The Sunday Times Launches New Top Restaurant Guide With Extended Online Version

LONDON, Oct. 29 /PRNewswire/ -- This Sunday, October 31, the first ever The Food List: Britain's Top 100 Restaurants will be launched.  Launching online at 00.01 on Sunday 31st October, it crowns Gidleigh Park restaurant in Devon as the best eatery in Britain with Heston Blumenthal's famous Fat Duck restaurant coming a close second.  Covering the whole of the UK, the guide identifies the top restaurants across the regions as well as London, voted for by 8000 real customers in nearly 100,000 detailed, user-generated reviews.

In addition to this weekend's paper supplement, an extended list of the Top 200 restaurants will be available exclusively at thesundaytimes.co.uk/foodlist, and will remain accessible to subscribers all year round.  New subscribers can sign up now to access the full top 200 restaurants in the Sunday Times Food List, only 1 pound for the first 30 days.  

Designed specifically for the online environment, it allows users to search the top 200 restaurants by location, type of cuisine, cost or via an interactive map and also features the ability to directly book a table at participating restaurants.

This new addition to the paper's roster of definitive lists has a refreshingly simple appraisal system.  Assessment for The Food List is based on food alone, the most important aspect of any dining experience, and the result is the ultimate league table for British restaurants.

Television chef Gordon Ramsay has no restaurants in the top half of The Food List: Britain's Top 100 Restaurants.  Restaurant Gordon Ramsay in London was placed 52nd and his prestigious Petrus eatery was rated 77th.  Former Petrus chef and bitter rival of Ramsay, Marcus Wareing, fared much better.  His restaurant in The Berkeley Hotel (formerly managed by Ramsay) gained number three spot, followed by The Ledbury in fourth.  Finishing off the top five is The Waterside Inn in Bray, Berkshire.

A 32-page special supplement counting down the best 100 restaurants, with in-depth profiles of the top 25, The Food List: Britain's Top 100 Restaurants will appear in The Sunday Times on Sunday October 31, 2010.

Sunday Times Editor, John Witherow, says: "The Food List: Britain's Top 100 Restaurants is set to become the definitive guide of where to dine in Britain today.  The approach of assessing each restaurant on the quality of the food alone is unique, and manages to take a lot of the stuffiness out of the whole process of eating out."

The Food List: Britain's Top 200 Restaurants is compiled in association with Harden's, publisher of The UK Restaurant Guide.  The full list of The Food List: Britain's Top 200 Restaurants will be published online from 00.01 on Sunday October 31st on thesundaytimes.co.uk/foodlist.

SOURCE The Sunday Times