactly the problem - nothing really stood out. If a 3* meal can be boring, this was it.

Don't get me wrong - good food, nice presentation, good ingredients (mostly), nice ambience, but I don't think there is anything about this meal that I'll remember 5 years from now. Esquisse (2*) last week at half the price (for lunch) was more exciting.

While I think the Michelin system is generally on point and reliable in the US and Europe, I tend to disagree with its rating more in Asia more often than not.

Huh? This is not my own observational assessment; this is coming straight from the source. I have read multiple interviews with directors of the Michelin Guide (past and present) and they have stated that stars are awarded solely based on the food, not the service, decor, or other "soft" aspects of a restaurant. Moreover, here is the link to a Michelin Guide press kit that states on p. 6, 'If Michelin often says that the stars “are in the plate and only in the plate,” it’s
because only the quality of the cuisine is evaluated. The restaurant’s location, decoration, service, equipment or other features are absolutely not taken into account.'
Link: https://www.michelin.com/content/dow...gapore-ENG.pdf

The interview linked below with Michael Ellis, current managing director of the Michelin Guides, outlines the criteria Michelin inspectors use when they award stars, all of which relate to the plate/food (e.g., quality of cooking, quality of ingredients, plating, and value for money).
http://fine-dining-guide.com/micheli...-michael-ellis

Regarding Daniel in NYC, Pete Wells dropped it to 3 stars from 4 in The New York Times because of service issues; that wasn't why Michelin eliminated a star. It would only have been due to a slippage in the quality or value of the food/plating.

Now, many of you point out a correlation between service and the number of Michelin stars. Well this is unsurprising and is what I'd call "omitted variable bias"! What you are referring to are high-end restaurants where guests pay not just for the food but for the experience. But none of this bears on the stars rated.

Wow, thank you! I don't currently know when or if I'll be back in Singapore any time soon, but will let you know if so. I actually loved Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodles but it was my first ever meal in Singapore! What I appreciated was the complexity and subtlety of the layers of spice. I had the noodle dish with pork and fish.

i know what they say.

And what incentive would there be to lie about the criteria? You very well could be right that there is a hidden criterion for service; if so, though, Michelin goes very far out of their way to say that this is not the case and I wonder why they would want to do that.

I’m not accusing anyone of lying. But I don’t believe any human is completely without bias and good service gives a favorable overall impression.

That's a valid point. Even if service is no criteria and you try to fading it out it may influence you. This may not be the case with average service but I can imagain that if the service has a really bad day you also don't find the food as good as it is in an "objective" (is this possible?) pov.

I've a vague memory around about the time Tim Ho Wan in Hong Kong first got its star that it was the result of a deliberate decision to move away from restricting its awards to more formal orientated restaurants.

I've also had chef-patron in two separate countries complain to me about the restrictions operating in a Michelin quality environment impose on table settings, including measuring place settings and not being able to join tables or use convertibles (so the restaurant ends up getting set up inflexibly, generally to focus on tables for 2, with the effect that at times when demand changes, i.e. conferences or large groups, they can't respond).

These discussions were both in the last 10 years, although clearly with the number of more casual restaurants appearing in the guides something has obviously changed. Amusingly in one (not to be named) south eastern French restaurant, the proprietor wasn't starred at that point and told me not only was he not interested, he went on a complete rant and said he would chase the inspector out the door if he saw him.

When I next visited 18 months later, the restaurant was proudly displayed its newly starred status :)