In the age of the algorithm, gastronomy runs the risk of substituting popularity for judgment. When that happens, we all lose.
I have always thought that gastronomy requires a virtue that is not very compatible with the times we live in: patience. Patience to get to know a product, to listen to a cook, to understand a territory, to discover the work behind a dish, and, above all, to accept that the more you learn, the more aware you are of how much you still have to discover.
I have been going to restaurants for many years. Enough to have learned a certainty that time has only confirmed: the more someone knows about gastronomy, the less need they have to pretend. Those who truly know this craft usually speak with caution, ask more than they affirm, and listen much more than they pontificate. Perhaps that is why I find it difficult to understand an increasingly frequent phenomenon: that of those who, after a few meals, a mobile phone, and thousands of followers, seem convinced that they are now in a position to lay down the law.
Because gastronomy has never been solely about eating. Eating is probably the easiest part of the whole story. The truly interesting part happens long before the dish reaches the table and continues long after the last bite.
Behind good cuisine there are producers, artisans, cooks, and front-of-house professionals. There is also territory, product, technique, culture, tradition, and innovation. There is, above all, a lot of work that rarely appears in a photograph or fits into a few-second video.
Perhaps that is why I have always understood that communicating gastronomy consists of trying to tell all that the diner does not see. It is not enough to issue a verdict. The truly important thing is to be able to explain it.
And it is precisely there that an increasingly evident gap begins to open between those who understand gastronomic communication as an exercise in curiosity, knowledge, and independence, and those who have reduced it to a succession of personal impressions.
We live in a time when it has never been easier to talk about food. It has never been simpler to make oneself heard. And that, in itself, is magnificent news. New voices, new formats, and excellent communicators have emerged, bringing gastronomy closer to audiences who were previously on the sidelines.
The problem begins when immediacy replaces learning. When the algorithm starts to weigh more than knowledge. When popularity is confused with prestige and reach seems to grant an authority that has never passed through the filter of experience, study, or curiosity.
The algorithm knows how to measure how many people view content. What it has never known how to measure is judgment.
And it is precisely in that scenario where a phenomenon that I find difficult to understand begins to appear.
More and more people are confusing having eaten at a restaurant with knowing gastronomy. As if a personal impression were enough to issue a well-founded judgment and, moreover, turn it into a recommendation for thousands of people.
I believe we have begun to normalize something that should make us reflect. Expressing an opinion has never been so easy. Having judgment remains just as difficult. And between one thing and the other there is a huge difference: judgment cannot be improvised. It is built with time, with curiosity, with study, and, above all, with enough humility to continue learning even when one believes they already know enough.
Confusing an impression with judgment is, probably, one of the most frequent errors of our time.
Perhaps that is why I increasingly distrust those who have answers for everything and admire more those who continue to ask questions. Because, after all, curiosity has always been the best starting point for understanding gastronomy.
To all this is added another reality that should not be ignored either: the proliferation of profiles for whom gastronomy has ceased to be an object of knowledge to become, above all, an opportunity for notoriety and personal promotion.
There is nothing reprehensible in a communicator maintaining a good relationship with restaurants or collaborating with them with transparency and independence. What is worrying is when that independence disappears. Because, at that very moment, judgment ceases to occupy first place and credibility begins to deteriorate.
It is curious to note that some profiles seem to use an extraordinarily limited vocabulary. Everything is "brutal." Everything is "spectacular." Everything is "essential." Everything is "the best." The restaurants change. The dishes change. The words, curiously, almost never change. And, what is more striking, neither do the explanations.
It gives the impression that gastronomy has reached an unknown perfection. Or, quite simply, that critical spirit has ceased to be part of the profession.
And when that happens, those who speak of gastronomy with rigor stop winning. Restaurants also stop winning. Because a reader's trust takes years to build and is lost in mere seconds.
It is not a matter of determining who can speak of gastronomy and who cannot. The diversity of voices has enriched the gastronomic conversation and has brought cuisine closer to many people.
The issue is different. An opinion should never be confused with knowledge, just as popularity should never replace judgment. Because whoever decides to influence the opinions of others also assumes a responsibility: that of respecting the work of those who make it possible and of being honest with those who place their trust in their words.
In the end, the true heritage of any communicator is credibility. And that cannot be bought, it cannot be improvised, nor is it decided by an algorithm. It is built with curiosity, with independence, with honesty, with rigor, and with the time that any profession aspiring to be taken seriously demands.
Perhaps that is why I still believe that gastronomy needs less haste to opine and more time to understand. Less need to pretend and more desire to learn. Less notoriety and more judgment.
Because, in the end, anyone can talk about gastronomy. The truly difficult thing is to do it with judgment: with the knowledge, rigor, honesty, and humility that gastronomy deserves.