How to choose a good restaurant

Undoubtedly, when choosing a restaurant to go to one has to consider an occasion and a company. The restaurant where you have a family dinner is likely to differ from the restaurant where you hold a business lunch or a loud party with a group of friends. However, there is still a set of features which are important in any situation.

One of them is the cleanliness and hygiene of the place. This includes everything from the dining area and cutlery to the kitchen facilities and toilets. Lack of hygiene can not only spoil the experience, but also be dangerous for one�s health. The second feature which always contributes to one�s impression about the restaurant is the quality of service no matter what the occasion and the company is. Impolite, unfriendly and unhelpful staff may affect the decision to come back to the restaurant even if other features were satisfactory. Overall, good restaurants tend to have high quality of both service and hygiene.

Thus, quality of service and cleanliness of the place are factors that have to be considered whatever the occasion for dining out is. However, there is a set of restaurant qualities that have to be considered separately for each occasion. For example, family outing is more likely to require the place where kids are catered for, music is not too loud and where you can get value for your money. At the same time, when you go out with friends, variety of drinks offered and music might be more important.

By all means, one of the best ways to find out the best place to meet you need is to ask around. The chance of disappointment is lower when it is recommended by a relative or a friend. If you have a particular place in mind, it might be useful to find out how busy it is. Good restaurants tend to be more crowded, so �following the herd� is not a bad idea when it comes to choosing a restaurant. Another source of opinion about the quality of the restaurant is internet. You can always find a forum where local restaurant are discussed and assessed. However, in this case you should be aware that hardly any restaurant is going to have exclusively positive feedback. Don�t let your mind to be swayed if you found one bad review among fifty good ones.

If you found a restaurant which was not visited by any of your friends or relatives or which has been recently opened and is not discussed much, try to use your common sense in order to assess whether the place is good or not. For example, check the menu and ask yourself whether you could cook that at home. Try to find out more about the chef. If the restaurant specialises in a specific type of cuisine, check if the chef comes from the country where that cuisine is.

Finally, by all means try to list the features you want the restaurant to possess (mind the occasion at this point) and try to find out more about the place you might be planning to visit. If the decision to dine out was a spontaneous one, you can always follow the crowd and see where it takes you. Just try to maintain the positive attitude towards the experience, even if was not as good as you expected it to be.

Share |

< Prev		Next >