

The Michelin Guide also has a Bib Gourmand award for the restaurants that are the best value for money, and there is a wide range of San Francisco restaurants with this award for you to explore if you prefer gourmet dining on a budget.Īs you might have guessed, these lauded Bay Area Michelin Star restaurants tend to be expensive, with the most expensive venues featuring multi-course tasting menus that soar into the $300 per person range.


There are currently a handful of restaurants in the Bay Area with this distinction and two San Francisco restaurants that sport the green star, and we will indicate which stared restaurants earned it by putting “green star” in parentheses next to the restaurant’s name. This distinction is meant to highlight restaurants that are industry leaders in sustainable, eco-friendly practices. There are also other ratings, such as the Michelin Green Star, which restaurants can earn on top of the regular Michelin stars. For the following tier, two Michelin stars indicate “excellent cooking, worth a detour.”įinally, the Michelin Guide defines one-star restaurants as “high-quality cooking, worth a stop”, and in the Bay Area, there are a growing number of restaurants that fit this category. A three-star restaurant, according to the Michelin Guide, is a restaurant that is so good it’s worth a road trip itself to get to it. As such, restaurants with Michelin stars are ranked according to how worthwhile they are to go out of your way and visit. The Michelin Guide is meant as a driver’s guide for which restaurants are worth stopping on a road trip. What Is the Michelin Guide and How Does It Work? Designed around the concept of omotenashi, meaning the “spirit of selfless hospitality, anticipating needs without having to be asked”, this elegant and highly instagrammable restaurant founded by Kyle and Katina Connaughton serves an 11-course kaiseki menu that often features fresh produce straight from the restaurant’s vegetable gardens. Out in the NorCal wine country, SingleThread’s journey to three Michelin stars took much less time than Atelier Crenn’s as the restaurant made the jump from two to three stars within just two years of opening. In the meantime, her French eatery was ranked in the World’s 50 Best Restaurants and earned her a James Beard Foundation Award for Best Chef in the West.īut it’s not just San Francisco’s gourmet scene that has put Bay Area Michelin-Star restaurants on the culinary map. Though Crenn garnered her first Michelin star in 2012 and then her second the following year, it took eight years for her to achieve three-star status.
#CITY WITH MOST MICHELIN STARS PROFESSIONAL#
The honor bears particular significance, as it highlights historic gender disparities in both professional kitchens and trusted international culinary guides. Atelier Crenn chef-owner Dominique Crenn also made history in another way by becoming the first woman to head a three-star restaurant in the United States, a truly remarkable achievement. Michelin Star restaurants in the Bay area that kept their three-star status in 2022 include San Francisco restaurants such as Benu, Quince, and the famed Atelier Crenn which in 2019 helped push San Francisco over the line to briefly overtake New York City in three-star Michelin guide restaurants. Nevertheless, Bay Area as a whole remains a highly dynamic region in American cuisine that shows a lot of promise for growth with both newcomers and some of California’s oldest restaurants making the list. With three three-star Michelin restaurants in 2023, San Francisco itself falls slightly short of New York City, which has five.

Fortunately, the Michelin Guide is here to provide you with the best of the best in Bay Area Michelin Star restaurants. There are so many good restaurants in the region that it can prove challenging for a foodie to figure out where they want to go for a luxuriant night out on the town. Moreover, the whole Golden State has made a real name for itself as a major gourmet hub around the world, and that is even more true in 2022 when the Michelin Guide recognized 89 California Michelin Guide restaurants. The number of Bay Area Michelin-star restaurants currently stands at around 50, and the region remains one of the prime places for restaurants with Michelin stars in the entire country. The esteemed Michelin Guide awarded stars to 57 Bay Area restaurants-the most the region has ever seen, making 2019 a record-breaking year. It’s official: Northern California is the nation’s fine-dining hub.
