About a year ago, a new kind of Italian restaurant swept into the smoke. It moved the goal posts, threatened the old guard and breathed new life into this country’s image of Italian cuisine. And it was mightily affordable. The decor bare, yet efficient, the service regimental yet friendly, the food simple but quite majestic. In its relatively short existence, it had won many fans, I count myself amongst that group, but the better half is the truly fervent follower. She has been back at least once every two months and has witnessed the cooking inch ever so slowly toward perfection. Like a finely tuned orchestra, each cog is a marvel to the senses, working together to pump out masterpiece after masterpiece. I was with a table of four and a half, and I was glad to see the energy and the smell of roasted coffee beans still filled the atmosphere inside this restaurant. The menu was still as brief as the A4 it was printed on. A smatter of antipasti dishes, fish, cheese, Italian ham; a couple of pasta dishes, a meat ragu and one with mushrooms; grilled fish fillets and meat chops. The memory of my first couple of meals at Zucca last year, lingered like a good summer fling, fuelling my appetite as I sat down to order. However, as this meal progressed, it was obvious that
£46 may sound like a steep price, but I assure you, it is one of the best investments you will make, when you are looking for something to fill that gaping void when you are feeling utterly ravenous. The proposition in question is the £46 buffet at the 4th floor restaurant inside the guts of Harrods. Yes, it’s that sprawling space past the pet section, with the autopiano running off epic Chinese ballads, and the occasional Whitney Houston belter. The all-you-can-eat includes unlimited return trips of roast rib of beef, leg of lamb or turkey, and occasionally fish (though I didn’t see any) , plus all the trimmings you can afford to pile on to your plate without the mountain of food collapsing before you get back to your table. Not to mention the myriad of salads, cold cured meats, cold seafood, cheese and fruit. This is what I managed on the first trip: Roast lamb, and roast beef and yorkshire puds, gravy and carrots … all on the same plate. Mmmm. But where we got our pennies worth were these superb king prawns… …. some of the juiciest giant shellfish ever to grace a free for all buffet. Seriously, these things could easily pass for £3 a pop at a Caprice outfit or a Hart brothers restaurant. The missus and I kept going back for more and more of
All together now : Medlar is the best new restaurant of 2011. I said it, and I’d love for you guys to agree with me because I love this place to bits. The cooking is eye-wateringly sensational, the pricing is mind boggling slender, service is shy yet charming and the ambiance is that of the perfect neighbourhood restaurant. I’ve not been this excited about a neighbourhood restaurant for a long time coming and I could only thing of one place to visit for my birthday, last weekend. This time, I took with me, a couple of serial restaurant goers in Mark and Carina, who are such, out of necessity because of work, and obviously because they enjoy the lifestyle, and my better and more skeptical half. 12 courses (that’s 3 x 4 palates) later and we were all largely in agreement : Medlar is brilliant. I am a firm believer that great dishes rely upon the individual aspects being cooked correctly. The basics have got to be right, since each element acts like a building block, so that when it’s all assembled, it has the best chance of becoming more than the sum of its parts. Everywhere we sniffed and licked, we were greeted with slick cooking. Take the most basic dish we were served for example, the triple cooked chips, and the in-house whipped béarnaise. Dipping the crusty chips
… yeah it really is, quite special. This must be my sixth visit, and everytime I’ve been back, I alternate between two of – what is quickly becoming – my favourite snacks: The ground beef & bone marrow slider and the gooey truffle egg toast. Most of the menu is fabulous, the panzenella (a kind of stale bread and tomato salad) , the mac & cheese, the cheddar grits and the PB&J pudding, are entirely edible. But I think I like it because it’s so accessible, you can drop in, have a swift bite and a short measure of meantime ale, enjoy the food and the speakeasy-esque ambiance, and the 50s harmonica laden background noise and be on your way again. I’ve come in here by myself a few times, and I’ve seen a few people do the same. Places such as these, where you can pop in for a snack are few and far between, and I cherish it for this very reason. Also it’s only but a stone’s throw from Gelupo.. who have started to bring back their Zabione gelato again, which I really appreciate! Basically, this is my Friday afternoon routine, ie, lunch at Spuntino, followed by dessert at Gelupo. Four months since it opened it’s dusty doors, I think its become a unique part of the London dining scene, and of course, a unique landmark in
Earlier this year I wrote about the largely underrated Nizuni in Charlotte Street. A Japanese restaurant, with a Korean accent in its cooking, it is owned by the same people who operate the crowd pleasing Koba, which is incidentally close by. So I returned for a quiet Friday night dinner to celebrate the coming weekend, and was largely impressed with the sushi, fairly priced, well portioned, not particularly groundbreaking, but the fish they use are of a reasonably high quality and the maki (sushi rolls) are fairly large. Salmon Skin Roll (£4.50) and Negi-Toro Roll (£5.50). Crispy salmon skin centre and juicy fatticilious chopped tuna belly. Rock and roll. Chu-Toro, (£3.50 each) and Chicken Gyozas (£4.70). Superb medium fat tuna belly, firm, yet fleshy, yet fatty, tender, fragrant and melt-in-the-mouth fantastic. One immediately wonders where they get their fish from. At times, I feel that a good chu-toro beats otoro for the balance of flavour, with the latter being too oily, too rich and generally too fatty for certain palates. I suppose it’s like choosing between a sirloin (better balance of texture + flavour) versus a ribeye (more fat, more sinews). On a rather serious note, I probably shouldn’t be supporting the over indulgence of tuna belly – in particular bluefin tuna – since this very act contributes to the overall decline of the humble species. On that topic,
I really like Leather Lane over lunch hours, because it converts into an electric street market, overflowing with people. It’s like a crack in the universe peering into an alternate world, where Holborn is cool, eclectic, and entirely down with the kids. It is especially special to me, because it’s also home to a very awetastic permanent mobile food cart, which – in my opinion – serves one of the best steak burritos in London. Mucholy hot if you get the burrito with hot salsa. Yowza. Lunchtimes in Leather Lane can get very cramped, extremely bustly and chocked full of life. Topless construction workers woo at passerbirds, women haggling over pashminas, and whatever garments that catches their eye. Legend has it that the Leather Lane street market has nearly 100 years of history. On the topic of history, London was once the capital of coffee sniffing accompanied by a good dose of gentlemanly debate. Affectionately, these coffeehouses were called Penny Universities, as it only costed patrons a penny to enter – referring to the total egalitarian nature of its clientele – which meant anyone from whatever societal class were able to exchange minds on whatever issues they wished to talk about. Of course, not very long ago, the very concept resurfaced when Square Mile roasters decided to create a pop-up brew bar, calling it the Penny University last year.
Hello Meat, I’m back. It’s been six months since I was last here. And my information gathering has returned the following: John had left the Josper to pursue new charcoaled pasteurs in Swindon… and is possibly back at Maddox St… , Dave S is still the smooth operator, and Goodman Mayfair is still ever overbooked. It remains my favourite place to go for a steak dinner in the city, and I am very glad to say the Josper grilled, charcoalised, blood filled sensteaktions are still my paramour. Food wise, sex wise, I mean, you know what I mean. Please excuse the vulgarity, it’s meat afterall. As per usual, I always request for a bespoke cut of meat, on the bone, and have it served sliced, and to be shared. I have since come up with a formula to figure out how much each table requires: Firstly, to figure out the weight you should order, apply Kang’s Standard Equation of Meat: 150 + 200 x (n1) + 300 x (n2) + 400 x (n3) replace n1, n2, n3 with number of persons who fall in the categories according to the key below : Key: 150 – weight of bone, n1 – number of ladies on table, n2 – number of gentlemen, n3 – number of men with impossibly large guts. eg: if table of three contains 2 ladies and a large
Unless you have been living under the proverbial rock that requires abstination from evil things such as sex, alcohol and greasy chips, you would have otherwise heard about the gospel of The Meatwagon. Unfortunately, the wagon was stolen late last year, so in early 2011, Yianni Papoutsis – aka Blighty’s one true burger king – had reassigned his team at the first floor of a closed down pub, in New Cross Gate. The pub had offered its space, as it is in the middle of its refurbishment plans. Yianni’s intention is to be able to secure enough funds to get a new van to roll out for the summer. And thus, #MEATEASY was born. And it’s fucking brilliant. Very rough around the edges, but we don’t mind of course, because we love quirky and egalitarian, rage against the guerilla dives. Upon arrival, you are given a ticket, and then it’s a mad scramble to find a spare seat at the cramped space, as you study the menu scrawled across the wall. The first time I went was a Thursday night at 9, and we didn’t eat till 11. So we spent all our cash on the £7 cocktails and £3 beers. Rum swizzlers aplenty. But when the food arrived, oh my giddy Uncle Bob, it was certainly worth the long wait. As expected, the menu is not for vegetarians, their
If somehow you missed it the first time round in ’10, make sure you don’t miss it now. The patty is grounded Scotch chuck and is supplied and prepared fresh by Darragh O’Shea in his Knightsbridge shop. His Irish Angus steaks are – as you know – amongst my favourite choices for steak, and his Big D patty (which can also be bought at his shop for home-a-flamin’) is well regarded. It is big, like 8oz big, 30% larger than the standard Bryon patty, and is simply awetastic. You must have it medium rare, and you must have it with cheese. Better bloody and juicy than dry and overdone. It does become overcooked very easily, and at that state, it is not better than the standard Byron patty. If you fear bloody centred minced beef, well this would be the perfect opportunity to conquer it. It’s a high quality mince – not quite hand chopped tartare – but O’Shea’s dry aged stock are about as good as it gets in terms of British Isles beef. So you shouldn’t need to worry about an upset tummy, unless of course you’re one of these people who cannot physically handle slightly undercooked food. My dad is one such person. I forgot to get cheese with mine during this visit, which means I need to go again on the weekend. My goto Byron cheese
Yes… the blog has been rather slow lately because I am still travelling in Asia. I’m on my annual leave to celebrate Chinese New Year. I must say, I am itching to get back to London, especially to meet my reservation at Heston’s Dinner at the Mandarin Oriental. Thus far, I have refrained from reading any GB media about perhaps the most hyped up restaurant opening in recent memory, until after I try it for myself… and of course you can expect a blogpost from me, to follow shortly after. Ohh, also the Byron Big D February Special is still rolling and rolling and I can’t wait to get back to that as well. Yesterday, I was quite pleased to have received a mention in The Times, this time around, not in the The Table supplement, rather in the non-food related Daily Universal Register section instead. Also the paper’s original name when it was founded, I believe. Yep, I am a proud subscriber to The Times. So I had the distinct pleasure of sampling Singaporean food for the last couple of days, including the high nose stuff like Iggy’s (2010′s 28th entry on the World Top 50, eh.) and Shinji. However, I stopped short of going all the way at Waku Ghin (which is Tetsuya Wakuda of Tetsuya’s Sydney fame) , as my eyeballs popped into the stratosphere after
Let me just reiterate, if you don’t already know this : Cambio de Tercio has been my favourite London restaurant for many years, and in 2011, it remains my favourite. I had written exhaustive love letters in the past, expressing my true feelings regarding the superb work of CdT. I shant preach to the converted… but I could not help not sharing the photographs of my most recent meal at this fabulous restaurant. On this occasion, snapshots of – in my opinion – their strongest dishes. Needless to say, I found little to criticise, I love the food, the presentation, the balance of flavours, the attention to temperature and texture, and especially the boisterous service. You may or may not know this, but I am travelling in South East Asia as I write this. I do plan to update the site as frequently as the 3G connection will permit while out here. 30C night and day baby. Deconstructed omellette ‘El Bulli’ Recipe. Like whipped potato, with cream, sugar and eggs. I never had the pleasure to try the El Bulli version, but this was cool. Foie gras, muscat jelly and bitter chocolate. The foie gras was sweet and smooth, emphasised by the chocolate and then brought to life with the sting of the jelly. We liked this, but a tad too sweet to start, almost like a savoury creme brulee
I revamped my food photography portfolio for 2011 with a series of images that were taken completely inside the various restaurants that I had visited throughout 2009 and 2010. You might even recognise some dishes in these photographs. The photographs are presented
The sheer volume of blogposts on Bob Bob Ricard throughout 2010 made the interwebs quite a homogeneous place to read about new things. For a moment in time, BBR was perhaps the trendiest all day, all-booth, Anglo diner in London, complete with
Are you still stuck on plans for the festive break? I almost forgot that I had filed away this experience till I rummaged through my archives. While we were still sweltering in July, I – very enthusiastically – accepted an invitation to preview the Christmas menu
London is blessed with many a handsome weekend market, all of which are worth a visit. The beauty is that food is sometimes incidental, at Broadway for instance, antiques and boutiques have their rightful stalls in the market as well. It makes for a wonderful atmosphere,
I swear, this is the last time I’m posting photos from a meal at Shiori…. so good…. So I believe I’ve tried everything on the Shiori menu now (not the tonkatsu or kaarage) , this set of photos are from my 3rd visit, and I’ve been four times. The canape sushi at £23 deserves your attention, however if you are spoilt by choice, then the omakase is a good place to start with Shiori. I’ve had their omakase (the chef’s choice menu) at £30, £40 and £50, and have found the £40 to be happy median. Having said that, the £50 omakase was pure decadence. I’m mentioning prices, because that’s what you need to decide when you call to book, and you’ll need to because the sushi bar can only accomodate nine people at any one time. I wrote two exhaustive reviews which cover more details, if you want to know more : First review ; Second review. This blog post is just photos of the seven courses you get from a £50 omakase. Needless to say, I love Sushi of Shiori. Course 1: Abalone, enoki and spinach You can tell that the £50 menu is serious, when they serve luxury seafood as an appetizer. Ponzu zestiness, soya sauce, refreshing stuff. Course 2: Okra soup This was REALLY interesting. Chopped up okra, served cold, with all the slimy, gooey goodness
Everybody loves Korean food no? The burning red chilli paste, the lively sting of properly fermented kimchi, the hot, hot soups. Mmm, as I’m sure many of you have already done, like me, you’ve been frequenting Koba to top-up on the kimchi pancake cravings
It has taken me about a year to visit Bea’s in Bloomsbury, but I’m glad I finally made it. This tour de force bakery, cake house, coffee & tea shop produces top notch sugary things from their massive kitchen on site on a daily basis. Needless to say,
Twenty quid doesn’t go too far in London, maybe two courses. Three if it’s a michelin-on-a-budget. On the otherhand, the Taiwanese have perfected the art of amazingly affordable fine dining on half a shoe string. Back in February, I was over in Taipei for
I remember the early days when Byron was the new kid on the block, did sliders and was firmly a West London thing. I didn’t think much of them back then, but all that’s change. I am a little amazed that some of my friends still haven’t tried a Byron yet. There are now ten locations spread across the most densely populated parts of town, while they maintain a reticent philosophy to burgers and life, each branch has its own individual character. I’m not going to pontificate about burgers – I know very little about them to be quite honest (I remain un-shacked) – but I do visit a Byron at least once every month (actually, I now use it as an incentive to go running) and I just love them to bits. The charred beefiness… ohh… I am a gruyère, medium rare with skinny chips. My local is Gloucester Road, but I like the new Old Brompton branch, a little further away from me, which opened last month. However, my favourite is the Intrepid Fox in Soho. Just ambiance I mean, burgers are consistent across the board, it’s a franchise afterall. Let’s see now, I have been to the High Street Ken one, Westfield, Gloucester Road, Old Brompton Road, Intrepid Fox, Covent Garden…. but have never been to the Canary Wharf, Islington, Kings Road or Kingston ones. As an
The man is almost too beautiful to be a chef. As we ended the meal, I told our waiter to give our...
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