I do not remember Bristol as having so many hills... is this perhaps a key indicator of increasing age? I remember Clifton largely for the virulence of the cider at the Coronation Tap during the 1970's and I am pleased to say that while there are now plenty of food-shops, delis and restaurants there is still mischief to be had in a selection of fine public houses. Taking on a ruined listed building and trying to make good use of it while retaining its character is the sort of project that crops up weekly on that television programme Grand Design. You know, the show with Kevin McCloud shaking his head at the huge budget overspends and despairing owners that are brave enough to fire their architects. At the Lido in Clifton the owners are pretty perky, they have turned a Victorian swimming pool dating from 1849 into a bar/restaurant/cafe over two floors, added a spa and retained a chic and slick swimming pool.
Weighing in at 2.9 kilos, David Thompson's latest book "Thai Street Food" is large enough and beautiful enough to give any cook pause for thought. It's an epic tome, take the entry for Pandanus Layer Cake – the "preamble" and "method" for this cake runs to a tad over 700 words. As David says in the preamble "The Pandanus Layer Cake demands a level of commitment, not only is it an acquired taste, but it also takes some time to prepare". So there you have it, this is a difficult recipe and you may not like the cake you end up with!
It sounds implausible but the Bangladeshi Catering Association is celebrating its 50th Anniversary. On 10th October there was a fine dinner (catered by Madhu's of Southall), many speeches and a host of awards recognising the excellence of the 12,000 curry houses in Britain. Here is my contribution to the glossy Anniversary brochure....
Both as a journalist and as a food critic I have always ha
All that stuff about eating well in England by eating breakfast three times a day is wrapped around a kernel of truth. There is something joyfully self-indulgent about sitting down to a full English breakfast – and all too often the only time we allow ourselves this luxury is when we are staying in a hotel. Whoever may be paying, the prospect of not taking up the hotel on the breakfast part of the Bed and Breakfast contract seems wasteful. All of which means that I could describe my recent trip to the sprawling but feisty East Midlands Food Festival as an objective survey of Leicestershire breakfasts.
It's getting on for sixteen years since Fergus Henderson and Trevor Gulliver took over a derelict smokehouse near Smithfield and changed it into a rather stark white-painted restaurant called St John. Then it was another fifteen years before the Michelin men noticed what an important restaurant it was and gave it a star. Few chefs have done so much for the reputation of British cooking as Fergus, he has the happy knack of making the traditional seem up-to-the-minute and a steely honesty about cooking and flavours. In a world of telly chefs Fergus is about cooking rather than camping it up.
Even as I write, learned academics are doubtless putting the finishing touches to their theories about the nature of the credit-crunch crisis. The trouble is that when they refer to "double dip" they are not talking about an ice cream cone and two lots of sprinkles, but I dare say that someone out there is busily correlating our need to eat sugar with the adverse times. Chocolate may soothe on a personal level but in the "macro" arena nothing short of a return to home baking will do. Sod the overdraft, let us eat cake. Let cakes be the next big thing. Let's see television programmes about baking...
For nearly twenty years I have been meaning to go to the Monkey House, a place spoken about in hushed tones by some of the most hardened topers I know. This hostelry's proper name is the Cider House at Woodmancote and it is a bit of living history. There is no bar (you drink in the garden in summer and under a bit of a lean-to in winter or when it rains) and there is cider for sale.
NEWSFLASH More shameless self-publicity! I had the great pleasure of making an entire episode of Radio Four's Food Programme on the much neglected subject of "Pork Scratchings"! It airs on Sunday 15th August – 12.30pm and repeats on Monday 16th August - 4pm.
"Cymru Gwir Flas" – each year the True Taste of Wales Awards sees a gathering of foodies and technical experts to judge the Welsh food and drink Oscars. It is a good opportunity to see what's new and to reward what is excellent. What's more for someone who spends a lot of time in London, it was interesting to see many old friends and catch up on the gossip. One of the other judges was legendary Italian chef Franco Taruschio...
After a period when he turned a warehouse appartment on the Kingsland Road into a wildly successful super club, Nuno Mendes is now steering Viajante to glory. This restaurant is improbably located in the former town hall at Patriot Square E2. Mendes is a charming, quiet, considered sort of chef. He has a red hot pedigree – time at El Bulli, his own place Bacchus in Hoxton, then "The Loft Project
There's nothing like a good birthday party to gladden the heart and in a world where the life expectancy of restaurant projects seems to be declining steeply 20 years is a real milestone. When Chutney Mary opened the aim was to offer the kind of Anglo-Indian food that was enjoyed by Brits during the Raj and the menu listed dishes like Country Captain. Gradually the emphasis changed and now the restaurant specialises in regional Indian cooking and has a brigade headed by six chefs each from a different region.
