How to assess whether a restaurant is good on the spot?

By my experience, the condition of the toilets usually correlates with the quality of the restaurant. I’m not entirely certain why that is, but I’ve noticed it in so many cases, that I now use it as a quick guideline to understand if I’m in a good restaurant or not, i.e. is it worth ordering that exclusive, interesting-sounding dish or better to keep to something that’s hard to get wrong.

It might be that it is simply a matter of attention. If they take care of the bathrooms, they probably take good care of everything else as well. Also, of course, a restaurant with good reputation and a high level of everything would not afford itself to have a cheap, dirty bathroom.

A good restaurant is one that is “crowded,” but has few other amenities.

For instance, the decor need not be modern or trendy; people aren’t going there for the decor.

People are respectably dressed, but “not to nines.” They aren’t going there to meet or impress others. It’s also not a place for “tourists.”

If little or no alcohol is served, that’s great.

Basically, if a restaurant has a steady stream of customers, and you’ve ruled out a bunch of other reasons, people must be going there for the food.

Judging a book by its cover is always fraught with missed opportunities and wasted time, but if you are interested in good food at a good price— not necessarily the best food, or the most authentic, in the best setting, or with the best company, or delivered with the best service— there are some rules I think you can follow. Some of these will be a departure from the other answers offered.

• A crowded restaurant is not always a good sign! As Andrew Ferrier noted previously, a restaurant in a great location is a restaurant that doesn’t need to try to attract customers. If it’s on a trendy street, offers a great view, or is super-convenient to a famous site, you’re likely to have overpriced food to cover the overpriced rent.

• On much the same note, a place in a guidebook has a steady stream of visitors, and by the time the guide is published has had a chance to get lazy on account of it. I steer well clear of any place with a “Lonely Planet-recommended” sign in the window. They’re a good place to meet other travelers (who blindly follow Lonely Planet recommendations), but bad for crowding and prices.

• Observe the clientele and facilities. A restaurant full of “beautiful people” may well be a place to see and be seen— not to eat. As economist Tyler Cowen has pointed out, if an establishment is making most of its money from men buying drinks for pretty women, food is of little concern; the women don’t eat and the men will pay for anything. If it’s a restaurant frequented by the “rich and powerful,” the menu is designed to soak expense accounts, not to please the palate. Luxurious fixtures mean money that could have gone to a higher-priced chef or supplier has gone to a tablecloth manufacturer or silversmith instead. The food will be overpriced what what you get in quantity or quality.

• Similarly, the lower the focus on alcohol (which is always heavily marked up), the better the food needs to be. Tyler Cowen claims that the average Pakistani restaurant in northern Virginia will be better than the average Indian restaurant for this reason. I don’t know if I buy that, but certainly a meal at a restaurant that also serves alcohol will be better than one at a bar that also serves food.

• Any place offering tourist specials and any branch of national chain restaurant is serving the lowest common denominator.

• Pay attention to ingredients. In places like the U.S., where food is often shipped over long distances and heavily processed, the simpler the ingredients the better. Elsewhere, local ingredients you see in the market are likely to have better quality and selection— the fish in Zanzibar will be more reliable than the turkey. I often eat street food when abroad, because I can see the conditions in which the ingredients are stored and the food prepared, and it’s made fresh in front of me, as opposed to some mystery meat pie from a faceless hotel kitchen.

• Review sites such as Yelp can be helpful in big cities where you have a good sampling of opinions over a good amount of time. That means, however, that those sites aren’t much help off the beaten path. A single review from someone who ordered a single dish on a single night at a restaurant a year ago is not reliable.

• Is it busy? That’s generally a positive sign.
• Do the customers look like locals? Also a good sign, means they know of others but are still willing to come here.
• What does the crowd look like? You can use their clothes, manner etc to hazard a guess at their background and what they may be willing to spend on – and use that to compare with what you want.
• Is there a price board out front with ‘discounts for tourists’ or some nonsense? Likely mass-produced for the tourist market – not necessarily bad, but it’s not likely to be a local meal.
• Is it on the main tourist street? Go one block off there, you’ve got a better chance of value for money.

Generally, I tend to find checking reviews on websites such as Yelp and TripAdvisor can be somewhat reliable, especially if there are many reviews for a place, increasingly the statistical likelihood of the score meaning something. Of course, you need some kind of smartphone to do that on the spot.

Another good approach, especially if you are staying in a fancy hotel, is to ask the concierge (although you do normally need to do this before leaving the hotel, admittedly). It’s their job to know the city, and their tip depends on the result. They should be able to find you somewhere “not touristy” if you want, and can often even get you a table and a restaurant that’s otherwise booked out.

At the other end of the scale, there are some red flags that suggest you might want to avoid a restaurant (of course there are always exceptions to these rules, so they aren’t hard and fast):

• Menus in English (if that’s not the local language, of course) – they are likely catering to tourists, which can be a sign of overpriced and underquality food.
• Restaurants in hotels, especially mid-range or cheap hotels – some five-star or fancy hotels might have good restaurants, but even if the food is good, it will typically be overpriced due to the captive market. Often better to get outside your hotel.

There is no scientific way of knowing what you want. I mean you need to know on the spot without reading a guide or asking people. You need to be God to know that.. which you can’t!

Any way there is a simple formula to spot a good restaurant with nice staff.. its too simple and it works most of the time: The more customers the restaurant has, The better it is. Just pick the crowded restaurant with the long queue.. Follow this and most likely you will not have burnt chicken or rude staff.

Regarding the price, Most of the restaurants leave a copy of the menu by the entrance just check it and you will know.