tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18781763241000295212024-03-05T06:35:24.746+00:00TwelvePointFivePercentA Restaurant Blog Of Real DiscretionAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.comBlogger126125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-65951746962925498742013-05-19T12:06:00.000+01:002015-03-27T15:20:27.179+00:00A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It started with a sandwich. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">So impressed was I with an extremely tasty and unexpectedly cheap prawn baguette from <a href="http://www.twelvepointfivepercent.com/2009/07/harrods-sandwich-counter.html" target="_blank">Harrods Sandwich Counter</a> that, when I got home, I decided to start a food blog. I already had a blog - in the classic, now-almost-obsolete mould of the straightforward online diary - but it had become neglected and I had felt for a while that it was time to focus on one subject; I just wasn't sure which one. That baguette was my light-bulb moment.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I've always loved eating out. As a child [screen fades to denote misty-eyed reminiscence of idyllic, bucolic Dorset childhood] 'eating out' meant very occasional family trips to the pub; I remember thick, sugary tomato soup, probably Heinz, big slabs of paté served with toasted brown bread and foil-wrapped pats of butter, and gammon steaks with chips, peas and pineapple - a meal that I would, and do, still happily order anywhere I see it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">As I got older, into my teens, eating out became something I did with friends, from birthday meals at Beefeater (one chap who ordered his ice-cream 'Chocolate no nuts' rather too enthusiastically was lumbered with that as a nickname for many years - kids can be so cruel) to more sophisticated group outings to <a href="http://www.la-lupa-3.co.uk/" target="_blank">La Lupa</a>, a family-owned Italian restaurant where we first tried breadsticks and, if ordered with sufficient confidence by the boy with the deepest voice - which wasn't me, not then - you could get wine.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And then - after a long summer spent working as a host at <a href="http://www.chiquito.co.uk/site/" target="_blank">Chiquito's</a>, whence began a love which endures to this day for tacky Tex-Mex and frozen Margaritas with heavily-salted rims - I went to uni, and London, and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLS29AE6rqw" target="_blank">a whole new world</a> (albeit a far, far smaller one than today's) of culinary possibility opened up to me. I remember still my first visits to a smart new place called Wagamama where they didn't take bookings (fancy that!) and served big bowls of soup noodles called ramen (it'll never catch on); to Yo! Sushi, and <a href="http://bit.ly/TPFP_BZ" target="_blank">Atlantic Bar & Grill</a>, and - oh, the glamour! - to <a href="http://www.twelvepointfivepercent.com/2011/08/quaglinos-st-jamess.html" target="_blank">Quaglino's</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">So I've always loved eating out. And I've always loved writing. So writing about eating out - making one new hobby from two existing ones - was, as a contestant on <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0071b63" target="_blank">The Apprentice</a> might put it, a no-brainer win-win. I've done it for nearly four years now, and I think I've done OK at it. But now it's time to stop.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Because I have, as some of you will know, landed a rather fantastic job with a restaurant group, doing their communications - social media, copywriting, press, PR, all things that I have developed an expertise in as a direct but I can honestly say unintentional consequence of starting this blog. The poacher has turned gamekeeper; I've gone over, as more than one restaurant PR has put it, to the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oGMbAIcXCQ" target="_blank">Dark Side</a>. Entirely organically, two of my great passions, eating and writing about it, have become my living, and I couldn't be happier.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Which means that, for now at least, it's time to say goodbye to blogging. I certainly won't stop writing, and I most definitely won't stop eating out, good heavens no, I just won't be doing one about the other on this platform. You'll still be able to hear my views on restaurants and the industry on <a href="http://twitter.com/HRWright" target="_blank">Twitter </a>- God, just try shutting me up on there - and of course face-to-face. And I'm sure there'll still be occasional posts on here about anywhere that particular blows me away, and non-food topics including another passion of mine, travel - <a href="http://www.twelvepointfivepercent.com/2013/04/nuremberg-city-guide.html" target="_blank">something I recently dipped a toe into</a> to an encouragingly positive reception.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Blogging about restaurants is a very different game now from what it was when I started in 2009. It's been fun - <i>huge</i>, crazy, booze-fuelled, stomach-distending fun - but this feels like a good time to get out. I have my views - oh boy do I have my views - on the ethics of restaurant blogging, on who's worth reading and who isn't, on the cynical manipulation of SEO and how businesses confuse readership with influence, on freebies...but those are for another time.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For now I would just like to say, thank you for reading (and for reading this far), for commenting, for challenging me, for sharing, and <i>au revoir</i>. I hope it's been for you even 12.5% of the pleasure it's been for me.</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-4091144922762015432013-05-06T14:07:00.000+01:002013-05-06T14:07:24.669+01:00McQueen<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheE-tOgR3ehIwUKh2IRSVvfELjPRPbF68Yl3Fedu5U6-TL7JjzBnKE9v-Tp_RMpneVgcVanof4fo-S6kgsPtBUiB3X-NXQ_0bkz2_84HCtPFyoQKhRmnv3MzspNZgQB_Ac8jaVc9lPwN8/s1600/McQueen_Restaurant2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheE-tOgR3ehIwUKh2IRSVvfELjPRPbF68Yl3Fedu5U6-TL7JjzBnKE9v-Tp_RMpneVgcVanof4fo-S6kgsPtBUiB3X-NXQ_0bkz2_84HCtPFyoQKhRmnv3MzspNZgQB_Ac8jaVc9lPwN8/s320/McQueen_Restaurant2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ordinarily, a</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 115%;"> glitzy bar-cum-restaurant-cum-nightclub like <a href="http://www.mcqueen-shoreditch.co.uk/" target="_blank">McQueen </a>in Shoreditch isn't the kind of place you'd find me having dinner. Aimed squarely at the kind of high-spending, hard-living City geezers 'n' gals who like their spirits premium, house happy and ropes velvet, it's somewhere I've always given a wide berth, even though I used to work just round the corner.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 115%;">But then a few weeks ago at a networking event (yes, people <i>do</i> still go to those, or at least I do; they're like <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/hughwright" target="_blank">LinkedIn</a>, but with wine) I met McQueen's very charming Marketing & PR Manager who, doing what good Marketing & PR Managers do when they scent someone who writes about restaurants, invited me in to try theirs. My kind of place or not, it would have been churlish to refuse, especially when it transpired that we had a mutual friend who would make the perfect dinner date.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">Not realising that the restaurant has its own entrance on Tabernacle Street, we entered through the bar which, on a Thursday night, was - as I believe the kids say these days - going off. The decor, which carries through to the restaurant, is a bit blingy but perfectly inoffensive - parquet floors, Chesterfield sofas, slate walls, gilt-framed black-and-white pictures of the venue's inspiration, the eternally-cool Steve McQueen - and succeeds in making the space feel razzy without tipping over into tacky. The louche, sexily-lit room would, my pal Nic and I agreed, be ideal for a date, perhaps with someone who wasn't publicly your partner.<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnh8ew2f0k7Ri41RGFihSDD2D5UM2G_xffAAvYPodfKmIasOgvS_UGu8l9eOVrKSdWw8qcE8RP00PkK_he9iCE2BxCzbQdRcvnBf73zjCIykgmL_B3EiocKtVblP2-BflvFtMeES-jOMU/s1600/1365113210469.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnh8ew2f0k7Ri41RGFihSDD2D5UM2G_xffAAvYPodfKmIasOgvS_UGu8l9eOVrKSdWw8qcE8RP00PkK_he9iCE2BxCzbQdRcvnBf73zjCIykgmL_B3EiocKtVblP2-BflvFtMeES-jOMU/s320/1365113210469.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></span></span></span></div><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">The menu (as well as the <a href="http://www.mcqueen-shoreditch.co.uk/restaurant/a-la-carte" target="_blank">a la carte</a> there are good value express lunch and early evening set menus) is unthreatening stuff - salads, bistro classics and a few grills - at not-too-terrible prices; starters are around the £8 mark and mains, except for steaks, all under £20. We kicked off with a couple of well-made cocktails and some courgette fritters, pleasingly thick wedges in a crunchy, salty crumb.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">Nic's starter, a salad of carpaccio-thin slices of pretty candy beetroot with red apple and pepper cress in a lemon and herb dressing, was lovely to look at and fresh and clean on the palate, if a little bland. Mine, three plump, sweet scallops </span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;">topped with crumblingly-crisp streaky bacon and served </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">on a cauliflower puree given a kick with white pepper, was much livelier.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">Poor Nic didn't do too well with her main course, a very ordinary veggie burger which - horrors - wasn't cooked all the way through and was served on an only-partially-defrosted bun. The dual shame of this was that, having chosen to serve such a humdrum vegetarian option in the first place, the kitchen couldn't at least do it well. They redeemed themselves with my monkfish, a good firm fillet served on soft, silky buttered leeks with smoky griddled razor clams, although it was rather heavy-handedly salted.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">Desserts, fortunately, were spot on. Ginger pannacotta with honeyed madeleines was a very happy marriage of tastes and textures, while a classic hot chocolate fondant was as good an example as I've encountered anywhere. Coffee, too often an over-priced afterthought, was of a high standard, as was service which was nicely paced and unpressured with none of the forced formality or up-selling that I might have expected of such a 'see-and-be-seen' location.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">All-in-all, bar that very poor veggie burger, McQueen was better than I thought it would be. My perhaps prejudiced expectation of venues like this is that they'll be more style than substance, the food and beverage offering secondary to loud music and a late licence in attracting customers; not so here. Not only did I enjoy McQueen despite it not being somewhere I'd usually go; I'd go so far as to say that I'd happily go back.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b>McQueen, 51-56 Tabernacle Street, London EC2A 4AA Tel: 020 7036 9229 <a href="http://www.mcqueen-shoreditch.co.uk/">www.mcqueen-shoreditch.co.uk</a></b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1582216/restaurant/Shoreditch/McQueen-London"><img alt="McQueen on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/link/1582216/biglink.gif" style="border: none; height: 146px; padding: 0px; width: 200px;" /></a> </span><a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/104234/Mcqueen?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of McQueen"><img alt="Square Meal" height="125" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/104234/get-blog-review/image/large.png" width="230" /></a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span></span></span></span></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-60059042953616311762013-04-27T21:54:00.001+01:002013-04-29T15:13:16.362+01:00Brigade Bar & Bistro<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5wa3wObN3V4/UXv1JPEVuUI/AAAAAAAAH4s/3Zb2t8G_bJY/s1600/1363469731123.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5wa3wObN3V4/UXv1JPEVuUI/AAAAAAAAH4s/3Zb2t8G_bJY/s320/1363469731123.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">At risk of being accused of platitudinous middle-class hand-wringing - the dreaded #firstworldproblems - I've been thinking a lot lately about the ethics of eating out. <br />
<br />
This week <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/apr/24/number-people-food-banks-triples" target="_blank">The Trussell Trust announced the biggest ever annual increase in use of its UK foodbanks</a>, just as many London foodies were getting in a tizz over yet another new restaurant where the cheapest option is a £45, six-course tasting menu. Some of us are agonising over whether to go for 6 or 10 courses at lunch; some of us are agonising over whether we will eat at all today. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Never, that I can recall in my lifetime, has the gulf between 'haves' and 'have-nots' seemed so painfully wide.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But I'm not about to say that eating out, and enjoying it, is wrong, or immoral; it'd be vastly over-simplifying matters, not to mention hypocritical of me, to say that because some people can't afford to eat, those who can should feel bad about it. What I would say however is that where an opportunity presents itself to support disadvantaged people while stuffing our faces, it is - I think - incumbent on us, at least occasionally, to take it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.thebrigade.co.uk/" target="_blank">Brigade Bar & Bistro</a>, on Tooley Street, presents just such an opportunity. A social enterprise offering six-month apprenticeships to people who have experienced or are at risk of homelessness, Brigade supports the <a href="http://www.beyondfoodfoundation.org.uk/about.html" target="_blank">Beyond Food Foundation</a> which helps apprentices into careers in catering and hospitality. It's a similar principle to <a href="http://www.jamieoliver.com/the-fifteen-apprentice-programme/home/index" target="_blank">Jamie Oliver's Fifteen</a> - which celebrates ten years in business this year - but, lacking as high-profile a figurehead as the ubiquitous Jamie O, is rather less well-known.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">To deal first with the only thing I really couldn't bring myself to love about Brigade, the dining room is not going to win any design awards any time soon. Although the room has as its focal point a fashionable open kitchen, the decor is harsh and dated with cream pleather chairs and fake flowers doing nothing to diminish the impression of having walked into a suburban budget hotel with airs, not a smart modern restaurant in an increasingly-happening part of London. It's noisy too; the shrieks of a large group ricocheting off every hard surface made it at times hard to hear or think on my visit. The rest of the building, which houses private dining and meeting rooms, a cookery school and offices is, by contrast, rather chic. <br />
</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhLnp59wwhVbFsxN-jtK_enz5tR_9KPXZCSnLphTKis9mjAPHq5sr7AtuRxiCs7GRmEeF1G9IzuZQ1uAqe2RQ4BTYF1ufEPxSCtbj6-bWqM05GS62D91n9l7Y4uW8XLwKIpRu4Q0oCdVs/s1600/BrigadeBrasserie11-680x315.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhLnp59wwhVbFsxN-jtK_enz5tR_9KPXZCSnLphTKis9mjAPHq5sr7AtuRxiCs7GRmEeF1G9IzuZQ1uAqe2RQ4BTYF1ufEPxSCtbj6-bWqM05GS62D91n9l7Y4uW8XLwKIpRu4Q0oCdVs/s400/BrigadeBrasserie11-680x315.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></span></div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Fortunately that's where the gripes end because the food - which is, ultimately, what it's all about - is very good, and certainly well above the standard one might expect from a brigade of mostly chefs-in-training. Bar a couple of minor, and in </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">the circumstances excusable, glitches, old school-friend David and I each enjoyed three pretty much perfect courses.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To start, David chose Wiltshire venison carpaccio, each deep red petal carved carefully to a uniform thinness and served with aged Old Winchester cheese, a clever British substitution for the usual Parmesan. My sardine tart, from the daily specials, was beautifully presented, two plump glistening silver fillets framed by puff pastry. The fish tasted deliciously fresh, its natural oiliness balanced by the crispness of the pastry.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">David's main course of pan-fried lemon sole was, as my sardines had been, impeccably good fish, firm textured but delicate, although the lemon butter it was served in didn't taste of lemon at all and could have used a more generous whack of citrus. My chicken mousse-stuffed breast of guinea fowl was excellent, the mousse sufficiently boldly-flavoured as to not be overwhelmed by the game. Guinea fowl is all too often overcooked to dryness; not so here. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Sides were interesting but needed tweaking; deep-fried broccoli with a small bowl of rustic tomato and white bean stew was tasty stuff, notwithstanding slightly clumpy batter on the broccoli, but was such a huge serving that it would have been better offered as a starter than a side-order - a surfeit of food can be as bad as a lack. Roasted beetroot, cumin seeds and honey meanwhile used lovely earthy beets but I couldn't detect any cumin, by taste or sight, leading me to wonder if it had been left out altogether.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZE3M5y2_F3A/UXwq2JfiqCI/AAAAAAAAH5E/-B7zfE5KkzE/s1600/1363466176256.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZE3M5y2_F3A/UXwq2JfiqCI/AAAAAAAAH5E/-B7zfE5KkzE/s320/1363466176256.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Desserts were a highlight. Caramelised apple tart - <i>tarte aux pommes a l'alsacienne </i>in anywhere less proudly flying the flag for all things British than Brigade - with Calvados ice-cream was a textbook assembly of thinly-sliced apple fanned around a crisp, fine base, while white chocolate and raspberry </span><span style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">crème brûlée was luxuriously unctuous without being overly rich.</span></span><br />
<span style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Helped by the fact that service was faultlessly polished and polite and despite the decor and noise, David and I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The food was mostly very impressive, if in places lacking nuance and finesse - the unlemony lemon butter, the missing cumin - which can of course be excused knowing that the chefs here are learning on the job and will only do so by making mistakes. That said, the pricing at Brigade is pretty punchy with starters at £5.95-£10.50, mains at £14.95-£28.50 and desserts £5.50-£7.95, so one might not unreasonably expect (even) better. David felt that I was being harsh on this point and that if the money spent at Brigade is going to support good work - which it plainly is - then the pricing was justified.</span></span><br />
<span style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Which brings us neatly back to my original point, and the one that I would ask you to take a moment to reflect on, namely that while there is of course no reason for us to stop going out and having lovely expensive meals just because </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 20px;"><a href="http://www.trusselltrust.org/stats" target="_blank">346,992</a></span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 20px;"><a href="http://www.trusselltrust.org/stats" target="_blank"> people received a minimum of three days emergency food from Trussell Trust foodbanks in 2012-13</a>, wouldn't it be great if, just occasionally, we could find a way of doing it that benefits others? Thanks to Brigade, we can.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 20px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 20px;"><b>Brigade, The Fire Station, 139 Tooley Street, London SE1 2HZ Tel: 0844 346 1225 <a href="http://www.thebrigade.co.uk/">www.thebrigade.co.uk</a></b></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 1px; line-height: 21.125px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 1px; line-height: 21.125px;"><a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1748134/restaurant/London-Bridge/Brigade-Bar-Bistro-London"><img alt="Brigade Bar & Bistro on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/link/1748134/biglink.gif" style="border: none; height: 146px; padding: 0px; width: 200px;" /></a><br />
</span></span> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 20px;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></span></span></span><div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 20px;"><a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/107664/Brigade?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Brigade"><img alt="Square Meal" height="125" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/107664/get-blog-review/image/large.png" width="230" /></a></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i>Another very worthwhile campaign I'm supporting:</i></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i><br />
</i></b></span> </span></span></span></span></span><div><span style="color: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 1px; line-height: 21.125px;"><br />
</span></span> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="https://www.livebelowtheline.com/uk?lang=en" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img alt="" border="0" height="197" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-c20AMlTFWk8/UXw0v1RaCDI/AAAAAAAAH5U/inNkM-MGXdc/s400/LBTL+Banner.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></span></span></span></span></div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span></span></span></span></span></div></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-40687636640245216662013-04-17T23:22:00.000+01:002013-04-19T16:11:26.372+01:00Nuremberg - A City Guide<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Indelibly associated with the </span><span style="font-size: 15px; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Reichsparteitag </span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">- Nuremberg Rallies - and the trials held there after World War II, Nuremberg in 2013 is a city mindful of its sombre role in history but not defined by it. Earlier this year I travelled to Nuremberg as a guest of the city’s bi-annual Fashion Days festival and found a forward-looking city rich with some of Germany’s best museums, delicious food, colourful markets and lively nightlife, making it the perfect destination for a stylish alternative city break. </span></span></b></b><br />
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></b> <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-hZO9fo_bh0o/UW8RGWwSyTI/AAAAAAAAHMk/8VQWAPMG1X0/s1600/01+Mar+2013_4340.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="A (handsome, nearly-shirtless...) model at Fashion Days" border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-hZO9fo_bh0o/UW8RGWwSyTI/AAAAAAAAHMk/8VQWAPMG1X0/s320/01+Mar+2013_4340.jpg" title="A (handsome, nearly-shirtless...) model at Fashion Days" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">A (handsome, nearly-shirtless...) model at Fashion Days</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">About Fashion Days:</span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> A three-day extravaganza taking place in spring and autumn, <a href="http://fashiondaysgroup.com/" target="_blank">Fashion Days</a> </span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">brings together Nuremberg’s top designer and high street stores as well as labels from further afield for a roster of runway shows, pop-up boutiques, networking and glamorous after-parties. </span></span></b><br />
<br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Taking a different theme each time - March 2013’s event was cleverly and meticulously styled to pay homage to London’s fashion scene - Fashion Days makes the kind of shows usually only accessible to industry insiders available to all, brilliantly democratising and demystifying fashion without stripping away any of the elegance. </span></span></b><br />
<br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I fell hard for the edgy street style and pimped tailoring shown by department store </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="http://www.woehrl.de/" target="_blank">WÖHRL</a></span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">’s concept line U-eins and the beautifully-tailored avant-garde collection by <a href="http://www.chang13.com/start.html" target="_blank">CHANG13</a>.</span></span></b><br />
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<div dir="ltr" style="display: inline !important; line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<div style="display: inline !important;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"></b></div>
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Where to stay:</span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> The slick, modern <a href="http://www.novina-hotels.com/index.php" target="_blank">Novina Hotel</a> in the nearby town of Herzogenaurach makes an ideal base for a weekend in Nuremberg. As the official team hotel of German premiership team FC Nuremberg, the Novina has a sports theme throughout, not to mention a well-equipped spa and gym where you may find yourself working out next to a Bavarian Beckham. </span></span></b></b></span><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></b></b></span></span></b></b></span></b></b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD_NsfGjV8Qm6Awlxc-l9TlItulhST5-1newNsVSWnC7iYMpBHrmHfkxlks4O58_sEBvHiKqA4g9ObA8LXp4698sSb78DWjnzI0ZQN2IgSguRQR_H8HQNScPtKL2QBjakWT3wqGjovdCc/s1600/02+Mar+2013_4101.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Novina Hotel Herzogenaurach Herzo-Base photo by Hugh Wright" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD_NsfGjV8Qm6Awlxc-l9TlItulhST5-1newNsVSWnC7iYMpBHrmHfkxlks4O58_sEBvHiKqA4g9ObA8LXp4698sSb78DWjnzI0ZQN2IgSguRQR_H8HQNScPtKL2QBjakWT3wqGjovdCc/s320/02+Mar+2013_4101.jpg" title="Novina Hotel Herzogenaurach Herzo-Base photo by Hugh Wright" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">Novina Hotel Herzogenaurach Herzo-Base</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The immaculate bedrooms have flatscreen TVs, Nespresso machines and free cabled WLAN internet access; wifi is charged at a reasonable €4,95 per 24 hours. Breakfast is included in the room-rate and is a splendid, ample buffet of regional, continental and cooked dishes.</span></span></b></b></span></span></b></b></span></div>
</div>
</div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Herzogenaurach is also home to the massive global headquarters of sportswear Titans <a href="http://www.adidas.co.uk/" target="_blank">adidas </a>and <a href="http://www.puma.com/" target="_blank">Puma </a>- founded by sibling rivals Adolf (Adi) and Rudolf Dasler respectively - and both companies have factory outlets offering incredible bargains on clothing and footwear. Nike also have an outlet store here - Nike Air sneakers start at about €25 - as does fashion retailer <a href="http://www.soliver.com/en/magazine.html">s.Oliver</a>, making this a shoppers’ paradise.</span></span></b></span></span></b></b></div>
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></b></span></span></b></b> <br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"></b></span></span></b></b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dRf5dLTJCwI/UW7w4N7d8vI/AAAAAAAAHFM/0CyOMfERlak/s1600/01+Mar+2013_4229.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="The Dokumentationszentrum at the Nuremberg Rally site. Photo by Hugh Wright" border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dRf5dLTJCwI/UW7w4N7d8vI/AAAAAAAAHFM/0CyOMfERlak/s320/01+Mar+2013_4229.jpg" title="The Dokumentationszentrum at the Nuremberg Rally site. Photo by Hugh Wright" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">The Dokumentationszentrum</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">History Lessons:</span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> The city of Nuremberg has struck a very intelligent balance with regards to how it marks its unfortunate place in history. </span></span></b></span></span></b></b><br />
<br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The structurally-unsound grandstands around the </span><span style="font-size: 15px; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Zeppelinfeld</span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> parade ground - including the balcony from which Hitler addressed the hundreds of thousands of Nazi party members massed below - can be freely explored at visitors’ own risk, the city lacking neither the volition nor the €70m required to restore them. The likelihood is that with time they will crumble and disappear - a fitting end one might say. </span></span></b></span></span></b></b><br />
<br />
<b style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">Contextual information on the events that took place in the city and how they came about can be found in the admirably dispassionate </span><span style="font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="http://www.museen.nuernberg.de/dokuzentrum/">Dokumentationszentrum</a></span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">, a jagged modern building carved into the former Nazi Congress Hall.</span></span></b></span></span></b></b></div>
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></b></span></span></b></b> <br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Culture Fix:</span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As the country’s largest museum of cultural history, the </span><a href="http://www.gnm.de/index.php?id=384" style="text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><span style="background-color: white; color: #0b0080; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>Germanisches Nationalmuseum</i></span></a><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> is Germany’s answer to London's <a href="http://www.vam.ac.uk/" target="_blank">V&A.</a> Boasting a delightful, eclectic collection of applied arts, clothing, pottery, furniture and art, the Renaissance and Enlightenment galleries are particularly impressive. The museum is accessed via the incredible </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Straße der Menschenrechte - </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Way of Human Rights - lined with thirty pillars each engraved with one of the articles of the European Declaration of Human Rights in a different European language.</span></span></b></span></span></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></b></span></span></b><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-JGqHoJasmCU/UW7z3bxEsXI/AAAAAAAAHGo/-_YDDquOZlU/s1600/02+Mar+2013_4126.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="An exhibit at the Germanischen Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg. Photo by Hugh Wright" border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-JGqHoJasmCU/UW7z3bxEsXI/AAAAAAAAHGo/-_YDDquOZlU/s320/02+Mar+2013_4126.jpg" title="An exhibit at the Germanischen Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg. Photo by Hugh Wright" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">An exhibit at the Germanischen Nationalmuseum.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Time To Eat:</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> Nuremberg is famous for its finger-sized </span><span style="font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline;">Nürnberger rostbratwurst</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> sausages and the city’s signature snack is </span><span style="font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline;">drei im weckla</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">, three bratwurst served in a crusty roll. Available on almost every street corner from kiosks for €1,50-€2,50, a <i>drei</i> makes for a tasty bite at any time of day. </span></span></b></span></span></b></b></span></span></b></b></b></span></span></b></b><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"></b></span></span></b></b></b></span></span></b></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><b style="background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></span></b></span></span></b></b></span></span></b></b></b></span></span></b></b></b></b></b> </div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For something more substantial, head for the sensational <a href="http://www.bratwurst-roeslein.de/" target="_blank"><i>Bratwurst Röslein</i></a> just off the main marketplace at Rathausplatz 6. The world’s biggest bratwurst restaurant (so they say, and who am I to argue?) serves huge platters of bratwurst and other Bavarian specialities such as </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">schäufele</span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> - roast cured pork shoulder - with dumplings and sauerkraut. Share a platter (prices start at around €15,00 per person) and you won’t need to eat again all day. Or indeed all weekend.</span></span></b></span></b></b></div>
<br />
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Finally, no visit to Nuremberg would be complete without a <i>kaffee und kuchen </i>stop at city-centre institution <a href="http://cafebeer.de/" target="_blank">Cafe Beer</a> at Breite Gasse 79. It's easy to see why this sprawling cafe-bakery, with its vast selection of mouth-watering cakes, pastries and chocolates, has been in business since 1879.</span></b></span></b></b></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<b style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></span></b></span></span></b></b></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zi8HryvAEak/UW73RjK05vI/AAAAAAAAHIQ/a2VGeHyVnGM/s1600/01+Mar+2013_4289.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Bratwurst Roslein. Photo by Hugh Wright" border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zi8HryvAEak/UW73RjK05vI/AAAAAAAAHIQ/a2VGeHyVnGM/s320/01+Mar+2013_4289.jpg" title="Bratwurst Roslein. Photo by Hugh Wright" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 18px; text-align: start;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small; vertical-align: baseline;">The world’s biggest bratwurst restaurant, Bratwurst Roslein</span></span></b></span></span></b></b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<b style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Something Sweet:</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> Nuremberg is known for its spicy, squishy </span><span style="font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline;">lebkuchen</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> - delicious gingerbread especially popular at Christmas but available all year round from the main </span><span style="font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline;">Hauptmarkt</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> and various stores including perhaps the city’s finest,</span><span style="font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline;"> <a href="http://ww2.lebkuchen-schmidt.com/en/home/" target="_blank">Lebkuchen</a></span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="http://ww2.lebkuchen-schmidt.com/en/home/" target="_blank"> </a></span><span style="font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="http://ww2.lebkuchen-schmidt.com/en/home/" target="_blank">Schmidt</a>. </span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">Plain, iced, chocolate-coated and shaped varieties are all sold here, in plain packaging or beautifully elaborate tins which make perfect gifts. Around Easter-time Schmidt also stock </span><span style="font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline;">Osterbrot</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;">, a tasty traditional fruit-loaf that is Nuremberg’s version of panettone.</span></span></b></span></span></b></b></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></b></span></span></b></b> <br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nuremberg by Night:</span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> With a population of just over half a million, Nuremberg is a fairly quiet city by night but that’s not to mean there’s no nightlife. The city has a number of lively bars and clubs, the best of them being bijou boite <a href="http://www.club-360.de/" target="_blank">360</a> at Adlerstra</span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">ße 36. This tiny club offers an ever-changing series of DJ nights and live acts; it’s worth booking a table to be sure of getting in. If you can’t, the much larger and more commercial <a href="http://www.goija.de/" target="_blank">Goija</a> at </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Bahnhofstraße 11 is a safe bet, albeit one with a rather more pretentious crowd.</span></span></b></span></span></b></b></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> <span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></b></span></span></b></b><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When to go:</span><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Other than for Fashion Days (of course!) Nuremberg is especially worth visiting at Christmas (for the spectacular Christmas market), at Easter, and in autumn for the </span><a href="http://www.nuernberg.de/internet/portal_e/kultur/ctz_3801.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Old Town Festival</span></a><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Host to many cultural, sporting and trade events throughout the year, flights and hotels are often at a premium so it’s advisable to plan well ahead to ensure that you get the best rates for accommodation and travel.</span></span></b></span></span></b></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></b></b><b style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 15px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.15; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; vertical-align: baseline;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><b id="internal-source-marker_0.30909885047003627" style="font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline;">Getting there:</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline;"> Nuremberg is well served by airlines from the UK. Direct flights are available with <a href="http://www.airberlin.com/prepage.php" target="_blank">airberlin</a>, <a href="http://www.cityjet.com/" target="_blank">City Jet</a> and budget airline <a href="http://www.ryanair.com/en" target="_blank">Ryanair</a>; <a href="http://www.lufthansa.com/uk/en/Homepage" target="_blank">Lufthansa </a>and <a href="http://www.swiss.com/web/EN/Pages/index.aspx?1366223800495&Country=GB" target="_blank">Swiss</a> also fly to Nuremberg via their hubs in Frankfurt and Zurich. I flew from <a href="http://www.londoncityairport.com/" target="_blank">London City Airport</a> with Swiss via Zurich; two of my favourite airports and my favourite airline (they give you chocolate during landing, what’s not to love?) ensured an easy and very pleasant journey in little over two hours.</span></span></b></b></span></span></b></b></b></b><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></b></b></span></span></b></b></span></span></div>
</div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I travelled to Nuremberg as a guest of Fashion Days, who provided my travel and accommodation, but none of the businesses or locations mentioned in this guide have paid or otherwise provided any incentive for inclusion.</span></span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span></span></span></b></b></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-9094092613068940352013-04-11T13:29:00.000+01:002013-04-11T15:34:07.755+01:00Balthazar<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5X1p4mu5TjE/UWaLYC5hxrI/AAAAAAAAGcQ/2HJrCxiXs1w/s1600/20130410_210732.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Balthazar London interior" border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5X1p4mu5TjE/UWaLYC5hxrI/AAAAAAAAGcQ/2HJrCxiXs1w/s320/20130410_210732.jpg" title="Balthazar London interior" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">One question often asked of best-TV-series-ever-made <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Xaz6yq4eQs" target="_blank">Buffy The Vampire Slayer</a> was how the citizens of Sunnydale, a town unusually prone to attack from vampires, demons and the occasional robot, seemingly experienced collective amnesia after each new massacre. Die-hard fans however know that this was neatly explained very early on (Season 1, Episode 2, 'The Harvest') when Giles - Buffy's 'Watcher', or guardian - tells the Scoobies that, "People have a tendency to rationalise what they can and forget what they can't."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">So with Giles' advice in mind I am writing this as quickly as possible - the morning after the horror of the night before - so that if, as I truly hope I shall, I forget everything that I can't rationalise about dinner at <a href="http://www.balthazarlondon.com/" target="_blank">Balthazar</a>, there will at least remain some record of it to warn others away from this Hellmouth of a restaurant.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Balthazar, a huge brasserie occupying the site of the old Theatre Museum just off the piazza in Covent Garden, is a near-carbon copy of the original Balthazar in New York. Why it was thought that what London really needed in 2013 was its own branch of a restaurant that was very fashionable when it opened in 1997 but nowadays is, by most accounts, strictly one for 'out-of-towners' is beyond me, but so are cooking rice and why people find Ricky Gervais funny - I don't pretend to understand everything.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I certainly don't understand what all the fuss is about the room at Balthazar, or the fabled 'buzz'; you will recognise the decor immediately if you have ever been somewhere like <a href="http://www.bofingerparis.com/en/" target="_blank">Bofinger </a>in Paris, or <a href="http://www.caferouge.co.uk/" target="_blank">Cafe Rouge</a>. I am about the thousandth person now to compare Balthazar to a Cafe Rouge, but the comparison is inevitable when the shared 'I've-been-designed-to-look-like-I've-always-been-here' ersatzness is so stark. As for the 'buzz', fill a cavernous room with people and blast middle-of-the-road jazz over the speakers and of course they'll raise their voices to be heard. You say 'buzz', I say 'racket', <a href="http://youtu.be/LOILZ_D3aRg?t=1m6s" target="_blank">tomato, tomato</a>.</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxuAHEI4iq_Ul50NBYk_hyIre5ycMAmlpHsPwQIDkiotWttWm2K-QcO1cM3gG339SiOHMuKMRi9bxCPu5S16j8jji-wtoeMGIgL5qrEgmGvZR2yFtJY0JibHJYjM_5pIa3rEZdZaRXcNk/s1600/Balthazar+Dinner+Menu.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="The menu at Balthazar, London" border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxuAHEI4iq_Ul50NBYk_hyIre5ycMAmlpHsPwQIDkiotWttWm2K-QcO1cM3gG339SiOHMuKMRi9bxCPu5S16j8jji-wtoeMGIgL5qrEgmGvZR2yFtJY0JibHJYjM_5pIa3rEZdZaRXcNk/s400/Balthazar+Dinner+Menu.jpg" title="The menu at Balthazar, London" width="275" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Already at our table when I arrived early for our booking, dinner-date Matth</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">ew explained that he had fled the adjacent bar because of over-crowding; an unwelcome import from New York is the notion that herding diners cheek-by-jowl into a holding pen before being allowed to have their dinner builds excitement, a theory as flawed as the belief that administering fear-hormone adrenaline to veal calves before slaughter will make the meat taste better.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To the eating. I cannot rationalise how a restaurant jointly operated by Keith McNally - a man who in countless, angst-soaked pre-opening interviews stressed how much of a 'perfectionist' he is - and </span><a href="http://www.caprice-holdings.co.uk/" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Caprice Holdings</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">, a company whose restaurants, almost without exception, I love, could allow such mediocre (and in the case of one dish genuinely inedible) food to be served. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A basket of bread, from Balthazar's own bakery in Waterloo, had been brought thence so slowly or long ago that it was stale and flavourless. My starter of dressed crab was fine, likewise Matthew's chicken liver and foie gras mousse, although presentation was rather forlorn, my crab on a bed of tired lettuce with a tin pot of entirely superfluous Marie Rose sauce, Matthew's mousse a cone plonked on the plate straight from a catering mould. Accompanying red onion confit at least appeared to have been lovingly spooned from the jar.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But the main courses - oh dear, oh God. I ordered whole grilled dorade with Romesco sauce and herb salad, Matthew steak tartare with a side of frites. The fish had been grilled so long that all moisture had been obliterated, and the lemon and herb filling was so over-powering that the dorade tasted - the one mouthful I had before sending it back - as if it had been marinated in Toilet Duck. It was truly horrible, and swiftly changed for a salad Nicoise, which was OK. Matthew's anaemic, undercooked fries, too, had to be replaced and once done properly were far more enjoyable than his meagre portion of dull, dry tartare.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Unsurprisingly, we had no interest in desserts. Nor did we fancy ordering anything from the cheeseboard our waiter presented; would <i>you </i>want to pay £10.50 for brie or roquefort shown to you sweating under their clingfilm wrappers? I thought not. We did at least enjoy the perfectly pleasant mini cookies that came with our coffees. That at first an espresso was served instead of a macchiato came as no surprise; that our bill, for two courses (my replacement for my awful main course was still charged for), coffee, one cocktail, one glass of wine and service came to £92, did.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">To give credit where credit is due, our waiter and most of the staff we came into contact with were delightful, but it is humiliating for them and for Balthazar's owners that an army of floor-walking management - from New York, I'm guessing - are trying to train them on the job. If <i>I</i> felt embarrassed that a manager came to the table with our waiter when he was serving our main courses and hissed, "Position 2 for the fish" out of the side of her mouth, how must <i>he </i>have felt? I have heard rumours of a power-struggle between the New York side of the operation and the London team over how things should be done; I didn't expect to see it played out in front of me table-side.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Never before have I left a busy restaurant - and for reasons that cannot have anything to do with the food or atmosphere Balthazar and its veal-truck bar were packed - so inclined to stand at the door and implore people to go somewhere, <i>anywhere</i> else. <a href="http://bit.ly/TPFP_TD" target="_blank">The Delaunay</a> is just round the corner and doing the grand brasserie thing a thousand times better; hell, <a href="http://www.twelvepointfivepercent.com/2012/09/tuttons-covent-garden.html" target="_blank">Tuttons </a>bang next door is superior by several powers, and that's saying something. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Would that London were Sunnydale and Buffy could come along and plunge her stake into the heart of this blood-sucking horror of a restaurant; then it would crumble into dust and, not being able to rationalise the sheer dreadfulness of what we had experienced, we could all just forget it had ever happened.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>Balthazar, 4-6 Russell Street, London WC2B 5HZ Tel: 020 3301 1155 <a href="http://www.balthazarlondon.com/">www.balthazarlondon.com</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1733313/restaurant/Covent-Garden/Balthazar-London"><img alt="Balthazar on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/link/1733313/minilink.gif" style="border: none; height: 36px; padding: 0px; width: 130px;" /></a><br />
</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/105860/Balthazar?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Balthazar"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/105860/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/balthazar/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=9312" /></a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-5603747118702413622013-03-31T20:10:00.002+01:002013-04-03T12:17:05.633+01:00Brasserie Chavot<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WN7qJICdaLQ/UVgTZlUGGSI/AAAAAAAAGTo/D8Da2zY5HFc/s1600/Brasserie+Chavot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WN7qJICdaLQ/UVgTZlUGGSI/AAAAAAAAGTo/D8Da2zY5HFc/s320/Brasserie+Chavot.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">"I knew you would," a friend replied when I tweeted after dinner about how much I'd loved <a href="http://www.brasseriechavot.com/" target="_blank">Brasserie Chavot</a>, "it's very you." And it's true; <a href="http://www.hot-dinners.com/Gastroblog/Interviews/reinventing-chavot-eric-chavot-returns-to-london" target="_blank">Eric Chavot's</a> new, eponymous brasserie on Conduit Street is very me, encapsulating pretty much everything I love in a restaurant in one very polished package.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Take the stunner of a room, a long, high-ceilinged space formerly (and briefly) The Gallery at <a href="http://www.westburymayfair.com/default-en.html" target="_blank">The Westbury</a>, the Mayfair hotel that the restaurant is part of but discrete from. F</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">latteringly-lit</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> by twinkling chandeliers above a glorious mosaic floor, with a small, chic bar at the front and seafood counter looking onto the kitchen at the back, it's just the kind of room I like, and can't imagine anyone not liking, to eat in; elegant but informal, welcoming and warm.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The menu's right up my street too, the kind that at first glance looks a little 'so what?' because nothing leaps out, until it dawns on you that that's because you'd happily order all of it. There are no alarms and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5CVsCnxyXg" target="_blank">no surprises</a> here, just all your brasserie staples - oysters, parfait, steak tartare - with a couple of modish interlopers like soft-shell crab and ceviche to keep things current.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A party of three - myself and two very elegant <i>femmes d'un certain </i></span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>âge </i>of my acquaintance Lyn and Vicki - </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">we started off with a dozen oysters to share. Advertised as rocks, some appeared to be fines de claires, which I minded a little. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">If it seems ungrateful of me not to appreciate receiving ostensibly superior oysters to those ordered, let me say in mitigation that I have always preferred the full-on snog-with-tongues of rocks to the refined peck-on-the-cheek of fines de claires, while accepting that there is a time and a place for both. That aside, </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">they were completely delicious and very attractively served, with accompaniments of shallot vinegar in a china oyster shell and <i>crepinette,</i> little patties of peppery veal sausage for crumbling on top. Great value too, at under £2 a piece.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-m4jHatduVAg/UVqduGbntQI/AAAAAAAAGUk/E51XI3Lit5w/s1600/Brasserie+Chavot+Interior.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-m4jHatduVAg/UVqduGbntQI/AAAAAAAAGUk/E51XI3Lit5w/s320/Brasserie+Chavot+Interior.jpg" width="320" /></a>I was a little ambivalent about my starter proper of steak tartare; something of a Tartar when it comes to tartare I was curious to see what 'mustard dressing' might bring to it. The answer was a piquancy - of course - and creaminess that while perfectly pleasant didn't particularly improve on a classic. There was exceptional flavour to the beef mind you (rump from <a href="http://www.aubreyallen.co.uk/" target="_blank">Aubrey Allen</a>, the chef told me later) and it was generous in quantum for £9.50 - Vicki's main course serving at £15 even moreso - although neither size came with anything, no toast, or fries, or salad, which I thought odd.<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Lyn's ceviche was unimpeachable, translucent slices of scallops in a beautifully balanced marinade of lime juice and chilli, and we all enjoyed the basket of sourdough bread with its moreish bitter, dark crust. Her main of tiger prawns with chickpeas and chorizo was a hit too, the large prawns split in half and given a smoky char from the Josper grill.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Although I'll admit to having suffered slightly from plate envy, it was quickly dispelled by my own main course of choucroute garnie. Served in a cast-iron casserole dish it was more <i>garnie</i> than <i>choucroute</i>, and none the worse for that, a mini-mountain of pork - belly, back bacon, sausage, shoulder, oh my - concealing a tangle of glossy sauerkraut with a couple of potatoes and carrots thrown in for good measure. In his wonderfully obsessive 1989 essay 'True Choucroute', reproduced in <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0747260974?ie=UTF8&camp=3194&creative=21330&creativeASIN=0747260974&linkCode=shr&tag=twelv-21&hvadid=9550944309" target="_blank">The Man Who Ate Everything</a>, Jeffrey Steingarten calls choucroute garnie 'a dizzying, almost inconceivable gastronomic summit'; I think he'd approve of this rendition.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Only I had room for dessert, a not unusual state of affairs, and my Mont Blanc was a soothingly light end to a rich, comforting meal. Like the steak tartare, this was Eric Chavot's take on a classic rather than a textbook version of it; I liked the replacement of pureed chestnuts with chestnut parfait and the addition of black-cherry sauce, but purists might not. You'd have to be dead inside </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">not</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">to love the presentation though, in a beautiful heavy-based glass bowl.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-xKZicLCp0GA/UVwOmYSKU7I/AAAAAAAAGU4/9FT_7I5uVf8/s1600/Brasserie_Chavot_choucroute.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Choucroute garnie a l'alsacienne at Brasserie Chavot" border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-xKZicLCp0GA/UVwOmYSKU7I/AAAAAAAAGU4/9FT_7I5uVf8/s320/Brasserie_Chavot_choucroute.jpeg" title="Choucroute garnie a l'alsacienne at Brasserie Chavot" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">With a carafe of Rioja for the ladies, a Virgin Mary for me and service, our bill would have come to about £50 a head, had it not transpired when we asked for it that it had completely unexpectedly 'been taken care of'. I couldn't quite work out exactly why, or by whom, but whoever it was I'm very grateful to them. We'd had a really delightful time and that very pleasant surprise was just the icing on the cake.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Brasserie Chavot is not perfect; there is definitely room for tweaking. Service for example was friendly and unhurried, but a used aperitif glass stood empty on the table until late in the meal, and one main course came a little after the others (which was apologised for, but serving everyone at the same time is fairly basic stuff). These might seem petty quibbles, but like a spot of red wine on a brilliant white tablecloth, little things stand out when everything else is so accomplished.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But as my friend had known I would, I liked Brasserie Chavot; I liked it a hell of a lot. I don't see how anyone could fail to. It's a lovely room to eat in, the food's fantastic, it's very good value for money and it helps that the chef is a real character. Go, be seduced, have fun, then tweet about how much you liked it so I can say, "I knew you would."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Brasserie Chavot, 41 Conduit Street, London W1S 2YF Tel: 020 7078 9577 <a href="http://www.brasseriechavot.com/">www.brasseriechavot.com</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1731990/restaurant/Mayfair/Brasserie-Chavot-London"><img alt="Brasserie Chavot on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1731990/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/109925/Brasserie_Chavot?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Brasserie Chavot"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/109925/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/brasserie-chavot/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=9625" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-80689503890598536512013-03-31T02:00:00.000+01:002013-04-02T09:47:19.538+01:00Mr Kong, Chinatown<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QDTtyD3FW7s/UVcWCAio5FI/AAAAAAAAGTU/OpkjVW-iCio/s1600/20130329_185810.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QDTtyD3FW7s/UVcWCAio5FI/AAAAAAAAGTU/OpkjVW-iCio/s320/20130329_185810.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Restaurants in London's Chinatown, indeed in the Chinatowns of most world cities, tend to fall into one of two broad categories. There are those aimed squarely (one might say cynically) at tourists, of the all-you-can-eat buffet and menus-with-pictures variety, and those intended for Chinese diners, where the food is the real deal but <i>gweilo</i> visitors are positively discouraged and any bold enough to cross the threshold receive the frostiest of welcomes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">What a delight then to find that <a href="http://www.mrkongrestaurant.com/" target="_blank">Mr Kong</a> on Lisle Street, the comparatively quieter thoroughfare parallel to Chinatown's pulsing main artery of Gerrard Street, falls into neither category. Venerable travel agents <a href="http://www.coxandkings.co.uk/" target="_blank">Cox & Kings</a>, who dispatched me to Mr Kong as part of a wider campaign to encourage <a href="http://www.coxandkings.co.uk/far-east/china" target="_blank">holidays to China</a>, describe the country as 'vast and varied', and the same could be said of </span><a href="http://www.mrkongrestaurant.com/menus/New%20Mr%20Kong%20M_M%200408.pdf" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank"> Mr Kong's almost bewilderingly-long menu</a>. A<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">ll the dishes familiar to and favoured by western palates are present and correct, but alongside many of the less familiar, more challenging choices that a Chinese diner would expect and the more intrepid non-Chinese guest might at least like to try.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My dinner date Alyn being a fairly conservative eater, we side-stepped the likes of braised duck's web with fish lips and played things pretty safe with our ordering, starting with soups - crab and sweetcorn flecked with generous chunks of real crabmeat and a blandly soothing shredded duck broth; crunchy spring rolls with a spicy soy dipping sauce; and grilled pork dumplings, whose juicy, peppery filling made up for slightly claggy casings. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VEKZC69bpYI/UVcWwLDjpfI/AAAAAAAAGTY/y0VqKE-7VaM/s1600/20130329_210135.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VEKZC69bpYI/UVcWwLDjpfI/AAAAAAAAGTY/y0VqKE-7VaM/s320/20130329_210135.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Next came half a roasted Peking duck served with spring onion, cucumber, pancakes and hoi sin sauce, marinaded, the menu explained, 'in vinegar and honey, then inflated to make the skin tasty and crispy'. You're not wrong, Mr Kong; while the flesh was delicious, the caramel glass-hard skin was the highlight, adding exciting savoury crunch to our pancake parcels.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Had we known - or perhaps been warned - how large the main courses were, we would have ordered only one rather than two, the sheer quantity of food which was brought to the table next proving somewhat daunting. Mongolian crispy lamb was an ample mound of meat, first roasted then shredded and deep-fried to crispen the edges. Instead of pancakes, lettuce leaves were provided as wrappers, along with more hoi sin sauce and a tangy dip made of rice wine, vinegar and sugar with slices of chilli.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The best dish of the meal, not to mention the most enormous and most fun, was a hotpot of curry crab with glass noodles from the <a href="http://www.mrkongrestaurant.com/menus/Chef's%20Special%200408.pdf" target="_blank">Chef's Specials menu</a>. A whole baked crab, the shell cracked and cleaved into about eight large pieces, swam in a deep pan of sweet, mild curry laced with fresh chillis, vegetables and short strands of noodles. As I worked my way through it (Alyn having admitted defeat after the lamb), napkin tucked into </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">collar, occasionally rinsing my sauce-soaked digits in the finger bowl, the debonair manager - the eponymous Mr Kong - placed a fatherly hand on my shoulder and advised, "Patience. For this dish you need patience!" I paused for breath, then redoubled my efforts. It was soon all gone.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Unsurprisingly neither of us had any inclination to order or room for dessert, but had we wanted to we could have chosen from a short list of toffee fruit or, as we heard one table of regulars intriguingly requesting, "Those things that look like lychees but aren't lychees". Instead, once the carnage had been cleared from our table, we were brought a dish of refreshing orange wedges and warmed (not to mention, much-needed) cleansing towels. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Many of Mr Kong's neighbours are notorious for the rudeness of their staff, but</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> again marking out Mr Kong as different from its Chinatown rivals we found the service to be, if not particularly effusive, then at least courteous, efficient and brisk rather than brusque. The dining room was pleasant enough, too; a little overly bright perhaps, and the furniture chosen more for function than form, but warm, comfortable and tasteful nonetheless.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZPQBwMzO_v3-Rt7ctBZTxf-cElWTl68jKwjW6vss_YCY15Y3iAuvnQHR5J61RGo6jHM08b-Mb0EKX_e5SiHlOmHwhfELYAp849li90BW901Z_odGc-e8kJZVsVSYKbRi5T1JgFAq8wMA/s1600/20130329_210122.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZPQBwMzO_v3-Rt7ctBZTxf-cElWTl68jKwjW6vss_YCY15Y3iAuvnQHR5J61RGo6jHM08b-Mb0EKX_e5SiHlOmHwhfELYAp849li90BW901Z_odGc-e8kJZVsVSYKbRi5T1JgFAq8wMA/s320/20130329_210122.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">With a couple of soft drinks and tip, our bill came to £69, which felt like excellent value for the quality and - I'll admit excessive - quantity of food consumed. Around us, smiling faces at every table told tales of similarly-satisfied customers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Other restaurants might be smarter or more specialised; the presentation of their food might be sharper, their ingredients finer. But taken as a whole, it's hard to imagine there being a safer bet in any Chinatown than Mr Kong, a restaurant in a class of its own.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Mr Kong, </span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">21 Lisle Street, London, WC2H 7BA Tel: 020 7437 7341 <a href="http://www.mrkongrestaurant.com/">http://www.mrkongrestaurant.com</a> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></b>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/567226/restaurant/Chinatown/Mr-Kong-London"><img alt="Mr Kong on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/567226/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/80914/Mr_Kong?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Mr Kong"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/80914/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/mr-kong/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=9811" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-63798198743460129062013-03-18T01:12:00.000+00:002013-03-18T15:37:48.322+00:00Champagne Brunch at The Landmark<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHyerXhgkCMxKbfdd4ACWAT-v6bc8YIQEmsKLpndy6V1tUvKLmjvIHclHbvzmqEbKN1895NBfjWsO-pUJp4huDyzEm9RGvYBpuKJGwt3SFkiRQjDvcjjpxFUTp77jsfRtVmjOedivFDDk/s1600/20130106_121324.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Exterior, The Landmark Hotel, London" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHyerXhgkCMxKbfdd4ACWAT-v6bc8YIQEmsKLpndy6V1tUvKLmjvIHclHbvzmqEbKN1895NBfjWsO-pUJp4huDyzEm9RGvYBpuKJGwt3SFkiRQjDvcjjpxFUTp77jsfRtVmjOedivFDDk/s320/20130106_121324.jpg" title="Exterior, The Landmark Hotel, London" width="240" /></a></div>
<span style="color: #444444;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For all that it's increasingly hard to make money, let alone a living, out of this food writing lark, it's certainly not without its compensations. An endless whirl of breakfast meetings and cocktail soirees, openings and anniversaries, lunches, launches and good old-fashioned <i>d</i></span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>îners à deux </i>keep one tremendously well-fed and watered while also constituting a pretty enviable social life, with only the prospect of high cholesterol, gout or the dreaded NFI to worry about.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;">But best of all are the occasional really great commissions that come along, the kind that leave you cackling </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uSTOHa4Im4" style="line-height: 16px;" target="_blank">Muttley-style</a><span style="line-height: 16px;"> and wondering aloud "This is </span><i style="line-height: 16px;">work?</i><span style="line-height: 16px;">" as you fire off your invoice. The kind that saw me dispatched recently by </span><i style="line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://deuxmessieurs.com/sumptuous-brunches-best-brunch-in-london/" target="_blank">les Deux Messieurs</a></i><span style="line-height: 16px;">, the luxury travel guide for which I am the gloriously-titled Editor-At-Large, to <a href="http://www.landmarklondon.co.uk/en" target="_blank">The Landmark Hotel</a> in Marylebone to experience their unlimited Champagne brunch.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;">Now if you're a pedant like me you'll be asking which it is that's unlimited, the Champagne or the brunch. And like me, you'll be delighted to know that it's both. Served every Sunday afternoon in the Winter Garden restaurant beneath The Landmark's soaring eight-storey atrium, brunch here consists of a vast all-you-can-eat buffet served with free-flowing Drappier Champagne, for £80 a head.</span></span>
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-kLBR_s7Srjs/UUYqCXg3eqI/AAAAAAAAGHo/X5YyOVQKHp4/s1600/20130106_121643.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="color: #444444;"><img alt="The soaring eight-storey atrium of The Landmark Hotel, London" border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-kLBR_s7Srjs/UUYqCXg3eqI/AAAAAAAAGHo/X5YyOVQKHp4/s320/20130106_121643.jpg" title="The soaring eight-storey atrium of The Landmark Hotel, London" width="240" /></span></a></div>
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;">If, even taking into account the potential for drinking your own body-weight in fizz, that sounds expensive, rest assured that the quality and quantity of the food are commensurate with the price. Table after table groans with freshly-prepared, regularly replenished fare - hot breakfast favourites and an omelette station; salads, sushi and whole sides of smoked and cured salmon; four - four! - roasts with every imaginable trimming and various gravies, and a couple of stir-fries and stews.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;">Alyn and I went, as should you, with empty stomachs, determined to try as much as we could; I won't exhaust you (or rather, disgrace myself) by itemising absolutely everything we ate. But we especially liked herby, coarse sausages from the full English counter; the fun build-your-own Caesar salad bar; thick ribbons, cut-to-order, of wonderful beetroot-cured salmon; dainty, colourful temaki and nigiri sushi; and beautifully, bleedingly rare beef sirloin, swimming in gravy made with the roasting juices.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 16px;">The best, however, came last, with the astonishing selection of desserts and patisseries available for afters. Having as sweet a tooth as I do, I was in seventh heaven faced with the stacks of macarons, mousses and possets, the cheesecakes, </span></span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">brûlées and brownies. Little fruit tarts packed with huge, plump blackberries nestling on </span></span><b id="internal-source-marker_0.3383192515466362" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #444444;">crème pâtissière and bite-sized squares of passion fruit cheesecake were my particular favourites. Oh and did I mention the white chocolate fountain with fruit skewers for dipping? I might have visited that just a couple of times.</span></span><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #444444;"><br /></span></span></b>
</b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.3383192515466362" style="font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cKl6OAr_zOc/UUZZFMZQCOI/AAAAAAAAGH4/RHUGfTpBNR0/s1600/20130106_124338.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Desserts at Sunday Champagne Brunch at The Landmark Hotel, London" border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cKl6OAr_zOc/UUZZFMZQCOI/AAAAAAAAGH4/RHUGfTpBNR0/s320/20130106_124338.jpg" title="Desserts at Sunday Champagne Brunch at The Landmark Hotel, London" width="320" /></a></b></div>
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.3383192515466362" style="font-weight: normal;">
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #444444;">Throughout the afternoon (your table is yours for the whole 12.30-3pm sitting) a pianist and double-bassist entertain with an eclectic medley of music, and if we were surprised at some of the choices -'Suicide Is Painless' and <a href="http://soundcloud.com/nationalanthems/deutschlandlied" target="_blank">the German national anthem</a>, anyone? - it provided the perfect acoustic backdrop to the satisfied murmur of the guests and frequent popping of Champagne corks.</span></span></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #444444;"><br /></span></span></b>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #444444;">Unsurprisingly given the price and the setting (The Landmark may not be as grand as some of London's <i>grande dame</i> hotels but is still very obviously five-star) the Sunday Champagne Brunch mostly attracts dolled-up diners celebrating special occasions; when the pianist broke off from 'Single Ladies' to play 'Happy Birthday' more than one table assumed it was for them. But with so many restaurants now pushing how casual they are as a selling-point, it's rather refreshing to find somewhere where Sunday best is still <i>de rigueur</i>.</span></span></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #444444;"><br /></span></span></b>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #444444;">It's saying something that, having spent a great deal of time lately staying and eating in some very fancy hotels for <i>les Deux Messieurs</i>, this experience genuinely felt like a treat. Nice work, if you can get it. And if not then heck, just treat yourself.</span></span></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #444444;"><br /></span></span></b>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><span style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #444444; line-height: 24px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box;">The Landmark London Hotel, 222 Marylebone Road, London <a href="https://maps.google.com/maps?q=NW1+6JQ&ll=51.521909,-0.163829&spn=0.00725,0.021136&hnear=London+NW1+6JQ,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">NW1 6JQ</a></span></span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 24px;" /><span style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 24px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box;"><span style="color: #444444;">020 7631 8000 </span><a href="http://landmarklondon.co.uk/" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.6) 0px 1px 0px;" target="_blank" title="Landmark London"><span style="color: orange;">landmarklondon.co.uk</span></a></span></span></b></span></span><br />
</b><b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/571733/restaurant/London/Winter-Garden-at-The-Landmark-Hotel-London-Marylebone"><img alt="Winter Garden at The Landmark Hotel London on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/571733/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a> </b><br />
<br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;">
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/81396/Winter_Garden_at_the_Landmark?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Winter Garden at the Landmark"><img alt="Square Meal" height="125" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/81396/get-blog-review/image/large.png" width="230" /></a> </b><br />
<br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></b>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span></b><br />
<br />
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-19841755260895449812013-02-22T18:28:00.000+00:002013-03-20T00:30:15.580+00:00The Dead Dolls Club<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Z9E0MMWqdjc/USdTQEDveCI/AAAAAAAAF_4/vVMOKu5HQ6E/s1600/20130130_212954.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Dead Dolls Club, Dalston" border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Z9E0MMWqdjc/USdTQEDveCI/AAAAAAAAF_4/vVMOKu5HQ6E/s320/20130130_212954.jpg" title="The Dead Dolls Club, Dalston" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Anyone who's had the misfortune to be in my vicinity when I've got on my soapbox about foraging will know that I think it's a bit of a con. Growing up as I did in the Dorset countryside, picking fruit, veg and herbs from the land around you wasn't a skill, it was just something you did, a means to an end, a way of livening up picnics when the limited produce on offer at Mrs Eve's Stores didn't appeal or you fancied something for pudding and you'd missed the ice-cream van's weekly visit.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My other great beef with foraging is that for so many restaurants it is seen as a licence to charge ridiculous prices for something that is, bar the cost of the time spent actually foraging (or 'picking stuff' as I call it), entirely free. On various eighty-quid-a-head-ish tasting menus I've seen 'foraged salads' which diners too rich or stupid or both to realise that the ingredients cost exactly £0.00 wolf down with the gusto they would usually reserve for luxury foodstuffs which, while still swingeingly marked-up, have at least actually cost the restaurant something to buy in the first place.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And yet something grabbed me about the menu at <a href="http://www.thedeaddollsclub.com/The_Dead_Dolls_Club/eating.html" target="_blank">The Dead Dolls Club</a>, a cute little place in Haggerston (it's the new Dalston - possibly) where the food is provided by <a href="http://the-foragers.com/" target="_blank">The Foragers</a>, a collective who, their website says, '</span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">believe in collecting, preserving, and rummaging through hedgerows like a child in a sweet shop, but respectfully and gratefully making something simply found into something spectacular'. Which sounded nice. So taking with me </span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">a young East London-dwelling trendy, </span><a href="https://twitter.com/mattbramf" style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Matt Bramford</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">, so as not to feel too conspicuous in my late-thirties uncoolness, I went along to see if The Foragers could make me eat my ranty words.</span>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUT7OVlbqnuHZtMJIp_DKwijPNFLJZEYiJ8HY7h69YgxW-IJPG2zOSKMNcRM0l1TB9d4b6zOEWIpmkuDl68YKZELWJNBBd8CTa5hz7pWbPF-cVA6adQ18XHe7FypXXnzvJVWUUnVRz7Fc/s1600/photo+10.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Food & drink at The Dead Dolls Club, Dalston by Matt Bramford" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUT7OVlbqnuHZtMJIp_DKwijPNFLJZEYiJ8HY7h69YgxW-IJPG2zOSKMNcRM0l1TB9d4b6zOEWIpmkuDl68YKZELWJNBBd8CTa5hz7pWbPF-cVA6adQ18XHe7FypXXnzvJVWUUnVRz7Fc/s320/photo+10.JPG" title="Food & drink at The Dead Dolls Club, Dalston by Matt Bramford" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I'll say this much for them: they're certainly turning out some bloody good food. The '<a href="http://www.thedeaddollsclub.com/The_Dead_Dolls_Club/eating.html" target="_blank">Grazing Menu</a>' of small plates is concise at just seven dishes and three sides, and if what we ate wasn't quite 'spectacular' it was at least near impossible to fault. </span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In no particular order we tried marinated wood pigeon breasts, served daringly rare with a moreish, sticky rosehip barbecue sauce; venison Scotch quails' eggs, which if rather heavy on the meat-to-ovum ratio were made with </span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">piquant, peppery mince of </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">patently </span><a href="http://youtu.be/yfOfpYx4ZN8?t=2m4s" style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">good game</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">; and lovely firm chunks of heady Jerusalem artichoke cleverly paired with a tart herb dressing.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Best of all was air-dried mutton - a sort of glorious ovine jerky - with leeks, hazelnuts and a mercifully-not-overpowering truffle vinaigrette, and thick slices of hedgerow berry-cured trout with wholemeal crisps and punchy wild horseradish. Wild horseradish root, freshly grated, is to the creamed sauce we're used to buying in jars what Iranian caviar is to chip-shop cod roe; related, but immeasurably superior in flavour. It served as a one-ingredient advertisement in favour of foraging.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A dessert of goat's cheese with Hertfordshire honey, fennel and hairy bittercress - a herb I thought sounded like a resident of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle-earth" target="_blank">Middle-earth</a> - was an innovative and successful exercise in using traditionally savoury ingredients in a sweet, although there was an unpleasantly waxy residue of some sort which despite our lovely waitress's protestations to the contrary I remain convinced was, in fact, wax, from the honeycomb which formed part of the dish. Lemon posset with wild crab apple jelly and dried blackberries however was flawless, the blackberries particularly bringing back very happy memories of those childhood Dorset days spent picking stuff.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Matt enjoyed a couple of the incredibly potent cocktails, <a href="http://www.thedeaddollsclub.com/The_Dead_Dolls_Club/cocktails.html" target="_blank">whimsically named</a> after characters from an imagined country house drama, including The Game Keeper - lager-based with rum, amaretto and Angostura bitters - and a special with violet liqueur and absinthe after which it's a miracle the boy could speak let alone walk. Still off booze, I was thoroughly spoiled with some well-crafted mocktails including one with hibiscus syrup in which a hibiscus flower prettily floated. Glassware, when used, was of the exquisite, heavy, etched crystal variety, although tap water and some cocktails were served to my great chagrin in jam jars - quite the most irritating affectation of the last couple of years and one I can't wait to see the back of.</span></span><br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4z_lktooPd4/USeldHX14zI/AAAAAAAAGBA/a1uaOYQ0csc/s1600/DDC+Cheese+Honey.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Goat's cheese with Hertfordshire honey, fennel and hairy bittercress at The Dead Dolls Club" border="0" height="212" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4z_lktooPd4/USeldHX14zI/AAAAAAAAGBA/a1uaOYQ0csc/s320/DDC+Cheese+Honey.jpg" title="Goat's cheese with Hertfordshire honey, fennel and hairy bittercress at The Dead Dolls Club" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">Goat's cheese with honey and fennel by <a href="http://londoneer.org/" target="_blank">Pete Stean</a> </span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">If foraged food has struck me as being a bit of a con elsewhere it certainly isn't here, with none of the dishes costing more than £7.50 and those lethal, ample cocktails £9. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Combined with very pleasant service and a groovy if rather drafty room, it all made for a very enjoyable evening and one I'd happily repeat.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I remain of the view that <i>some</i> foragers are leading diners up the garden path, but I like what <i>The </i>Foragers are doing very much. Like hairy bittercress and wild horeseradish, The Dead Dolls Club is worth making the effort to seek out.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>The Dead Dolls Club, 428 Kingsland Road, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=The+Dead+Dolls+Club,+428+Kingsland+Road,+London+E8+4AA&ll=51.542625,-0.075982&spn=0.007246,0.021136&hq=The+Dead+Dolls+Club,&hnear=428+Kingsland+Rd,+London+E8+4AA,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">E8 4AA</a> <a href="http://www.thedeaddollsclub.com/">www.thedeaddollsclub.com</a> / <a href="http://www.the-foragers.com/">www.the-foragers.com</a> <a href="http://twitter.com/deaddollsclub" target="_blank">@deaddollsclub</a> <a href="http://twitter.com/weforagers" target="_blank">@weforagers</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1738509/restaurant/Hackney/The-Dead-Dolls-Club-London"><img alt="The Dead Dolls Club on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1738509/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/116889/The_Dead_Dolls_Club?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of The Dead Dolls Club"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/116889/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/dead-dolls-club/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=9373" /></a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-73175297944016049262013-02-10T14:36:00.000+00:002013-02-10T17:02:54.852+00:00Shoryu Ramen<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-aoXA7cOIps4/URaCQPFbKsI/AAAAAAAAF8Y/kwJwvjHyXEY/s1600/20130204_135652.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Exterior of Shoryu Ramen, 9 Lower Regent Street, London SW1Y 4LR" border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-aoXA7cOIps4/URaCQPFbKsI/AAAAAAAAF8Y/kwJwvjHyXEY/s320/20130204_135652.jpg" title="Exterior of Shoryu Ramen, 9 Lower Regent Street, London SW1Y 4LR" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I've lost count of the number of places I've walked into </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">recently</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">- shops being by far the worst offenders, but a fair number of restaurants and offices too - where no-one's said "Hello!" or otherwise acknowledged my presence. So the cheery, traditional, "Irasshaimase!" from the staff </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">and beating of a drum </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">on entering <a href="http://www.shoryuramen.com/" target="_blank">Shoryu</a>, London's latest ramen joint on Lower Regent Street, endeared me to the place before even a mouthful of food passed my lips.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But oh, the food...it's wonderful. Just brilliant. So much so, in fact, that after an impressive first visit I returned twice in the space of a week. The room's nothing special - tightly-packed, functional (trans: hard) seating; bright lights, an apparently <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EhMom-wAzE" target="_blank">Spirographed </a>mural - and the Lower Regent Street location, horrible, but these are minor considerations next to the combined allure of the warmth of welcome and the sheer quality of the ramen.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Shoryu's menu, presented on a clipboard, is much longer than at any of the other <i>ramen-ya</i> that have sprung up around town. The basic Shoryu Ganso tonkotsu is a huge bowlful of rich opaque pork-bone broth to which hosomen noodles, tender barbecue pork, crunchy, woody kikurage fungus, seasoned boiled egg (nitamago), beansprouts, spring onions, pickled ginger (gari) and crisp dried seaweed (nori) are added. Then ingredients are added or subtracted to make different dishes, there are miso and soy broth variants, and all can be tweaked and customised to personal taste. There's a good twenty-odd starters and sides to choose from too. </span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-H5kHLe3XBFI/UReMphKcexI/AAAAAAAAF84/P--0wPtoeN8/s1600/Shoryu_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Dracula Tonkotsu at Shoryu Ramen, 9 Lower Regent Street, London SW1Y 4LR" border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-H5kHLe3XBFI/UReMphKcexI/AAAAAAAAF84/P--0wPtoeN8/s320/Shoryu_1.jpg" title="Dracula Tonkotsu at Shoryu Ramen, 9 Lower Regent Street, London SW1Y 4LR" width="213" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The dish that blew me (and the cobwebs) away on my first visit was Wasabi Tonkotsu, which saw a sinus-purging whack of potent fresh and pickled wasabi added to a gari-free Shoryu Ganso. It was in many ways the perfect meal; lovely to look at, nourishing, complex - each mouthful slightly different in taste and texture from the last - and filling without leaving one bloated. I loved it; food is often fun, sometimes intriguing, but rarely is it genuinely exciting. This was.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A side-order of chicken kara age, chunks of thigh meat lightly-battered and fried, was initially a little bland but came alive with a squeeze of lemon juice and dipping in the accompanying spiced mayonnaise. Although great value for the portion size at £5, there was rather too much of it for one person; solo diners shouldn't have to miss out on trying extras for fear of over-ordering (not, I'll admit, something that often afflicts me, as my waist size will attest).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I enjoyed the kara age again on my second visit, this time in tori kara age men, one of the shiitake and konbu soy broth choices. Although in its non-broth components not dissimilar to the tonkotsu, this was a much lighter, more cleansing affair, slices of gari folded into the noodles adding little depth-charges of flavour. In this setting the fried chicken - as much of it as in the side-order serving - felt rather decadent. I wasn't sure if I liked the roundels of garish pink fishcake, which didn't feel like they quite belonged in this assembly, but I polished the whole lot off just the same.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">On a third occasion I took along my BFF <a href="http://www.anderswhite.co.uk/" target="_blank">Anders </a>and, as confident as I could be that I wouldn't be chatting anyone up later, ordered the Dracula Tonkotsu. Really it should be called anti-Dracula Tonkotsu as it includes mayu - black garlic oil - and garlic chips, caramelised and roasted to take away some of the pungency but none of the warmth of the vampire repellent. Although enjoyable, of the three ramen I'd now tried it was my least favourite, being rather one-note; that much garlic can't not dominate a dish. Still, I'd order it again, if <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmoU05_Fr5A" target="_blank">Buffy</a> was having a night off and there was no snogging to be done.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh57zbvdKiUHzCOL6E8nf9diNBeCQiHycCAWRm27_EHYSxWiOHPyVjVo1x2vEisw5fjBWwkRX8ELyHfsirY8wROVUGK7EvmKyxFsMguvPY1odL4pM2CgUb1ZDJ0wL2cDBESmdqBDxhTkog/s1600/shop_a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img alt="Interior at Shoryu Ramen, 9 Lower Regent Street, London SW1Y 4LR" border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh57zbvdKiUHzCOL6E8nf9diNBeCQiHycCAWRm27_EHYSxWiOHPyVjVo1x2vEisw5fjBWwkRX8ELyHfsirY8wROVUGK7EvmKyxFsMguvPY1odL4pM2CgUb1ZDJ0wL2cDBESmdqBDxhTkog/s320/shop_a.jpg" title="Interior at Shoryu Ramen, 9 Lower Regent Street, London SW1Y 4LR" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Anders's Yuzu Tonkotsu was interesting, the fragrant citrus fruit made into a chutney with chilli and piled high in the centre of the bowl. Its citric acidity, which should in theory have cut through the fattiness of the sliced pork and collagen-rich broth, somehow seemed to sit apart from it, but this sort of experimentation is what makes the food at Shoryu so enticing. A side of pork gyoza were, if not the best of their kind, perfectly fine, but as with the kara age on my previous visit not strictly necessary.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Staff, many of them Japanese, provide service that is briskly efficient while also friendly and very courteous; diners are not hurried or harassed but tables are turned at such a rate as to ensure that the queues which inevitably build up at busy times keep moving along. As well as the lively greeting there are other customer-friendly touches; a complimentary palate-awakener of cabbage dressed in rice wine vinegar is brought with the menu, and the discretionary service charge is a modest 10%.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">When somewhere like Shoryu opens that nails its concept so assuredly from the get-go, it's always tempting to believe that the first branch might be the prototype for a chain. If that is the case here, then good; I'd welcome a Shoryu on every corner as warmly as they welcome every customer.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Shoryu Ramen, 9 Lower Regent Street, London SW1Y 4LR <a href="http://www.shoryuramen.com/">www.shoryuramen.com</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1717785/restaurant/St-Jamess/Shoryu-London"><img alt="Shoryu on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1717785/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/113959/Shoryu_Ramen?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Shoryu Ramen"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/113959/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/shoryu-ramen/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=7736" /></a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-67118402079403523932013-02-03T17:23:00.002+00:002013-02-22T18:44:11.811+00:00Dock Kitchen<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-FLFtaLARZ9o/UQ5ct4S0U-I/AAAAAAAAF3A/zXRrdbIar0I/s1600/Dock+Kitchen.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Dock Kitchen, Portobello Dock, 342/344 Ladbroke Grove, London W10 5BU" border="0" height="235" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-FLFtaLARZ9o/UQ5ct4S0U-I/AAAAAAAAF3A/zXRrdbIar0I/s320/Dock+Kitchen.jpg" title="Dock Kitchen, Portobello Dock, 342/344 Ladbroke Grove, London W10 5BU" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Few restaurants can boast as impressive a setting as <a href="http://www.dockkitchen.co.uk/" target="_blank">Dock Kitchen</a>. Overlooking the Grand Union Canal, in a smartly restored Victorian wharf, globetrotting chef <a href="http://www.dockkitchen.co.uk/stevie-parle.php" target="_blank">Stevie Parle's</a> Ladbroke Grove base doubles as a showroom for furniture and lighting designer <a href="http://www.tomdixon.net/" target="_blank">Tom Dixon</a>, whose studio is downstairs. Restaurant/showroom hybrids might be nothing new - Chair in Westbourne Grove (chairs, obvs) and Firevault in Marylebone (designer fireplaces, believe it or not), both now closed, got there first - but nowhere does it with quite such urbane modernity as here.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Parle has made a name for himself travelling the world, researching and discovering regional techniques and ingredients - nice work if you can get it - and parlaying that into a number of popular books (on sale in the restaurant, natch) and TV series. It was watching the most recent of these, <a href="http://www.channel4.com/programmes/spice-trip" target="_blank">Spice Trip</a>, which led my pal <a href="http://twitter.com/lennybaker" target="_blank">Ian </a>to suggest that we give Dock Kitchen a whirl, his appetite whetted and interest piqued by Stevie's televised adventures. We took mutual friend <a href="http://www.anderswhite.co.uk/" target="_blank">Anders </a>along on the itself not-insubstantial trek to W10.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Dock Kitchen offers two options at dinner, a <a href="http://www.dockkitchen.co.uk/set-dinner.php" target="_blank">set menu</a> changing every ten days or so which showcases a particular region (Old Delhi on the night we visited) and <a href="http://www.dockkitchen.co.uk/daily-menu.php" target="_blank">a la carte</a>; we chose the latter. Like Stevie Parle himself the menu roams from country to country, name-checking an unusual spice here, a less-than-familiar vegetable there. If it weren't for the likelihood that, like Ian, most diners will be fans of the chef's programmes and thus know their labneh from their lavash, it could seem wilfully opaque. Instead it reads excitingly and although fairly concise at six choices for each course, is hard to choose the most appealing dishes from.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lfJLWa-WE_M/UQ5YJUbWisI/AAAAAAAAF2c/iKf2wrocpCc/s1600/20130124_213516.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="The open kitchen at Dock Kitchen, Portobello Dock, 342/344 Ladbroke Grove, London W10 5BU" border="0" height="188" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lfJLWa-WE_M/UQ5YJUbWisI/AAAAAAAAF2c/iKf2wrocpCc/s320/20130124_213516.jpg" title="The open kitchen at Dock Kitchen, Portobello Dock, 342/344 Ladbroke Grove, London W10 5BU" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A pre-starter nibble of tempura sage leaves, drizzled in honey and sprinkled with chilli flakes, were fiendishly moreish, as was a basket of lavash, an unleavened flatbread served hot and charred from the grill. There was more of it with my starter, lusciously fat and bloody chicken livers cooked in seven spice and pomegranate molasses, which I smooshed onto the bread and wolfed down before, mea culpa, the boys could have even a taste.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ian's starter, listed as 'A piece of Iberico secreto' (a piece of menu writing I found rather affected) was a good tender slice of this pinkest of porks, its delicacy not overwhelmed by grilled leek and pleasantly smoky if rather wet romesco sauce. Anders' cotechino sausage, served as is traditional in some parts of Italy on New Year's Eve - despite it being late January in London - on a bed of lentils, had enough peppery savour to not really need its accompanying mustard fruits and dragoncello sauce. Dragoncello, incidentally, is tarragon; why it wasn't just called that here escapes me.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I won't reproduce the exhaustingly-long twenty-word name of Anders' main course in full, but it was, essentially, a Sri Lankan thali. A very good one, too, albeit one with an occasional whack of such intense heat as to make Anders' eyelids snap back in his head. Ian and I shared lamb biryani (available only for two people or more), cooked in a clay pot sealed with dough to keep moisture and its wonderful aromas in. It was a superb dish, the lamb flakingly tender and so beautifully spiced as to prove without doubt that Stevie knows his stuff. We liked too that it came with dishes of rose petals, almonds and coriander to mix in to taste, bringing a little variety to each mouthful.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dtLyD2VaTYY/UQ5YLZ7i_3I/AAAAAAAAF28/9kwJqYyA4v8/s1600/20130124_221631.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Unusual ingredients on display at Dock Kitchen, Portobello Dock, 342/344 Ladbroke Grove, London W10 5BU" border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dtLyD2VaTYY/UQ5YLZ7i_3I/AAAAAAAAF28/9kwJqYyA4v8/s320/20130124_221631.jpg" title="Unusual ingredients on display at Dock Kitchen, Portobello Dock, 342/344 Ladbroke Grove, London W10 5BU" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Desserts were pleasant enough if not in the same league as the more complex savoury courses. Ian's pistachio and nutmeg cake with saffron yoghurt was good as cakes go but nothing to get too excited about, and my Seville orange tart, while refreshing after the biryani, was rather too sharp. A pot of poky smoked Sri Lanka tea took the sourness away most agreeably.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The boys' ordering of wine by the glass (still on the wagon, I stuck to the excellent home-made lemonade) pushed our bill including service up to about £53 a head, steep but about the norm for food of this quality and into which clearly a lot of thought and love, not to mention considered sourcing, had gone. Only the biryani, while admittedly splendid, </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">felt over-priced </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">at £35 for two. Service, from a hipsterish brigade of jeans-clad boys and girls, was impeccable.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">You enter and leave Dock Kitchen through a mini-grocery store where many of the ingredients championed by Stevie Parle in his programmes and books - as well as the books themselves - are on sale. This rather sums the place up; more than just a restaurant, Dock Kitchen is the shop-window for a clearly very talented cook who, less ostentatiously but no less surely than Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay before him, is fast becoming a one-man industry. And good luck to him with it I say; when food's as exciting and enjoyable as this, the person responsible for it deserves to be shown off.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Dock Kitchen, Portobello Dock, 342/344 Ladbroke Grove, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Dock+Kitchen,+Portobello+Dock,+342%2F344+Ladbroke+Grove,+London+W10+5BU&ll=51.527463,-0.214448&spn=0.007249,0.021136&fb=1&gl=uk&hq=Dock+Kitchen,+Portobello+Dock,+342%2F344+Ladbroke+Grove,+London+W10+5BU&cid=0,0,4805042640563396120&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">W10 5BU</a> Tel: 020 8962 1610 <a href="http://www.dockkitchen.co.uk/">http://www.dockkitchen.co.uk</a></b></span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1541444/restaurant/Notting-Hill/Dock-Kitchen-London"><img alt="Dock Kitchen on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1541444/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/103262/Dock_Kitchen?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Dock Kitchen"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/103262/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/dock-kitchen/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=4780" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-2495639110580783002013-01-30T01:02:00.000+00:002013-02-04T12:13:32.471+00:00Cassis<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqTw5Ix03aSK-zzqFE8CHQmNkh_oWR1fOS0P1s-fgEeYfv8k3oHMC4KUKc_7pxbuRgjeQ7xPN9sASXJsU0JDptGZRB-KHaM-LCBzkWOCAnHsrajNGEyF_XeG7nrBR5zJhxMN3dZvY17pg/s1600/Cassis+exterior.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Exterior of Cassis Bistro, 232-236 Brompton Road, London SW3 2BB" border="0" height="221" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqTw5Ix03aSK-zzqFE8CHQmNkh_oWR1fOS0P1s-fgEeYfv8k3oHMC4KUKc_7pxbuRgjeQ7xPN9sASXJsU0JDptGZRB-KHaM-LCBzkWOCAnHsrajNGEyF_XeG7nrBR5zJhxMN3dZvY17pg/s400/Cassis+exterior.jpg" title="Exterior of Cassis Bistro, 232-236 Brompton Road, London SW3 2BB" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In a very enjoyable recent article for <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2013/02/top-chefs-totalitarian-restaurants" target="_blank">Vanity Fair</a>, Corby Kummer bemoaned the 'tyranny' of the tasting menu. "How," Kummer asked, "</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">did the diner get demoted from honored guest whose wish was the waiter’s command to quivering hostage in thrall to the chef’s iron whim?" My thoughts exactly. In London as in America, an increasing number of restaurants - usually, but not always, the kind helmed by ambitious young chefs who include </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">hubristic </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">vacuities like 'reaching for the [Michelin] stars!!' in their Twitter bios - offer only tasting menus, even at lunchtimes when most right-minded diners don't even want two courses, never mind eight and up.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">As a diner, I generally shy away from tasting menus for the reason that having what I eat in which order and at what speed dictated by the kitchen is the polar opposite of how I like to eat out; I have a great deal of respect for many chefs and restaurateurs but as a paying customer I like meals to be about my choice and convenience, not theirs. And as a writer I tend to avoid them because tasting menus have almost always to be served to the whole table and it's terribly boring to write (and read) about a meal only saying, "We all had the soup, and then we all had the halibut, and then we all had the duck" and so on ad infinitum.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">But a tasting menu that genuinely serves to showcase the talents of a brilliant chef, perfectly balanced, carefully timed and matched with expertly chosen wines? Now you're talking, and that's exactly what's on offer at <a href="http://www.cassisbistro.co.uk/" target="_blank">Cassis</a>, the smart Provencal bistro in Knightsbridge where I enjoyed a meal that, on reflection, was probably the single best restaurant meal I ate in 2012. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOwyQFAf-taDGVkdvQ9d6ZCKoet-iSam_GTTJ8YsJFK8m93ZJR-oVQnin2VCkqf6qy5U1ISl0dnnPscdNKXwX4qnK5du8OIPGcqTP0S7oaVDuryloNZTqP_AJvYY2SFtGvaSNuABDRgkM/s1600/A_19578.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Sea bass tartare at Cassis Bistro, 232-236 Brompton Road, London SW3 2BB" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOwyQFAf-taDGVkdvQ9d6ZCKoet-iSam_GTTJ8YsJFK8m93ZJR-oVQnin2VCkqf6qy5U1ISl0dnnPscdNKXwX4qnK5du8OIPGcqTP0S7oaVDuryloNZTqP_AJvYY2SFtGvaSNuABDRgkM/s320/A_19578.jpg" title="Sea bass tartare at Cassis Bistro, 232-236 Brompton Road, London SW3 2BB" width="320" /></a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">I've visited Cassis (<a href="http://www.twelvepointfivepercent.com/2010/12/cassis-bistro-kensington.html" target="_blank">and liked it very much</a>) before and was lured back by an invitation to see what new executive chef Massimiliano Blasone - ex of <a href="http://www.twelvepointfivepercent.com/2009/10/apsleys-heinz-beck-restaurant.html" target="_blank">Apsley's</a> - was doing differently. The answer is, in a good way, not much; the upscale bistro menu, mindful of but not enslaved to the cuisine of Provence, is still there. What Blasone has done is to add some exceptional pasta and risotto dishes, and refine presentation so that what's on the plate is as visually impressive as owner Marlon Abela's art collection on the walls.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">After expertly-mixed Martinis by way of aperitifs, my artist pal <a href="http://www.paulvyse.co.uk/" target="_blank">Paul Vyse</a> and I started with sea bass tartare, coarsely-cut, silkily-fresh fish bound in a subtle trace of goat's cheese with a dash of citrus and sandwiched between crisp sesame wafers. Geometrically arranged on a plate decorated with a stripe of piment d'Espelette, the precision of presentation and equilibrium of flavours served as a clear statement of intent for the dishes that would follow.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">Ethereally light cod brandade was perfect scooped up with its accompanying black olive tuile, while tart rhubarb marmalade countered the richness of caramelised Landes foie gras, dusted with bitter chocolate powder. Black Angus sirloin steak tartare - an additional dish included at our request - was surprisingly light, its spicing subtle enough to allow the flavour of the beef to dominate. </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">Rabbit ravioli with pistachio cream was more robust, the nutty, rich cream stopping just shy of being actually sweet.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">Lobster risotto was gloriously rich, dusted with saffron and containing generous translucent, just-cooked slices of lobster tail. Seared scallops, served with a pea puree as vibrant in taste as of colour, were similarly well-timed, lightly crusted from the heat of the pan and inner-cheek tender inside. A subsequent game dish, a classic combination of vividly red venison with red cabbage, was cooked sous-vide but retained far more texture than this fashionable but, I find, often disappointing method of cooking usually permits. Roasted sprouts provided additional crunch.</span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6r6o-Kftbi0/UQhjyQUrluI/AAAAAAAAF08/OlbN7V8JSEM/s1600/Cassis-+looking+across.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Interior of Cassis Bistro, 232-236 Brompton Road, London SW3 2BB" border="0" height="202" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6r6o-Kftbi0/UQhjyQUrluI/AAAAAAAAF08/OlbN7V8JSEM/s400/Cassis-+looking+across.jpg" title="Interior of Cassis Bistro, 232-236 Brompton Road, London SW3 2BB" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;">After a palate-cleansing mouthful of lime jelly came a trio of desserts: a chocolate sundae of sorts, a raspberry sorbet of the like I could happily eat after, or indeed for, every meal, and an elegant seven-layered assembly of ganache and wafer in chocolate crumb that reminded me, wonderfully, of an extremely posh <a href="http://www.treasureislandsweets.co.uk/products/Drifter-Chocolate-Bar.html" target="_blank">Drifter</a>. We somehow managed the dainty chocolate and fruit petits-fours that provided the finale to this note perfect, epic meal.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times New Roman, Times, serif;">Massimiliano Blasone is clearly a prodigious talent; his cooking is intelligent, precise, innovative and exhilarating but also, refreshingly in a time when many chefs appear to be trying to outdo each other with the obscurity of their ingredients and idiosyncrasy of technique, really rather accessible. Less accessible - unsurprisingly - is the price; the seven-course menu we enjoyed is £75 with wine flights at £30 or £50. I'd certainly suggest letting the sommelier choose wines for you, as we did; highlights included a wonderful green-appley </span></span></span><em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Albariño</span></em><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> w</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times New Roman, Times, serif;">ith the brandade, Monbazillac with the foie gras and and a really exceptional 'L'Instant' </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">r</span></span></span><em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">osé from Provence with our ravioli. </span></em><br />
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></em>
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Service throughout was knowledgable, attentive and polished, and if I have </span></em><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 16px;">one reservation about Cassis it's that the overall identity and decor of the place don't quite seem to marry up with the aspirations of the kitchen. The food might be Provencal, but casual bistro this n'est pas, and with Blasone's addition of Italian dishes to the menu this crisis of identity seems even more pronounced. Marlon Abela has for some time now been rumoured to be bringing his high-end Italian brand A Voce to London; perhaps with a simple name change for Cassis and some minor cosmetic tweaking he could achieve it on this site.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Corby Kummer dislikes tasting menus, as explained in his Vanity Fair piece, because they are 'tedious; <span style="background-color: #f8f8f8; line-height: 21px;">surprise and delight and originality shouldn’t be banished'. They're certainly not banished at Cassis, where surprise, delight and originality are to be found in every course.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #f8f8f8; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, 'Palatino Linotype', 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<b style="background-color: #fcfdf9; color: #575757; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 15px;">Cassis Bistro, 232-236 Brompton Road, London <a href="http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Cassis+Bistro,+232-236+Brompton+Road,+London+SW3+2BB&sll=51.496427,-0.16973&sspn=0.007508,0.01929&gl=uk&g=236+Brompton+Rd,+London+SW3+2BB&ie=UTF8&hq=Cassis+Bistro,&hnear=236+Brompton+Rd,+London+SW3+2BB,+United+Kingdom&ll=51.499339,-0.170889&spn=0.014346,0.038581&z=15&iwloc=A" style="color: #a4481f; text-decoration: initial;">SW3 2BB</a> Tel: <span class="skype_pnh_container" dir="ltr" skype_menu_props="{'numberToCall':'+442075811101' , 'isFreecall':false, 'isMobile':false, 'isRtl':false}" style="background-attachment: scroll !important; background-color: transparent !important; background-image: none !important; background-position: 0px 0px !important; border-collapse: separate !important; border: 0px none rgb(0, 0, 0) !important; bottom: auto !important; clear: none !important; clip: auto !important; color: rgb(0, 175, 253) !important; cursor: pointer !important; direction: ltr !important; display: inline !important; float: none !important; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue Regular', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif !important; font-weight: normal !important; left: auto !important; letter-spacing: 0px !important; list-style: disc outside none !important; margin: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; padding: 0px !important; page-break-after: auto !important; page-break-before: auto !important; page-break-inside: auto !important; position: static !important; right: auto !important; table-layout: auto !important; text-shadow: none !important; top: auto !important; vertical-align: baseline !important; width: auto !important; word-spacing: normal !important; z-index: 0 !important;" tabindex="-1"><span class="skype_pnh_highlighting_inactive_common" dir="ltr" skypeaction="skype_dropdown" style="background-attachment: scroll !important; background-color: transparent !important; background-image: none !important; background-position: 0px 0px !important; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat !important; border-collapse: separate !important; border: 0px none rgb(0, 0, 0) !important; bottom: auto !important; clear: none !important; clip: auto !important; cursor: pointer !important; direction: ltr !important; display: inline !important; float: none !important; left: auto !important; letter-spacing: 0px !important; list-style: disc outside none !important; margin: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; padding: 0px !important; page-break-after: auto !important; page-break-before: auto !important; page-break-inside: auto !important; position: static !important; right: auto !important; table-layout: auto !important; text-shadow: none !important; top: auto !important; vertical-align: baseline !important; width: auto !important; word-spacing: normal !important; z-index: 0 !important;"><span class="skype_pnh_textarea_span" style="background-attachment: scroll !important; background-color: transparent !important; background-image: none !important; background-position: 0px 0px !important; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat !important; border-collapse: separate !important; border: 0px none rgb(0, 0, 0) !important; bottom: auto !important; clear: none !important; clip: auto !important; cursor: pointer !important; direction: ltr !important; display: inline !important; float: none !important; left: auto !important; letter-spacing: 0px !important; list-style: disc outside none !important; margin: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; padding: 0px !important; page-break-after: auto !important; page-break-before: auto !important; page-break-inside: auto !important; position: static !important; right: auto !important; table-layout: auto !important; text-shadow: none !important; top: auto !important; vertical-align: baseline !important; width: auto !important; word-spacing: normal !important; z-index: 0 !important;"><span class="skype_pnh_text_span" style="background-attachment: scroll !important; background-color: transparent !important; background-image: none !important; background-position: 0px 0px !important; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat !important; border-collapse: separate !important; border: 0px none rgb(0, 0, 0) !important; bottom: auto !important; clear: none !important; clip: auto !important; cursor: pointer !important; direction: ltr !important; display: inline !important; float: none !important; left: auto !important; letter-spacing: 0px !important; list-style: disc outside none !important; margin: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; padding: 0px !important; page-break-after: auto !important; page-break-before: auto !important; page-break-inside: auto !important; position: static !important; right: auto !important; table-layout: auto !important; text-shadow: none !important; top: auto !important; vertical-align: baseline !important; width: auto !important; word-spacing: normal !important; z-index: 0 !important;">020 7581 1101 </span></span></span></span><a href="http://www.cassisbistro.co.uk/" style="color: #a4481f; text-decoration: initial;">http://www.cassisbistro.co.uk</a></b><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1565333/restaurant/South-Kensington/Cassis-London"><img alt="Cassis on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1565333/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/cassis/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=127" /></a>
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-80077530090453362732013-01-18T21:32:00.001+00:002013-01-19T14:33:32.180+00:00Barrafina<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bvZxRMkpJR4/UPliq9sYgzI/AAAAAAAAFw8/yicooa-5yUs/s1600/20130102_141738.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bvZxRMkpJR4/UPliq9sYgzI/AAAAAAAAFw8/yicooa-5yUs/s320/20130102_141738.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.barrafina.co.uk/" target="_blank">Barrafina </a>is such a clever name. Opened in 2006 by London's most dashing sibling restaurateurs Sam and Eddie Hart, '</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Barrafina'</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> alludes to its </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">being</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> a more casual tapas bar off-shoot of the brothers' estimable first restaurant <a href="http://www.finorestaurant.com/" target="_blank">Fino</a>, as well as translating neatly, and highly appropriately, as 'Excellent Bar'. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">London might, now, be spoiled for high-end tapas joints - and given my love of that cuisine this can only be A Good Thing - but Barrafina was the first to show that there was more to Spanish small plates than </span><em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">champiñones al ajillo and patatas bravas (although the latter do appear on <a href="http://www.barrafina.co.uk/food-menu" target="_blank">Barrafina's menu</a> and are, like everything, exemplary).</span></em><br />
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></em>
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Another trail blazed by Barrafina, almost unheard of seven years ago but all but the norm now, was that of not taking reservations; seating just 23 at the L-shaped bar with a few outside tables for when weather (and Westminster Council...) permits, bookings would be impractical. Instead, plenty of space is available for those waiting and drinks and nibbles are served, creating a lively atmosphere. Lunch date <a href="http://twitter.com/drapersarms" target="_blank">Nick </a>and I arrived early enough - just before 12.30 - to be seated straight away, but might not have been so lucky had it not been the first day of opening after the New Year bank holiday when much of central London was still pretty much abandoned.</span></em>
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></em>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-i077T0qMTKQ/UPmpSnpCPII/AAAAAAAAFxY/40Ex6bpgHW4/s1600/20130102_132702.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="The L-shaped counter and open kitchen at Barrafina, Soho" border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-i077T0qMTKQ/UPmpSnpCPII/AAAAAAAAFxY/40Ex6bpgHW4/s320/20130102_132702.jpg" title="The L-shaped counter and open kitchen at Barrafina, Soho" width="320" /></a></div>
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Executive chef Nieves </span></em><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Barragán Mohacho</span></span><em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> augments the menu of mostly-familiar tapas classics with more ambitious specials using the very finest produce available each day. Fish and shellfish dominate and are alluringly displayed on ice behind the counter; the mackerel and sea bream on the day we visited were so iridescent of skin and bright of eye that they could have just swum in.</span></em><br />
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></em>
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Dishes are served in a perfectly-judged order decided by the kitchen. Nick and I kicked off with springy little clams bathed in butter, lemon juice and parsley, a liquor we greedily mopped up with excellent bread, and pillowy salt cod fritters with properly punchy al-i-oli. Next came a whole mackerel, simply grilled a la plancha, the skin moreishly crisp, the sweetness of the flesh balanced by a colourful salad of wafer thin, delicately-pickled beetroot.</span></em><br />
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></em>
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Morcilla Iberica - crumbly Spanish blood sausage - came topped with dainty fried quail's eggs, nested on a tangle of smoky piquillo peppers. Brussels tops were the very best sort of vegetable dish - the sort tossed in generous amounts of butter and stirred through with shreds of Serrano ham. A final dish of lamb sweetbreads, </span></em><em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">sautéed with shallots and capers, somehow managed to be both robustly offally and delicately savoury, a Special in every sense.</span></em><br />
<em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></em>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">Nick and I were abstaining from alcohol but the choice for those who've not taken the pledge is outstanding. Unsurprisingly the list is all-Spanish, covering all regions and including such unusual wines as Basque </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Txakoli" style="font-style: normal;" target="_blank">txakoli</a><span style="font-style: normal;"> and sherries </span><i>en rama</i>, drawn from the middle of the cask without filtration. Beer drinkers will enjoy the variety of bottled and draft Iberian brews.</span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigWRPVZDcYMJJINbB9q6B6iUjq0wNMO2olGrJ67_Z3xKlafwSL40YH1LW6bN_4n2FPh1hEsy8ggGwYc5nGyUxJr1f7-T7qD4mKbDcg1335zK2Au47IXWWMkoLbajJ2AfRAm5nOWal3VrY/s1600/20130102_141717.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The L-shaped counter and open kitchen at Barrafina, Soho" border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigWRPVZDcYMJJINbB9q6B6iUjq0wNMO2olGrJ67_Z3xKlafwSL40YH1LW6bN_4n2FPh1hEsy8ggGwYc5nGyUxJr1f7-T7qD4mKbDcg1335zK2Au47IXWWMkoLbajJ2AfRAm5nOWal3VrY/s320/20130102_141717.jpg" title="Exterior of Barrafina, Soho." width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Service is impeccable, well-paced but unhurried even given the pressure to keep the queue moving (simple good manners ensure most diners vacate their coveted stools as soon as the last plate is cleared and the bill paid). Barrafina is, understandably, not cheap, the insistence on quality produce - if the best is not available, a dish will simply not go on that day - reflected in the pricing. But it is certainly not over-priced for what is, some would argue, the best tapas in London. </span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Barrafina falls into that rarest of categories, restaurants about which there is nothing to fault. It's lively, egalitarian, elegant, the food is out of this world and you won't pay a fortune for it. This <i>barra </i>is very fine; very fine indeed.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Barrafina, 54 Frith Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Barrafina,+54+Frith+Street,+London+W1D+4SL&ll=51.514966,-0.131707&spn=0.014502,0.042272&hq=Barrafina,+54+Frith+Street,+London+W1D+4SL&t=m&z=15&iwloc=A" target="_blank">W1D 4SL</a> <a href="http://www.barrafina.co.uk/">http://www.barrafina.co.uk</a></b></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/560905/restaurant/London/Barrafina-Soho"><img alt="Barrafina on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/560905/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/84236/Barrafina?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Barrafina"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/84236/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/barrafina/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=1671" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-24876287623220703092012-12-31T14:15:00.002+00:002013-02-18T18:30:59.710+00:00Hawksmoor Air Street<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XbTC47kbcUI/UOC1Wm3UB9I/AAAAAAAAFRE/1Z_CNoe_c1U/s1600/Hawksmoor+Air+Street.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Hawksmoor Air Street interior from www.http://thehawksmoor.com/airstreet" border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XbTC47kbcUI/UOC1Wm3UB9I/AAAAAAAAFRE/1Z_CNoe_c1U/s320/Hawksmoor+Air+Street.jpg" title="Hawksmoor Air Street interior from www.http://thehawksmoor.com/airstreet" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I love steak. If in the final hours prior to my expiring I retain any capacity to choose and masticate then I am certain to include a great big slab of beef, <i>bleu</i>, in my last meal. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But I very rarely order it in restaurants, or go to steakhouses, because of what is known in my family as The Pam Principle™. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">My mother, Pam, never orders in a restaurant anything which she might reasonably expect to make at home, believing that it's wasteful to pay someone to do something you can do yourself. I have an excellent local butcher (</span><a href="http://www.moen.co.uk/" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Moen & Son of Clapham</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">, if you're interested) and a heavy griddle pan, and as such I cook steak - really, really good steak - exactly how I like it, often and well.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">As a result, the crop of high-end steakhouses that have exploded onto the London restaurant scene over the last few years have largely passed me by; sure I've heard of the big players - Goodman and Hawksmoor being the Titans of the genre - and had good times at steak specialists <a href="http://bit.ly/TPFP_34" target="_blank">34 </a>and <a href="http://www.twelvepointfivepercent.com/2011/10/cut-at-45-park-lane.html" target="_blank">CUT at 45 Park Lane</a>, but as a general rule I've abided by The Pam Principle and enjoyed my sirloin strictly chez moi for no more than about a tenner a time, including service (of course I tip myself - doesn't everyone?) </span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"></span></div>
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jHNpvWpbirI/UOF-Z-ljulI/AAAAAAAAFjw/eP4SWmCfKTQ/s1600/HAS+Martini.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="A perfect dry Martini at Hawksmoor Air Street" border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jHNpvWpbirI/UOF-Z-ljulI/AAAAAAAAFjw/eP4SWmCfKTQ/s320/HAS+Martini.jpg" title="A perfect dry Martini at Hawksmoor Air Street" width="216" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Something piqued my interest however about <a href="http://thehawksmoor.com/airstreet" target="_blank">Hawksmoor Air Street</a>, the latest and largest opening from partners Will Beckett and Huw Gott. It's the first of their restaurants to focus on fish as well as flesh, bringing in esteemed seafood specialist Mitch Tonks to curate the crustacea; 2012 has very much been the year of <a href="http://tgr.ph/0CHOICE" target="_blank">restaurants doing only one thing, well </a>so I was curious to see if Hawksmoor could pull off doing two. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The answer (for the impatient among you who like to skip to the last page of a book first) is yes, although the main courses dinner date <a href="http://twitter.com/david21cummins" target="_blank">David</a> and I tried were actually the least exciting part of an overall extremely good meal. Char-grilling lent my 'Hawksmoor Cut' turbot - a thick lateral tranche served on the bone - a wonderful subtle smokiness, but the same savour was a little overwhelming on David's slightly-too-chewy 600g bone-in sirloin. Both were good, but only as good as you'd expect at <a href="http://thehawksmoor.com/wp-content/uploads/menus/AS-Dinner.pdf" target="_blank">Hawksmoor's prices</a>.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">What we really enjoyed were the supporting elements, the accompanying bits and pieces that distinguish Hawksmoor Air Street from its competitors. Cocktails - from <a href="http://thehawksmoor.com/wp-content/uploads/menus/AS-Cocktail.pdf" target="_blank">a list</a> divided up by suitability to the time of day, and a real joy to read - were ace, from a perfect dry Martini to an after-dinner Buttered Old-Fashioned using bourbon stirred patiently with clarified butter to produce a rich post-prandial soother. W</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">ines were chosen for us from the reasonable-enough selection on offer by the glass, the house Grenache proving particularly fine for £6.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A pre-starters dish of seasonal pickles - which on our visit included mushrooms, carrot and cauliflower as well as an egg, but changes - was sensational, each ingredient pickled in different vinegars and spices creating complex layers of flavour. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sides were unusually good, too; Jansson's Temptation, a Swedish potato gratin with anchovies, worked well with both the steak and the turbot, as did a light, fresh dish of spinach tossed with lemon and garlic in which every component could be discerned. Starters were one hit, one miss; David's roast scallops were terrific, three fat succulent specimens served on the shell </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">with white port and garlic, but my potted beef and bacon with Yorkshires suffered from the puddings being slightly toasted and bitter.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We went a bit salt caramel crazy for dessert; a peanut butter shortbread with salt caramel ice-cream was astonishing (although surely anything which combines peanut butter and salt caramel has got to be A Good Thing), as were three salt caramel 'Rolos', larger than </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 19.200000762939453px;">Nestlé</span>'s finest and easily ten times as tasty although I'll be interested to see how long the Swiss confectioner's IP lawyers let Hawksmoor keep calling them that for.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ed5X5fVpKws/UOGLcLDC19I/AAAAAAAAFkM/lk_swLJPwXc/s1600/HAS+Window+by+Niamh+Shields.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Interior detail of Hawksmoor Air Street by Niamh Shields eatlikeagirl.com" border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ed5X5fVpKws/UOGLcLDC19I/AAAAAAAAFkM/lk_swLJPwXc/s320/HAS+Window+by+Niamh+Shields.jpg" title="Interior detail of Hawksmoor Air Street by Niamh Shields eatlikeagirl.com" width="223" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">Interior detail of Hawksmoor Air Street <br />by Niamh Shields </span><a href="http://eatlikeagirl.com/"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">eatlikeagirl.co</span><span style="font-size: xx-small;">m</span></a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The room - a 235-seater first-floor behemoth overlooking Regent Street - </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">is attractive, </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">decorated in clubby dark wood, parquet and green leather with some beautiful stained glass and salvaged Art Deco light fittings, but too huge properly to appreciate. It's also very loud; perhaps unsurprisingly the vast majority of tables were taken by all-male groups bellowing at each other over their bone-in prime rib.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Service was good if at times a little disjointed, but it jarred that in these grand surroundings the clothing worn by the staff was mostly the type of jeans-and-check-shirt combo that even local boozers would consider too casual. I found <a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/443d5068-cc34-11e1-839a-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2GcxWpRF4" target="_blank">an interview with Will Beckett</a> in which he explains that staff are allowed to wear their own clothes as it makes them happier and therefore able to deliver better service. Well sorry Will, but if I'm handing over forty quid for a bit of turbot I think I'd rather it be served by someone in a nice starched apron, thanks.</span>
</span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Hawksmoor Air Street is a glamorous place serving some pretty good, and at times very good food (I'd go back for a cocktail or two and those pickles alone) but didn't wow this diner enough to question the validity of The Pam Principle. Fortunately for its owners however, not everyone's mother knows best.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Hawksmoor Air Street, </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">5A Air Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Hawksmoor+Air+Street,+Air+Street,+London+W1J+0AD&hl=en&ll=51.511574,-0.13617&spn=0.007251,0.021136&sll=51.509638,-0.136091&sspn=0.007252,0.021136&oq=Haw5A+Air+Street,+W1J+0AD&gl=uk&hq=Hawksmoor+Air+Street,&hnear=Air+St,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=16" target="_blank">W1J 0AD</a> Tel: 020 7406 3980 <a href="http://thehawksmoor.com/airstreet">thehawksmoor.com/airstreet</a></span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I was a guest of Hawksmoor Air Street on this occasion</span></i></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1711531/restaurant/Soho/Hawksmoor-London"><img alt="Hawksmoor on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1711531/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/109009/Hawksmoor_Air_Street?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Hawksmoor Air Street"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/109009/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/hawksmoor-air-street/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=7502" /></a>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-70156666491213105222012-12-24T23:34:00.000+00:002013-01-02T19:38:21.155+00:00Wishbone<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GzG5NHnriXA/UMkLGfjhZEI/AAAAAAAAFHo/Rl5rTpG3tFA/s1600/20121211_151824.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Wishbone, Brixton by Hugh Wright" border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GzG5NHnriXA/UMkLGfjhZEI/AAAAAAAAFHo/Rl5rTpG3tFA/s320/20121211_151824.jpg" title="Wishbone, Brixton by Hugh Wright" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Back in August when I wrote a piece for The Telegraph about <a href="http://bit.ly/TgrphChix" target="_blank">the emerging trend for up-market chicken shops</a>, I felt safe in including Wishbone in Brixton even though it hadn't opened yet. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For one thing, I'd been to a menu-testing (yes, I know, it's a hard life) at co-owner <a href="http://twitter.com/thepubgeek" target="_blank">Scott Collins</a>' MEATLiquor earlier in the year and thought everything was pretty much spot on, and figured that if the food was as good as it was in beta it would only get better with time.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For another, whatever your feelings might be on the burger cult that has had London in its sweaty clutches for the last eighteen months or so, there's no denying that Collins is a canny businessman who seems to have <a href="http://youtu.be/Hkp9f_CjEL4" target="_blank">the Midas touch</a> when it comes to peddling nouveau junk food, so why shouldn't his fried chicken joint be as big a smash as his burger bars? Combine all this with the fact that his partner in this venture is all-round food know-it-all and social media darling <a href="http://www.wleigh.co.uk/food.html" target="_blank">William Leigh</a>, and surely you have the recipe for a finger-lickin' success?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RLqjhTP2jjs/UNjTwwY2ogI/AAAAAAAAFPY/Q7bqIxOF5po/s1600/20121211_151807.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="The menu at Wishbone, Brixton. Photo by Hugh Wright" border="0" height="239" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RLqjhTP2jjs/UNjTwwY2ogI/AAAAAAAAFPY/Q7bqIxOF5po/s320/20121211_151807.jpg" title="The menu at Wishbone, Brixton. Photo by Hugh Wright" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Well, yes. You do. Wishbone, in Brixton Market - the covered grid of avenues which together with adjacent <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/oct/09/jay-rayner-brixton-village-unit" target="_blank">Brixton Village</a> has stolen Bermondsey Street's crown as the capital's hippest restaurant strip - is just great. Split over two colourfully-decorated floors, Wishbone pays knowing homage to south London's myriad jerk chicken shops without resorting to patronising pastiche.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The menu is concise but offers enough choice to allow for variety on repeat visits (which, having been once, I imagine most folk will want to make). The free-range fried chicken, using Cotswold Whites from <a href="http://www.aubreyallen.co.uk/Home.aspx" target="_blank">Aubrey Allen</a>, is served as a quarter, half or in a sandwich and if the meat is slightly dry, it's made up for by exceptional flavour - actually of <i>chicken</i>, imagine that! - and a deliciously crunchy, oil-less batter.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Wings and thighs come with a variety of imaginative toppings; I have become dangerously hooked on the Thai thighs, boned, rolled and battered before being tossed in a tamarind dressing and topped with mint leaves, red chilli and crisp shallots. Buffalo wings are worth ordering for the accompanying sauce, studded with chunks of blue cheese, alone. Sides can be hit-and-miss; black-eyed pea salad and potato salad both proved bland, but deep fried mac 'n' cheese - because how else do you improve cheesy pasta if not by dipping it in breadcrumbs and deep-frying it, right? - is a thing of evil genius.</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuXnq0NksWYNAmOYr47dT9aqvMDg_Vaz1sMjAz46SSwfuMeOfMc_Hn466BzpBfl1BCtJfl3GDfNhHefiNQyzx3zpaCyW9Yytqz3Dl6BFdT4kcZfjSre0ym83k0Jvi7fAMlpph-Aj72QpQ/s1600/20121211_144220.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuXnq0NksWYNAmOYr47dT9aqvMDg_Vaz1sMjAz46SSwfuMeOfMc_Hn466BzpBfl1BCtJfl3GDfNhHefiNQyzx3zpaCyW9Yytqz3Dl6BFdT4kcZfjSre0ym83k0Jvi7fAMlpph-Aj72QpQ/s320/20121211_144220.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">What I most like about Wishbone however, even more than the food, is the attention to detail. Even something as simple as a can of pop is served with care - chic glasswear, ample crystal clear ice-cubes, a neatly-cut slice of lemon - by unfailingly enthusiastic staff who manage to pull off the very rare feat of being extremely cool but not too much so for school. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Moreish, fruity hot sauce and lip-smacking chilli vinegar are provided on every bright formica table along with eminently-practical wet-wipes for the inevitable sticky fingers. Price-wise Wishbone is fantastic value - a vast quarter chicken is just £5.50, sides all £2.50-£4.50 - and if I have one complaint it is that portions are so large that even, say, a quarter chicken and a portion of thighs is too much food for one person. Perfect for sharing though, so just take a friend or two.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I wasn't alone in spotting that chicken would be one of 2012's big food trends, but I'm glad that my early faith in Wishbone has paid off. This is fun, fantastic funky chicken - and worryingly for my waistline, only a leisurely fifteen minute stroll from my flat. I can't be the only resident of SW9 who's counting their clucky stars.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Wishbone, Unit 12 Market Row, Brixton Market, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=brixton+market+london+sw9+8pr&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&hq=brixton+market+london+sw9+8pr&t=m&z=15" target="_blank">SW9 8PR</a> Tel: 020 7274 0939 <a href="http://www.wishbonebrixton.co.uk/">www.wishbonebrixton.co.uk</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1700427/restaurant/London/Wishbone-Brixton"><img alt="Wishbone on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1700427/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/109313/Wishbone?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Wishbone"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/109313/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/wishbone/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=8452" /></a><br />
<br />
Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-26979562199531219082012-12-11T00:06:00.000+00:002013-01-02T20:55:34.264+00:00Edwin's French Wine Bar & Restaurant<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0_5htKbGE5bYsqLYPmH8VXpZ2QU9_RBXe9OI1Bg8D2HC1lvXuwNnP0HUQppCuSCYVCJt4y2TtYrBIwbpMt02rG59i5rUGR5Enxxehl-_q2gzqp413aDf1B178PjCMXknMetVjgCTETgM/s1600/20121030_214301.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Interior of Edwin's French Restaurant & Wine Bar" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0_5htKbGE5bYsqLYPmH8VXpZ2QU9_RBXe9OI1Bg8D2HC1lvXuwNnP0HUQppCuSCYVCJt4y2TtYrBIwbpMt02rG59i5rUGR5Enxxehl-_q2gzqp413aDf1B178PjCMXknMetVjgCTETgM/s320/20121030_214301.jpg" title="Interior of Edwin's French Restaurant & Wine Bar" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">You have to admire - or envy - Edwin Chan. After a long and incredibly successful career in advertising, culminating in his founding his own global agency, Chan handed over the day-to-day running of the business to his partners and decided to pursue his passions of French food and wine. This saw him open an eponymous brasserie and wine bar in Lyon in 2007 and in October of this year, one in London.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The choice of Shoreditch as a location is an interesting one; although not quite as painfully trendy as in its <a href="http://www.channel4.com/programmes/nathan-barley" target="_blank">Nathan Barley</a> hey-day, the still-hip axis of Great Eastern Street and Curtain Road wouldn't seem ideally suited to somewhere priding itself on its traditionalism, as Edwin's does. But not everyone in EC2 wants to eat Peruvian-Japanese fusion atop a skyscraper, or vertically-roasted chicken under a giant Damien Hirst vitrine, so actually Chan could well be on to something.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Chef Jeremy Huguet's menu is a simple affair; nothing on it will be unfamiliar to even the most conservative diner. A three-course prix-fixe is offered at both lunch and dinner for an eminently reasonable £20, although with prices of only £6-£9 for starters, all mains around £15 and desserts no more than £6, three courses won't come to much more than that </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">a la carte.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZGunMCnb2ryLT3FeiKJnp-WbzDJ1InClQ3d-8D4p3F4Ae3NdyBqMpF3kO9UECmHsrriGZUIYxzj7Pe6qKqi_-BN5JsQH4BNcse2yp9zm3FRzFvn82P8un2wY0enfcfoEqW9LZUT4y3ww/s1600/20121030_191836.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZGunMCnb2ryLT3FeiKJnp-WbzDJ1InClQ3d-8D4p3F4Ae3NdyBqMpF3kO9UECmHsrriGZUIYxzj7Pe6qKqi_-BN5JsQH4BNcse2yp9zm3FRzFvn82P8un2wY0enfcfoEqW9LZUT4y3ww/s320/20121030_191836.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My fashion buyer pal James started with a plate of charcuterie (the rabbit terrine he'd initially wanted being unavailable) which was fine, as you'd expect a plate of Bayonne ham and salami to be. My escalope of foie gras with figs and raspberry coulis was excellent, seared to a crust on the outside and trembling within.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For our main course we both chose onglet, or hanger steak, presented sliced and with rather too many </span><em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">sauté</span></em><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> potatoes. It tasted lovely but in both effort and presentation fell firmly into the 'I could (and do) make this at home' camp, which I think is taking simplicity just a step too far. A plate of cheeses, including a delightfully pongy Coulommiers and a sweet, nutty Tomme, rounded things off perfectly.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Chan personally curates and imports the wine list, which changes frequently. None of it is cheap, starting at £20 a bottle, but can be relied on to be good (and good value); our Haute Cote de Beaune was light but warming. Service, from an all-French staff, was entirely faultless.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSPsNQMEBOUMW_QQmRxIPA1AX70Iz_A9YJ2L71OMo0D8JB710LftoNS8tAh3cx-Ande0wVMzbMUUXgDJ6g3CjPs81q-aYpcFnmjdBk0FB1o_xrZi1Pvr7tq_kF3PAQ9fhQmCW1zInLNyg/s1600/Edwin's+Wine+list.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Example wine list for Edwin's French Restaurant & Wine Bar" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSPsNQMEBOUMW_QQmRxIPA1AX70Iz_A9YJ2L71OMo0D8JB710LftoNS8tAh3cx-Ande0wVMzbMUUXgDJ6g3CjPs81q-aYpcFnmjdBk0FB1o_xrZi1Pvr7tq_kF3PAQ9fhQmCW1zInLNyg/s320/Edwin's+Wine+list.jpeg" title="Example wine list for Edwin's French Restaurant & Wine Bar" width="234" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Any restaurant, anywhere, serving good if unexceptional food at fair prices complemented by a strong and interesting wine list should do well; one with someone as passionate as Edwin Chan behind it, moreso. But Edwin's will, I think, struggle to achieve true popularity unless more is done to make it somewhere you really <i>want</i> to eat, rather than just being somewhere there's no really good reason not to eat.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The room, for example, is basic almost to the point of harshness, with aggressive fluorescent lighting; </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">a restaurant - unless famed for its ascetic aesthetic, such as St. John - with no candles, no ornamentation, borders on the unwelcoming. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">From outside, too, Edwin's lacks warmth, retaining the unappealing doors and canopy of the backstreet trattoria it previously was. It's one thing to be a labour of love, quite another to actually feel like it to the customer.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Edwin, from a conversation I had with him after our dinner, appears confident that the restaurant and wine bar he's put his name to will do just fine without such finessing. I might not share his confidence, but I hope nonetheless that that proves to be the case. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Edwin's French </span></b><b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Wine Bar & </span></b><b><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Restaurant, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 15px;">18 Phipp Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=18+Phipp+Street,+London+EC2A+4NU&hnear=18+Phipp+St,+London+EC2A+4NU,+United+Kingdom&gl=uk&t=m&z=16" target="_blank">EC2A 4NU</a> Tel: </span></b><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 15px;"><b>020 7739 4443 <a href="http://www.edwinsfrenchwinebar.co.uk/">www.edwinsfrenchwinebar.co.uk</a></b> </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 15px;"><br /></span>
<b><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I was invited to review Edwin's</span></i></b><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1714242/restaurant/Shoreditch/Edwins-French-Wine-Bar-and-Restaurant-London"><img alt="Edwin's French Wine Bar and Restaurant on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1714242/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/109813/Edwin's_French_Wine_Bar_and_Restaurant?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Edwin's French Wine Bar and Restaurant"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/109813/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/edwins-french-wine-bar/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=7964" /></a><br />
<br />
Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-14685297534538676102012-12-02T17:18:00.000+00:002013-01-02T20:57:13.357+00:00Mele e Pere<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ywCQdt6ST00/ULs7ybPjawI/AAAAAAAAFDE/KDAhLShaYxU/s1600/20121102_200054.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The neon sign and display of glass apples and pears at Mele e Pere, Soho" border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ywCQdt6ST00/ULs7ybPjawI/AAAAAAAAFDE/KDAhLShaYxU/s320/20121102_200054.jpg" title="The neon sign and display of glass apples and pears at Mele e Pere, Soho" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I would love to have been a fly on the wall at the brainstorming session where they came up with the name <a href="http://www.meleepere.co.uk/" target="_blank">Mele e Pere</a>. "Well it's going to be an <i>Italian</i> restaurant, so let's give it an <i>Italian</i> name!" some young marketing wonk with heavy-rimmed glasses and a choppy hairdo would have intoned with the gravity usually reserved for decoding the human genome. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">"Yah," Livia the intern would have continued, "but maybe something a little...ironic?" thereby at least justifying the lunch money she'd later go and spend on Marlboro Lights. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">"Uh, now guys, I'm thinking waaaay outside my Dr Dre Beats Audio Boombox on this," Zander the 'Ideas Furnace' would volunteer, "but hear what I'm saying, si? Well it's <i>Italian</i>. And its down some <i>stairs. </i>And what could be more ironic, y'know, than Cockney rhyming slang - but <i>in Italian? </i>Apples and pears, stairs. <i>Mele e Pere - stair-ay!</i>" At which point, and following a brief awe-struck silence, everyone would applaud before adjourning to the John Snow for celebratory Staropramens all round.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And so it came to pass that Mele e Pere was rendered in neon in the <i>tricolore </i>of the Italian flag, appended to the front of the building (a corner plot on busy Brewer Street) and the windows filled with a Damien Hirst-ish installation of beautiful Murano glass apples and pears. So far so conceptual. Except that if you didn't know what was behind the name and very elegant facade you'd walk straight past, thinking that it was...well, some sort of Soho creative agency.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixvj_no4xZ-nDMeHaJ4gkazsBck2rCKfIlYQLYPorQuPhLpEpJPj7_X1jrMcLNyrVgdwi5bUHpVSNY3ud3M9FDvNs6trovY8jpt0XQnfv_u0M2qagKaXqWkoQzpQbLYpFp4F1GLUWKtOk/s1600/Mele+e+Pere+soup.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixvj_no4xZ-nDMeHaJ4gkazsBck2rCKfIlYQLYPorQuPhLpEpJPj7_X1jrMcLNyrVgdwi5bUHpVSNY3ud3M9FDvNs6trovY8jpt0XQnfv_u0M2qagKaXqWkoQzpQbLYpFp4F1GLUWKtOk/s320/Mele+e+Pere+soup.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">Photo by Michael Ford <a href="http://anastasia-duck.com/">anastasia-duck.com</a></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In fact, </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">down the </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">mele e pere</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> is a very decent restaurant, serving modern, unpretentious Italian food. A</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> large chic bar area gives onto an arched dining room decorated in fashionable low-key neutrals, sultrily-lit by wall-mounted anglepoise lamps. Underground spaces can feel dingy and cold; this room is neither.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My vegetarian guest, uber-blogger <a href="http://www.anastasia-duck.com/" target="_blank">Michael Ford</a>, struggled to find much that was meat-free on the menu but that was about our only complaint. While waiting for our starters we tried Mele e Pere's home-made vermouth - a citrusy white and sharper rosso - which at £4 for a generous measure made for a perfect aperitif. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Michael started with maltagliati - 'misshapen' - pasta with walnut pesto, chilli and garlic, which was excellent, as was my thick soup of chestnut, curly kale and white beans which put me in mind of a breadless ribollita. A generous sprinkling of Pecorino Romano added welcome tang. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Potato gnocchi - Michael had again to order from the pasta section for his main course for want of other options - were an exercise in luxurious simplicity, drizzled in white truffle oil and stirred through with shavings of slightly dry but nonetheless discernibly fungal Italian black truffle. My roasted wild duck was served alluringly pink and was deliciously tender, quince puree bringing a nice acidity to the plate. A side order - one of any from the menu is included in the price of mains, giving a flexibility of choice I'd like to see catch on elsewhere - of broccoli with chilli and almonds was good if a little cold.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOGtOBKgFXfZ56KX6AFkedASoMvh5zGcup-d3IkqE0NpmCInbIfLajFBs6H3_yirNKxAcFI1ZHjNmGLvJfdHvyQLxs7RCmCb0Tulvg-1po5mNcSKL4uUwSWgT4QQql1h_BhssnbhAUdeo/s1600/Mele_Pere_2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The bar at Mele e Pere, Soho" border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOGtOBKgFXfZ56KX6AFkedASoMvh5zGcup-d3IkqE0NpmCInbIfLajFBs6H3_yirNKxAcFI1ZHjNmGLvJfdHvyQLxs7RCmCb0Tulvg-1po5mNcSKL4uUwSWgT4QQql1h_BhssnbhAUdeo/s320/Mele_Pere_2.jpeg" title="The bar at Mele e Pere, Soho" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To finish we shared some Fontal and Gorgonzola cheese, served with mostarda di frutta - candied fruit in a mustard syrup, a delicious cross between chutney and piccalilli. Had space allowed we could've chosen from a short list of classic puds - tiramisu, pannacotta - or Mele e Pere's home-made ice-creams and sorbets, which given the quality of everything else we ate I'm sure would have been splendid.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The wine list is almost exclusively Italian and quirkily categorised under headings such as 'The Jewels In The Crown', 'The Aromatics' and 'Gems From All Over The Boot'. Our bottle of Pignataro Montepulciano d'Abruzzo delivered a lot of fruit and flavour for £25; the list starts as low as £16.50 and there's plenty of choice by the glass and half-bottle too. Thought's also been given to cocktails and digestifs; drink is clearly taken as seriously as the food although working through too much of any of it might make the return ascent of the <i>mele e pere</i> rather tricky.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So bang slap in the middle of Soho there's a smart restaurant serving honest, unfussy Italian food and interesting drinks at fair prices - you just need to know that it's there, and now you do. One of the categories on the wine list is 'Hidden Treasures'; it's a category Mele e Pere falls into itself. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Mele e Pere, 46 Brewer Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Mele+e+Pere,+46+Brewer+St,+Soho,+London+W1F+9TF&hl=en&ll=51.513457,-0.13557&spn=0.007251,0.021136&sll=51.511211,-0.136099&sspn=0.029006,0.084543&oq=Mele+46+brewer+st,+W1F+9TF&gl=uk&hq=Mele+e+Pere,&hnear=46+Brewer+St,+City+of+Westminster,+London+W1F,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">W1F 9TF</a> Tel: 020 7096 2096 <a href="http://www.meleepere.co.uk/">www.meleepere.co.uk</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<i><b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I was invited to review Mele e Pere</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1650004/restaurant/Soho/Mele-e-Pere-London"><img alt="Mele e Pere on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1650004/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/106808/Mele_E_Pere?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Mele e Pere"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/106808/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/mele-e-pere/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=4380" /></a><br />
<i><b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></b></i>
Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-51578135857116033132012-11-20T00:32:00.002+00:002013-01-02T20:58:44.571+00:00El Pirata, Mayfair<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiooO6ApOwARTp8nYD3KXAwQpFJC-QF70AE3KOGDPvVPLcWmpjz1Yk_Fp9jE5YW_DywfWheXPmJ6o8zGsaC5hPif6lCQFKWd6CLpp1Peyoe8Ody6CngbeaDR5lp6aclTEcQDw15vpyKd-Y/s1600/20121018_195459.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="El Pirata Tapas Bar & Restaurant, Down Street, Mayfair" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiooO6ApOwARTp8nYD3KXAwQpFJC-QF70AE3KOGDPvVPLcWmpjz1Yk_Fp9jE5YW_DywfWheXPmJ6o8zGsaC5hPif6lCQFKWd6CLpp1Peyoe8Ody6CngbeaDR5lp6aclTEcQDw15vpyKd-Y/s320/20121018_195459.jpg" title="El Pirata Tapas Bar & Restaurant, Down Street, Mayfair" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">With the exceptions of 'literally' and 'gourmet', I can think of few words more liberally abused than 'tapas'. With the not-unwelcome advent a few years ago of the 'small plates' concept came an entirely unwelcome side-effect, the rebranding of small plates of any cuisine as 'tapas'. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Thus we have seen 'Italian tapas' (actually <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/europe/uk/london/8837129/From-chic-to-cheap-cicheti-are-London-restaurants-first-top-down-trend.html" target="_blank">cicheti</a>), 'Asian tapas' (at the appallingly-named Tapasia, among others), even Norfolk tapas (for which I have at least to give the guys at <a href="http://www.thepigs.org.uk/eating/pigs-menu/" target="_blank">The Pigs</a> 10/10 for originality). When a while ago I received a press release vaunting a restaurant's new 'Spanish tapas' offering my Tautology Klaxon went off so violently that my ears have only just stopped ringing.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">So what an abundant pleasure then to discover <a href="http://www.elpirata.co.uk/" target="_blank">El Pirata</a>, a sleek and shiny but entirely unponcey tapas bar in, of all places, Mayfair. Pointed in its direction by a pal who works round the corner, dinner date <a href="http://twitter.com/josayhef" target="_blank">Joe </a>and I spent an extremely enjoyable couple of hours eating great food, drinking nice wine and finishing off with a couple of not-'alf-bad cocktails. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Unlike the fancier new-wave tapas joints that have cropped up in recent years, there are no surprises on the menu at El Pirata. All the staples are present and correct - Padron peppers, Iberico ham, croquetas, patatas bravas, c</span><em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">hampiñones</span></em><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> al ajillo - along with a few perhaps less familiar but nonetheless resolutely traditional weekly specials. For the indecisive or, if there still are any, the uninitiated, there are a couple of crazy-good-value set menus. Joe and I decided to take the glutton's way and just asked them to keep bringing us food until we either begged them to stop or passed out.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE6FynRobxc0XVVDdGrJ2A8gNz5WnehwCSLHSPy5zM58CrXhyphenhyphenvRh-Vu9cpWbleCazCxQtKK-ADWNGGfZTy4WmmT7TK8BQhugbbKnsSoH2K3Xv77d05IkFCYPv-ChnULQbfKr6V5JBvTA8/s1600/20121018_214713.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="El Pirata Tapas Bar & Restaurant, Down Street, Mayfair" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE6FynRobxc0XVVDdGrJ2A8gNz5WnehwCSLHSPy5zM58CrXhyphenhyphenvRh-Vu9cpWbleCazCxQtKK-ADWNGGfZTy4WmmT7TK8BQhugbbKnsSoH2K3Xv77d05IkFCYPv-ChnULQbfKr6V5JBvTA8/s320/20121018_214713.jpg" title="El Pirata Tapas Bar & Restaurant, Down Street, Mayfair" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">So as we worked our way through a lovely half-bottle of chilled Amontillado 'La Joya' we grazed on bread with good alioli, a plate of extraordinarily silky, sexy Iberico ham, simple chargrilled asparagus and the Russian roulette of tapas, pimientos de Padron (I took the bullet of the hottest of the bunch and the consequent thrilling endorphin rush).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sherry drained we moved on to a bottle of crisp, grapefruity Inurrieta 'Orchidea' Sauvignon Blanc (<a href="http://www.elpirata.co.uk/elpirata_wine_list.pdf" target="_blank">El Pirata's wine list</a>, all-Spanish, is tremendous fun and offers something to suit every pocket starting in the very low twenties and peaking at about £70). With it came calamari, on rice blackened with its heady ink, and sizzling prawns <i>al pil-pil</i>, the olive oil, garlic and chilli marinade seeping deep into the heads, making sucking them irresistible.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">We finally gave up on savoury courses only having demolished some pork belly, its slight dryness made up for by cracking crackling, chicken and chorizo skewers - again a little dry, but damn tasty - and gorgeously tender pan-fried medallions of steak with a touch of white wine, served alongside creamy, dauphinoise-y potatoes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I'm glad that we buckled and ordered afters, because the plate of cheeses, including Manchego and Mahon with that wonderful Spanish quince paste membrillo, was terrific. Better yet was a lemon </span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">brûlée, combining sorbet and cream fillings under a sugar topping made crunchy - evident in the tell-tale spiral scorch-marks and smoky flavour - with a proper </span><i>quemador. </i></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsBACMPxhk62SrOB_lewxFbGhH7EuOBeiyDzBTeNX-YwxuHZBvcIrR6eo_BoEJUoN0fZ-j8uLt1-2W4lzQfFdZLjzOWZa9plWkEgdXu4X_Kn0TJvu454XsKLDNvURWYlSDJ6mCUgaontI/s1600/20121018_213532.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Margaritas at El Pirata Tapas Bar & Restaurant, Down Street, Mayfair" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsBACMPxhk62SrOB_lewxFbGhH7EuOBeiyDzBTeNX-YwxuHZBvcIrR6eo_BoEJUoN0fZ-j8uLt1-2W4lzQfFdZLjzOWZa9plWkEgdXu4X_Kn0TJvu454XsKLDNvURWYlSDJ6mCUgaontI/s320/20121018_213532.jpg" title="Margaritas at El Pirata Tapas Bar & Restaurant, Down Street, Mayfair" width="240" /></a><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For no better reason than that we could, we ended the meal with palate-cleansingly tart Margaritas; we could have chosen a digestif from the remarkable selection of spirits, liqueurs and brandies, arranged on stepped gold shelves climbing up and down the mirrored back of the bar.</span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">There was a last, pleasant, surprise; I knew that the friend who'd recommended El Pirata to me knew the owners, and as such figured that a couple of dishes might not appear on the bill, but in an act of unexpected generosity not only was no bill at all presented but we were forced - forced! - to accept a glass of Pedro Ximenez before we were allowed to leave. Altogether though, with sherry, wine, cocktails and tons of tapas, we'd have been looking at about £45 a head.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Perhaps because of the owners' largesse, or because of the lakes of liquor consumed, or all the fab food we'd had, or as is most likely because of all of the above, we left feeling thoroughly jolly and very favourably disposed towards El Pirata, as seems to be quite widely the case judging by the lively, buzzy crowd packing most of the two floors on our visit.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Literally, gourmet tapas. </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">What's not to love about that?</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>El Pirata, 5-6 Down Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?ie=UTF-8&q=El+Pirata,+5-6+Down+Street,+London+W1J+7AQ&fb=1&gl=uk&hq=El+Pirata,&hnear=0x4876052f42dc7309:0x2572347751bf492,5-6+Down+St,+London+W1J+7AQ&cid=0,0,6339427233085553250&ei=tcqqULGbGenJ0QWW0oGADQ&ved=0CJEBEPwSMAA" target="_blank">W1J 7AQ</a> Tel: 020 7491 3810 <a href="http://elpirata.co.uk/">elpirata.co.uk</a></b></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/563409/restaurant/Mayfair/El-Pirata-London"><img alt="El Pirata on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/563409/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/80528/El_Pirata?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of El Pirata"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/80528/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/el-pirata/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=1748" /></a><br />
<br />
Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-18151142564822499112012-11-04T20:44:00.001+00:002013-01-02T21:00:33.986+00:00Soif<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ifcrFHYIxrk/UJVQT_O4e7I/AAAAAAAAEqE/OdpNT2x6tTw/s1600/20120925_214835.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Exterior of Soif, Battersea" border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ifcrFHYIxrk/UJVQT_O4e7I/AAAAAAAAEqE/OdpNT2x6tTw/s320/20120925_214835.jpg" title="Exterior of Soif, Battersea" width="240" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It always rather irks me, when reading about a restaurant outside of Zone 1, to see it described condescendingly as a 'good local restaurant', as if to reach it would require a journey worthy of Gulliver and that the preparation of decent food is somehow dependent on the possession of a W1 postcode. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">To those of us who live in Zone 2 (or - horrors - even further afield) it's the central London gaffs that need travelling to; our local restaurants are just our restaurants, ta very much, and many of them are very good indeed.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">One such, which I've only just got round to visiting despite the enthusiastic recommendation of others fortunate enough to have it on or near their doorsteps, is <a href="http://soif.co/" target="_blank">Soif</a> in Battersea. The third wine bar and restaurant to open in a group which now numbers four (the others being Terroirs, <a href="http://bit.ly/TPFP_Brn" target="_blank">Brawn </a>and the newly-opened-at-the-time-of-writing Green Man & French Horn), Soif follows broadly the same if-it-ain't-broke don't fix it formula - great produce, rustic dishes, carefully-chosen wines in convivial casual surroundings.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">If that sounds like your idea of somewhere fantastic then I'd heartily concur; the slightly bistro-by-numbers interior might feel a little dated but there's nothing not to love about the food. While choosing from the daily-changing menu, chalked up on a large blackboard, three of us grazed on an excellent charcuterie selection - butch rillettes, the fat countered by tiny, mouth-puckeringly sharp cornichons, herby pork terrine and salty, paper-thin salame toscano - and a dish of perfect little leaf-on radishes Peter Rabbit would've risked Mr McGregor's wrath for.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihV4hRgli57iZY8L_Y6nbhUCplCDf2SCbSMN_ydkT-UojdmiFcT0O94Po9CvPgQQ7CmLtuyNYvvTWZ9g3BynXpuOnkTuHxGLhmGTzcnxVjRCYbLeZhzqoEYSfUmTkZq2Hr5NB4WTO2iF8/s1600/20120925_192025.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="The menu and wines are chalked up on a blackboard at Soif." border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihV4hRgli57iZY8L_Y6nbhUCplCDf2SCbSMN_ydkT-UojdmiFcT0O94Po9CvPgQQ7CmLtuyNYvvTWZ9g3BynXpuOnkTuHxGLhmGTzcnxVjRCYbLeZhzqoEYSfUmTkZq2Hr5NB4WTO2iF8/s320/20120925_192025.jpg" title="The menu and wines are chalked up on a blackboard at Soif." width="240" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The fat, tender chicken livers on toast with anchovy and rosemary butter which two of us chose for our starters were so big on flavour and beautifully balanced that I found myself craving them for breakfast the next day; I'd go so far as to say it was one of the best things I've eaten all year. Steak tartare - simply done, un-fannied about with, a process yellow egg yolk on top ready for smooshing in - was excellent.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Other mains - a nice hunk of roast cod with moreish, Moorish spiced chickpeas and alioli and a blushing pink magret of duck with garlicky sarladaise potatoes - were gutsy and faultless. It was a shame that bavette with duck fat potatoes was only available for two; I fancied red meat but no two of us could agree to have it so I ended up having the steak tartare from the starters,</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> padded out with an exemplary green salad.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Instead of dessert, neither of the only two choices for which appealed, we shared a selection of immaculately kept French cheeses including Soureliette, a </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">wonderful unpasteurised ewe's milk whose nutty sharpness was the perfect match for a tangy bleu d'Auvergne and smoky </span><em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Curé Nantais</span></em><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">. I often find the prices charged for cheese in restaurants rather hard to fathom; £10 for three decent-sized pieces here seemed about fair.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">As you'd expect from a restaurant whose name means 'thirst', drink is taken seriously and <a href="http://soif.co/assets/files/11_wine-list.pdf" target="_blank">Soif's lengthy wine list</a> is big on natural varieties, idiosyncratically categorised. There's a decent selection by the glass and carafe but cheap it ain't, with very few bottles under £25. That said you get what you pay for and our 2011 Roussillon 'Les Foulards Rouges' was, like my fellow diner <a href="http://www.grumblinggourmet.com/" target="_blank">Rich</a>, full-bodied and bursting with character.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdlOlmWFeY7wKHYp8SMJcZFBrTjLcdTstQjofxyxqtG1w8Dnoxh7eZ62GS_Ri2cxyCQ7VwyJdAvwydBj__c7gwAtpTlFp6b1Fr-O_whKbYPX27nzQeOsWKOP80F_QtyXQyHeR5pbwY6EU/s1600/20120925_192039.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The 'slightly bistro-by-numbers' interior of Soif." border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdlOlmWFeY7wKHYp8SMJcZFBrTjLcdTstQjofxyxqtG1w8Dnoxh7eZ62GS_Ri2cxyCQ7VwyJdAvwydBj__c7gwAtpTlFp6b1Fr-O_whKbYPX27nzQeOsWKOP80F_QtyXQyHeR5pbwY6EU/s320/20120925_192039.jpg" title="The 'slightly bistro-by-numbers' interior of Soif." width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Two bottles of it, aperitifs and service pushed the bill for three up to £183 - just over £60 a head - which took me rather by surprise. The food had been good, and exceptional in places - those chicken livers, my gosh - but that still felt high, especially as similar quantities of even-better food and booze at sibling restaurant Brawn had only come in at about two-thirds that.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">No matter; Soif is a very good restaurant and one to which, being lucky enough to be able to call it local literally, I'll be returning. Wherever you live, it's a journey I'd recommend you make, too.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>Soif, 27 Battersea Rise, London <a href="https://plus.google.com/116973549143803291715/about?gl=uk&hl=en" target="_blank">SW11 1HG</a> Tel: 020 7223 1112 <a href="http://www.soif.co/">http://www.soif.co</a> </b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1633953/restaurant/London/Battersea/Soif-Wandsworth"><img alt="Soif on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1633953/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/106826/Soif?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" target="_top" title="Read Square Meal's review of Soif"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/106826/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/soif/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=1255" /></a><br />
<br />
Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-42364669841902870252012-10-22T00:07:00.000+01:002013-03-05T13:25:25.756+00:00Disiac, Soho<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KzsM8xLDbx8/UIQo7got-eI/AAAAAAAAEiI/EtPZGbDAxVM/s1600/Disiac+Exterior.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Disiac Restaurant, 6 Greek Street, Soho, London" border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KzsM8xLDbx8/UIQo7got-eI/AAAAAAAAEiI/EtPZGbDAxVM/s320/Disiac+Exterior.jpg" title="Disiac Restaurant, 6 Greek Street, Soho, London" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">New restaurants open in London at such a whirlwind rate that, if it's not your actual job to do so, it's almost impossible to keep up. I subscribe - as should you, if you have any interest in these things - to Catherine and Gavin Hanly's definitive </span><a href="http://www.hot-dinners.com/About-Us/About-us/sign-up-to-our-newsletter" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Hot Dinners</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> e-newsletter, and keep an eye on, among others, the excellent blog of lifestyle concierge company </span><a href="http://www.bonvivant.co.uk/blog/" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Bon Vivant</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">, but very often even reasonably high-profile openings pass me by.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">All this having been said, I was still surprised when a friend who has nothing to do with restaurants professionally or otherwise raved to me about Soho newcomer <a href="http://www.disiaclondon.com/" target="_blank">Disiac</a>, because not only had I not heard about it, apparently no-one else had either - not the newsletters, nor in my 'Food People' column on Twitter, nor even a couple of real-life restaurant critics I asked.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">You will, I think, be hearing rather a lot more about Disiac before long however, because having gone along to try it for myself I reckon it's going to be very popular indeed. For one thing it's an absolutely gorgeous little place, with a minimal but luxurious monochrome interior and a variety of flexible dining spaces - see-and-be-seen window seats, tucked-away booths or around the central raw bar and open kitchen. For another, the bar turns out some extremely good - and potent - cocktails at £9 a pop from opening o'clock until gone midnight.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-erCJE8LK--c/UIRkZ2omObI/AAAAAAAAEig/uhZVBiybPDE/s1600/Strozzapreti.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Strozzapretti pasta at Disiac, London" border="0" height="213" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-erCJE8LK--c/UIRkZ2omObI/AAAAAAAAEig/uhZVBiybPDE/s320/Strozzapreti.jpg" title="Strozzapretti pasta at Disiac, London" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But the real excitement at Disiac lies in the fantastic food, some of the best I've had anywhere in a while. Executive chef Paolo Palmisano and head chef Michele de Rosa (ex-<a href="http://bit.ly/TPFP_Cccn" target="_blank">Cecconi's</a>) have put together a mostly Italian menu, divided simply into Starters, Fish & Meat and Pasta & Risotti, all made to order.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My date - rising star of fashion illustration <a href="http://www.jlarkowskyillustration.com/" target="_blank">Joe Larkowsky</a> - and I started with some ace bruschetta followed by a beautifully oozing Pugliese burrata, simply drizzled in some very good Spanish olive oil. That same oil, with the addition of just a little lemon and parsley, was used to </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 115%;">sauté</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> fat mussels, the resulting rich emulsion coating the bivalves like butter.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A plateau de fruit de mer was for its £32 price - all-in, not per person - absolutely huge and especially generous considering it included half a grilled lobster and a few Colchester rock oysters alongside super-fresh, super-tasty mussels, clams and langoustines, pleasingly chewy chilli-flecked razor clams and sweet, bright Mediterranean prawns. We finished off with two incredible pasta dishes, strozzapretti - thick hand-rolled whorls - tossed with courgettes, cherry tomatoes, bitter wilted radicchio and tangy dolcelatte, and the classic Neapolitan <i>scialatelli alle vongole, </i>short cables of pasta dotted with dinky palourde clams.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The forty-five bin wine-list is strong on champagne and sparklers - accounting for a third of the list - and elsewhere offers an interesting selection of all-Old World whites, reds and ros</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;">és, none marked up by more than about 100% on the retail price meaning there are some bargains to be had. A crisp, green Tramin Pinot Bianco was a good match both for the salinity of our seafood and the bigger flavours of the pasta.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNhhhTnp_IuVDaPYjm2Sx-apXCGBTgy3VafEaoCEHALuy6h4MiFh3savMByNMZoAz4JjIrx2ISVc1St1EmG6v77X8DB6ZnveqqChLSc3umO_XpXlTPC96vuh4c6U-Oo_0AKtqX-yktQm0/s1600/Fruits+de+mer.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Plateau de fruits de mer at Disiac, Soho" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNhhhTnp_IuVDaPYjm2Sx-apXCGBTgy3VafEaoCEHALuy6h4MiFh3savMByNMZoAz4JjIrx2ISVc1St1EmG6v77X8DB6ZnveqqChLSc3umO_XpXlTPC96vuh4c6U-Oo_0AKtqX-yktQm0/s320/Fruits+de+mer.jpg" title="Plateau de fruits de mer at Disiac, Soho" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;">So great food, fair pricing, cracking cocktails and a smart space; what's not to love? Nothing that I can see, although Disiac will face some challenges to really establish itself and do as well as I hope it will. Firstly, the slick interior is so the opposite of the current ubiquitous bare brick/exposed lightbulbs fashion that trendier restaurant collectors might unfairly give it a wide berth. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;">Also the changing roster of events - a DJ some nights, live jazz others - could put off punters who prefer consistency over variety. Not me, though; I intend to go back, and often, to enjoy more of the brilliance Joe and I experienced on this first night, and suggest that you do too. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;">Disiac, ladies and gentlemen - unusually, you heard it here first.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;"><b>Disiac, 6 Greek Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=6+Greek+Street,+London+W1D+4ED&hl=en&ll=51.515526,-0.131385&spn=0.006677,0.021136&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=6.491479,21.643066&hnear=6+Greek+St,+City+of+Westminster,+London+W1D,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">W1D 4ED</a> Tel: 020 7734 3888 <a href="http://disiaclondon.com/">disiaclondon.com</a></b></span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1711581/restaurant/Soho/Disiac-London"><img alt="Disiac on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1711581/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/109989/Disiac?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" title="Read Square Meal's review of Disiac"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/109989/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/disiac/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=7327" /></a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-32975505516014166622012-10-03T15:25:00.000+01:002013-01-02T21:04:17.009+00:00Brasserie Zédel<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-v6tEXlwVPOc/UGwDeopklWI/AAAAAAAAEaM/QwWT0F_sKhM/s1600/20120619_134323.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Entrance to Brasserie Zedel on Sherwood Street" border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-v6tEXlwVPOc/UGwDeopklWI/AAAAAAAAEaM/QwWT0F_sKhM/s320/20120619_134323.jpg" title="Entrance to Brasserie Zedel on Sherwood Street" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Anyone who, like me, was living in London in the 1990s will remember Atlantic Bar & Grill. Owned by the then-coolest cat in town, Oliver Peyton - the Russell Norman of his day, now better known for his role as a judge on Great British Menu - Atlantic, with its snappy bouncers and seemingly untraversable velvet rope, was for a time at least <i>the </i>place to see and be seen, if only you could get in.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It's rather poetic then that in its new incarnation as <a href="http://www.brasseriezedel.com/" target="_blank">Brasserie </a></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><a href="http://www.brasseriezedel.com/" target="_blank">Zédel</a></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">, what was once London's most exclusive venue is now among its most democratic, offering all-day dining at extremely accessible prices to a staggering 240 covers at a time. Reservations are taken (fancy!) but a substantial proportion of tables are kept for walk-ins meaning that, unlike Atlantic, any and everyone is able to get in.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And get in they must if Rex Restaurant Associates, the Chris Corbin and Jeremy King-helmed investment vehicle behind </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;">Zédel</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> is to make back the fortune that must have been spent on the decor, one of London's most jaw-dropping rooms by a country mile. Shayne Brady, the impishly-handsome head designer at David Collins Studio has turned what was a dark and imposing subterranean space into a light, even dazzling room with acres of pink-hued marble, brass railings and real gold leaf on the capitals atop the room's mighty columns.
</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-OU7gD_9_zng/UGwEUxWSkyI/AAAAAAAAEac/6g7VDuEi7K4/s1600/Brasserie+Zedel+Interior+Photograph+by+David+Loftus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Brasserie Zedel's beautiful interior designed by David Collins Studio" border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-OU7gD_9_zng/UGwEUxWSkyI/AAAAAAAAEac/6g7VDuEi7K4/s320/Brasserie+Zedel+Interior+Photograph+by+David+Loftus.jpg" title="Brasserie Zedel's beautiful interior designed by David Collins Studio" width="213" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">As for the pricing, much has been made of how cheap many dishes on <a href="http://zedel1.d3r-cdn.com/pdfs/original/110-zedel-mainmenu-003.pdf" target="_blank">Brasserie </a></span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><a href="http://zedel1.d3r-cdn.com/pdfs/original/110-zedel-mainmenu-003.pdf" target="_blank">Zédel'</a></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://zedel1.d3r-cdn.com/pdfs/original/110-zedel-mainmenu-003.pdf" target="_blank">s all-French menu</a> are - not least the <i>soupe du jour</i> at a no-it-can't-be £2.25 - but it's not necessarily a cheap restaurant; on my most recent visit, one of several since it opened, four of us clocked up a bill of about £40 a head once a couple of decent bottles of wine had been added to the mix. Rather, it is one offering value for money almost unheard of not just in London's West End but just about anywhere.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;">Starters start with that soup and
peak at £7.75; particularly brilliant are the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>c<span style="background: white;">rème Dubarry</span></i> - a thick cream of
cauliflower soup - and the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>soupe
de poissons</i> at £4.75, almost as good as The Ivy's at two-thirds of the
price. Salads, too, impress, particularly endive and roquefort which happily
marries the bitterness of chicory to the saltiness of blue cheese.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Of the main courses, even the simplest <i>steak </i></span><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>haché - </i>£7.50 on its own or available as part of the £8.75 for two courses or £11.25 for three prix-fixe - is noteworthy, using good beef and enlivened by a perky <i>sauce au poivre</i>. The vast choucroute Alsacienne, £11.75 and a meal in itself, is as delicious a mountain of pickled cabbage and pork as you'll ever find. </span></span> </span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MrhQbxvaWHM/UGwDPnE2AAI/AAAAAAAAEaE/05kCJCnURxs/s1600/20120920_192227.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Neon signs point the way to Brasserie Zedel" border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MrhQbxvaWHM/UGwDPnE2AAI/AAAAAAAAEaE/05kCJCnURxs/s320/20120920_192227.jpg" title="Neon signs point the way to Brasserie Zedel" width="240" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Desserts continue the theme of being far better than one would expect for the price. I simply can't fault the <i>ile flottante</i> - £2.75! - and even the <i>caf</i></span></span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">é</i><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"> gourmand</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"> with the prix-fixe is a generous serve, three mini pastries with a cafetiere of decent filter coffee. There's also all manner of ice-cream coupes, sorbets, tarts and cakes, all for under a fiver.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">In a restaurant of this size, serving this many people, choreographing service is bound to be a challenge and to date my only real gripes with Brasserie </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;">Zédel</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"> have been around this. Firstly, wherever the kitchen is in this behemoth of a building, it is clearly too far from the dining room to ensure that food arrives piping hot; nothing I have eaten has been much hotter than tepid although it's tasted none the worse for that. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">Also, in the time it takes for plates to arrive at the tables, sauces can congeal; a quick whisk with a fork at the service station before presentation would help no end. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">Worst of all, on my most recent visit our main courses arrived before we had even finished our starters and rather than being taken away, they were served while one of our party raced under pressure to finish her soup, which is a serious no-no in my book. So i</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">t's not perfect, but it's still early days for Brasserie </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;">Zédel</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"> and with luck and a little more time these glitches should iron out.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"> </span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
</span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"></span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4WMjn__k72oapQmWNgdMre1etmTkfESCU0-nJA2BagqmOmQOSeeU99U1qCliuPCYYwJPgpyx3vy_sshzRhDW9XDtYaBi9lzgdkddPg96TAHJljKZgRF3royYnOQUO40da0Z5qntFHBWw/s1600/Brasserie+Zedel's+Bar+Americain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="The art deco Bar Americain at Brasserie Zedel" border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4WMjn__k72oapQmWNgdMre1etmTkfESCU0-nJA2BagqmOmQOSeeU99U1qCliuPCYYwJPgpyx3vy_sshzRhDW9XDtYaBi9lzgdkddPg96TAHJljKZgRF3royYnOQUO40da0Z5qntFHBWw/s320/Brasserie+Zedel's+Bar+Americain.jpg" title="The art deco Bar Americain at Brasserie Zedel" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">Everything else - the reasonably-priced wine list, the perfect classic cocktails being served in the beautiful Art Deco <a href="http://www.brasseriezedel.com/bar-americain" target="_blank">Bar Americain</a>, the camp coral pink napkins one of which, <i>mea culpa,</i> found its way into my handbag - make this easily one of the most exciting new openings in London this year.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">As I write, reservations have just opened for Corbin & King's next project, <a href="http://www.colbertchelsea.com/" target="_blank">Cafe Colbert</a> on Sloane Square; with its SW1 location and </span><a href="http://www.theweek.co.uk/people-news/17131/earl-cadogan-forces-chelsea-brasserie-close" style="line-height: 18px;" target="_blank">aristocratic landlord</a><span style="line-height: 18px;"> it is unlikely that it will be as democratic as Brasserie </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;">Zédel.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;"> No matter; for here is a restaurant that in both pricing and geography is truly accessible to anyone - and not a velvet rope in sight.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b><br /></b></span></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><span style="line-height: 18px;">Brasserie </span>Zédel</b></span><b style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">, 20 Sherwood Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Brasserie+Zedel,+20+Sherwood+Street,+London+W1F+7ED&ll=51.5112,-0.127115&spn=0.014209,0.038581&hq=Brasserie+Zedel,+20+Sherwood+Street,+London+W1F+7ED&hnear=London,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=15&iwloc=A" target="_blank">W1F 7ED</a> Tel: 020 7734 4888 <a href="http://www.brasseriezedel.com/">http://www.brasseriezedel.com</a></b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b><br /></b></span></span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1686927/restaurant/Soho/Brasserie-Zedel-London"><img alt="Brasserie Zedel on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1686927/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/107670/Brasserie_Zedel?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" title="Read Square Meal's review of Brasserie Zédel"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/107670/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a> </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/brasserie-zedel/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=6179" /></a> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></span></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span></span></span></span><br />
</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-35659635701011843932012-09-24T12:30:00.000+01:002012-09-26T12:15:26.826+01:00Tuttons, Covent Garden<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8_OwNfAeZNAy7D9fYvIwqLNIdOftGvUJB_u33qF981s9JP4J6FbvoGaStPWkgbEB7nVJ0vpa9lzlBUavm8vRK-kZJeiD13NfyAlHlxlzktbZq1GZp4CaZ_N1QvkHezsTU1N5nOP1U6BU/s1600/Tuttons+Interior.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The opulent new interior of Tuttons, designed by Russell Sage Studio" border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8_OwNfAeZNAy7D9fYvIwqLNIdOftGvUJB_u33qF981s9JP4J6FbvoGaStPWkgbEB7nVJ0vpa9lzlBUavm8vRK-kZJeiD13NfyAlHlxlzktbZq1GZp4CaZ_N1QvkHezsTU1N5nOP1U6BU/s320/Tuttons+Interior.jpg" title="The opulent new interior of Tuttons, designed by Russell Sage Studio" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Until fairly recently, Covent Garden was something of a culinary wasteland, its restaurant scene not having kept up with an ever-improving retail landscape. Bar one or two decent places - Joe Allen, Clos Maggiore - options for eating out in WC2 were mostly limited to </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">terrible tourist traps and </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">what might charitably be called 'better chains'.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Then, within a couple of years, a slew of serious restaurants arrived - among them Opera Tavern, Mishkin's and Dishoom, to name just three - and suddenly Covent Garden became as much a destination for food as for fashion. With them came an influx of more discerning - or at least, more demanding - diners, faced with which the area's older businesses have had to adapt or die.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.tuttons.com/index" target="_blank">Tuttons</a>, the landmark 'brasserie round the corner', has chosen the former, its owners throwing a presumably huge cheque at a new interior and revamped menu. The room's undeniably very nice to look at - the work of Russell Stage Studio, responsible for such recent beauties as Zetter Townhouse and The Balcon - and clearly cost a bomb, all heavy dark wood, chunky mirrors, shiny red banquettes and faux-alligator tabletops. </span><a href="http://www.tuttons.com/inc/menu?menu=8852" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Tuttons' menu</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> reads impressively too, offering modern brasserie staples with a heavy emphasis on British produce - four counties are name-checked in the starters section alone. </span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-V2Cyy0Kx2kg/UF-iAok91xI/AAAAAAAAD9o/ZS3X9guVYkM/s1600/Tuttons+Bar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="The bar at Tuttons, Covent Garden." border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-V2Cyy0Kx2kg/UF-iAok91xI/AAAAAAAAD9o/ZS3X9guVYkM/s320/Tuttons+Bar.jpg" title="The bar at Tuttons, Covent Garden." width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It's a shame then that at least based on my recent visit with Anders, the menu is writing cheques that the food can't cash. A starter of 'Honey-rolled beef carpaccio with veal heart dumplings' had leapt at me off the page and wasn't at all bad, the carpaccio silky, the little offal dumplings rich and peppery, but if the 'honey-rolling' was meant to add a sweet counterpoint then it wasn't there. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Anders' Dorset crab, saltwater prawns and avocado was of unimpeachable freshness and flavour but suffered from poor presentation, the crustacea lying on forlorn iceberg lettuce and salad leaves that spoke of recent extraction from a bag.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Lacklustre leaves also served to spoil the look of my main course of Buckinghamshire veal wrapped in Parma ham (yes, saltimbocca); no-one wants to see a vast clump of slightly-past-its-prime watercress on their plate. Our waiter actually said, "I'm not going to ask how the veal is because it's amazing, right?" Well, wrong, I had to correct him to his evident disappointment; after a jaw-workout-tough first mouthful it improved in both texture and flavour but 'amazing' it was not. I couldn't detect any anchovy in the lemon and anchovy butter, but a fried duck egg on top and some wonderful crispy sage were nice touches. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Poor <span style="color: #666666;">Anders' main course</span></span><span style="color: #666666; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">, </span><span style="line-height: 19px;">a cauliflower, leek and Montgomery cheddar bake, was no more than fine; the kind of thing one could easily rustle up at home and disappointing for the only vegetarian main course available.</span></span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHlbaxe4rvREYEJ4qByPkGylKrYin7CTGQHZ8p8PwNVNzKU1tEB7M6UgM4frvj2ZQctau1XFhMgGyYaXIyfLGRnYtEONQFv8wTiE0Jbf0Yt2h7D8qVON-csnHkJ8LLcbvsz5VnSbIWscY/s1600/Tuttons+Cheesecake.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Tuttons deconstructed Kentish raspberry 'cheesecake'" border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHlbaxe4rvREYEJ4qByPkGylKrYin7CTGQHZ8p8PwNVNzKU1tEB7M6UgM4frvj2ZQctau1XFhMgGyYaXIyfLGRnYtEONQFv8wTiE0Jbf0Yt2h7D8qVON-csnHkJ8LLcbvsz5VnSbIWscY/s320/Tuttons+Cheesecake.jpg" title="Tuttons deconstructed Kentish raspberry 'cheesecake'" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Plates sat for an age uncleared before we moved on to desserts and any hopes of a climactic high-note were to be in vain. Kentish raspberry cheesecake with biscuit crumb - that 'biscuit crumb' should have rung alarm bells - was an irritating deconstructed affair, a loose frothy quenelle of 'cheesecake' dropped amidst half a crumbled digestive biscuit, the whole drizzled in a cheap-tasting raspberry sauce. Anders's summer pudding trifle used some good fresh fruit but was otherwise unexciting.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My overall impression - gently rebutted by the duty manager whom I put it to - was that here was a menu that had been conceived with good intentions, by a clearly very passionate chef, but which was being delivered without his supervision by a kitchen that was cutting some corners and lacking finesse. Nothing we ate was actually bad, and some dishes - the crab, the veal after the first few mouthfuls - at least tasted very good. But with prices on a par with <a href="http://bit.ly/TPFP_DST" target="_blank">Dean Street Townhouse</a>, which has clearly been looked to for inspiration both for decor and menu, the whole operation will have to work a lot harder if Tuttons is to establish itself as serious competition for the area's upstart newcomers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Tuttons, 11/12 Russell Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Tutton's,+11%2F12+Russell+Street,+London+WC2B+5HZ&ll=51.514391,-0.121729&spn=0.007104,0.01929&fb=1&gl=uk&hq=Tutton's,&hnear=0x487604cba0a0510f:0xcd456cb4124b2a03,11-12+Russell+St,+London+WC2B+5HZ&cid=0,0,15884752974013331834&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">WC2B 5HZ</a> Tel: 0844 371 2550 <a href="http://www.tuttons.com/">http://www.tuttons.com</a> </b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i><b>I was invited to review Tuttons. </b></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/571250/restaurant/London/Covent-Garden/Tuttons-Holborn"><img alt="Tuttons on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/571250/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/81348/Tuttons?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" title="Read Square Meal's review of Tuttons"><img alt="Square Meal" height="90" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/81348/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" width="170" /></a><br />
Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-40944887098628311712012-09-11T17:26:00.002+01:002013-01-02T21:07:44.240+00:00Tonkotsu, Soho<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PVe0zm9BIRY/UE8-UZ4iDGI/AAAAAAAADlc/Hc8wzpL3T_s/s1600/Tonkotsu+sketch.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Artist's impression of Tonkotsu, Soho from www.tonkotsu.co.uk" border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PVe0zm9BIRY/UE8-UZ4iDGI/AAAAAAAADlc/Hc8wzpL3T_s/s320/Tonkotsu+sketch.jpg" title="Exterior of Tonkotsu, Dean Street, Soho" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It's the smell that gets you first. Rounding the corner of Old Compton Street into Dean Street, the intense, rich aroma emanating from <a href="http://www.tonkotsu.co.uk/" target="_blank">Tonkotsu </a>like a vapour grabs you in its tractor beam, winds its way into your dilated nostrils and demands that, like a <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aimwGUOs2SM" target="_blank">Bisto Kid</a>, you track this heaven scent to its source.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">That source, it transpires, is the vast vats of pork-bone stock which simmer away for up to eighteen hours and then, with the addition of noodles and toppings, become the <i>tonkotsu</i> ramen from which this jaw-droppingly good Soho newcomer takes its name. S</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">till relatively unheard of in London, </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">ramen bars are u</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">biquitous in Japan, where ramen has the same quick, cheap, feed-me-now status as <a href="http://bit.ly/TgrphChix" target="_blank">fried chicken</a> does here. Now the owners of the estimable <a href="http://tsuru-sushi.co.uk/" target="_blank">Tsuru Sushi</a> have decided it's the capital's turn for some top notch noodle action.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-TsqhBegMshk/UE8-B1ikbQI/AAAAAAAADlM/VAun6ga5Rk4/s1600/Interior+credit+Senthil+Sukumaran.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Tonkotsu's 'part-Japanese, part neo-industrial' interior. Photo by Senthil Sukumaran" border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-TsqhBegMshk/UE8-B1ikbQI/AAAAAAAADlM/VAun6ga5Rk4/s320/Interior+credit+Senthil+Sukumaran.jpg" title="Tonkotsu's interior. Photo: Senthil Sukumaran" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">Tonkotsu's interior. Photo: </span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">Senthil Sukumaran</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">As is the law for any Soho opening these days, Tonkotsu is a no-reservations affair, but spread over two floors so as to provide a decent chance of getting a table without too long a wait. The decor's part traditional Japanese - stripped wood, silk wall hangings - and part neo-industrial, with reclaimed school dining room chairs at the bare refectory tables and an imposing caged spiral staircase linking the floors.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="http://www.tonkotsu.co.uk/food/" target="_blank">The menu</a>, concise as a haiku, offers three varieties of ramen alongside a handful of simple sides and gyoza. These crimped dumplings, hand-made daily, are a triumph; usually offered either steamed or fried, here they are first steamed to cook the super-fresh fillings - pork, prawn and pork or shitake and bamboo shoot- before being flash-fried to give a golden colour, slight crunch and savoury flavour to the wrapper. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sides, too, show attention to detail. Chicken kara age - Japan's rather more civilised take on fried chicken - sees chunks of tasty thigh marinated in soy, ginger and garlic before being dusted in flour and deep-fried; the resulting nuggets are moist, tender and so packed with flavour as to not need the accompanying dipping sauce. A deceptively simple salad of spinach and bean sprouts benefits from its nutty, viscous sesame oil dressing coating each leaf, making the overall flavour smoky rather than bland.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But the best part of all is, of course, the ramen itself. I tried the Tonkotsu, which adds to a generous bowl of that sumptuous broth thin noodles, belly pork, a seasoned egg - sunshine-gold yolk still slightly oozing - bean sprouts and spring onions, and Alyn had the Tokyo Spicy, much the same but using pulled chilli pork and thicker noodles. Both dishes had in common an incredible consistency; the labour- and time-intensive cooking of the stock, during which the collagen in the pork bones breaks down, results in a creaminess almost like a </span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 19.200000762939453px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">velouté.</span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 19.200000762939453px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnBFzjIA4k0y85ceesQALLdXwNHoKOk-atgM32Ojtyu_-AwaajCTnEYXqpafRI9ftvM4n1GFZ_JsJfv_EOtgQwHXc1nuSak1q-eku8CZ5hFVv4jhpbTC5LAnWCr1-sOpx3lCw9So-zcbA/s1600/TokyoSpicy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Tokyo Spicy ramen at Tonkotsu, Soho." border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnBFzjIA4k0y85ceesQALLdXwNHoKOk-atgM32Ojtyu_-AwaajCTnEYXqpafRI9ftvM4n1GFZ_JsJfv_EOtgQwHXc1nuSak1q-eku8CZ5hFVv4jhpbTC5LAnWCr1-sOpx3lCw9So-zcbA/s320/TokyoSpicy.jpg" title="The 'Tokyo Spicy' ramen." width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Each of us preferred our own choice, Alyn liking the only-slight extra heat of the Tokyo Spicy while I liked the restraint of the Tonkotsu, but agreed that both bowlfuls put anything we'd had before in the shade. Slurping, Japanese-style is encouraged; we didn't need any.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The concise <a href="http://www.tonkotsu.co.uk/drinks/" target="_blank">drinks list</a> might confuse some customers, focusing as it does on British craft beers, sake and whiskies. There are a couple of big-name Japanese beers (Asahi, Sapporo) that diners will recognise but other than those it's pot luck as far as liquid refreshment goes; even the soft drinks eschew the familiar, including 'Dalston Cola' which we didn't try but the gents on the table next to us abandoned after one sip. Still, all credit to Tonkotsu for being as innovative with their drinks as with their food.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Pricing is reasonable especially considering the quality; ramen dishes (as well as the two we tried there's a veggie option using miso broth) are £9 or £11, gyoza £5 for five and side orders all about a fiver. With drinks and service, a meal for two will work out at about £25 a head, a pit-stop lunch for one of ramen and a drink closer to £15, putting Tonkotsu firmly in the affordable category.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Tonkotsu continues <a href="http://tgr.ph/0CHOICE" target="_blank">the trend in London</a> for restaurants doing only one thing but doing it exceptionally well and in that respect is a very welcome addition. If, as I expect it will, it starts a new trend for <i>ramen-ya</i>, then we can only hope that they'll be nearly as good as this.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Tonkotsu, 63 Dean Street, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Tonkotsu,+63+Dean+Street,+London+W1D+4QG&ll=51.51339,-0.132222&spn=0.007678,0.01929&hq=Tonkotsu,&hnear=63+Dean+St,+London+W1D+4QG,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">W1D 4QG</a> Tel: 020 7437 0071 <a href="http://www.tonkotsu.co.uk/">http://www.tonkotsu.co.uk</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1687240/restaurant/Soho/Tonkotsu-London"><img alt="Tonkotsu on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1687240/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/108723/Tonkotsu?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" title="Read Square Meal's review of Tonkotsu"><img alt="Square Meal" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/108723/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/tonkotsu/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=6448" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-3641254635149350062012-08-30T13:39:00.000+01:002013-04-06T15:58:40.172+01:00Gyms Kitchen, Leyton<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-JuSSo3c1ttI/UN-BLmijh5I/AAAAAAAAFQg/paB45MmCd-0/s1600/Gyms+Kitchen+-+Exterior.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Exterior of Gyms Kitchen, Leyton" border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-JuSSo3c1ttI/UN-BLmijh5I/AAAAAAAAFQg/paB45MmCd-0/s320/Gyms+Kitchen+-+Exterior.jpg" title="Exterior of Gyms Kitchen, Leyton" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i>Updated, April 2013</i></b> What a difference six months make. Matthew, my friend who took me along on the visit I wrote about below, implored me to come back and give Gyms Kitchen (still no apostrophe...) a second chance, assuring me that the place was much changed, and improved since last August.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">How right he was. The decor - which I didn't even mention first time around, feeling that I'd given the place enough of a kicking for the food, but had really not liked - has been softened, with rustic wood panels covering the once-bare walls and saloon doors hiding the formerly visible kitchen and dishwash area.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A much-extended and redesigned <a href="http://www.gymskitchen.com/?page_id=20" target="_blank">menu</a> stays true to the healthy-eating vision (which, do remember, was one of the things I genuinely admired about the place first time round) but offers greater variety - even puddings! - and ordering from it felt much more enjoyable and less of an exercise in parsimony. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But the biggest and most pleasant surprise was the food itself. Butterfly chicken breast and grilled tuna steak from the grill were adeptly cooked and subtly flavoured with home-made marinades, and beautifully plated on distinctive but unfussy flatware. Sides of asparagus and halloumi (grilled, of course) were well-seasoned and bulked out with crisp, fresh salad. And we very much enjoyed dessert of banana & chocolate protein pancakes with peanut butter and honey - that's pretty much all of my favourite things on one plate there.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Noticeably, the clientele now better reflects the owners' original vision too; the strapping chaps occupying the other tables were remarkably easy on the eye. And those 'eminently threesomeable' waiters? As hot as ever, I'm glad to report.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">When somewhere takes as much notice of early criticism as Gyms Kitchen clearly have, and improve this much, I'm very happy to eat my words. And I'd be very happy to eat there, again.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1695457/restaurant/Waltham-Forest/Gyms-Kitchen-London"><img alt="Gyms Kitchen on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/link/1695457/biglink.gif" style="border: none; height: 146px; padding: 0px; width: 200px;" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Original Post</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Call me old-fashioned - Lord knows I've been called far worse - but I find the current trend for and obsession with 'dirty' food really rather disgusting. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Table manners have gone out the window, perhaps unsurprisingly given that the popularity of street food means there are no tables to need manners for. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">If I read one more breathless paean to a burger whose 'bloody juices run down my face and through my fingers' or another review of a barbecue gaff serving up 'melting fatty piggy gorgeousness', written by an apparently sane and presumably not-raised-by-wolves adult now gone feral, I shall probably give up reading (and possibly writing) about food altogether. Enough is enough.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">By the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxist_philosophy_of_nature#Law_of_opposites" target="_blank">Law of Opposites</a> then I should be very excited about a restaurant like <a href="http://www.gymskitchen.com/" target="_blank">Gyms Kitchen</a>, proudly 'serving fresh, healthy grilled meats and vegetables' - the polar opposite of all the triple-deep-fried, lard-basted, confited, hickory-dipped nonsense I find so unappealing. Except that Gyms Kitchen (I've checked, no apostrophe) is not the kind of restaurant it's possible to get excited about, unless you are the kind of serious gym-goer at whom it is aimed, the kind of muscle-bound, mahogany-stained body-builder who sees food as fuel and fat and carbs as the enemy. Which I am not, and don't.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-oBO5cJr90So/UD8vYQytUII/AAAAAAAADRc/US15_upy-sg/s1600/20120828_195006.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Interior of Gyms Kitchen, Leyton" border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-oBO5cJr90So/UD8vYQytUII/AAAAAAAADRc/US15_upy-sg/s320/20120828_195006.jpg" title="Interior of Gyms Kitchen, Leyton" width="240" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">To be fair, I only came to be at Gyms Kitchen through necessity; I was due to cook dinner for a friend who has just moved in nearby but a botched delivery meant that not only did we not have a table to eat off or chairs to sit on, but no crockery or pots or pans either. He'd had breakfast at Gyms Kitchen and enjoyed it so suggested we try it for dinner, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't hope that a place with the slogan 'Eat Clean...Train Dirty' would be heaving with hunks.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Disappointingly, with the exception of the present writer and a brace of eminently threesomeable waiters, the clientèle on the night of our visit was entirely hunk-free, consisting of a large family group and a solo lady diner none of whom appeared to be on their way either to or from the gym. Nor did they strike me as the kind of customer who was overly concerned by the calorie, fat, carb and protein content of their food as listed for every dish on <a href="http://www.gymskitchen.com/?page_id=20" target="_blank">the menu</a>. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">More than likely they were attracted by what I could see as being Gyms Kitchen's wider selling-points, namely convenience and value for money; certainly there was no faulting the portion size of our - huge - grilled lamb wraps for the price, £6 or £8 with the addition of a side order. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Less attractive though was the actual food itself; huge wholemeal wraps had the texture and consistency of linoleum and the meat within was tasty but tough - I suspect grilled at high heat straight from the refrigerator without time for proper resting - and in places pure gristle. Side dishes of spicy rice and chargrilled asparagus were just that. There were, unsurprisingly, no puddings, nor any booze, with its evil carbs and empty calories; instead diners can choose from protein shakes (oh God), low-fat smoothies with an optional scoop of protein powder (shoot me now) or a virtuous range of soft drinks. Coffees are, of course 'all served with skimmed milk' as if you'd dare order anything else.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tQimUBaZdQI/UD8vFJzACoI/AAAAAAAADRU/pnSWzSraCZI/s1600/20120828_193916.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The drinks menu at Gyms Kitchen, Leyton" border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tQimUBaZdQI/UD8vFJzACoI/AAAAAAAADRU/pnSWzSraCZI/s320/20120828_193916.jpg" title="The drinks menu at Gyms Kitchen, Leyton" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">If I didn't enjoy Gyms Kitchen - and I'm sorry to say that with the exception of the company, I didn't - it could be said in their defence that I'm so far off their target customer that I was never going to. And it should also be said in fairness to them that even though it's not my cup of whey powder, their concept is at least thoroughly thought through and honest in its intentions, and I'd like it to do well.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Were it in Soho, say - the spiritual stomping ground of the gay (and they are mostly gay) gym-obsessed body-dysmorphics who absolutely love this kind of thing, Gyms Kitchen would be doing a roaring trade, but it isn't - it's at the top end of Leyton High Road, an odd choice of area to test out a concept which, <a href="http://www.gymskitchen.com/?page_id=267" target="_blank">the website admits</a>, the owners hope will be the model for a franchise. As it is, all the available spots in Soho have been taken up by the kind of dirty-fried-street food pedlars that Gyms Kitchen is anathema to. For the time being, Gyms Kitchen will have to try even harder than they train to make eating clean as appealing as eating dirty.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Gyms Kitchen, 388-392 High Road, Leyton, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=E10+6QE&hl=en&ll=51.563359,-0.010579&spn=0.00767,0.01929&sll=51.531943,-0.083097&sspn=0.122804,0.308647&hnear=London+E10+6QE,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">E10 6QE</a> Tel: 020 8988 6362 <a href="http://www.gymskitchen.com/">http://www.gymskitchen.com</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1878176324100029521.post-66353427537873962322012-08-12T18:50:00.000+01:002013-01-02T21:09:54.705+00:00Reform Social & Grill, Marylebone<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjf7NsJVVVAqoQYfgahEKwca6fz-VqYhDZLbY6T0l94HJ9QQFMk5hq_E2_YvrsSVyZfv-QazPCZR_27iL3pQ8ahpaRBo0FW_WkXeswWxkq5ys4NNfGowOse6LPWNmZxEmnMN7bBr9Da0o4/s1600/20120525_200215.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjf7NsJVVVAqoQYfgahEKwca6fz-VqYhDZLbY6T0l94HJ9QQFMk5hq_E2_YvrsSVyZfv-QazPCZR_27iL3pQ8ahpaRBo0FW_WkXeswWxkq5ys4NNfGowOse6LPWNmZxEmnMN7bBr9Da0o4/s320/20120525_200215.jpg" width="310" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">About three or four years ago, restaurants offering robust, butch British fare in clubby surroundings </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">(gentlemen's rather than night)</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">were the height of fashion, </span><a href="http://bit.ly/TPFP_DST" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Dean Street Townhouse</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> being the first and I would still argue the best of the bunch. It was a fashion I was very happy with, this being exactly the kind of food I like to eat and the kind of place I like to eat it in.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Fashions change however, with</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> each new restaurant opening now seemingly contending to be more niche and novel than the last, s</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">o just as I was thinking we'd all moved on to places serving <a href="http://bubbledogs.co.uk/" target="_blank">only hot dogs and champagne</a> or <a href="http://www.tonkotsu.co.uk/" target="_blank">authentic pork-bone ramen</a>, </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">it came as a not-unpleasant surprise to hear about somewhere as resolutely - one might say wilfully - old-school as </span><a href="http://www.reformsocialgrill.co.uk/" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">Reform Social & Grill</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Located in the <a href="http://www.mandeville.co.uk/" target="_blank">Mandeville Hotel</a> in Marylebone, Reform consists of a bar area (the Social) serving some pretty spot-on cocktails - they got my vodka Martini exactly right - and the Grill, a large room which with its bare-wood floors, dark Edwardian colour palette and studded leather banquettes and booths is attractive but almost oppressively masculine. On the night Alyn and I visited we were the only diners for almost the entire evening, word having clearly not yet spread that Marylebone, an area well-served for high-end eating establishments but less so for good everyday options, now has exactly that.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UT8ghfdpgNU/UCe8VWLpCfI/AAAAAAAACyA/dYfwfdFS2KI/s1600/20120525_200238.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="238" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UT8ghfdpgNU/UCe8VWLpCfI/AAAAAAAACyA/dYfwfdFS2KI/s320/20120525_200238.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I always enjoy being faced with <a href="http://www.reformsocialgrill.co.uk/menus/main_menu.pdf" target="_blank">a menu</a> I find it hard to choose from due to liking the sound of everything, and that was certainly the case here. The starter I eventually settled on, St George mushrooms on toast with a poached egg, was exactly the kind of comforting savoury I enjoy at home, while Alyn's pheasant Scotch egg with mayonnaise managed to be an imaginative, tasty reboot of a dish which appears in myriad variants on almost every pub/grill/bistro menu these days - no mean feat.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For main courses we both ordered from the Charcoal Grill selection. Alyn's 300g rib eye steak - great beef, its origins surprisingly unidentified given the menu writer's attention to provenance elsewhere - was huge and very tender, served on the bone with obscenely moreish chips sprinkled in smoked Cornish salt. I pigged (and cowed, and lambed) out on an exemplary mixed grill of English rose veal, a lamb chop, chipolatas, black pudding (Ramsey's, whoever he is), roasted bone marrow and a veal Scotch egg, all of unimpeachable quality and beautifully cooked. If that sounds gut-busting, it wasn't, the quantum of everything being just enough to appreciate and sate but not to overwhelm. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">If the inclusion on the menu of both Desserts and Puddings seems affected, it only reflects an attention to the semantics of sweets, the </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">desserts being various sugary afters and puddings proper steamed mounds of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Bunter" target="_blank">Billy Bunterish</a> nostalgia. Alyn's Bakewell pudding with raspberry preserve came with a generous Cornishware jug of custard and disappeared before I could taste it; apparently it was excellent. So too was my Reform trifle, cleverly - and fashionably - substituting sticky PX for the usual sherry, mascarpone for whipped cream and pistachios for almonds. It was the kind of dish I wish was served everywhere, but because it isn't will return here for.</span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TrAR51LhnQg/UCe84dOuLhI/AAAAAAAACtg/8cmRl3pQAYg/s1600/20120525_214130.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TrAR51LhnQg/UCe84dOuLhI/AAAAAAAACtg/8cmRl3pQAYg/s320/20120525_214130.jpg" width="238" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">As well as a glass each of a wonderful orange Muscat with our puds we chose a bottle of a complex rosé Malbec, one of few new world bottles on a </span><a href="http://www.reformsocialgrill.co.uk/menus/wine_list.pdf" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">mostly old world list</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> interesting for its inclusion of familiar grapes from lesser-known vineyards, accessibly-priced.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://draft.blogger.com/"></a><span id="goog_765916195"></span><span id="goog_765916196"></span><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Service was courteous and, to our relief bearing in mind the emptiness of the place, not overly-attentive. If staff occasionally lingered longer to chat with us than they might otherwise have done, it couldn't be held against them given the lack of anyone else to distract them.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Dedicated followers of food fashion might consider it a folly for anyone to open a restaurant so far off the zeitgeist, now of all times and in London of all places. Those who care about the more important details however - </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">that Reform Social & Grill serves extremely good food at fair prices in a pleasant room where, in another sign that current trends are being eschewed, it is possible to book a table, not that currently at least you would need to - should rejoice.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>Reform Social & Grill, Mandeville Place, London <a href="https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=W1U+2BE&ll=51.516782,-0.150976&spn=0.007811,0.01929&hnear=London+W1U+2BE,+United+Kingdom&gl=uk&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A" target="_blank">W1U 2BE</a> Tel: 020 7224 1624 <a href="http://www.reformsocialgrill.co.uk/">http://www.reformsocialgrill.co.uk</a></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/52/1682677/restaurant/Marylebone/Reform-Social-and-Grill-London"><img alt="Reform Social and Grill on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/logo/1682677/biglogo.gif" style="border: none; height: 34px; padding: 0px; width: 104px;" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/london/view/108555/Reform_Social_and_Grill_at_the_Mandeville_Hotel?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Blog&utm_campaign=Link" title="Read Square Meal's review of Reform Social and Grill at The Mandeville Hotel"><img alt="Square Meal" src="http://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/108555/get-blog-review/image/medium.png" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/restaurants/reform-social-grill/" target="_blank" title="FoodVerdicts"><img src="http://foodverdicts.co.uk/badge-generator/?RID=6481" /></a>
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Posted by <a href="http://plus.google.com/108971092886579794167?rel=author">+Hugh Wright</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09488124266266755162noreply@blogger.com0