Yelp claims Chicago area's best restaurant is 40 miles away in Waukegan | Hacker News Reader

Yelp claims Chicago area's best restaurant is 40 miles away in Waukegan

chicagotribune.com

25 pointswglb24 comments

Lthforum.com's great neighborhood restaurant guide is probably the best food guide for Chicago: http://www.lthforum.com/chicago-restaurant-guide/

Yelp used to be (and likely still is) filled with people giving 5 stars to bad Mexican restaurants because they like the drinks and Thai places that drown everything in sugar. The GNR guide will lead you to wonderful, authentic, and affordable restaurants and will likely widen most people's perspective on the city as it will take you into all of the neighborhoods.

Anyone know of a website like this for more than just chicago?

Looking through the list, there are indeed some very good options there, but that's more of a site for locals, not for visitors who want to stay near the center of the city and try the Chicago staples which may not necessarily be the "best" food, but is at least consistently decent.

The list seems to intentionally avoid well-known delicious, popular spots (the aviary, au cheval, pequods, minghin, serai) in favor of hole-in-the-wall places which might not be as good but have edgy, hidden, or traditional vibes to them (violet hour, Marie's, Nicky's hot dogs). I do like some of the picks (Birrieria Reyes de Ocotlán is amazing) but there's a lot to be desired. Only one restaurant from Pilsen? And Al's beef... really?

Then again, it would be damn tough to conglomerate a restaurant list for the city of Chicago that pleases everyone. Thanks for sharing, it was fun reading through these nostalgically.

And Al's beef... really?

Yeah. That right there shows that the list was made by someone who's never eaten in Chicago. Which would include any automated/AI-generated list.

(For those outside of Chicagoland, Al's Beef is the McDonald's of Italian beef/hot dogs).

Violet Hour is a hole-in-the-wall to the point of being almost impossible to find, but isn't it rated as one of the best bars in the country pretty consistently?

But really, does anyone still take anything from Yelp as anything other than a joke?

I was referring to the Lthforum list, not the yelp one. Apologies if that was unclear. Violet Hour is great! I was just using it as an example as one of many proclaimed "hole-in-the-wall" or "hidden gem" examples. It's really not all that hard to find considering people line up consistently down the block.

Oh, right. Yes, LthForum, Eater etc. are actually quite useful. Yelp, not so much.

Interestingly, first time I tried to find Violet Hour, maybe it was a slow night, but I just couldn't. With no line of people trying to get in it was nigh impossible. Aviary at least has a sign, not that it were easy to get in on a whim. Worth it, though.

Sometimes it is.

Listen. I'm from the Midwest, so for all you #WestCoast refugees seeking asylum here. Sometimes you gotta drive a half an hour, and you'll find a really shiny gem sleeping just outside your 'burb.

All I ask is that you please don't ruin this land for the rest of us. We've enjoyed our lives here quite well, while you mock us for being "fly over country".

shhhh

I mean there's nothing but gross trees, ugly bluffs, and big dumb cows here.

/nothing to see here. move along people

Welp, sounds like Yelp's algorithm for this is sort of wacky. Ratings supported by fewer data points (which I would call less reliable for that reason) are over-represented.

Seriously. I worked in research for a while and we would weight data to fit demographics but there were limits to how much weighting you could apply before the data sample was considered insufficient. I really wonder how much this algorithm is ignoring general sampling rules like ‘n > 30’ to crank out this list.

Serious question. I thought Yelp was basically dead? I essentially only use Google reviews.

Last I checked Yelp is used by Apple on their maps in the US (and perhaps elsewhere). As for Google reviews - they always appear inflated whenever I cross check them, so you're always eating somewhere good. Same thing for facebook reviews.

I’m someone who prefers Yelp to Google Reviews. 4, 4.5 and 5 star yelp rating is as good as an objective top rating for me - and the volume of reviews seems to be higher on Yelp as well.

I find Google ratings are inflated as well. I’ve commonly seen restaurants that is 3 stars on Yelp have 4.5 stars on Google. A 4.5 Yelp restaurant (in SF) at least almost always means there is a line or a reservation. 4.5 stars on Google almost always means “they won’t poison you here”

I agree with this analogy. Mostly because I will give a place 5-star review if it's half decent and affordable. On Google Reviews that is.

There must be some weird Yelp-fu to which I am not privy.

I have never found Yelp to be useful in the slightest. Yet my gf is able to look in Yelp and find great places to eat or find something we need. I honestly haven't the faintest idea how she acquired this superpower.

girlfriends know yelp.

I don't pick the first place I see off Yelp, it's more of a filter for bad restaurants and then check remaining menus. I've found the actual written reviews to not be very useful unless I'm looking for authenticity (Chinese vs American Chinese)

I thought Yelp was basically dead? I essentially only use Google reviews.

I don't trust Yelp. But I trust Google even less. Yes, maybe the Google Reviews people are siloed from all the bad things happening elsewhere in the company. But as far as I am concerned, anything with Big G's logo on it is automatically suspect.

/Moving my e-mail and documents off of Google as I write this

No joke though. If you are in the Portage Park area in Chicago Bistro 6050 is great. I usually get the empanadas there and they never disappoint.

Any nights quieter than others to try it?

I think any night is usually a good night, they don't really ever fill up. Sometimes if there's an early show at the patio some of the crowd might stop by there but I don't think I've ever had to wait for a seat. The ice cream is good as well.

Yeah, they also claim that the "best" restaurant in America is "Bangers and Brews" in Bend, OR.

Maybe the list should be "Restaurants which most successfully appeal to the lowest common local denominator" - then things start to make sense.

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