Cyprus Eats launches public vote for first People’s Eating Awards

Nicosia, Cyprus. Cyprus Eats is inviting diners to choose their preferred venues in its inaugural People’s Eating Awards, with voting open until November 15. Winners across 22 categories will be revealed during an awards ceremony on December 7.

Diners make the final choice

Cyprus’s dining scene ranges from restaurants honoured by leading industry professionals to small, unassuming eateries. The new awards seek to establish which venues local diners favour, leaving the final decision entirely to the public.

Organised by Cyprus Eats, a widely followed and trusted creator of food content on the island, the awards carry the tagline: “You eat here. You decide”.

Categories cover brunch venues, souvlaki outlets and burger restaurants, alongside less conventional distinctions such as Value for Money, Taste of Cyprus Award and Favourite Social Media Account.

Akis outlines the awards’ purpose

Akis of Cyprus Eats said his audience had requested the awards. During eight years of food blogging, he has reviewed hundreds of restaurants and developed a role as a dining consultant and knowledgeable guide trusted by restaurant operators and diners alike.

Drawing on restaurant visits in Cyprus and overseas, Akis said the island had excellent establishments and no reason to envy dining options abroad.

He stressed that the awards were not intended to promote either his personal favourites or venues involved in collaborations. He estimated that he had probably never visited, or had never covered, about 70 per cent of the restaurants included.

How the shortlists were selected

Public involvement and transparency have guided the process. Akis, whose background is in IT, spent the past year and a half developing the voting platform. After completing the system this summer, he brought together 15 food bloggers and content creators to determine each category’s 10 shortlisted restaurants.

Akis said the committee used a Eurovision-style points system, awarding 12 points to a first choice, 10 to a second choice and continuing down the rankings. Each category offered at least 50 or 60 restaurants for consideration, while the overall process examined more than 700 restaurants before the shortlists were established.

Venues cross category boundaries

Several restaurants feature in multiple categories, and some nominations place venues outside their more obvious specialities.

A burger restaurant, for example, may also contend for Favourite Social Media Account. A venue associated with brunch may instead appear on the Sweet Tooth Award shortlist rather than in the brunch category.