Longtime readers will know that we don't give much space to the endless "best of" restaurant lists churned out in Hungary, for the simple reason that most are nothing more than shameless, "pay-for-play" PR stunts. But sometimes the results are so silly they are worth a mention. Falling into this category is the annual "10 best" list recently published by the Dining Guide, one of those glossy advertising handouts that can be found scattered in the corner of local restaurants like so many dead cockroaches.

According to business daily Világgazdaság, the 10 winners were... Oh, wait: Actually it only listed nine, as did items about the awards on hvg.hu, deluxe.hu, antropos.hu, and probably a bunch of other sites which probably based their "reports" on a press release sent out by the quarterly's publisher that somehow ended up one restaurant short. (We managed to eventually find #10 on the website of the magazine's parent company, PrintXBudavár Zrt, though as of this posting there is nothing about the whole contest on the DG's site.)

For the record, the lucky 10 selected by the "28-member international jury" included four from last year's list: Fausto's, Le Bourbon, Lou-Lou and Páva. Also from among the world of Budapest eateries were Arany Kaviár (the "missing" #10), Bock Bistro, Manna Euthentic Lounge and Múzeum, while the two countryside restaurants that made the cut were Ráspi and Villa Medici.

So is it a good list? Well, since five out of the 10 are on our own "Top 33" list of leading Budapest restaurants, it's at least half-good. That said, we'd argue that any "jury" of dining experts that picks Arany Kaviár and Manna over Csalogány 26 and Klassz should be prosecuted for obstruction of restaurant justice, even if no improper payoffs led to the result.

Finally, while Arany Kaviár suffered the indignity of being left out of the PR brouhaha, the Dining Guide itself seems to have suffered an even worse snub: we couldn't help but notice that the above shot of the "gala" ceremony seems to be missing at least one important person: Fausto Di Vora, the man who runs the eponymous restaurant that came in first place.