Seoul chef Eo Yun-gwon has shocked the restaurant world after
announcing that he is suing Michelin Guide for including his restaurant
in their 2019 edition, despite him asking them not to.
Most chefs would kill to have their restaurant included in the famous
Michelin Guide, and in fact some waste years of their lives and big
money in pursuit of a Michelin star and never get it, so Eo Yun-gwon’s
announcement that he not only explicitly asked the authors of the guide
to remove his restaurant from this year’s edition, but that he also sued
them for not honoring his request, came as a huge shock. Eo described
the Michelin Guide as cruel and unfair, and vowed to continue his
crusade against the publication.
“Michelin guide is a cruel system. It’s the cruelest test in the
world. It forces the chefs to work around a year waiting for a test
[and] they don’t know when it’s coming,” Eo Yun-gwon told CNN. “It is humiliating to see my restaurant given a rating in that unwholesome book,” Eo continued.”
“Including my restaurant Eo in the corrupt book is a defamation
against members of Eo and its fans. Like a ghost, they did not have a
contact number and I was only able to get in touch through email.
Although I clearly refused listing of my restaurant, they included it at
their will this year as well,” the founder of Ristorante Eo added.
The famous South-Korean chef mainly takes offence with how the
Micheling Guide rates restaurants, particularly its obscure criteria. He
claims he asked the authors to reveal how Michelin reviewers rate the
restaurants they visit, but the French publication is notoriously
secretive about the process, and he got no response. So he asked that
his restaurant be removed from the guide, but Michelin decided to
include it anyway.
“There are thousands of restaurants in Seoul that are on the same
level or better and more honest than those listed on the Michelin guide.
It is a sad joke that a mere 170 of them are representing Seoul,” chef
Eo Yun-gwon complained. “Numerous restaurants and the workers are
wasting away their soul (money, time, and effort) to pursue the mirage
that is Michelin star.”
Eo sued the Michelin Guide claiming that by including his restaurant
in the 2019 edition they broke a South Korean law against public insult,
but legal experts say that his case doesn’t really have a leg to stand
on. In order to claim insult, the Michelin Guide would have had to have
used profanity in its description of Ristorante Eo, or otherwise
negatively affect its social standing, which wasn’t the case.
But even if Eo’s lawsuit proves unsuccessful, there are those who say
that he already reached his goal by shinning a spotlight on the obscure
rating system of the Michelin Guide.
