michelin-green-star-restaurants-california

Union Square's Sons & Daughters earned Michelin's Green Star for sustainable gastronomy at last week's 2025 awards ceremony. (Courtesy of @tinastastytravels/@sonsanddaughterssf)

California’s Michelin Green Star restaurants lead the way in sustainable dining.

Amber Turpin

Jun 30, 2025

Living in a state that is so heavily blessed with Michelin stars, we certainly hear plenty about The Guide—especially since 2019, when it stretched its boundaries beyond cosmopolitan zones for the country’s very first statewide coverage.

But there’s another Michelin award—introduced in January of 2019 and handed out sparingly in the United States since 2020—that, despite earning much less recognition, is perhaps even harder and more meaningful to get: the Green Star.

What is a Michelin Green Star, and how do you get one? Any chef will tell you how secretive the whole star rating process is—so it is no surprise that Carly Grieff, public relations manager for the U.S. and Canada Michelin Guide, was somewhat elusive about the criteria.

Bee keeping is among Caruso's many sustainability efforts.(Courtesy of @rosewoodmiramarbeach/@carusos)

“The Michelin Green Star awards restaurants at the forefront of practices committed to a more sustainable gastronomy… It takes into consideration concrete sustainable initiatives and highlights industry leaders when it comes to a restaurant's commitment to eco-friendly gastronomy,” she explains. “These initiatives can take on a wide variety of forms, depending on the issues and resources specific to each restaurant, but range from the sourcing of ingredients and respecting seasonality to reducing waste and raising customer awareness.”

Still not exactly sure how a place is deemed worthy of a Green Star here in California, I spoke with a chef who won one. Chef Massimo Falsini at Caruso’s (1759 S. Jameson Ln.) in Santa Barbara not only has a Green Star, he also has a “regular” Michelin Star. In fact, the whole Rosewood Miramar Beach Resort that houses Caruso’s is renowned—one of only 15 triple 5-star resorts in the world.

“We opened in 2019, then in March of 2020 we closed like everywhere else in the world,” says Falsini. “In 2020, the Guide didn't come out because of the pandemic. In 2022, we got the Green Star and Michelin Star. So it was all very, very fast.”

Richards Farm regenerative filet tartare at Caruso's(Courtesy of @carusos)

When asked about the process of the awards, and if he had a heads-up at all, Falsini continues, “No, you never know initially—and I wish. They're amazing how secret they are. I mean, you never know. What I do know, having been fortunate to achieve the award many times in my life, in my career life, is… if you are recognized, you are good...It's an Oscar for a chef.”

As for the Green Star specifically, winning one is a similar process as winning a regular star, he explains. “They actually investigate what you do, and they're very good at investigating. They check your media, they check your guest comments, they come and eat here, and they check… they check your sourcing. There is always a way to find out. They are like investigative journalists.”

For Italian-born chef Falsini, for whom the concept of slow food and sustainability are second nature, the Green Star is well deserved. His cooking ethos is all about seasonality, zero waste, and localism. “Being sustainable means being frugal,” he says, like turning the byproduct buttermilk from the butter he makes for The Miramar’s famous gluten-free lemon ricotta pancakes into gelato at the poolside scoop shop.

The Enclos team selects ingredients from their Sonoma greenhouse(Adahlia Cole)

“For me, cooking sustainable, it's normal,” says Falsini. “There is no other way. I don't understand some restaurants here. Even in California, you see restaurants flying in Dover sole from London, flying turbot from France. Why? I just don't understand. I mean, go out in a boat and fish some fish. And cook it. Right? I just don't understand. For me, it's something so natural because I grew up with that. I grew up with seasonality. I grew up with that mindset.”

The 2024 Guide listed only 15 Green Star restaurants, seven of which were in the Bay Area. Last week, at the 2025 Michelin Star Awards ceremony in Sacramento, they added two more—Enclos (139 E. Napa St.) in Sonoma and Sons & Daughters (708 Bush St., Union Square) in San Francisco.

Dining at any of them means supporting deep sustainability efforts—even if we’re still not exactly sure what criteria the secret agents giving the awards go by.