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Michelin Guide releases ‘Bib Gourmand’ best value restaurants in Northern California for 2022
The Michelin Guide has released its first 2022 rankings for California, revealing new additions to its Bib Gourmand list.
These Bib Gourmand picks don’t include Michelin’s famous stars. The French guide tends to reserve that designation for fine-dining restaurants with a high standard for service. Instead, Bib Gourmand winners are what the guide’s anonymous inspectors consider a good value — typically under $50 for “two courses and a glass of wine or dessert.”
There were just three Northern California additions to the Bib Gourmand list this year: Good Good Culture Club in San Francisco, an offshoot of the wildly popular Liholiho Yacht Club; Hilda and Jesse in San Francisco, a sophisticated brunch restaurant; and Jo’s Modern Thai in Oakland, known for pushing boundaries with dishes like barbecue brisket drunken noodles.
This year’s list is much briefer than the 2021 group of new Bib Gourmands for the region. That’s at least in part because the guide took 2020 off due to the pandemic. The three newcomers will join a total of 141 Bib Gourmand designees for 2022, including 13 from Southern California, to which the guide expanded in 2019.
The full picture of Michelin winners, including Bib Gourmands, won’t be clear until all the stars are announced. The guidebook does not issue the entire Bib Gourmand list until next week; for now, it announced just the new additions.
“We don’t release the full list in advance because people can connect the dots and it ruins the big reveal,” a representative wrote. “Think of it as an appetizer before the full meal.”
Still, in a press release last month, the guidebook did share a list of the 37 new additions for this year, though without noting their ratings. It’s possible to spoil your appetite by consulting that list, whose members are still in the running to receive stars.
Those star winners will be announced on Monday, Dec. 5, at a ceremony at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles. The choice of venue is a handy reminder of the guide’s origins: The French tire company released its first promotional guide in 1900 to encourage auto travel, declaring restaurants worth a detour or special trip. The company’s supply of rubber, once cultivated on a plantation in French colonial Vietnam, is now sourced from farms it owns and co-owns in Brazil, West Africa, Thailand and Indonesia.
Caleb Pershan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s assistant Food + Wine editor. Email: [email protected]
What a record-breaking Black Friday means for restaurants
Sales results from Black Friday and its younger sibling Cyber Monday may have surprised a few folks this year given the stubbornly high inflationary environment we’re navigating. To recap, a record $9.12 billion was spent online on the Friday after Thanksgiving – known as “Black Friday” since the 1950s – while Cyber Monday sales also hit a record $11.3 billion.
Notably, much of those sales were driven by the aforementioned inflation. That said, traffic metrics were also nominally positive, providing a fuller picture of consumer confidence in this strange moment. For Black Friday, in-store retail traffic rose by 7% versus last year, according to RetailNext. Placer.ai data shows some shopping malls, outlet malls and open-air lifestyle centers experiencing triple-digit traffic growth versus the daily average for Q1 through Q3. All told, the National Retail Federation reports that a record 196.7 million Americans shopped over Thanksgiving weekend – exceeding expectations by more than 30 million people. The total number of shoppers grew by nearly 17 million from 2021 and is the highest figure since NRF started tracking this data in 2017.
Doesn’t seem like inflation is slowing us down much this holiday season. But what does that mean for restaurants? Like everything the industry has endured this year, it’s complicated.
According to Fair Betting Sites, which analyzed data from Mastercard SpendingPulse and Adobe Digital, US consumers who were out shopping during Black Friday weekend spent 23% more at restaurants than they did last year. That number is likely driven by both inflation and the high demand for restaurant gift cards this time of year. According to Credit Suisse, the restaurant industry sells the majority of its gift cards from Thanksgiving through New Year’s Day. This period can account for more than half of the annual gift card sales for the average casual restaurant.
Good news, right? Well, simultaneously consumer confidence continues to dwindle, and November marked the fourth straight month of declines on this metric. So, maybe not “good” news as much as “mixed” news, which seems to be a theme this year in general.
That said, there are plenty of reasons to be hopeful, despite growing predictions of a recession. The Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index cited higher gas prices as a reason for November’s decline, for example. Since that report was released, gas prices have fallen and are now at their lowest level since February. Earlier this week, GasBuddy projected gas prices could drop below $3 by Christmas. Lower gas prices tend to correlate with higher restaurant sales as consumers balance their spending wants and needs.
Consumers also have plenty of cash on hand to better manage inflation than they have at some time. According to the Wall Street Journal, US households still have about $1.7 trillion in savings they built up during the pandemic, perhaps explaining why they’re not shunning restaurants despite double-digit menu increases. The National Restaurant Association reported that consumer spending in restaurants increased in October, the last month reported, while traffic also ticked up slightly versus the previous four months.
The association notes, “Looking ahead, restaurant operators are slightly more optimistic about business conditions in the month ahead.” Sticking with the “mixed” theme, however, those operators, while bullish about their sales prospects in the near term, remain pessimistic about the direction of the economy overall.
Friday’s jobs report may also provide more reasons for optimism, at least right now. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, restaurants and bars added over 62,000 jobs in November, nearly doubling the industry’s gains from October. Granted, the industry remains nearly 400,000 positions short of pre-pandemic levels, but progress is hard to come by these days, so we’ll take it.
Contact Alicia Kelso at [email protected]
Drinking Tea Really Does Boost Your Heart Health, New Study Confirms
Whether you’re squeezing in an early-morning workout or swapping out fries for a salad, making heart-healthy choices can often feel like a sacrifice. The good news? According to a new study, there’s one cardio-friendly choice you can make that only enhances your daily routine.
Researchers found that drinking black or green tea every day helps reduce a key cardiovascular risk factor that’s associated with heart attacks and strokes. Read on to learn more about why these types of tea boast major cardiovascular benefits, and which other foods may also help improve your heart health.
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Foods that contain flavonoids promote heart health.
Flavonoids are compounds found abundantly in plants that are rich in antioxidants. Research has shown that flavonoids are useful to the body in helping to fight inflammation and oxidative stress, and may help protect against certain chronic diseases such as Type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and certain types of cancer.
A Nov. 2022 study by a team at Edith Cowan University (ECU) has confirmed another key benefit to add to that list: it concluded that flavonoids are beneficial when it comes to heart health. The team behind the study gathered 881 elderly women with a median age of 80 to assess the benefits of regular consumption of flavonoids, and found that those who regularly consumed certain foods with flavonoids were less likely to experience an accumulation of abdominal aortic calcification (AAC)— an important risk factor for heart attack and stroke.
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Green and black teas offer a high dose of flavonoids.
The study explained that drinking one particular flavonoid-rich beverage every day helps promote heart health. The team found that regularly consuming green or black tea successfully helped lower the subjects’ risk of AAC, and that black tea was the group’s main source of food-based flavonoids.
When the researchers compared those who drank two to six cups of tea daily to those who had none, the tea drinkers experienced a 16 to 42 percent reduction of extensive AAC. However, even though the heart health benefits grow with the amount they consume, it’s important to note that green and black tea is most often caffeinated, and can come with its own set of side effects when consumed in excess.
You can load up on flavonoids by eating these other foods, too.
If tea isn’t part of your preferred daily diet—or if you’re looking for a caffeine-free way to enjoy the benefits of flavonoids—experts say several other foods are rich in the heart healthy compound.
“Good sources of flavonoids include berries, red and purple grapes, cocoa and dark chocolate, green and black tea, cinnamon, kale, parsley, and soybeans,” Lindsay DelkRD, RDN, the Food and Mood Dietician, tells Best Life. “In order to reap the rewards of flavonoids, try to consume at least five servings of fruits and vegetables per day, along with drinking one or two cups of tea daily,” she advises.
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Certain flavonoid sources are less beneficial, experts say.
The study also looked at other food sources of flavonoids, and found that they are not all created equally when it comes to heart health benefits. Fruit juice, red wine, and chocolate—often touted as being flavonoid-dense—did not appear to lower one’s risk of abdominal aortic calcification, according to the ECU study.
Delk also cautions against making supplements your primary source of flavonoids, explaining that you should always aim to “meet your nutritional needs from food whenever possible. When you focus on getting your nutrients from food instead of supplements, you are able to obtain the necessary nutrients in the right amounts but enjoy a wide variety of health benefits that come from eating a balanced and varied diet,” she tells Best Life. “Some research has suggested that flavonoid supplements might also be beneficial, but there is not enough evidence yet to make any firm conclusions.”
Speak with your doctor or nutritionist to learn more about how to boost your heart health through your daily diet.