Where to this week?

CoastBuote headed to Clayton Park for Monsoon, a place I have no idea about and still don’t because the review was ambiguous. HeraldSpurr heads to Berwick and enjoys a meal at the Black Trumpet.
The city critic heads to a a generic, middling eatery, the provincial critic wanders to a hole in the wall out of town.
So how do restaurant critics decide which places to hit?
In Spurr’s case, he mentions getting an email from a reader. I would consider reader recommendations, as well as those from friends and acquaintances.
Of course, I would also check out places that appeared on my food radar, after they’d been open long enough to get in a groove, get the kinks worked out, that kind of thing.
And I would keep an eye on restaurants that got themselves a “makeover”, be it a new chef or a drastic new menu.
Halifax is not a big town, and there’s a finite number of eateries to visit, even at the staggering rate of closures and openings in the restaurant business.
So every now and then, in a particularly long dry stretch, I too ended up at mediocre hole in the wall cafes, places bland and boring, places neither good nor bad enough to evoke feelings, positive or negative, strong enough to inspire a really great piece.
When I remember eateries like that, I don’t miss restaurant reviewing at all.