The Gourmez

A few things to note about my food and drink reviews:

1. Reviewing is innately subjective. My taste buds are not your taste buds and that’s okay. Heck, one human’s notes of leather are another’s notes of tobacco—this is precisely why I include other bloggers’ thoughts with my wine reviews. For food and cocktails, we all have different ideas of the right amount of salt or alcohol bite in a dish or drink.

2. My ratings skew toward the higher end of the scale. This is solely because I pay for my meals and drinks, and I’m generally not going to waste my money somewhere or on something that doesn’t look like it will promise a tasty meal or at least a satisfactory beverage. I have no qualms giving low ratings—if it’s not that great, in my opinion, I’ll say so—but because I discriminate before I go out, those low ratings are not common. On the rare occasion that I’m comped for a meal, drink, entry ticket, et cetera, I’ll note it in the blog.

This is my strangely derived rating scale for restaurants, wines, and cocktails. It is based solely on my culinary preferences; at least I know what I’m talking about! From worst to best:

Mushroom: Squishy, drab, and usually a fungus. Stay away if at all possible.
Olive: It may come in many colors and flavors, but there’s always a bitter pit at the core.
Chicken: The art of neutrality. It tastes like everything and everything tastes like it.
Avocado: So good, without overwhelming its peers. Pure, simple, delightful.
Truffles: Luscious, tantalizing, a masterpiece of its genre.

I’m always open to suggestions on places to go, wines to drink, or cocktails to sip.