Food Discovery: The Hungry Turban Approach
So you’re traveling to a new city, are only there for a few days, and have to plan out a dozen or so meals. Where do you eat? This post isn’t for you if you’re the type of person to go with the flow, stop at a local deli on the way to see some tourist attraction. This is for those of you for whom the restaurant is the attraction. For those who don’t have a meal to waste, are super intentional about where you’re going to eat, and don’t mind parting ways with your friends to get in an extra dining experience. Do people like this exist? It can’t just be me…Anyway, this is my process, how I choose where I’m going to eat. It’s intense but bear with me.
Infatuation
The Infatuation is where I start my search. If you haven’t heard of the Infatuation, this blog post really isn’t for you. I trust you can find one of 2109 McDonald’s locations in your city. But seriously, the Infatuation is an incredible food discovery site, filled with guides for 40+ cities, with really specific recommendations like “Where To Go in NYC When You're Not Sure If It's A Date” (a personal favorite of mine) or “Where To Go When You Just Got A New Haircut” (this one…not so much). In an effort to support the hospitality industry at large in the wake of COVID, the Infatuation got rid of its popular rating system, where it graded each restaurant on a scale of 1-10. Not to worry, it still has The Greatest Hits list for every major city, and that’s where I begin.
Eater
After I’ve spent some time on the Infatuation, I move on to Eater. Specifically, I read through the “Top 38 Best Restaurants in XYZ City Right Now”, which Eater offers for ~25 cities. I’ll cross-reference the Infatuation Greatest Hits with this list, and I’ll flag the ones that overlap. What’s cool about Eater is that it has an interactive map that points out where the 38 restaurants are located in your city, making it easy to plan certain meals and activities together. I think the Infatuation might do this too, but I’m pretty sure Eater hit it first.
Trip Advisor
Now I swear I don’t have trust issues, but AFTER all that research, I’ll take the intersection of the two lists (Infatuation ∩ Eater for you math nerds) and quickly look them up on TripAdvisor. Why might you ask? Cause a man only can only visit so many restaurants, and there’s no time for an underwhelming meal. Tripadvisor is by the people, for the people - it’s hardly wrong! Tripadvisor also has an algorithm to rank each restaurant in a city. Like 1-10,000. I’m not sure what it takes to be #1 in a city, so I’ll generally look at percentiles, like if a restaurant is in the top 10% in its city. Beware though, because these rankings aren’t foolproof. I’ve seen a restaurant ranked as #1 in a city with only 10 reviews. Huge red flag. If it’s that popular, you’re looking for something with 100s or 1000s of reviews, depending on the city. Tripadvisor also categorizes restaurants into buckets like Fine Dining, Moderately Priced, or Cheap Eats, so you know exactly what you’re getting yourself into.
As The Hungry Turban following has grown and I’ve connected with foodies around the country and world, a lot of my recs have come from you guys. I’ll usually throw a story up on Instagram to collect recommendations, and you guys sure as hell don’t disappoint! I will, however, still run your recs through TripAdvisor :)
Yelp
Lastly, I’ll check Yelp to see a picture of the most up-to-date menu. Since COVID, restaurants have changed their menu time and time again, and a lot of them don’t always update their website with each iteration. One of my biggest pet peeves is when restaurants don’t include prices in their online menus. I don’t mind spending money on a meal, but I’d like to plan and budget accordingly. Since information on Yelp is crowd-sourced, the menus and prices are pretty up-to-date. The menus also really easy to find since Yelp categorizes pictures by Food, Drinks, Menu, Inside, and Outside. What I won’t do on Yelp is check reviews, as that part of the process is over. I’ve read enough.
Would love to hear your own process, however simple or complicated it may be. Comment, email, or DM!
