My husband and I keep arguing about where to find the best resteraunt information online. I am firm believer in going online and reading people's opnions on sites like yelp, urbanspoon and even google places. My husband thinks you can learn everything you need to know about a resteraunt from their website - which I think is biased and only shows the resteraunt in the best light.
Any advice? How do you decide what food places to go to?
We see it as we drive by or hear about it from family or friends and try it. We never ever research them. For us it is trial by fire. However, often we stick to the larger chains unless it is a diner.
We look at a variety of things: type of cuisine, recommendations from friends, reviews in the paper, online comments, "best of" magazines, and looking at the menu on the restaurant website.
There are a ton of great restaurants in our area. I love to eat out, but unfortunately out budget restricts how often we can do that.
I use online sometimes. It's more time consuming imo than the newspaper. Our local paper has reviews(food critics and regular diners) every week.
We hate chains and know we won't ever eat any of them, so that narrows it down to local joints.
I will go online and look at menus though.
Word of mouth is the other big one. I trust folks I talk to more than the ones online(there are a lot of people who like applebees & chilis, mediocre food, IMO who rave about other places). That's usually how I determine if I should listen to the person or not..."Do you like applebees?" If yes, disregard. If no, think about what they say...LOL
For me normally I'll see an interesting place and either stop in or I'll check out some reviews online to get a feel of what kind of food they serve. I never go based solely on what the reviewers say anymore and the actual restaurant websites normally just have the menu. You have to remember that everyone has different tastes, so the reviews aren't always accurate for your tastes. Now if a restaurant has a ton of "this place is dirty" or "I got food poisoning" reviews, it's your best bet to take their words for it. lol!




- sarabarrett33
on Jul. 5, 2012 at 10:03 PM