AdamLawrence

I know it's the coward's option, but couldn't you get the butcher to skin the hare for you? Can you call wild boar game now that they are virtually all farmed? But then that raises an interesting question - what's the difference between farmed and wild - I mean, pheasants and partridge are all raised and fed by estates, deer are 'farmed' in a sense (and not just the ones kept in fields). Adam

I think these are traditionally known as 'Royal Roasts' in Britain, and consist of a pheasant inside a duck inside a goose. There's a poultry supplier in Oxfordshire, Peachcroft Farm, from whom I bought my Christmas goose last year, and they have them (www.peachcroft.co.uk). They're hellish expensive though. Adam

Bloody scientists. Anyway, how about Robert Boyle? Bit off to go back to the seventeenth century for your lot and pick all of ours from the last hundred years. Dudley Moore was organ scholar at Magdalen when my father in law was a choral scholar. According to Robin his finals were awful, but the dons were fighting amongst themselves to viva him because they knew it would be such a hoot. Adam

I believe "Tab" is the appropriate term of abuse. Bear in mind that the most notable dining place at the Poly of East Anglia is... Sticky Fingers (although even that may have closed by now) Much as it pains me to say it I would reckon Midsummer House to be better than anything in Oxford city at the moment.

Cabrales, I'm not entirely sure what you mean by 'for members based outside of London'. We can get the Indie out here in the sticks, you know Adam But it takes the mule train four days to reach Oxford, no? Bloody fenlanders...... Adam

Cabrales, I'm not entirely sure what you mean by 'for members based outside of London'. We can get the Indie out here in the sticks, you know Adam

Macrosan - now there's a good idea. I'm off for a week's golfing in Portugal tomorrow, so now isn't the time, but when I get back, I'll see what I can do. Vanessa - Jericho is restaurant row these days, but none are especially outstanding IMHO, so unless you can remember a bit more about the place, it'd be difficult to identify. Most of my favourite places are outside the city centre, but if I were looking for a relaxed lunch in the city, I'd probably go for Thai at Chaing Mai Kitchen. It's in a beautiful old building within fifty yards of Carfax too, which helps. Edamame on Holywell Street has good, dirt-cheap Japanese canteen food, but you can't really relax, 'cause it's in and out. I haven't enjoyed Le Petit Blanc the last couple of times I've been, but there isn't really anywhere else of that ilk about. Maybe I should give it another go - I've been avoiding it for a while. Actually, if you have wheels, I'd probably recommend the Harcourt Arms in Stanton Harcourt. Pretty village, chef Philip Baker cooks excellent food; the bar menu is interesting - excellent salade de frisee aux lardons and smoked haddock omelette in there the other week, restaurant menu changes regularly, but had some good-looking game dishes on last time I looked. Philip is opening a fine dining room at the Harcourt next spring. cheers Adam

Reasonably well. I was going to say, I doubt our next-door neighbour would be an obvious customer, though, because she's 93 (and has been living in the house since it was built, hence our claim to an estate agent recently that 'the house has many original features, including neighbour' ), but then I remembered she went for lunch there last weekend with a couple of her friends. Must ask her how she enjoyed it. cheers Adam

Eynsham, my home, is a large village of about 6,000 souls five miles west of Oxford. Like many Cotswold villages it is fairly wealthy; unlike most it is large enough to support a few services beyond one pub and a post office. There's a building just off the village square that has, in the 40 months since we moved in to the village, housed three different restaurants, all of which are/were good, and none of which (so far) have been able to make a living for their owners. Anyone would think the premises were cursed. About three months ago, the property reopened as an Indian restaurant called Chula. From the decor and the menu - which is short, only about twelve dishes - you can tell it's trying to be more than the average curry house. We've been a few times now, often enough for the staff to recognise us. Last time, Lucy ordered an okra dish, and the chef came out of the kitchen to say that he was unhappy with the freshness of his okra, and could he cook her a different vegetable dish? He offered two options, but sent out a small tasting portion of the one she didn't choose anyway. Tonight I worked late to try and clear my desk in preparation for our holiday which starts Thursday. When I got home, neither of us could be arsed to cook, and we needed to pop into the local to give a key to our friend who'll be feeding the cat while we're away. So we decided to nip down to Chula (it's only two minutes walk) for a quick bite. It was about seven when we walked in. The place was, depressingly, deserted. We were recognised by the waiters, and seated at the same table we occupied last time we visited. The chef came out of the kitchen to talk with us, and asked us what we'd like to eat - anything, whether it was on the menu or not. He suggested a number of options, one of which was 'a real biryani'. He wouldn't be able to do a perfect job, he said, because to cook biryani properly took much longer, but it would be worth eating. Sat with my back to the room, I didn't notice him remove one of the clay pots decorating the mantlepiece. Half an hour later, I certainly noticed the biryani emerge from the kitchen. When the dough sealing the pot closed was broken, the aroma filled the room - fresh mint, any number of spices. The raita served with it - whose name I can't remember - contained dried smoked chillies that added a wonderful earthy note to the dish. I knew that biryani was a grand banquet dish, but I've never understood why before. My closest friend as a teenager was from a Mumbai family, and his mother was a superb cook. I haven't had better Indian food since then. Once we'd eaten, we chatted with the chef for ten minutes. Turns out he formerly worked as a chef (not, I presume head chef, or he'd be running a big kitchen in London) at the Sheraton in Delhi. Give me 24 hours' notice next time you come, he said, and tell me what you'd like to eat. Now, I'm no expert on Indian cuisine. But I can tell you that I've never eaten Indian-inspired food of this freshness in this country before (but I've never eaten in any of the top London Indians - the chef said the chap who's currently cooking at the Red Fort used to be his boss in Delhi) and I've rarely met a chef of any kind who exuded such passion for his cooking. I have to fill this place up. Partly because good restaurants and good people deserve to prosper anyway, and partly for selfish reasons - I want to be able to eat great food within two minutes of home. If you're ever in the Oxford area, try it. Adam

Yang Sing remains utterly brilliant. For Indian, I've always liked Shere Khan. Adam

Maybe it's just that the market doesn't exist for Italian-derived haute cuisine. I don't know Italy well enough to say whether there are sufficient domestic customers for such places, but it seems to me that, without the gastronomic tourists, most of the three-star French palaces would be up shit creek sans paddle; and perhaps that's not why travellers go to Italy. After all, Steve, you're a pretty assidous gastrotourist, and you yourself have said that you haven't yet been to El Bulli, or Arzak, or El Raco because you can't quite see yourself going to Spain on a food-driven trip (I'm paraphrasing from inadequate memory of previous threads; feel free to correct my paraphrase if you like) - and the buzz about Spain is deafening at the moment, so how hard must it be to attract people like you to go on a similar trip in Italy? And most those people who do travel regularly in Italy seem to be interested in a different aesthetic - that's why they are Italophiles, not Francophiles. Those haute cuisine places in Italy that do exist must be competing for a relatively small number of customers. So it's a bit circular. Adam

So Italy is stuck with culinary catenaccio? Cool. Adam

Le Manoir aux'Quat Saisons is _very_ child friendly. When I was last there, there was a photograph in one of the lounges of an absolutely blissed-out youngster, captioned 'Harry's [or whatever, I forget the name] first creme brulee'. Adam

Adam - yours is the second recco I've had for Moorilla Estate, must check it out. NZ pinots are good too, but the ones I like best - Felton Road and Martinborough - run close to twenty quid a bottle, not really everyday drinking. Pipers Brook is about twelve, so a bit better. But pinot is expensive everywhere..... Adam

Cabrales - Flap flap.... tweet tweet.... napkin over head. Am I right? Was it Claiborne who recommends Grands Echezeaux by the way? If you're in the UK before then, Seckford Wines (www.seckfordwines.co.uk) has a fair selection of these, including 1990 DRC G-E for GBP 375. Adam

spqr - the point about the GFG is that it only contains restaurants that it recommends, so simply being in the book is evidence of providing good food. The vast majority of restos in the UK don't appear in the book at all. I'm not sure whether the marks are meant to be absolute, or whether they relate to price, so a place that provides good cooking at a low price will score more highly than a place that cooks similar food but charges more. Adam

Walton Street, Jericho. Oddly, the cheapest of those Indians, the Bombay, at the top of the street, is the best. It's BYO. The others are standard-issue curry house crap. From Your Oxford Correspondent.

Plotonic ideal? Adam

The ones where the driver shakes his fist at you when you cut him up Adam

I usually have a number of different Joubere stocks in the freezer - my local Waitrose carries pretty much the full range. They are good for deglazing purposes, but they'd be very expensive indeed if you wanted large quantities. Marigold is OK but I wouldn't use it for anything that needed really good stock. I don't think it would make great risotto, for example. Adam

Kidneys, very rapidly seared and then served with a sauce made from pan juices deglazed with marsala or sherry, a bit of Dijon mustard and just perhaps a spoonful of cream, if I'm feeling villainous. Side dishes: dunno. Mashed potato and salad? Actually, the lady wife is out tonight. Thanks for the legup.... Adam

While that's true, Tony, do you think it's really that good an argument? Both those chefs handed back their stars because they wanted to stop cooking themselves, and build restaurant empires to make more money. Can you really say that the restaurant scene has been improved by these decisions? Adam

Am contemplating said resto for a birthday meal next month. Anyone been? I have a couple of reports, one said it was fantastic, t'other said good but not worth the cash.... seems (from the GFG) to be pretty good value for two-star Michelin. cheers Adam

Re. stopping blood from clotting: Fergus Henderson (in his recipe for jugged hare) says that, when the hare is skinned, and the blood saved, you should mix a splash of red wine vinegar with the blood. Now, given a helpful butcher, this shouldn't be too much of a problem in the context of furred game, even if you're not going to skin the beast yourself. But if you want pig's blood to make black pudding etc, seems to me a bit more problematic. I suppose if you've got blood on special order, they might do that at the slaughterhouse. cheers Adam

You can get fabulous mutton mail order in the UK from Graig Farm Organics (www.graigfarm.co.uk). Actually all the meat I have had from them has been brilliant. Strongly recommended. Adam