The people who
already know.
The Tasters are the half of this site we don’t write. Real people who ate a real meal, answered ten short questions about it, and put their name on the answer. Everybody knows three or four places worth the drive. This is where they get written down.
The room, right now
Those are live counts, not projections. If they look small, that’s because they are — the first tasters decide which places get found first.
Three steps. About four minutes.
A blank text box asks you to be a writer. Ten specific questions just ask you what happened — which is the part a stranger can actually use.
Ten statements. Pick a side.
You answer 10 forced-choice statements about a meal you actually ate. Agree or disagree, strongly or not — and that’s it. There is no neutral option, because “it was fine” never helped anybody pick a Friday night.
- “This was worth what I paid.”
- “Someone working here made the meal better.”
- “I thought about this meal the next day.”
Four ways to answer: Strongly Agree · Agree · Disagree · Strongly Disagree. Takes about four minutes.
We write it up. You own it.
Your answers get assembled into a short write-up in the house voice — your words, your best lines, quoted as you said them. Then it comes back to you. Nothing publishes until you approve every word. Not a paraphrase you half-recognise. Every word.
- Your quotes stay yours — we don’t improve them into something you never said
- Change anything, or bin the whole thing, right up to the second you hit approve
- It publishes under your display name, not “a verified diner”
The score is computed, not decided.
The tasters’ score comes out of everyone’s answers on one shared scale — no single person sets a number, including the one who felt most strongly. A place only gets a tasters’ score once at least 3 takes exist for it. Below that the page says Not ranked yet and means it.
- One take per person per restaurant. Loud doesn’t mean twice.
- Long-standing tasters carry a little more weight; brand-new accounts carry less
- It sits on the same 0–100 scale as everything else here, and a badge starts at 50
Who is actually doing the work
Ranked by points, and points come from takes — most of all from takes with a photo. A photo is never required. It is just worth more than double, because it is the part a stranger believes.
Nobody on the board yet
The first take published is the first name on this list, and it stays at the top until somebody writes more than it. That is a genuinely easy #1 to take.
Write the first onePoints buy standing on this page and nothing else. They do not move a restaurant’s Sweet Score, they cannot be bought, and writing more takes about the same place does not help — one take per person per restaurant, always.
Taster → Trusted Taster → Town Guide
Three rungs, and the first one is just showing up. Standing comes from a track record, never from volume and never from being agreeable.
Taster
Anyone who has eaten somewhere and will put a name on what they thought. Your takes publish under your own name and count from the first one.
From your first takeTrusted Taster
A run of takes that held up. Your answers carry a little more weight in the score, and you get first look at places nobody has written up yet.
250 pointsTown Guide
The top Taster in a town, named on that town's page. One per town, and it changes hands — this is a standing, not a title.
1,000 pointsThe four house rules
- Write up a meal you actually ate. First-hand only.
- Don’t write up a place you own, work for, or compete with. Disclose it and we’ll sort it out.
- Nothing personal about staff — no names, shifts, socials, or photos of them.
- No threats, no slurs. The 19-year-old running food is not the story.
Everything else — specific, enthusiastic, funny, opinionated — is not just allowed, it’s the assignment. Full detail in the guidelines.
Know somewhere good?
Free to join, free forever, and the only qualification is that you actually ate the food.
Scores can't be bought. Only earned. Read the full methodology if you want the math.