Michelin Guide
Michelin Guide
find out everything you need to know about the michelin guide, a restaurant directory first published by the French tyre company in 1900. Looking for the list of Michelin-starred restaurants in the UK and London? Take a look at the Michelin Guide For Great Britain and Ireland 2021.
How many Michelin star restaurants are there in the UK?
In the 2021 Guide for Great Britain and Ireland, there are 7 three Michelin-star restaurants, 20 two Michelin-star restaurants and 157 one Michelin-star restaurants.
Additionally, 126 restaurants are listed as Bib Gourmand recipients and 1058 have a Michelin Plate.
Who are the Michelin Guide inspectors and how to get a Michelin Star
The Michelin Guide didn't start out as the iconic restaurant guide to Michelin star restaurants it is today. It was originally conceived to encourage more motorists to take to the road, and over time, its 3 Michelin stars became the highest accolade a chef can hope to achieve.
The restaurant inspection process
But in September 2018, a new international director, Gwendal Poullennec, took the reigns, and his approach differs to his predecessors'. He believes that in order to ensure the guide's international expansion, restaurants must be given some clarity on how stars are awarded.
What is a Michelin Green Star?
In February 2020, the Michelin Guide introduced a Green Star accreditation to reward sustainable initiatives in the hospitality industry. The first green-starred restaurants appeared in the 2020 French Michelin Guide.
In the UK, the first restaurant to receive a sustainability award was one Michelin-starred Loam, owned by chef Enda McEvoy in 2020. Subsequently 23 Restaurants received a Green Star in the Michelin Guide for Great Britain and Ireland 2021.
Michelin Core Values
The first restaurant in the UK to gain a Michelin star was Albert and Michel Roux's Le Gavroche, in London. It went on to become one of the first UK restaurants to win a second star in 1977, and the first to win a third, in 1982.
Today it is still open as a two star restaurant, run by Albert's son, Michel Roux, Jr.
In 2010, the Roux family's second restaurant, the Waterside Inn, became the first restaurant outside France to have held three Michelin stars for 25 years. The Roux family was also influential in training and influencing other chefs who themselves have gone on to win Michelin stars; Pierre Koffmann, Marco Pierre White and Gordon Ramsay all went on to open restaurants which earned three Michelin stars after working with the Roux brothers.
Le Gavroche founder Michel Roux passed away in March 2020, and his brother Albert passed away in January 2021. Both left behind a legacy that will long outlive them.