Andy Lynes

Did you know that wife of multi-millionaire art dealer and mother of two Nigella is so busy, in such a rush that she doesn't even have time to take her coat of before she starts cooking! Imagine, what a life she must lead! And then, guess what? Only the creative director of the BBC turns up unannounced for supper - and she's got virtually nothing in her corner shop-sized pantry to give him! Despite having slipped through a hole in time and space and landed up in the middle of a 1970's sitcom, she uses all her culinary creativity and whips up a tray bake of haloumi and sausage and everyone laughs. Hurrah! It was so easy, so effortless, so express!!! And then a girlfriend rings up and invites herself round for Saturday lunch and Nigella has only got a plain old chicken. What can she do!! Its just a chicken - she can't give a girlfriend just chicken, are you completely mental!! Luckily she has this fab recipe for golden dressing. Making a dressing? But won't that mean more dull old washing up? No, because you make it in a three quarters empty mustard jar. Brilliant. And if you haven't got a three quarters empty jar of mustard, just get a whole jar and throw three quarters of it away - brilliant!!

You certainly could!

No way was that burger "two fingers" thick by the time they'd finished with it- two hands would have been closer. Quite an interesting show I thought, but why go to that immense time and trouble grinding your own burger meat and laying it out a particular way as it comes through the machine; spending 3 months (3 'ucking months!!!) finding a suitable bun recipe and creating home made cheese slices and tomato sauce, only to use crappy jarred mayo, squeezy mustard and iceberg lettuce with no explanation why. It undermines the whole process in my view. If you're going to ask viewers to suspend disbelief for 30 minutes and go with the idea that, for example, a tv crew really needs to spend licence fee money on traveling to New York in order to cook a burger then you've at least got to maintain the internal logic for the duration of the programme. If you're going to go to Holland to discover if Heston's bites of a burger are the same size each time (as Heston's mouth stays the same size throughout the eating process I reckon there's a bloody good chance that he might) then you've really got to explain why you've ended up with a gigantic burger when you we're aiming for a much slimmer one. Maybe the programme makers should watch a couple of episodes of Mythbusters to see how well popular science can be done.

Tyler's Ultimate meets Alton Brown.

My meal at Fishes earlier this year was quite expensive and disappointing. OK if you want to spend your Saturday night hugger mugger with the Kensington and Chelsea set and their kids down for the weekend in their holiday homes, chowing down on plateau des fruits de mer, drinking expensive Burgundy and shouting at each other. Front of house seemed over stretched and the food was good but nothing special. Can't say I'll be rushing back.

Info at Ramsay website

Substituting one cep rice dish for one cep pasta dish would not have brought the kitchen to its knees. A perfectly reasonable request in my opinion, especially if there were six empty tables.

What's he going to do between leaving West in December and opening at the Georgia in Oct 2009 - that's what I want to know!

Jay Rayner cuts through the richness to get to the The heart of the matter.

A chef, feeding people? The sheer bloody nerve of it!

Well, the menu reads very grown up - apart from the foie gras happy meal with free toy of course.

That's really quite a unique achievement.

Is that a good or bad thing? Could you give an example of a dish to explain what you mean - are we talking lots of purees or something?

Charles Campion

New Website including launch menu.

Here's the meal that I enjoyed back in July - some of this is off menu: Amuse, Vichyssoise of lovage, salt Pollock mousse, olive oil poached Pollock. Seared scallop, Jerusalem artichoke puree, globe artichokes. Cornish lobster , cauliflower puree,raw cauliflower, hickory smoked almonds and bladder campion. Line caught sea bass, squid trotter and tomato confit compote, sea purslane. Kid cannelloni, land cress puree, goats curds. Wood pigeon, warm salad of turnips,seared brisket and Hereford snails, hazelnut emulsion. Cinderford lamb, pea puree, peas, onion braised with eucalyptus. Rose geranium scented rice pudding, English raspberries, lemon verbena ice cream. Molasses parfait, bergamot cream, orange and liquorice sorbet. It was certainly one of the best meals I've had so far this year and may well end up as No 1 of 2007. David E-M is in a class of his own in my opinion and as gingerchef says, somehow he just keeps on getting better all the time.

Pierre Koffmann has been confirmed as one of the guests chefs at the Food and Wine festival at Nortcote Manor 21-27 January 2008. It hasn't been annouced which night he will cook on as yet. The other names are: Angela Hartnett Mark Edwards Shaun Rankin (Bohemia, Jersey) Shane Osborn Philip Howard Nigel Haworth

From my own equally extremely limited hotel experience, I would agree.

Yes - Texture website.

Chitterlings are good, the Welsh rarebit is unmissable (you can have it as a side if you like) as is the eccles cake. The desserts are very good - the apple and Calvados trifle on the current menu sounds cracking (haven't had it myself though). I popped in for coffee at the bar earlier this week. While we were waiting to be served, the waitress prepared two glasses of Fernet Branca mixed with creme de menthe for a couple of restaurant customers. It was 3.00pm on Monday afternoon.

They're in at the deep end! They're fish out of water! They've only got one week to learn how to run a restaurant otherwise Raymond Blanc's going to fucking kill them. They're all living together in a bloody big house - will they get on, will they fight? Will they leave their dirty pants on the floor? Look, here comes Raymond, he's got a challenge "Feed the whole of Oxfordshire now with no money or food or cooker. DO IT!" They go to TESCO, run around a bit, walk out and come back in again under the sign that says TESCO. There's an inspector "Hm, you're not very good are you. Call yourselves restaurateurs?" "No actually. We're total novices and therefore crapping it big time." "Times up - you failed and therefore won't win someone else's restaurant which is handy as they're going to reopen it in 6 weeks time themselves." Roly Keating, Controller, BBC TWO "As well as providing an insight into the food that is served on our plates, (The Restaurant) will reveal the harsh realities of the restaurant business."

Not actually Paul himself, but his press agent.

They're gonna be from London, probably.

A source close to Paul Kitching contacted me with the following information: "Paul is not going to appear. It’s true he was approached and we had discussions with Optomen at a pretty high level, but both parties agreed it wasn’t quite the right vehicle for him."

When he's pontificating away in that rather strange manner of his, Marco reminds me a bit of Jimmy Saville. Both from Leeds aren't they?