Andy Lynes

Will you be reviewing it anytime soon? I want to know if it's going to be worth £100.00 a head food costs alone or not.

This thread should explain all http://forums.egullet.org/ibf/index.php?ac...b31e9330d9e8dfe

Why not La Tante Claire? Reservations are easy to come by apperently and it will be history on 21 December so get in whilst it's still open. Otherwise Bibendum is a very safe bet, beautiful room, great wine list, terrific service and by no means least wonderful gutsy food. Offal 'n' onion rings, what could possibly be better?

Bapi, excellent post, thanks for taking the time to write in such detail.

It's just a saying, I have no statistical evidence to hand with which to back this up.

I forgot the "h" in pheasant. Sorry. The other starter was a brochette of belly pork and scallops with a tomato and cuecumber chutney BTW.

Yet another lunch at Bibendum, this time for my mother-in-laws birthday. The price is back up to £25.00 a head and despite the recent loss of Jamie Younger to Teatro, the food was as splendid as ever. Starters of duck terrine, a dish of hot smoked salmon, poached egg, crepe parmentier and buerre blanc and one other which I have forgotten, were excellent as were mains of peasant with juniper sauce, creamed cabbage and its own sausage, salmon wrapped in proscuttio with herb rissotto and a magnificant plate of kidneys, sauce soubise and onion rings. Side dishes of gratin dauphinoise, new potatos and chard were inclusive in the price. Desserts of Iced Zabaglione parfait with caramel sauce and poached pear, mulled red wine jelly, butter cake and creme chantilly were top drawer stuff. We drank champagne, a bottle of 1997 Verdecchio, some beers, coffee, tea, water and a dessert wine for a little under £170.00 including service. The room looked lovely decked out in it's winter garb of red chair covers (but to the disappointment of one Chandos Elletson, editor of Restaurant magazine, who was enjoying a steak at the corner table and who told me he had come specificaly to see the blue chair covers against the stained glass windows for a restaurant design article he was researching. He hadn't realised the covers are changed with the seasons. He was off to the Connaught next, for some dessert I expect).

My understanding is that the hotel wanted the kudos of a 3 star chef. Koffmann has arguably been on a slide since he moved there, being demoted to 2 stars straightaway. He now only scores 3 rosettes in the AA and 8 in the good food guide. Wareing on the otherhand is on the way up, almost certain to get a second star in January, and gagging for his third. Koffmann has allegedly had problems with the management from the minute he moved in, with an arguement over LTC being used as a breakfast room for the hotel being reported in Caterer. Perhaps things never really settled down for him there.

Here a link to the caterer report http://www.caterer.com/news/articledetail....articleID=45645 . No details on the exact date, but I suppose that depends on whether or not they refurbish.

I too would like to be able to fid the OED online, but I just can't work out how.

WD40. When can you ever lay your hands on a can when you need one? I'd bet you'd shift dozens.

Macrosan - I had lunch at Bibendum on Tuesday and for dessert I had Mulled Red Wine Jelly, Poached Pears, Creme Chantilly and Butter Cake. It was fantastic. (I'll write up the full meal elsewhere later).

Vanessa - Fat Duck gets 8 out of 10, one of only 8 restaurants in the guide to do so. That must put it in the top 1%. If LML doesn't mind me saying, I think you are safe to take his comments on GFG at face value. I have heard a story recently concerning one of the top rated restaurants in the guide which throws some doubt on the veracity of the quote from The Independent which says "The most literate, fiercely independent and nationally even-handed of restaurant guides". I am not in a position to elaborate further, and it is certainly nothing untoward as such i.e no money changing hands, but did make me go "Hmmmm" and raise an eyebrow in Roger Moore type way (it has nothing to do with either Fat Duck or Gordon Ramsay BTW). I have found the marking in this years guide quite perplexing, with what appear to be many anomolies between London and the rest of the country in particular. To sum up, it appears easier for a restaurant to score highly if it is outside London than if it is in the capital. Jim Ainsworth partly addresses this issue in his introduction,stating that "it is little wonder that reporters disagree when comparing the scores of restaurants. Some of you write to sat that A is better than B while C shouldn't be in the guide" and that "there are 166 million possible three-way comparisions". Well, I think that is hiding behind numbers to a certain extent. If the stated criteria is applied consistantly, and all restaurants are inspected by GFG staff, there is no excuse for such anomlies to arise. (Of course, this is simply my opinion of the markings allocated to the restaurants I happen to have visited).

Macrosan - I think you have a valid point about my role, but I would point out that in the normal run of events,this is not a moderated site as such and that my official title is UK Community Co-ordinator. Than means that it is more important for me to organise things like Q and A's, eGullet related events in the real world, generate new ideas for the site and chip in my 2 cents worth behind the scenes on the strategic aims of eGullet than it is to "moderate" what gets posted here. You are right that I do tend to post in "member" mode and may leap to the defence of the profession more often than I should. But I can assure that I am completely open and honest about who I know in the catering industry and just how well I know them. For example, I do not know Eric Chavot, or anyone involved in the Capital Hotel, or any of their other restaurants. I have never eaten at the Capital. You may also be interested to learn that I have been recently accussed of not defending a professionals reputation on these boards, so it would appear that I cannot win! I certainly do not see that it is my role to protect anyone's reputation, other than that of eGullet itself. I would like to clarify the intent behind my postings on this particular thread. I did not wish to pick fault with the words you used, or try to imply that you were wrong to say what you had said. However, I honestly could not see that your experience had been exactly similar to Simon's and felt that you had misinterpreted his review. I don't think it was an unreasonable thing to ask you to clarify what you were referring to. Re-reading my posts now, it's seems to me that I could have gone about things in a better way and I apologise for any annoyance caused by my rather ill mannered and short tone. I sincerely hope that I have not and will never do anything to surpress future discussion, my intention is to encourage it.

I was there on Saturday. There were several bakers, a number of butchers stalls selling fresh beef, lamb, pork, game and sausgaes, several cheese stalls, a chocolate stall, a couple selling turkeys for Christmas along with all the prepared goods already mentioned. It was raining and I stayed for a minute or so to watch Jeremy Lee, but he had lost his voice and Henrietta was doing the talking for him and it was all a bit odd so I left. I came back a little later to see Henry Harris only to find hed been replaced by someone from Rascasse of Mayfair, so we headed home.

Macrosan - I think that is the whole point of eGullet. People post as they wish within the bounds of the user agreement and should expect others to post as they wish in response. You are free to respond or not to respond to requests for clarification as you see fit. You are under no obligation to do so.

I think it's simply that people feel that what they like and dislike says something about them as people and may therefore feel any criticism of a restaurant they are particularly fond of is not only a criticism of that place but also their taste. (There's a better way of saying that, but I can't think of it at the moment).

Complete and accurate list of supporting evidence please....

Not all by me I trust!

My comments on both this thread and the Racine thread picked up on what I felt were generalisations or inaccuracies made by... well, Macrosan in both cases as it turns out. I seem to have it in for him If you re-read them, I think you will see that there is no inference made that "there is something wrong with the persons in question, or that they just didn't get it". That was certainly not my intention, especially as I have never eaten at The Capital. This is a free speech zone and it's primarily entertainment and all that, but I think we owe it to ourselves and all the others that post or lurk here to be as accurate as we can in our comments.

If you search for "The Capital" on this site, I think you will find quite a few recent positive reports. La Trompette is sort of restaurant of the moment, what with it's restaurant of the year award from the AA, Ollie winning Best New Chef of the Year at the Crafts Guild awards, a 7 out of 10 rating in the Good Food Guide.

Nico Ladenis used to turn walk up trade away from his empty restaurant (I was trying to find the exact quote from him but I can't, can anyone help? I'm sure it's in "My Gastronomy" somewhere) and was amazed that people couldn't understand why he did it. I cannot fathom the reasoning, but perhaps it's something along the lines of "We are a 2 Michelin star restaurant and are therefore so wonderful that we are always full. It is impossible to dine with us without several days notice. You will not therefore get a table if you simply walk up to the restaurant unannounced, even if we are empty or virtually empty, because otherwise the word will get out that we are not always full and that will blow the whole game." Or something.

I was fooled by the phrase "exactly the same". You had different dishes and in Simons case it was a highly reduced sauce that overpowered the veal, whilst your lamb was overpowered by the vegetable garnish which you found to be too acidic. The sentances "Now this is not a case of "not getting it" as SteveP might say, this was uneatable food. Stupid, ridiculous, and insulting. I have just read again Simon's review, and I see that he found exactly the same." seem to infer that Simon found the food "Stupid, ridiculous, and insulting" in the same way as you did, of which I could find no evidence in his review.

I have read both yours and Simons review and I have failed to note the similarity. What are you referring to exactly?

I have heard that the incident was blown out of all proportion and that it was less of a "branding" and more a playful tap on the arm with the hot knife, but again, just gossip.