Chef Chantel Dartnall of Restaurant Mosaic at The Orient outside Pretoria Facebooked her good news of making the 2020 Top 200 in the La Liste ranking of the 1000 top-mentioned restaurants in the world. Her restaurant was ranked around number 110 on this list, the joint highest ranked South African restaurant with The Yest Kitchen with a score of 94%. Four top restaurants, two of them from Tokyo, shared the number one ranking this year. 

Chef Chantel shocked the local restaurant industry when she announced at the Eat Out Awards two weeks ago that she would no longer participate in the local Eat Out awards, which one does not apply to participate in. Not only does her restaurant present beautifully plated dishes, but she has the only female-chef-run restaurant on our country’s top 10 restaurant list. It was an insult to her restaurant to only have been ranked 9th Best this year, especially given her international performance. 

Yesterday she got her real reward, in being in the company of the world’s 60 best chefs running the Top 200 La Liste restaurants, so much so that she received a mention about her performance on this list in Fine Dining Lovers yesterday. In the photograph on the right she is with Chef Eric Ripert of La Bernardin in New York, one of the number one ranked restaurants, taken at the award ceremony in Paris yesterday.

She wrote on Facebook: 

‘LA LISTE TOP 200 & SOUTH AFRICAN COUNTRY WINNER!

I am so proud to share that Restaurant Mosaic at The Orient has tonight been honoured in the La Liste TOP 200 Best Restaurants in the World, and in the process won the Country Award for the highest ranking South African restaurant at #LaListe2020! I am so proud of my team at Restaurant Mosaic, who have worked tirelessly this year, and have tonight seen us rewarded with this special achievement; a highest national ranking and a score of 94%!

Forbes wrote about La Liste as follows: ‘La Liste, which is celebrating its fourth edition this year, annually ranks the 1,000 best tables on the planet from 180 countries and will be unveiling the entire list that includes 16 restaurants in the United States (five in New York) among the top 200, during the dinner ceremony that will be attended by 60 chefs from around the globe. Founded by a former French diplomat, Philippe Faure, who also owned the Gault & Millau guide, the 2020 list includes, among its first 1,000: 112 restaurants from the United States, 130 from Japan, 125 from China, 116 from France and 65 from Spain. “French restaurants capturing this prize should come as no surprise, but that a seafood specialist based in New York came out on top is a significant achievement for American chefs and restaurateurs.” writes The New York Times. “Le Bernardin, Maguy Le Coze and the chef Eric Ripert’s Midtown restaurant, also has three Michelin stars, the top ranking for that guide.”

 

 

 

Unfortunately La Liste has not yet published its full 1000 top restaurant list, or even the Top 200 list. Fine Dining Lovers has published the 2020 Top 10 List, above. As soon as the full list is announced, I will update this post, to see how our other top restaurants rank on La Liste. 

POSTSCRIPT 5 November 2019: The full 2020 La Liste of 1000 top ranked restaurants in the world has been released, and shows that The Test Kitchen is jointly ranked with Restaurant Mosaic, at a score of 94 out of 100. I have written to Chef Chantel, to ask her to explain her winning the Country Award for South Africa, despite the tied win.  The other South African restaurants on the La Liste are:

La Colombe/Greenhouse/Chefs Warehouse Beau Constantia  90,50

Wolfgat 89,50

Camphors at Vergelegen 87,50

The Restaurant at Waterkloof/DW-Eleven13  83,0

The Pot Luck Club 82,50

Terroir 80,50

Indochine at Delaire Graff 79,50

 

Chris von Ulmenstein, WhaleTales Blog: www.chrisvonulmenstein.com/blog Tel +27 082 55 11 323 Twitter:@Ulmenstein Facebook: Chris von Ulmenstein Instagram: @Chrissy_Ulmenstein