Alan Richman's Rules

After noticing that both of Alan Richman's San Francisco picks for his Best New Restaurants list opened in 2009 (and, ahem, in LA as well- The Tasting Kitchen), Eater SF asked Richman what, exactly, the qualifications were. Said Richman: "Opening date? Now that's interesting. In general, we would love to include only restaurants that open within a year prior to the day I submit copy for Best New Restaurants. However...I'm one guy covering the whole country. Out of fairness, we are going to include any excellent new restaurants that might have opened after I last visited the city." [-ESF-]