Get ready for some culinary competition, Miami.
Broward and Palm Beach counties may soon be gleaming in Michelin stars too.
The French tire company on Tuesday announced the expansion of its esteemed dining guide into “Greater Fort Lauderdale, the Palm Beaches and St. Pete/Clearwater” in 2025. This means cities from Hallandale Beach up to Jupiter are eligible to be saluted, and Michelin plans to expand its Florida footprint even more in 2026, according to a news release, although future regions haven’t yet been announced.
“The Michelin Guide’s anonymous inspectors are already in the field, making dining reservations and scouting for culinary gems in the new territories,” Carly Grieff, a Michelin North America spokesperson, told the Sun Sentinel.
Perhaps the most respected restaurant rating system in the world, Michelin’s exclusive guide first came to Florida in 2022 after Visit Florida, the state tourism arm, and local agencies in Miami, Orlando and Tampa paid them about $1.5 million over three years to rate eateries in those cities and produce a printed guide.
Now, Broward County’s tourism promotion arm, Visit Lauderdale, has paid $90,000 in taxpayer-funded tourism dollars to Michelin, according to its contract, and this includes promotion and marketing for awarded restaurants. Palm Beach County’s marketing-tourism organization, Discover the Palm Beaches, also chipped in $90,000 to finance Michelin’s arrival, the organization said Tuesday. It was not immediately clear how much Visit St. Pete-Clearwater spent.
In January, the guide added six new Miami restaurants. Michelin plans to announce which eateries in Greater Fort Lauderdale, the Palm Beaches and St. Pete/Clearwater have earned the sought-after stars during a ceremony later this year, according to the news release.
Stacy Ritter, president and CEO of Visit Lauderdale, touts Michelin’s arrival in Broward as a major tourism catalyst — something it’s wanted ever since Michelin added culinary clout to Miami three years ago.
“We’ve been working on a plan to bring them here for years,” Ritter said. “I think that over multiple conversations, they realized what we already know: We’ve got many great restaurants. For far too long Fort Lauderdale has been overlooked, and it’s time for them to pay attention.”
Michelin, for its part, saw “a certain level of maturity in Florida, both in the culinary offerings and the dynamism of the industry making the culinary scene here worthy of having a Michelin Guide,” said Grieff, Michelin’s spokesperson.
“Recognition in the Michelin Guide is a well-deserved honor for our local restaurants and chefs,” Milton Segarra, Discover the Palm Beaches’ president and CEO, told the Sun Sentinel. It “not only cements our culinary excellence but also shares our dining scene and promotes our destination to a much broader audience.”
Even with a partnership, tourism bureaus can’t recommend which restaurants deserve Michelin’s lofty ratings, ranging from one (“high quality cooking, worth a stop,” in Michelin vernacular), two (“excellent cooking, worth a detour”) or three (“exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey”) stars.
That’s a job for “the famously anonymous inspectors of the Michelin Guide,” who visit restaurants secretly, Grieff said.
According to Michelin’s website, inspectors use five grading criteria: “the quality of the ingredients used; the mastery of cooking and culinary techniques; the harmony of flavours; the personality of the cuisine as expressed through the dishes; and consistency, both across the entire menu and between visits.”
Staff writer Phillip Valys can be reached at [email protected] or X @philvalys.
