How we rate every restaurant on Outside Eats

Most restaurant ratings come from a crowd. Thousands of strangers, each with a different idea of what a good night out looks like, averaged into a number that tells you a place is popular. Popular is useful. It is not the same as good.

Outside Eats works differently. Every restaurant in the guide is there because we chose it, and every Outside Eats rating comes from us. When we say the list is curated, this is what we mean.

We go there ourselves

Outside Eats was founded by David Gagne, and the guide starts with a simple rule: we visit the places we list. We walk in, look around, read the menu, and get a feel for the room before a restaurant earns a spot.

Visiting is the first step. Eating is the goal. We have not sat down for a full meal at every restaurant in the guide yet, and we will not pretend otherwise. That is the work in front of us, one table at a time, and every meal ends with a scorecard.

Six questions at every table

After a meal, the Outside Eats reviewer scores the restaurant on six criteria, each from 0 to 5. They are not weighted equally, because they do not matter equally.

• Food quality (35%). Taste, cooking, ingredients, and how much of the menu is worth ordering. A small, focused menu can still score a 5.
• Atmosphere (20%). Is the space enjoyable to spend time in, and does it fit the concept? We judge whether the room works for what the restaurant is, not whether it matches our personal taste.
• Value (15%). Given the quality and amount of food, was it worth what we paid? Price level does not matter. A $90 dinner can score a 5, and a $12 lunch can score a 1.
• Service and pacing (15%). How the staff treated the table and how the meal flowed from arrival to check. At a counter, that means the ordering experience and how long the food took.
• Delivers on its promise (10%). Does the restaurant succeed at what it sets out to be? A great dive bar can score a 5 here.
• Cleanliness (5%). The dining room, the tables, the restrooms, and any kitchen we can see.

What a 1, a 3, and a 5 mean

Every criterion has written anchors, so a score means the same thing at a taqueria as it does at a tasting menu. For food, a 1 is poorly made: badly seasoned, wrong temperature, little worth ordering. A 3 is solid and competent, with fresh ingredients and no real flaws, but nothing memorable. A 5 is exceptional: precisely cooked, ingredients you can taste the quality of, and a meal you will tell people about.

The same idea runs through every category. A 3 means the restaurant did the job. A 5 means it did something we will remember.

How the number comes together

Each score is multiplied by its weight, and the results add up to one Outside Eats rating out of 5. Food carries the most weight, so a restaurant cannot coast on a beautiful room. Cleanliness carries the least weight, but any cleanliness score of 1 or lower holds the rating for review before anything is published.

Every scorecard is reviewed before it touches a published rating. When a restaurant has been scored more than once, its rating is the average of those visits, so one great night or one off night does not decide everything.

Our opinions, and only ours

Restaurants cannot pay for a rating, and they cannot pay to change one. The Outside Eats rating is not pulled from other review sites or averaged with anyone else’s stars. It is our judgment, written down with a rubric so it stays honest and consistent.

You may disagree with us, and that is fine. A rating with a point of view is more useful than one without. Now you know exactly how ours is made.

Every rating on Outside Eats is one of ours. The list grows every week, one meal at a time.