Andy Lynes

There have been well over a hundred "new" or re-designed restaurants opened in the last 12 months, surely one of them deserved to be recognised over and above Sketch. Yauatcha is a beautiful room, The Greenhouse is lovely, The Ledbury is great, all would be worthy winners and I'm sure there are many more.

I did attend the ceremony. It was mercifully swift with plenty of time for chatting and meeting people which is what these things are really about. That said, I wouldn't have minded some context for the awards - who nominated and voted and what was the criteria. As much as I like Locanda Locatelli, it would be interesting to understand why the voters think its currently London's best restaurant, why Club Gascon is winning so many awards now and why Petrus is the best restaurant for wine. A longer and more explanatory citation for each award would have helped and need not have slowed the proceeding up too much. I don't understand the reasoning behind having an award for best design and then giving it to the same restaurant (Sketch) 2 years running, that's just crazy. Similarly, why does The Seafood get best seafod restaurant two years in a row? And why is it one of only two non-London restaurants to win an award? I had the opportunity to meet Andrew Fairlie who I'm glad to say looked very fit and healthy and apparently fully recovered from his recent illness. Brett Graham appeared quite chuffed with his award and was very graciously congratulated by Jason Atherton from Maze, another shortlisted newcomer. Gordon Ramsay was mobbed as usual but I did mange to say a few words to him. He still won't agree to a eGullet Q&A which is a real shame. I've told him that we'll all be very nice to him but he won't believe me! If anyone else spots him out and about, please feel free to try and twist his arm.

The winners of the Restaurateur's Restaurant Awards were announced at a ceremony in Olympia MC'd by TV's Richard Johnson: Restaurateur's Restaurant of the Year Locanda Locatelli French Restaurant of the Year Club Gascon Seafood Restaurant of the Year The Seafood Restaurant Modern European Restaurant of the Year The Fat Duck Oriental Restaurant of the Year Hakkasan Italian Restaurant of the Year Locanda Locatelli Indian Restaurant of the Year Amaya Wine Restaurant of the Year Petrus Design Restaurant of the Year Sketch Hotel Restaurant of the Year Claridges New Restaurant of the Year The Ledbury London Restaurant of the Year Tom Aikens Best front-of-house team Racine

I read in an unhistoric Winner review in the Sunday Times ten days ago or so that The Lovely Helena Hell ™ has left the Ledbury... I don't know where she's gone though. ← Sweden apparently - very sad news indeed. The good news though is that The Ledbury has just won Best New Restaurant in the Restaurateur's restaurant awards.

I thought leaving some of the names out in the book was a little bit odd. It's a matter of record that Chodorow was a partner in the restaurant so why not name him? (Can the lawers on staff help with this one?)

Here's some further info on the subject of frying foie gras from chef Bruce Poole: "One should not (in fact can not) de vein the liver if it is to be fried because it would simply fall apart when doing so. If a hot piece of liver is full of sinew it is probably because an ignorant cook has tried to cook the bit between the big and small lobe (which is full of sinew). Foie gras is never cheap, but my advice is buy the best and most expensive grade for frying. For instance at Chez Bruce we pay about £18/kilo for parfaits and terrines etc but £28/kilo for frying quality. Just to complicate matters, you can't always tell the two apart when raw! It is all to do with feed and the way the birds are reared which leads to fat content (and the quality of that fat). If you have attempted to fry foie gras before without success, it is probably because you don't have the right quality stuff in the first place. Controlling the heat also takes a bit of know how. Yes you need a very hot, dry pan (in which the liver needs to fit fairly snugly), but it also burns pretty readily too. Start with very hot pan, leave liver in pan on full heat until base side is correct burnished colour basting occasionally with exuding fat, then draw off pan and cook gently until liver is cooked, basting and flipping as you go. A 1.5cm cut of liver should only take 3 or 4 minutes or so and it must be served immediately. Of course foie gras needs to be de-veined for ballotines and terrines, but not for preparations which will end up going through a sieve (like a parfait mix). I personally don’t see the point in de-veining for frying but it is very important that the whole lobe is properly cleaned and understood in the first place (for instance, there is a lot of sinew between the two lobes and at the very ends of each lobe.)"

Jamie, thanks very much for the kind words, high praise indeed!

Moir may not have been 100% technically correct in her criticism, but you've just got to love "At the first provocation it collapsed, exhausted, into a sinewy puddle - just like Paula Radcliffe on the Athens track."

Moby thanks - the Ladenis is a real puzzle I have to say, as its definately a seared dish. If I didn't know better and was following the French Laundry recipes, going on the comments I have quoted above, I think I would have steamed in and de-veined the thing.

Moby, I was rather taken aback by your assertion so I checked a couple of cookery books. In My Gastronomy Ladenis says in the introduction to his recipe for Hot Foie Gras with caramelised oranges that "by the time you finish your process of deveining the liver, scraping off the membrane and removing the dark green bile located at the tip between the two lobes, your liver should be soft and supple." Similarly Robuchon/Patricia Wells says to "remove and discard the thin red blood vessel that runs lengthwise through the inside of each lobe" for Foie Gras with Smooth Lentil Cream Sauce in Cuisine Actuelle. On page 104 In the long feature on foie gras in The French Laundry Cookbook Keller says "I tell people to think of foie gras as Play-Doh. When you're cleaning it, don't be afraid you're going to make a mistake, because you can always put it back together again. You cut it, you scrape it, you get as many veins out as possible and then you mold it back together again." The following foie gras recipes, including one for whole roasted foie gras, all reference back to page 104 and the preparation technique he describes. Is there an existing thread on eGullet.org that you can direct us to that deals with this?

The Weavers Shed was reviewed by Jan Moir in the Telegraph this week. Thumbs up mostly.

Christine from Glasgow actually, but that's another story. Thanks for the kind words. Its always easier to write about truly talented and thoughtful people such as David Kinch. He also has a terrific turn of phrase in conversation which I think comes across in the interview, so it was nice to be able to catch some of that in print.

Caterer article now online.

I recently reviewed this book for a British publication and I would recommend it to anyone either in the business or with a keen interest in it. That would be the eGullet membership then I guess.

I agree that I'd return as much for the ambience and the service as the food, but I think that's a good thing. I think they are aiming for the mainstream with the restaurant rather than narrowcasting at a foodie audience. That said, there is no reason for them not to include some more left of field items - if Racine can serve tete de veau then I'm sure Galvin can dish up a trotter or two. Maybe they are playing it safe on their opening menu, it is after all their first business venture and their own money they need to see a return on. Once they become confident that punters will continue to walk through their doors, maybe they will get more adventurous with the menu, but I'd like to work my way through this one first!

Interior design is by Design LSM Ltd of Brighton.

The interior of Galvin is classic French bistro seen through the eyes of Ralph Lauren. Dark wood paneling hung with tasteful black and white food photography, dark brown leather banquettes and dark slate floor add up to a very masculine elegance. It's easy to imagine city types flocking to the place if it was on Threadneedle Street, but it's no fish out of water up west. The place was packed on Friday lunchtime with a smattering of suits, but many more were casually dressed. Chris Galvin was much in evidence; greeting what appeared to be a number of industry chums and fellow chefs. He looked like he'd hardly had time to breathe for a week, but was obviously elated. He stopped by our table to thank us for coming (the pleasure was all ours) and said that he and his brother were very pleased with how things were going so far. He told us that Marks and Spencer are making a big investment in the site opposite the restaurant and L'Entrocote, a French bistro chain, is due to open soon just down the road, so it looks as though Baker Street is set to become the new Marylebone Road. Terrine presse of Pork and foie gras (capitalization as per the menu) was generously layered with the fattened liver and served with toasted Poilane and sauce gribiche. The pithivier of wood pigeon was a single ruddy breast topped with an over-egged mousse encased in beautifully burnished crisp pastry with a few glazed chestnuts served in the side. Mains of grilled cod, parsley and coco beans and sea bass with marmalade of fennel and white onions both featured an unexpected Mediterranean twist; a splodge of creamy polenta with the cod and a tomato and caper compote with the bass. A savarin of red berries was a glorious rendition of the sadly seldom seen classic dessert and equal to the cracking version I had a few months ago at The Spread Eagle. Rice pudding with roast figs and Banyuls was a rarified re-mix of a nursery favourite heavy on the figs, light on the grain and looked as captivating as it tasted. My recent run of luck with wines of the Languedoc continued with a viognier at a very reasonable £16 which bought the final tally to £84.00 including service, water and two double espressos. Service from the large front of house team was excellent. It was a working lunch and my companion and I were deep in conversation for most of its nearly three hour duration but never felt intruded upon. The otherwise nicely paced meal dragged between starter and main; entirely understandable for a week old kitchen being slammed during a very busy service. I will return to try the lasagna of crab, the charcuterie, the oxtail parmentier, the confit and especially the St Emilion au chocolat from a menu that already reads like a list of signature favourites. An exciting opening for 2005 and one destined to win the hearts of Londoners. Website

I had the very great privilege to spend an hour or so in the company of Chef Keller during a whirlwind 36 hour tour of San Francisco earlier this year. I caught him between lunch and dinner services and I had further appointments that day and so was unable to enjoy a meal in the restaurant. I found him to be incredibly hospitable, charming and wise about his trade in way that only those that have survived earthquakes and dot com bubble bursts can be. I was only able to use a sentence from Hubert in my published piece about the restaurant scene in SF, but it was used as a large-font quote in the final layout which underlined the intelligence of the statement. To paraphrase - and bear in mind that many would consider Fleur de Lys a formal restaurant - Keller said that a smile from a waiter was more important than knowing to serve from the left and clear from the right. With that simple statement Keller articulated the much vaunted ideal of "professional but informal" service in way that no other chef or restaurateur that I have spoken to has managed to do before or since.

Germain Schwab has been named AA Chef's Chef of the Year.

Just got my copy of this weeks Caterer and am thrilled to my interview with David runs to five pages and looks stunning. There's a great portrait of David, a nice shot of the dining room, an illustrated recipe for strawberry gazpacho, a delicous looking photo of wild mushroom and foie gras cooked en papillote with slow poached egg which also appears in a small lead for the article on the front cover. More importantly from my point of view is that the interview is almost as I submitted it and has not been cut in length. Not on line as yet but should be soon.

Apart from Maureen Mills who is handling Galvin's PR and sent me the info that I posted at the top of this thread!

It can't be utterly transformed, but could be tweaked sufficiently to improve a rating.

Daniel, just to see if he was still any good or not and to be able to swank about it afterwards! I think its debatable whether the duck (or whatever it was) that Matthew Evans was served that night would have been better if had had been prepared by a line cook who had been knocking them out all night or Moran, one of that country's top chefs, who came fresh to that one dish and gave it his full attention. It's the intention to provide VIP treatment, something better than anyone else had recieved during that service, is the important factor in the context of this thread.

For the most part, and there are of course exceptions, the trouble with critics who have no connections or inside knowledge whatsoever of the industry is that their reviews tend to be school of "my wife plumped for the steak and jolly glad she was too! It was a huge portion and served piping hot!!" i.e. absolutely fucking useless, except to people who wouldn't know good food if mugged them in broad daylight.

Guide inspectors are not critics, they don't write reviews for public consumption, they are two entirely different roles. The inspectors will also usually have a background in the trade and will therefore already have the technical, insider knowledge a good critic needs to pick up by researching his subject. In addition, the guide maintains some dialogue with the restaurants it includes in its guides therefore inspectors and the likes of Derek Bulmer don't completely avoid all contact with chefs.