michelin stars

Auberge du Soleil Celebrates its Anniversary with Getaway Package

Filed under: Dining, Luxury Travel & Hotels

Auberge du Soleil, the iconic Michelin-starred restaurant (and winner of the Luxist Readers' Choice Award for Most Romantic Restaurant) and premier luxury resort is celebrating its 25th anniversary as a resort (30 years for the restaurant). Auberge du Soleil, which is Napa Valley's first fine-dining venue, helped transform the area into the must-see destination it is today for food, wine, and the beauty of wine country. In honor of this milestone, Auberge du Soleil will celebrate with a year of culinary offerings and experiences in addition to a fresh new look unveiled this month.

The first culinary offering features a "30-Year Journey Through Wine" list featuring 30 consecutive vintages from around the world as well as from the Napa Valley that was compiled by Wine Director Kris Margerum. This special list will be available through 2011 in addition to the more than 1,300 selections that are featured on Auberge du Soleil's standard comprehensive wine list.

Gallery: Auberge du Soleil

Tags: auberge du soleil, awards-main, luxist-awards, luxist-main, michelin, michelin guide, michelin stars, Napa Valley, Relais Chateau, RelaisChateaux

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Il San Pietro di Positano Wins Luxist's Editors' Choice Award for Best in Summer Travel

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

Il San Pietro di Positano Wins Luxist's Editors' Choice Award for Best in Summer Travel

At the famous Royal Horticultural Society Chelsea Flower Show in 2006, the Queen of England traipsed through a garden of hibiscus and bougainvillea inspired by the terraces of Italy's Il San Pietro di Positano-and liked what she saw.

"The Queen appreciated the display at the flower show, but has never been at the San Pietro," says the hotel's Lorenzo Saprio. "Her sister, Princess Margaret, was a frequent visitor."

Fortunately for the rest of the world, that experience can also be enjoyed by people who aren't members of the British royal family. Perched on the cliffs above the bay of Postitano with sweeping views of the town John Steinbeck once described as "a dream place that isn't quite real when you are there and becomes beckoningly real after you have gone," Il San Pietro di Positano is our pick for the Editors' Choice Award in Best Summer Travel.

The hotel features 61 rooms hewn into the rock, each with its own spectacular view and unparalleled privacy. A staff of 127 people buzzes about the resort, looking after guests as they stroll from orchid-filled lobby to dichondra-decked terrace, spacious swimming pool to state-of-the-art fitness center, all the way down to an umbrella-dotted sun deck set just a few feet above the rocky shore.

Gallery: Hotel Il San Pietro di Positano

Tags: amalfi, amalfi coast, awards-main, Carlo Cinque, Il San Pietro di Positano, Italy, luxist-awards, michelin guide, michelin stars, Queen of England, resorts, San Pietro di Positano, winners-summer-travel

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The French Laundry Wins the Luxist Award for Best Domestic Restaurant

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Few fine restaurants boast a past as sordid as The French Laundry. Even so, the Yountville, Calif. eatery is consistently rated among the world's best, and is the Luxist Awards' Readers' Choice winner in the best fine domestic dining category.

In the late 1880s, the building that currently contains the three Michelin star French Laundry was a humble saloon. When a town ordinance mandated that no alcohol be served within two miles of Yountville, the building was converted first into a brothel, then to a French steam laundry by the 1920s. In 1974, the town's mayor bought the laundry and converted it into a restaurant; twenty years later it was purchased by current owner and chef Thomas Keller.

Gallery: The French Laundry

Tags: awards-main, best domestic restaurant, best restaurant, luxist-awards, michelin, michelin guide, michelin stars, Napa Valley, The French Laundry, thomas keller, winners-fine-dining, Yountville

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Restaurant Guy Savoy Wins the Luxist Award for Best International Restaurant

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Fewer than 100 restaurants in the entire world have received Michelin's coveted three-star rating, and even fewer enjoy the renown of Restaurant Guy Savoy. The Paris eatery is also the winner of a Luxist Awards' Readers' Choice Award in the best international fine dining category.

Guy Savoy opened his first Paris restaurant in 1980 at the age of 27. Within five years, Savoy had earned two Michelin stars and Savoy was well on his way to becoming one of the world's most celebrated chefs. In 1987, he moved into the current Restaurant Guy Savoy location on Rue Troyon-all the while helping to establish Nouvelle Cuisine, a lighter approach to French cooking. Savoy earned a third Michelin star in 2002 and soon expanded internationally, opening a Las Vegas location in 2006 (a Luxist Awards nominee in the Best Domestic category).

Gallery: Guy Savoy in Paris

Tags: awards-main, best international restaurant, Guy Savoy, luxist-awards, michelin, michelin guide, michelin stars, Paris, Restaurant Guy Savoy, winners-fine-dining

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Restaurant Guy Savoy: Home of one of the World's Most Celebrated Chefs

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Fewer than 100 restaurants in the entire world have received Michelin's coveted three-star rating, and even fewer enjoy the renown of Restaurant Guy Savoy. As such, the Paris eatery is an easy choice as a nominee for a Luxist award in the best international fine dining category.

Guy Savoy opened his first Paris restaurant in 1980 at the age of 27. Within five years, Savoy had earned two Michelin stars and Savoy was well on his way to becoming one of the world's most celebrated chefs. In 1987, he moved into the current Restaurant Guy Savoy location on Rue Troyon-all the while helping to establish Nouvelle Cuisine, a lighter approach to French cooking. Savoy earned a third Michelin star in 2002 and soon expanded internationally, opening a Las Vegas location in 2006 (a Luxist Awards nominee in the Best Domestic category).

Gallery: Guy Savoy in Paris

Tags: awards-main, Guy Savoy, luxist-awards, michelin, michelin guide, michelin stars, Paris, Restaurant Guy Savoy

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Taillevent: A Shining Star in the City of Lights

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Taillevent in Paris is nominated for a Luxist Award for Best International Restaurant

Of all the restaurants in Paris, none have matched Taillevent's 34 years of three-star Michelin glory. Though the restaurant only carries two stars these days, it's still among the best in the City of Lights-and an easy choice as a Luxist nominee in the best international fine dining category.

Taillevent was founded in 1946 by restaurateur André Vrinat, who decided to name his restaurant after a fourteenth century cook credited with writing the first French recipe book. Within two years of opening, Taillevent received its first Michelin star; its second came eight years after that. In 1962 Vrinat passed off the business to his son, who soon earned a third star for maintaining his father's vision of a grand traditional restaurant where owners greeted patrons and chefs stayed in the kitchen.

Gallery: Taillevent in Paris, France

Tags: Awards-main, best international restaurant, Luxist-Awards, michelin, michelin stars, MichelinGuide, paris, Taillevent

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Pierre Koffmann to Open New Restaurant at London's Berkeley Hotel

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Award-winning chef Pierre Koffmann to open new namesake restaurant at The Berkeley hotel in London in June 2010

In June, legendary French chef Pierre Koffmann, whose name has been synonymous with some of the finest French food in the world for the past 35 years, will open Koffmann's in The Berkeley hotel in Knightsbridge, London.

Encouraged by his rave reviews and enthusiastic welcome back into the London culinary scene with his Selfridges pop-up restaurant in October 2009, Koffmann, a Michelin star-winning chef, is excited to embark on this next stage in his distinguished career.

"I have been searching for the perfect new restaurant site for several years," says Koffmann. "I am thrilled to be returning to a place I know and love."

This new venture will see Koffmann move away from his much applauded haute cuisine menu, and into a more relaxed, informal style while still embracing his classic, provincial, French culinary roots. His greatest passion is to be behind the stove, cooking the dishes he loves, many inspired by his maternal grandmother Camille, and this new restaurant will give him the freedom to express this vision.

Tags: haute cuisine, Knightsbridge, London, Marcus Wareing, michelin guide, michelin stars, Pierre Koffmann, restaurant, The Berkeley, The Berkeley Hotel

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Tell Us Everything, Chef Daniel Boulud

by Carrie N. Culpepper (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining, Tell Us Everything

In an era of celebrity chefs and big food personalities with TV shows, magazines and books, blogs and cookware lines, French chef Daniel Boulud is in some ways a throwback. A trained chef with farm roots and a fine-dining pedigree whose built a string of successful restaurants, now being replicated all over the world. Boulud is best known for his eponymous Manhattan restaurant Daniel, which this year earned him three Michelin stars – the Academy Award for Best Picture equivalent for a chef – it's considered the highest honor a restaurant can earn.

Gallery: Daniel Boulud Restaurants

Tags: bar boulud, cafe boulud, celebrity chefs, chef daniel boulud, daniel boulud, daniel boulud brasserie, daniel new york, DB Bistro Moderne, lumiere, maison boulud, michelin starred chefs, michelin stars, MichelinStars, new york chefs, new york dining, south beach food and wine festival

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Go Deeper into the Italian Dolomites at Rosa Alpina

by Alison Wellner (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

The New York Times just ran a lovely story encouraging travelers of the ski-enthusiast and foodie variety to head for Cortina d'Ampezzo in the Italian Dolomites. If you're looking for something that's just as luxey and lesser known in the US (which makes it more-luxurious by definition) I would nudge you just a bit further west and north into Alta Badia, and specifically to the tiny little town of San Cassiano.

Americans that visit the Alta Badia region and particularly San Cassiano tend to come in the summertime, for hiking and fishing. But in the winter, the area is mostly frequented by Italians, and for good reason: San Cassiano and its environs have all the scenery and the skiing, plus its restaurants are a tightly-knit constellation of Michelin stars -- apparently the highest Michelin star concentration in the Alps.

The place to stay here is Rosa Alpina with 51 rooms, three restaurants (including St. Hubertus, with two Michelin stars) It's owned by the Pizzinini family which fairly dominates hospitality in this area, having been in the hotel business here since the 1930s. The family owns hotels, restaurants and even the local butcher shop. This means that whatever you need is not only within the grasp of the management here, they're probably related to the people who can make it happen.

The clientele they cater to obviously expects nothing less. It was snowing on the day I arrived, and the winding mountain roads with their hairpin turns and minimal guardrails would have been difficult in a car without four wheel drive. One guest had his Porsche Carrera flat-bedded up the mountains so he could drive it during the weekend, having followed behind in a more sensible form of transport -- if you'll allow that sensible is a word that could at all be fairly applied to that entire situation.

Gallery: Rosa Alpina and San Cassiano

Tags: dolomites, frette, italy, luxist-awards, michelin stars, MichelinStars, prada, skiing

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Gordon Ramsay Loses A Michelin Star

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

With tax woes, debt and restaurant sales, 2009 was just not celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay's year. But the start of 2010 isn't looking too bright either. As the Daily Mail reports, Ramsay's Gordon Ramsay At Claridge's restaurant has lost its Michelin star in the 2010 Michelin Guide.

Despite a food poisoning scare Heston Blumenthal's The Fat Duck at Bray in Berkshire held on to all three of its stars. The Waterside Inn in Bray also has three stars. The guide even awarded its first star to a London pub, The Harwood Arms.

Ramsay, who recently filmed a new cooking show set in India, is said to be disappointed to lose the star but determined to get it back. He indicated that the loss may have come because he offered simpler and less expensive meals to attract customers during the recession. Ramsay is the most high profile chef to lose his star in Great Britain and Ireland but he's not alone. Caterer Search reports that a total of 15 establishments lost stars. They include The Capital and Aubergine in London and Mint in Dublin.

Tags: gordon ramsay, gordon ramsay at claridges, GordonRamsay, GordonRamsayAtClaridges, london, michelin star, michelin stars, MichelinStar, MichelinStars

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