RICHMOND, Va. — The Richmond Times-Dispatch recently published its "Richmond 100" list, ranking what it considers the top 100 restaurants in the Greater Richmond area.
The list, which took months to compile, features a ranked top 15 followed by 85 restaurants listed alphabetically. The cutoff date for inclusion was December 2024, ensuring only established restaurants were considered.
"They did a fantastic job, and it's not an easy assignment. They worked months and months on it. You can tell from the videos and the interviews they did with some of the chefs, and the photos were gorgeous," Eat it, Virginia co-host Scott Wise said on a recent podcast.
With 100 restaurants on the list, almost every restaurant you'd expect to see on this list was there, but some of the actual rankings raised eyebrows among Richmond restaurant goers.
"The one that jumped out at me as kind of being an outlier... if someone said, 'Let's go to dinner tonight, you can pick any restaurant in Richmond,' I think mine would be L'Opossum. It's just an incredible restaurant. So I was a little surprised to see it not in the Top 10 or even in the Top Five," Wise said.
Eat It, Virginia co-host Robey Martin agreed that L'Opossum deserved a higher ranking.
"I would put L'Opossum way further up in this list, for sure. People talk about it that are not in Richmond. People talk about it in other states that I've gone to," Martin said. "Also, I love Edo's Squid. I think it's a great addition. But I really am sad that I don't see Dinamo. I would put Dinamo in the Top 15, but that's me."
The list also raised questions about what constitutes a restaurant, with ice cream shop Gelati Celesti making the cut despite not being a traditional dining establishment.
"It's one of my favorite places on Earth, so I'm fine with it being on the list," Wise said when asked if an ice cream shop should qualify.
Martin also questioned why some restaurant groups were represented by multiple entries while others received only one mention, specifically noting Uliveto and Gersi appearing together while other restaurant groups had single listings.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch has invited public feedback on the list, encouraging readers to suggest any restaurants they believe were overlooked.
"This is hopefully going to be a great generator of conversation and content for them," Wise said.
"It's so hard, that list," Martin added, acknowledging the difficulty in compiling such rankings.
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