Is There ANYTHING Salvageable from the Reg's Best of Orange County Food Winners?

• They should make 2 lists: one for Chained restaurants and another for non-chains. All those Gustavo listed were chains (sans Indian). This also allows for (gasp) some kind of thinking process for the Reg readers...

• I just threw up a little bit in my mouth. At least the critic's choices were reasonable, as though they're trying to make up for the overwhelming bad taste of your typical Register reader. And Melissa, if there was a way to leave snotty comments it would be full of things like "MEXICANS GO HOME" or "NOTICE ALL THE ETHNIC PLACES GET CLOSED DOWN LOL" or "OBAMA IS A FASCIST PROGRESSIVE" or similar crap like that. But there are a few places on the non-hidden, non-criticpick list I've never heard of, so now I know to stay away from them.

• Jeff: Actually, if they let you and Niyaz go to school on the food part, it'd be fine!

• Ditto to everything Christian said. And I do think we could improve the feature if we rounded out the top ten in each category, briefly listing the other restaurants that received votes.

• I really, REALLY wish there was a way to leave shitty comments on the Best Of article. It's been bugging me all morning. Have the OCR readers never been to Little Saigon? Or Santa Ana? Oh. Wait. *Pissed*

• First point I want to make, I do know the difference of the word then and than, I just type faster than I think... :) Second, I'm glad to know data monkeys process the votes, I just get a bad taste in my mouth when a vote goes to a marketing department 1st. I think it's the 2 years of marketing and advertising classes I took years ago at Cypress College...

• It really is a numbers thing. I have heard that even Register employees don't agree with the way the readers vote. That is why last year El Torito won #1 Mexican restaurant again but the Register employees threw in a special non-voted-upon mention of Gabbi's. And, yes, they require voters to vote in a minimum number of categories so a lot of people get to the Mexican restaurant part and think, "Oh, I've heard of El Torito and Don Jose's and I saw Javier's on Real Housewives, so I'll write those places down." On one hand it is amazing how clueless people can be but there's still no escaping the fact that it's a numbers game and the most well-known high profile places are going to get the most votes. It'd be interesting to find out the actual numbers, like how many votes did El Fortin score. And, ultimately, people who didn't vote (including me this year) shouldn't be complaining about the results.

• which natraj? oc register has both the laguna beach and laguna hills restaurants listed as first place. natraj laguna beach imo is actually one of the better indians in orange county, but sadly inconsistent, sometimes i go and it's up there with the curries i was used to in england and not far off those i had in india. they're lunch buffet is also mediocre to bad and relatively expensive. laguna hills has a very good buffet of "indian" food, but the flavors seem a bit toned down here. anything is better than india cook house in irvine where i contracted salmonella poisoning.

• Dan: I don't know what you're trying to say, but that Best of OC list you might see around town is reader's choices, which we explicitly designate as such (and trust me--if ustedes vote dumb, I'll make fun!). The actual list is compiled by us data monkeys.

• Just finished reading the entire thing over at OCR. I think I'm going to go cry in a corner now. Fuck.

• But to be honest, it all has to do with numbers, more people know large chains then they know small hole in the walls. Also some of these voting lists require the person voting to select a business for every category, a practice that is good to prevent stuffing the ballot, but bad because it forces someone to vote on a category they really know nothing about.

• Well as long as these "Best of" votes go to the marketing departments of the paper, you'll get questionable results... *looks at OC Weekly Best of voting list and sees it goes to the marketing department...* I'm just saying.

• wow! that bad huh...P.F. Chang's = #1 Chinese food! haha... what a lack of effort

• Don't blame the Register readers...do they even have a say? This restaurant owner has been approached by Register advertising sales folk about the best of issue. Those best ofs are for sale.

• I thought I was the only one who had problems with this list. I wonder if it's just numbers...10 people voting for a good authentic Mexican restaurant isn't going to beat the combined might of 30 El Toritos with 2 voters each. Lame. Dumb. Lame.

• Yes, the readers are that "stupid and tasteless"--read any online reader comments in the Register lately? I weep for the human race...

• Because I had problems comprehending this post, I went to the Reg to see for myself. Unbefreakinlievable! Best Deli category is combined with sandwich shop. OK, that alone is a problem. And yes, as you said, Subway is number one?!? Staggering. Each category I checked was more unbelievable than the last. And then it occurred to me. The results are actually a blessing in splendid disguise: The unruly Reg riff-raff won't be hogging the tables at the truly delicious eating establishments and I'll still be able to eat there -- until your list comes out...

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