Category: One Michelin Star

Alyn Williams at the Westbury

“..surrounded by the greatest wines of the world..” The dining room is relatively small and is intimidating as it is posh, as the website’s official photographs suggest. Built around the ‘wine salon’, the restaurant’s private room takes up to 8 people and is encased by…

Tim Ho Wan, Mong Kok: Stressed Sum.

Rain washes down the windscreen. The cloudy, darkened skies forcing the afternoon traffic to dance the immobile jiggle of halogen lamps. As we inched closer toward Mong Kok, I piped up and said to the taxi driver : “You can stop here …I think”. He…

Chez Bruce : The Old Guard.

… I write to you as I lie on the blackened brown beach in Brunei. It overlooks the oil rigs just off the coast that fuels the economy of this tiny Sultanate on the Northeast coast of Borneo Island, and behind me, my parents’ backyard.…

The Sportsman: Genuine Article.

This is what you see when you arrive at The Sportsman. Perhaps this is the secret to the good cooking since this is also the view from Stephen Harris’ kitchen. I’m sure you must have heard about this place by now, quite literally every blog…

North Road: Smoke gets in your eyes.

I have never been to Denmark, with the way things are going with the rise and rise of Rene Redzepi, it looks like it will be a long while before I contemplate the Copenhagen trip. It doesn’t mean I’m not curious (obviously I am), you…

Hedone

Thoughts from 2012 Yes, I need to be slapped on the wrist, and I do hope Mikael Jonsson will accept my apologies if what I said before had grated in the past, but I gotta say, I’m not in it to run people down. I’m…

Pollen Street Social: Memories of Maze

5000. How do you even track that? Did they fill up three, four, ten books of names, numbers and dates? It is an insurmountable number, consider someone hanging by the phone to take 5000 calls in a continuous 24 hours period, which works out as…

Deceptively Semplice.

When I think about spending big on meals, where multiple stars are involved, I think French, I think Japanese, I think miniscular gastronomy, water-bathed, raw and beetroot. Rarely does the thought of an expensive Italian meal ever cross my mind anymore these days. I put…

Zafferano : Classic Italian Institution.

If ever there was a restaurant synonymous with the term institution, that restaurant could well be Zafferano. Entering its sixteenth year of service, it is regarded by all of us, as one of the key purveyors of high Italian cuisine, in London. It boasts a…

Reintroducing Murano by Angela Hartnett

Those of you interested in Angela Hartnett’s (MBE) progression as a chef, rejoiced at the news that she has finally left Gordon Ramsay to make her own name, though truth be told, the charismatic chef has already built a formidable reputation over the years. There…

Harwood Arms: West London Pub Galore

No doubt you will have read the multitude of pieces extolling the virtues of this greatest of London pubs. The pub’s shiny Michelin win, was both a surprise and a seal of approval that solidified its status as the epitome of pub grub in London.…

Texture: Deliciously unfamiliar.

Texture is the brainchild of Icelandic born Chef Agnar Sverrisson and French born sommolier Xavier Rousset. Butter and cream, I’m told, are not involved in the Icelandic-inspired recipes. Winner of a michelin star in 2010, Texture is one part of the ascendency of Nordic cuisine.