I kind of like restaurant reviews. For instance, one led me to a London pub hidden up a hill. It served real comfort food - delicious salt-marsh mutton, falling-off-the-fork tender, in a juicy sauce, with perfect mashed potatoes. Another in London, I got mussels and chips (moules marinière on the menu) and a glass of chardonnay: rib-stickers that enabled me to go and get my plane home in calm and dignity after a particularly upsetting visit.

I was cautious of our new local cafe (full of hipsters rather than locals, at first) until the reviews drove me to go in and try their coffee (superb) and I gradually moved on to their absolutely delicious lunches. Still haven't tried the place 100 metres or so up the road with the Michelin nod - it's never open at the times I'm hungry. And a couple of neighbours (whose word-of-mouth reviews I pay attention to) found it a bit meh.

I have a Michelin app (better for France than à l'étranger) that will often recommend good cheap places in Paris that serve nice workingman's food like lamb with lentils and that smoked-cod-mashed-potatoes dish beloved of schoolchildren, brandade de morue.

But really the only way to judge restaurant food is "is it better than I'd cook at home?" - or at the very least "is it as good as I'd cook at home?"