Alright, an exaggeration, but I am both very proud and flattered to have been invited by my favourite Brighton foodie Beth to speak at her event – the inagural Food Bloggers Connect. This event is basically a big party for food bloggers everywhere AND also anyone who has a vested interest in Food Blogging to network, share ideas and generally to have a good meal (yup food is obviously involved).

The event will take place this Saturday 28th Nov 2009 at Levant Restaurant in London. I have been asked to do two presentations and I just want to give you a little sneak sneak of what I intend to say… also keep reading for the competition regarding the tickets to Amsterdam.

Oh, I feel so bloody nervous.

So speech number 1 will be titled “Photographs in the Dark”. It will be short and schweet at no more than 7 minutes. I’ll be running through a couple of slides and I will show you a slice of what goes through my mind when I take pictures of food. The objective is for you to walk away with some ideas of how to nail that shot in a lowly lit room. I have a few surprise items that I’m going to whip out on the spot which I hope will help liven things up abit, so if you’re going, do look out for something shiny.

Speech number two is titled “Social media & me” and it will be abit more epic. I’ll keep it succinct at no more than 12 minutes and I just would like to give you a perspective of what Social Media means to me, and what I think my role is within Social Media. If I am articulate enough to get my ideas across, then you should come away with some practical ideas on how to make blogging even more fun than it already is and for the benefit of my non-blogging readership, a snippet of my thought process behind this very blog.

I should also mention that I am probably the pleb in the speakers line-up as there will be some truly fantastic food bloggers who will be presenting their ideas as well:

1. Jeanne from Cook Sister!
2. Jamie from Life’s A Feast
3. Meeta from What’s For Lunch Honey

The presentations will allow for alot of Q&A time, so it’s going to be totally interactive, giving you the chance to comment and for us to respond, just like a blogpost I suppose. Of course, I’ll try to make faces at you and will try to keep things as relaxed as possible, we’re all suppose to have a blast at this thing.

I think it’s gonna be a smasher of an event – there are people flying in from all over the place (as far as Singapore, yikes!) and I am going to give it my all to help pimp the status of the food blogging nation.

As you can tell I’m excited. Hoorah.

So as I understand it, there are already about 70 attendees now, and there are a few more tickets flying about. If you are free from 1pm onwards on Saturday and you feel like giving me a cheer (or jeer) then do come along.

Here’s a quick summary of the deets of the event and how to get your tickets:

What Food Blogger Connect
When November 28th, 2009, 1pm to 5pm
Where Levant Restaurant, Wigmore Street W1U 1BQ
Who Everyone who is or wants to be part of the Food Blogosphere. Food Blogger connect is open to all, and you don’t have to be a long-time blogger to attend. Are you thinking of starting a food blog? This is the perfect time to come and learn how. This event is open to Non-UK Food Bloggers as well.
How much £30 for food and 1 glass of wine. This is the only fee and it covers the meal.
WHERE CAN I RSVP Go to www.rsvpit.com. The event code is 2009.

I just want to also highlight the masterminds behind this too:

Beth of Dirty Kitchen Secrets, Jamie of Life’s a Feast, Hilda of Saffron & Blueberry and Mowie of Mowielicious.

See on Saturday Tweepers!!

OK and now on to the two running competitions from my sponsors Douwe Egberts.

First up is Video 2 of 3 which is part of an ongoing competition to win a coffee hamper. (You can see video 1 here)

Love Coffee? Love that first cup steaming from your cafetiere? Then this film is for you! Douwe Egberts have been growing, roasting and supplying the finest coffees for over 250 years and have learnt a thing or two about the world’s most popular drink along the way. This is the second in a series of 3 short films that charts the fascinating story of coffee and the breakthrough that truly made coffee instant and global – the filter. We also meet Etienne, the passionate tasting master behind the last 3 decades of Douwe Egberts blends. Narrated by James Nesbitt, we really hope you’ll enjoy this and the other films in the series!

Secondly here are the details regarding the competition to win a free holiday to Amsterdam.

The Netherlands is where it all started for Douwe Egberts, some 250 years ago, and we’ve been following the fascinating stories behind coffee ever since. We love hearing about your ideal endings to the coffee story – the kind of special coffee moments that you look forward to enjoying, week after week. In return for sharing, we’re inviting one lucky winner and their friend to experience where it all began. You’ll enjoy 3 nights of 4* accommodation, flights and transfers, £100 spending money and a whole host of Amsterdam’s cultural and culinary delights.

*The winner will be selected as the most original and humorous entry. Closing date is midnight, December 31st 2009.

To enter this competition visit the following : http://behindeverycup.douwe-egberts.co.uk/

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Right then, for the first competition, its a hamper giveaway…

Douwe Egberts are also sponsoring another competition for the UK readers of LondonEater giveaway a christmas hamper (6x Etienne Products, Cafetiere, 2x Mugs,1x Thermos Travel Mug1x Douwe Egberts storage tin). The competition relates to the three Douwe Egberts videos being posted over the next 2 weeks. There will be a question on each of the three videos So keeping watching the videos and keep your eye out for the question.

Video 1 is as follows:

OK folks, next monday, there will be another competition from the same sponsors and it will be a bigger prize – a free holiday to Amsterdam – you will have to go to the Douwe Egberts site to enter this competition, but details of it will follow on Monday, when I post video 2. G’Luck.

Eurostar (and their PR bods We are Social by extension) who put together the foodblogger trip to Lille a couple of weeks ago are now offering readers (that’s You) the chance to win two FREE eurostar tickets to Lille. You might have already seen the same competition up on other blogs such as World Foodie Guide and at the Greedy Gourmet.

Ok so here’s how to enter this giveaway, simply leave a comment to this post by answering this question:

Tell us why you’d love a little break to Lille.

Hey guys, you know me – make your comment interesting, witty and really have fun with it! The most interesting one will be picked by We Are Social and you will be notified via email (so do remember to leave your email address when you comment). I’ll keep the competition open until Friday 25th September 2009.

Oh and here are the Terms of the competition:

1. Available to UK participants only, travelling from London to Lille only.
2. Entrants must be able to make their own way to St Pancras.
3. The winner can choose to travel during any period of time until the end of October 2009. Departure and Return dates need not be on the same day (ie: longer than just a day trip).

Good luck

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The things I do for food. Sunday and I’ve signed up to the Nom Nom Nom Cooking Competition, and amazingly, was one half of the final nine teams. My cooking partner in crime is Billy of Cowfish, and we face-off against… lots of bloggers, with the grand prize of a dinner at Tsuru.

I didn’t win, I can’t cook, I almost made a fool of myself, but I did eat alot. Photo essay time folks, follow me behind the scenes to learn what made Team Cowfish+Eater tickle like clockwork. And so we go, into the kitchens of The Cookery School…..

Arrivals

So, we all got there at 9.30 am…. actually I got there at 9.30 am. Billy had been waiting for about twenty minutes, and he was so nervous that I would be a no-show. Are ya kidding? I always show up for food. Right then, breakfast is scones, cookies and brew. Ahh… right then, let’s get to work.

Sourcing Produce

We set off at around 10am to go and get our raw materials, our budget was £40, and this has to be the best part of the day, I love food markets.

Alright, so we need to pick up some really fresh produce, I haven’t gone through our menu yet, I will do so abit later, but we are starting with a fresh and summery salad.

One more of the fresh vegetables, before we move on to my favourite part, of the favourite part of the day. Hmm. So we’re serving up roast beef for mains, and we popped into The Ginger Pig for some proper bovine stuff.

Oh man, this shop really rocked hard. There’s alot of really tasty looking beef, all over the shop. It looked so good, I could have eaten it raw. Billy informed me that they did amazing sausage rolls, hmm, mid morning snack d’you think?

I don’t usually like featuring myself on the blog, but ah well, this picture is funny I think, I’m stuffing my face (and I need a haircut).

Yup didn’t even think twice about it. Picked up the £2.80 Pork and Stilton flavour….

Oh my gosh, the sausage roll is heavenly. Rich and intense flavours, the porkiness was full on and the stilton only added to flavour. There’s quite abit of oiliness, and the crust was crusty and crispy. It is really savoury and really, really good. I was hungry for more.

We also picked up some cheese from La Fromagerie, who informed me that I had to photograph the cheeses with at least ‘one person in the picture’. Too much trouble, no pictures of cheeses in that case. OK time to head back.

Cooking time

Ok so we had 2.5 hours to whip up a true storm, we’re team no.2, and we started with the desserts first. We’re making a trio of granitas.

That means we needed to squeeze all the juices as we can from the gooseberries, raspberries and blackberries, and then blast chill them. We had to take them out of the freezer every ten minutes to chip away at the ice crystals such that the final mix was a smooth one.

The roast beef, 45 minutes in the oven, and I think it came out pretty succesfully. But I have to give all the credit to Billy, he did all the magic. Can I just say that Billy is amazing in the kitchen. I was standing on the sidelines watching him work (no seriously, I really was) and I was so glad he was leading the way. I really am rubbish at cooking. But you know what they say, those who can’t, eat…

And here’s more of Billy doing more work, this time with the vegetables. We had very, very little time to plate up, about 8 minutes to be exact. And I was like what? how? where? huh? shitealicious? We managed to get the plates to the judges in time though. Phew. Ok, ok. Without further ado then, Team Cowfish+Eater presents…..

Starters: Seasonal Game Salad

Ok well, not quite game (we couldnt find any), but smoked duck in it’s place. The salad is rocket, land cress and sorrel, with radish shavings and crumblings of Sardinian Pecerino cheese, in a lemon balsamic dressing.

Mains: Roast beef with Trimmings

This one came out as expected. Roast beef, with butter infused carrots, roast potatoes, purple sprouting broccoli and peas.

And also, served with an oversized yorkshire pudding.

Pudding: Trio of Granitas

Raspberries, Blackcurrant and Gooseberry, garnished with mint leaves.

Clap, clap, clap. Billy, you are a true star, and you’re the real winner to me, watching you cook and working with you has been a real privilege, and I hope I wasn’t too much of a burden for ya mate.

Nope we didn’t win, but we didn’t win because everybody actually cooked really great food, and that was a good thing, as I found out when I tucked in….

and then the desserts….

All in all, it was a tiring day, but it was really fun. I felt strangely ‘fulfilled’ after it was done, and honestly, I didnt expect to win anything, but I was glad it was a wonderful experience.

And this shot, I love the most, everybody tucking in to the food. We live to eat folks, well at least I do.

And the winners are…

Tom Aikens was among the judges, and I regret not taking a picture with him, or indeed, making him sign my chest. Hm.

Thanks to all the wonderful people behind The Cookery School, whom without their help, I would just be double dipping with the same spoon, over and over again. (isn’t that multi dipping?)

Ok now on to the winners! And the runners-up….

…..The Ginger Gourmand and Chris ‘More Tea Vicar‘ Dreyfus.

Drumroll please, and the winners of Nom Nom Nom 2009….

They are The French Connection; with a team name like that, they gotta be winners.

Alright, so I hope you enjoyed the behind the scenes with Team Cowfish+Eater, clearly we lost because I spent too much time eating, rather than cooking, but hey did you expect any less?

The full set of photographs are on my flickr account here, so do check that one. That’s all folks.

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Drumroll please …. and the lucky readers who will get a copy of the Rough Guide to Food are*….

No. 17 – Little Miss Random
No. 4  – Ameea
No. 32 – The Purple Foodie
No. 25 – Sarah Spoon
No. 8 – Gudrun
*with random number generator

Congratulations folks! I’ll get in touch with you shortly to get a mailing address.

Still want to participate in another competition? Rough Guide are also running a proper one over at their website which will give you the chance to win a year’s supply of food boxes! Go check it out. Thanks to Rough Guide for the free books, and thanks to all you fine readers who participated in this, have a great weekend folks!

To keep things fair and dandy, the results from the random number generator:

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The amazing people over at Rough guides recently launched a new ’rough guide to food’ and they’ve been kind enough to offer LondonEater readers (yay, you) five free copies of the book. The Rough guide to Food aims to help average Joey Bloggs navigate their way through the wonderful world of food. There’s a wealth of useful information in there, and they have quite succintly pulled together extensive chapters on food into one pocketable read. Examples: It gives you information about which fishes being edible (or not), tells you about farming methods, a whole section on supermarkets, explains what a ‘deli’ actually is and there’s even mention of social media sites such as tipped being a good way to find local food shops/services. The final chapter gives you some starters advice on growing your own stuff (with a little chart on fruit/veg seasons) , all in all a pretty comprehensive little know-it-all book about what you and I love most (apart from the cat).

To win one, simply complete the following sentence by leaving a comment:

An Apple a day, keeps the ……

Make sure you leave your name/email address so I can contact you and arrange a delivery. I will be using a random number generator to tag the comments and so it’s all ethical and fair. I’ll do the prize draw next Friday and write a short review of the book too. 

So, leave that comment, now, please, pretty please.

PS: Rough Guide are also running a proper competition over at their website which will give you the chance to win a year’s supply of food boxes! Go check it out.

PS,PS: Bit of self promotion, would love for you to subscribe to my feed by rss or email, so you’ll be the first to know when free stuff like this comes up again in the near future.

PPPS: Ofcourse, I will ship to anywhere in the world and be creative with your comment. Cheers folks.

In the meantime, the guest posting competition with the super duper grand prize of £50 is now officially done. Over the past couple of weeks, fellow food bloggers have helped me prop up very edible guest posts on London Eater and I am eternally grateful to the foodies who chipped in. As today is finally the 11th of March, all the guests posts will now go into a voting poll. The name of the game is very simple: just vote for your favourite one of any of the eight guest posts  and I’ll pass £50 to the blogger with the most votes via paypal.

The poll will be open until 30th of March and the blogger with the most votes on that date will be £50 richer.

Not sure which one tickled your fancy? Keep reading for a quick summary of the guest posts:

1. A gen.u.ine feasting at Ambassade de L’ile [full post here]

 By Kian of Gen.u.ine.ness and it was a tour de force visit to Ambassade – the two star spot which has polarised opinion from London critics and bloggers alike. Kian said:

Amuse bouche was amusingly (sorry for the pun) served on a turf of grass. First, baked clam served in its own shell accompanied with brunoise vegetables and truffled butter. The tiny morsel of clam laid on top of a finely diced mirepoix and then topped off with a small dollop of truffled butter foam. The sweetness and slight brininess of the clam was highlighted by the grassy, tender vegetables.

2. Forays of a Finance Foodie into Chung Shin Yuan [full post here]

 This one comes from the Finance foodie and her visit to Chung Shin Yuan for a very Taiwanese breakfast. Athena said:

I figured since I was already awake, I might as well go to brunch (plus, I didn’t want to be known as “Anti-Social Athena”). When we arrived on scene, we found half of Boston’s Asian population had already beaten us. Luckily, we bribed an elderly Chinese couple ahead of us in line with a couple of kumquats and managed to nab a table at first seating.

3. 5 star foodie tucks in at The Inn [full post here]

 The five star foodie articulated this very charming write up about her visit to The Inn at Little Washington. She said:

We chose a fine Burgundy to marry with the menu’s winter flavors. Opting for the Domaine Hudelot Baillet “Les Cras” from Chambolle-Musigny, this wine tastes of delightfully concentrated bright fruit, rare for Côte de Nuits, while rich and well balanced, and thus perfectly suited for the courses to follow.

4. Chewing on the real Texas BBQ experience at the County Inn [full post here]

 The fourth entry is a very chewable entry by Hillary of the Chewonthat Blog and is a truly authentic Texas BBQ experience. Hillary said:

I ordered the beef brisket platter pictured at the top of this post and David ordered a combo of ribs, sausage and beef brisket pictured above. I’m no barbecue expert but the beef brisket was some of the most tender and tasty beef I’ve had in a long time. You could see the red smoke lines in the meat and to top it off, they doused it in their delicious barbecue sauce. I’m told Texas barbecue is infamous for the amount of sauce they use – and that’s just the way I like it.

5. Eating green and white worms in mud with The Food Site [full post here]

 This fun post is not really about actual worms in mud , rather it’s about a great Malaysian dessert made from glutinuous rice. Foong runs the excellent Food site and she says:

You know, we Chinese are a superstitious lot but when it comes to food, almost anything goes. The Chinese are known to eat anything that moves except for vehicles so when we talk about eating worms, whatever the colour, it is not really all that unusual. If the Chinese thinks eating animal penises can make them more virile, you don’t even want to know what else they eat for other so-called unproven medicinal values.

6. Fifty four miles separate me and some food for friends. [full post here]

Not only is this write up about a vegetarian restaurant, this post also only has one picture in it and the focus is on evocative writing. Jude – one half of fifty four food miles says:

Yup. But what if one (hypothetically speaking) comes to FfF with a soon-to-be ex boyfriend, in a last ditch attempt to rescue the relationship? What if one comes to FfF with one’s estranged father who has never expressed any attempt to be involved in one’s life until now? It wouldn’t so much be Food for Friends then, would it?

7. Thring for The Light with Oliver. [full post here]

 Thring for your supper! is one of my well liked blogs and I think that Ollie’s got great prose to go with great taste. In this post, he’s bashing the Light and says:

Some might argue that food isn’t the point here: the owners want an easygoing menu for pissed clubbers to nosh before a boogie. That being so, why open a restaurant at all? Why conceive a menu that can only be enjoyed – and even then, I have doubts – while drunk? Who would pay money for that kind of experience? And what kind of chef would work in such a place?

8. Dining on the Riverwalk with Hillary for one last time. [fulll post here]

 And so we have come to the last entry. This is Hillary’s second post and it’s about a cool texas bistro that does fresh guocamole in front of the diners eyes. Hillary says:

They use fresh avocadoes, fresh orange, and fresh limes. We were told some people just come and order like 8 orders of guacamole, no joke. It actually  was pretty darn addicting, but we stopped at one – we knew we had to save room for the rest of our meal.

Thank you Ollie.

Thank you Hillary.

Thank you Athena.

Thank you Kian.

Thank you Jude.

Thank you Foong.

Thank you Nathasha.

And finally thank you for continually reading London eater and also for reading my fellow foodie blogger’s blogs. We appreciate your kind attention and cannot wait to deliver more (and more) delicious content for ya. So keep coming back and we’ll keep serving them up. Hope you enjoyed this little series of guest posts, do vote for a favourite and I’ll see you back here again same time tomorrow for some sushi train bingeing.

Oh yeah.

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Aside from Texas BBQ, one of the more notable attractions in San Antonio is the Riverwalk. Many tourists like to stay on the Riverwalk (like us) so they’re close to all the restaurants and action. If the weather is right, it’s a pretty place to walk around, take a boat cruise and enjoy a relaxing delicious meal by the water.

So in my quest for San Antonio restaurant recommendations, many of you recommended Boudro’s, a Texas Bistro on the Riverwalk. It was definitely one of our considerations but the deal wasn’t quite sealed until the boat cruise tourguide recommended it as well. He said he’s never had a better meal than the ones he has had at Boudro’’s and that the prices were very reasonable, considering.

So after a relaxing boat cruise, we headed on over to Boudro’s. (On a sidenote: did you know that the San Antonio River is both natural and man-made? Maybe that will come in handy in a random facts trivia game).

But on to Boudro’s. First, let’s talk about the guacamole. Mexican cuisine definitely plays a part in this Texan bistro and they’re definitely famous for their “guacamole for two” salad that they make fresh AT your table like so:

They use fresh avocadoes, fresh orange, and fresh limes. We were told some people just come and order like 8 orders of guacamole, no joke. It actually  was pretty darn addicting, but we stopped at one – we knew we had to save room for the rest of our meal. For those of you who want to try their famous guacamole, they do give the recipe on their website. But you have to sign up, so here it is too:

Boudro’s Famous Guacamole

Ingredients

Juice of 1/4 of an orange
Juice of 1/2 a lime
1 avocado seeded and scooped out of skin
2 Tbs roasted and charred Roma tomatoes diced
1 ea Serrano pepper roasted seeded and diced
1 Tbs medium dice red onions
1 tsp chopped cilantro
coarse ground salt to taste (sea salt is better)

Directions

Squeeze juices into bowl. Add avocado and coarsely chop. Add onions, roasted tomato, serrano and cilantro fold into avocado mixture. Add salt (more is better). Result should be crudely chopped not mashed. That’s it.
To accompany our delicious guacamole, we stayed with the Mexican theme (a must in San Antonio!) and ordered prickly pear margaritas.

It had been a long long time since I had a good margarita and this was definitely a good margarita. It was made from tequila, Triple Sec, lime juice and prickly cactus pear puree. I saw this prickly pear margarita on many other restaurants’ menus too so it must be a Texas or San Antonio thing. They were so good, not to mention colorful!

And now, for our appetizer (I know, we splurged, the guacamole probably could have been a sufficient appetizer). Hanging out in other cities always brings out the adventure in me which led David and I to both try quail for the first time. They actually had an amazing quail dish for an entree but we were set on trying steak and seafood so had to rule that out. Luckily there was this quail appetizer so we could get our fix.

It looked like a tiny baby chicken sitting on a plate topped with fried parsley and served with pepperjack grits and yucca chips. The whole thing just looked fragile and sad (not the preparation – the quail itself) and I almost felt bad for eating it. But it was too late to change my mind so I took a bite. It was interesting to say the least – to me it tasted like chicken with the texture of steak – a little chewy but tender and tasty.

For one of our main courses, we ordered their signature blackened prime rib. We were tempted by  many other steaks on their menu like the  papaya marinated flank angus steak to the Texas sirloin filet with fried jalapenos, plantains and chimichurri. But in the end, we wound up succumbing to their signature item. It was served with roasted potatoes and a vegetable medley which were both good but nothing special compared to many other side items we had seen on the menu. The steak itself was cooked perfectly and tasted good, but if I’m going to be honest I would say it was very very overseasoned.

Speaking of overseasoned, our other entree had the same issue. We were quite excited for our “Big Tails, Little Tails” dish described as “Pan-seared baby lobster tail and giant Gulf shrimp smothered with spicy crawfish tails; with lemon, avocado and roasted tomatoe risotto and grilled scallions.” It sounded like a great thing to try but in the end it was simply a lobster tail and some shrimp in a very salty sauce.

Overall, my favorite part of the meal was the guacamole and margaritas. I don’t know if my taste buds opened up with the margaritas as the meal went on but everything eventually just tasted overseasoned to me. But in spite of this, I  know that Boudro’s was  undoubtedly one of the best choices for a restaurant on the Riverwalk. Dining on the bank of the river made the whole experience worth it and it was still a very memorable meal.

To view a complete dinner menu from Boudro’s, click here.

Boudro’s Texan Bistro
314 E. Commerce
Suite 402
San Antonio, TX 78205

The Light [1/5]

Restaurants invariably disappoint when attached to other things. The Disneyland diner. The burger van at the dogs. Balconies at the Royal Opera House. Of course, the trump card of such places, their snide and snickering victory, is that the trapped customers have nowhere else to go. Out, then, come the elephant foot kebabs or the patties of pulverised gristle, the preheated, lazily oleaginous mess of it all, with an apathetic shrug that seems to say, ‘What are you going to do about it?’

The Light, housed in a renovated electric light station for G.E.R., is a nightclub, bar and restaurant (the proper order, I fear) squatting at the border between the glassy City and the scruffiness of alt.Shoreditch. We’re here on some recession-wrought deal that one of our party found on the Internet. The place tries to do many things, and does most of them extremely badly. Downstairs, the oversized bar and restaurant have Hoxtonish exposed brickwork and high, uncomfortable stools, while the ‘Lounge’ disco above, the website somewhat mundanely informs us, contains a video projector that is ‘DVD, PAL, S-VIDEO Compatible’.

Nightclubs and restaurants are like oil and water. At Boundary, Terence Conran’s new opening not far from here, you eat in the basement and drink on the roof. Here, the bar and club thump sweatily beside and around the empty restaurant, with only a thin door keeping out the drunken hordes. Eating at The Light, you feel like the sailors in Das Boot, capsuled while the world clangs around you like some collapsing factory, aware that at any moment you might be struck by a torpedo or a sozzled secretary, which are much the same thing.

As a consequence of all this, the menu is a somnolent, familiar trudge. The bar serves burgers, chicken wings and the like. The restaurant is slightly more interesting, offering oxtail broth with pearl barley, or poussin with black pudding. It too, though, is fairly routine, and this wonted sort of food is difficult to do well. Custom shrinks the palate, leading to misty-eyed claims for the family’s roast dinner or microwaved Ginsters. The Light’s lamb chop with dauphinoise and courgettes, then, is going to have to be very good for people to come back for more. And its cheese board… well, I wouldn’t risk it.

Nothing we order is remotely edible. A fried duck egg on bacon brioche with purée of oyster mushrooms is a sugary, ill-considered brunch dish, the egg shiveringly congealed, the bread not even buttered. ‘Baby’ squid with a salad of baby cress and a sweet chilli dressing is even more unpleasant. Albert Steptoe is more of a baby than this squid: squelchy latex hoops with weeds and jam. A slab of pork belly terrine sags morosely beside a dead slimey creature, and has the texture of fresh cement. It too has been garnished with the chef’s evident favourite, baby cress.

Lamb chop is passably cooked, but appears beside a desiccated puck of dauphinoise heavy on potato and light on cream. Adjacent, out-of-season courgettes taste of magnolia limpness, while roast baby tomatoes, not a bad idea in themselves, flew here from somewhere far, far away and left all their flavour behind. Last and (despite stiff competition) least is what the menu describes as ‘papardelle [sic] with duck confit, wild mushrooms and truffle oil’. Each ingredient is present and flabbily incorrect, heaped above a pint of thin, muddy slop. The word ‘pappardelle’, incidentally, comes from pappare, to gobble, which I definitely don’t. What can I say for this dish? Just look at it.

Some might argue that food isn’t the point here: the owners want an easygoing menu for pissed clubbers to nosh before a boogie. That being so, why open a restaurant at all? Why conceive a menu that can only be enjoyed – and even then, I have doubts – while drunk? Who would pay money for that kind of experience? And what kind of chef would work in such a place?

By way of answer, a final note. The kitchen is essentially a cubicle at the back of the dining room, and after the starters, I trotted over to ask if I could take a few action shots. I snapped for perhaps a minute, and the chef said to me in a voice heavy with sarcasm, ‘You’re going to have an interesting photo album back home: starter, main course, pudding…’ I replied, ‘Yes, perhaps at home, or maybe even on the Internet.’ The colour drained from his face, and his sigh spoke of rage and regret in sad, equal
measure. Someone really needs to switch this place off.

The Light, 233 Shoreditch High St, London E1
Tel. +44 (0)20 7247 8989

See on the TFYS Map

Dinner for six, including drinks and service, costs £160.

I always really enjoy Ollie’s sense of humour, I actually want to go to The Light after reading this just to cure the curiousity. Well, I hope you liked this post too,  do remember to come back here on 11th March to vote for Ollie if you liked his post. Till then, why not thring for your supper!

Review: Food for Friends
17-18 Prince Albert Street, Brighton, BN1 1HF, 01273 202 310.

Brighton is an undeniably good place to be a vegetarian: it doesn’t make you a social leper; in fact as a meat eater you often find yourself in the minority in pub-table conversation.

Not surprising then, that Brighton (which now boasts nationally acclaimed veggie spots such as Terre à Terre, for example) was a suitable place to open Food for Friends – the city’s first vegetarian eatery – in 1981; a time when ‘I’m vegetarian’ provoked ‘a what?’ rather than ‘what kind?’ from people. Lactose / gluten-intolerant weren’t common phrases in those days of yore.

But, Food for Friends, as a restaurant name? For an old cynic like me it forces an eyebrow skywards. Its name is telling me that my experience will be joyous, wholesome, filled with laughter as my close-knit group of friends and I (yes we’ve had our downtimes! Yes, we’ve had our clashes and rivalries and love-disasters! But we’re through that!) raise a toast to our little cluster of amicable and honest companionship.

Yup. But what if one (hypothetically speaking) comes to FfF with a soon-to-be ex boyfriend, in a last ditch attempt to rescue the relationship? What if one comes to FfF with one’s estranged father who has never expressed any attempt to be involved in one’s life until now? It wouldn’t so much be Food for Friends then, would it?

I like the restaurant to provide good food, good service and good atmosphere but not to dictate my good experience in terms of the company I choose to keep. Nonetheless, I’d heard good things from my colleagues and friends about the place so I decided to take (well, be taken by) my parents (the estranged father thing was hypothetical – my own life ain’t half so interesting) on their recent visit to Brighton.

So, one point down for the name. But on picking up the phone, that’s when the plus points starting stacking up in FfF’s favour. First point: person-on-other-end is chatty and friendly on the phone, despite the last minute booking on a Friday evening. No Beatles references when I give my first name. My cynical eyebrow starts drooping.

Second point: the restaurant exudes warmth. As we pull up to its doors (in a taxi! It’s with my parents and the walk Hove-to-Brighton was a bit much to subject them to after a long day at work and an hour and half drive, complete with traffic jam) the logic behind its corner location in the Lanes is clear. Inviting light spills out from the windows and we want to be inside. So in we go.

Coats helpfully taken, we peruse the menu and time is given as we make slow choices. I remember that it’s from my parents I learnt the habit of ordering something different from the other diners – we hastily changes choices as we discover that someone else is going for the original selection.

For my mum, vegetarian eating can be tricky. While she often cooks vegetarian (Moosewood is her bible) she doesn’t like detests mushrooms, and doesn’t much care for tomato dominated dishes. But she’s getting extremely excited by her choice of butternut squash filo parcel.

Meanwhile, I’m getting excited by both mine and my dad’s choices. His – sweet potato and coconut curry and mine – a stuffed portobello mushroom.

Given we’ve splurged on a taxi (parking in Brighton is impossible) we share abottle of red – details of which get forgotten as we gasp at our food – apologies. Point down for reviewer.

We skipped starters and desserts but opted for a basket of perfectly oiled focaccia: eaten to last crumb after my mum meticulously divided the last two pieces – it didn’t come divisible by three.
The mains come well-presented and generous, and in true family tradition we all try each others (my mum shunning my mushroom of course). Her filo crisp on the fork, kissing the juicy squash and crunchy cashews (pronounced csh-sew rhyming with the sneeze-sound, in our family).

Meanwhile my dad’s curry is creamy on its bed of pilaf rice, cooled by the cucumber riata. And me… I slowly and delicately select pieces of meaty mushroom and rich feta and dip them in nutty pesto. I’m savouring.
Wine finished, and meals devoured, I’m losing count of all those positive points. FfF has delivered some truly culinary joy – ‘vegetarian’ as an adjective is redundant. The food is fine food. Enough said.

A couple of gripes – my dad’s glass of wine is poured with sediment; and the waiter seems a little eager to fill our glasses when we’ve only had a few sips and to press another bottle on us (declined). But on the whole, service is good.

So, well-fed, we tumble back out into the cold – my initial scepticism at FfF’s name long forgotten. It’s just as much food for families (and I suppose we are friends too), including those like mine, who like to spend ages choosing, eat each other’s food, pronounce cashew in a weird way, and divide the bread up very very fairly.

We ate:

(to start) a daily selection of breads served with extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar: £3.45
(her) filo parcel with roasted butternut, cashew nuts, spinach and caramelised onion on a mandarin and mango salad with mirin and chilli dressing: £10.95
(him) roasted sweet potato, butternut squash, cashew and coconut curry with herbed spinach brown basmati pilaf, cucumber riata and spicy vegetable crisps: £10.95
(me) portobello mushroom stuffed with feta, sun dried tomatoes and pine nuts with sweet potato wedges, fine beans with a pesto sauce topped with creme fraiche: £11.95

I really appreciated this one especially when it came to the description of creamy curry, yummy… if you loved this guest post, do come back here on the 11th of March and vote vote vote. Fiftyfourfoodmiles is now serving here.