2024 USA TODAY Restaurants of the Year: How we decided who made the list
Those of you who have been with me since I started this journey covering dining in Oklahoma a little over a year ago know how proud and passionate I am about the things our state has to offer.
One thing we don't always get is a fair shake when it comes to recognition and accolades, but that has started to shift as we've more consistently become part of national conversations about food and dining.
That continues with the naming of an Oklahoma City restaurant to the inaugural USA TODAY Restaurants of the Year list.
What is the 2024 USA TODAY Restaurants of the Year list?
A lot of Best Restaurant lists exist. The plan wasn't to do something new, but it was to do it a bit differently. Unlike other outlets and organizations that send journalists and photojournalists on brief missions to parachute into a city, try the food, and leave, this list is curated by journalists who live in the communities.
The restaurants on this list are places we visit, recommend and take our own friends and family to. They are the places we have come to know and love because we spend our days covering the communities surrounding them. They're the places we return to and try every item on the menu at.
More: Ma Der Lao Kitchen named one of the best restaurants in US. Everything to know before you go
"Our food writers live here, they work here, they eat here," said Liz Johnson, who is the regional features editor at The Record and northjersey.com and a former food writer and editor who led the project. "They know their beats. These may not be the fanciest restaurants in the U.S.A., though some are. These are the restaurants we want to eat at over and over again."
Another thing you'll see on the USA TODAY list is love for the little towns, the in-between places and flyover country. We still appreciate the great dining to be found in Los Angeles and New York and we include it, as well, but we also know sometimes the trips off the beaten path lead to dining experiences you never expected — experiences in places like Oklahoma City and Goshen, Kentucky and Shreveport, Louisiana.
How did I decide what OKC restaurant to recommend for USA TODAY's Restaurant of the Year project?
When the editors asked me to choose a restaurant, there were many that came to mind. Should I default to our most recent James Beard winner, or perhaps recognize our first, surely they were both deserving of this kind of honor.
As I mulled over a long list of options, I kept coming back to a restaurant I find myself going back to time and time again — a restaurant where, in a 30-minute lunch, you might hear the soundtrack go from Taylor Swift to 90s hip hop and R&B, a reminder that everyone is welcome at the tables there.
Now, seeing Ma Der stand among the 46 other honorees on this list, I'm even more proud to get to cover food in Oklahoma City and to get to share a little bit of our state's food excellence with people who otherwise might not know how great we actually have it here.
How did USA TODAY narrow the list?
There are over 200 sites in the USA TODAY network across 42 states. From those sites, reporters nominated more than 150 restaurants. A talented team with far more experience than me narrowed the list to 47, looking for consistency in food and service, atmosphere and more.
They sought a variety of flavors and backgrounds and found them, from a Florida seafood shack to a Filipinx spot inside a former North Carolina arcade room, to our own James Beard Award-finalist run Laotian restaurant in OKC.
"For me, reading this list was a delicious journey across America," said Todd Price, who writes about restaurants across the Southeast and is a former James Beard Award nominating committee member. He's one of the writers who helped choose and edit our Restaurants of the Year. "The restaurants from places large and small, show how varied dining is today in this country. So many other national lists rarely do more than dip their toes outside the biggest cities, and they miss so much of how, and how well, people are eating today in the U.S.A."
Now, we invite you to dig in and enjoy our 2024 Restaurants of the Year.
Alabama: Urban Bar & Kitchen, Tuscaloosa
Arizona: Cocina Chiwas, Tempe; Glai Baan, Phoenix
California: Atelier Crenn, San Francisco; Alps Village, Palm Desert; Holbox, Los Angeles
Colorado: Beijing Noodle, Fort Collins
Delaware: Harry's Savoy Grill, Wilmington
Florida: Brother Fox, Pensacola; The Daley Trade, Titusville; Stage Kitchen & Bar, Palm Beach Gardens; Star Fish Company, Cortez
Georgia: Cotton & Rye, Savannah
Illinois: Ardor Breads and Provisions, Peoria
Indiana: The Elm, Bloomington; Tinker Street, Indianapolis
Iowa: Harbinger, Des Moines; The Webster, Iowa City
Kentucky: Barn8, Goshen; Nami, Louisville
Louisiana: Dakar NOLA, New Orleans; Fat Calf Brasserie, Shreveport
Maine: Black Goat Test Kitchen + Supperclub, Warren
Michigan: Selden Standard, Detroit
Minnesota: Owamni, Minneapolis
Mississippi: Stamps Super Burgers, Jackson
Nevada: Louis' Basque Corner, Reno
New Jersey: Al-Basha, Paterson; Heirloom Kitchen, Old Bridge; Sushi by Sea, Ridgefield
New York: Ernesto's, Manhattan; Mariachi Mexico, Armonk; Redd, Rochester
North Carolina: Catch, Wilmington; Neng Jr's, Asheville
Ohio: Fyr, Columbus
Oklahoma: Ma Der Lao Kitchen, Oklahoma City
Pennsylvania: Doro Bet, Philadelphia; The Speckled Egg Cafe, New Hope; Viet Thai Cafe, York
Rhode Island: Gift Horse, Providence; Sly Fox Den Too, Charlestown
Tennessee: Locust, Nashville; Potchke, Knoxville
Texas: Mum Foods Smokehouse and Delicatessen, Austin
Washington: Communion Restaurant & Bar, Seattle
Wisconsin: Odd Duck, Milwaukee
This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Here's how we chose our 2024 USA TODAY Restaurants of the Year
