Romaney O'Malley

Dinner at the Anchor last night. Had to wait an hour and a half for a table to it's as popular as ever. I really enjoyed our evening it's great summer venue. Drinks in the bar to start. I like how they chill their glasses it's a nice extra and makes for a lovely chilly G&T (I felt guilty not going for a sherry but took a sledgehammer to my palate instead ) at 7.45 we were seated at a table next to the open windows which was an added bonus. The menu had me drooling so will get on with it. I chose a salad of marinated salt cod, peppers and aioli followed by roast beef rump, green beans and anchovy. My companion ordered spanish ham and melon followed by roast leg of lamb with braised veggies. The salad was delicious. Touch too much dressing for me but lovely tender chunks of salt cod and big strips of juicy roasted peppers. The base of the salad was rocket and it was presented all mixed together. I thought this was a good combination. The ham and melon was okay. The melon was perfect but I thought the ham might have been the last of a leg - still lovely flavour. My friend's lamb was perfectly cooked and came with a big dollop of chopped herbs in olive oil - same texture as salsa verde but just herbs. The veggies were melting and sweet and included some scrumptious fennel. My beef came at room temperature as the waiter had informed me and was three good quality pieces of rump with a thick layer of fat that was crispy on the outside (yum yum). It had been left out a bit long though and so had dried out a bit but was full of flavour and the fat providing some necessary moisture. The beans and anchovies were just that and were yummy. We shared a carafe of Portugese red (sorry forgot the name) which was well suited to our mains - good and robust. We were to full for dessert. Service was great and total bill came to £70 including 15% tip, wine, 2 large bottles of min water and two G&Ts. They are closed from the 15th of August to the 30th of August. Full menu as follows: Dinner 12.08.04 Rossini £4 Lettuce, pea and ham soup £4.80 Leeks, feta and pine nuts £5.40 Terrine £5.20 Fois Gras Terrine £10.00 Beetroot, horseradish and watercress £5.00 Cuttlefish risotto £6.80 Spanish ham and melon £6.80 Smoked herring and potato salad £5.00 Warm snail and bacon salad £6.40 Grilled lemon sole, tomato and cucumber salad £14.00 Griddled sea trout, lettuce, peas and ham £13.60 Tomatoes and goat's curd on toast £10.80 Pigeon, semolin gnocchi and field mushrooms £11.80 Roast leg of lamb, braised vegetables and herbs £14.00 Vitello tonnato £13.80 Roast rump of beef, green beans and anchovy £15.80 Tamworth chump, bacon , turnips and prunes for four £60.00 Green salad £3.20 Lentils £2.40 Greens £2.00 Corn on the cob £2.20 New potatoes £3.00 Buttermilk pudding and summer fruits £4.60 Greengage tart £5.00 Lemon curd cake £5.00 Caramel ice cream £4.00 Watermelon £2.80 Cheese £6.40 Edited for spelling

Thanks Che - this is a really interesting and informative post The two best pieces of beef I have had in London were a chateubriand at chez bruce and an awesome steak at the Gaucho grill.

Marylebone has Divertimenti as well - they seem to have a large program of cooking classes I just got one in the mail. Has anyone been to any?

Congratulations!!

has anyone seen the new trains station ads for a certain supermart? "10 sausages for 49p - Daft" - I agree and not in a good way

My husband and I were at PB Friday night. The food was superb. Amongst other things I had sea bream which was cooked to perfection so it's a shame about the bass you had Marlyn. Have to agree on the service though. It was ropey and just lacked any kind of direction. At one stage a waiter was hovering with my husband's entree as he was still finishing his amuse. The waiter practically took the spoon from my husband's hand so he could place the next course in front of us and then proceeded to blame the chef for the timing. They seemed to have loads of staff just none of them were particularly polished and they didn't seem very experienced. It felt like the service strategy was just to throw more people in. I don't think the front of house does justice to Demetre's cooking. But I'll definitely be back despite this as I thought his food really was sublime.

There is an Australian chef/cook called Maggie Beer who has a book called 'Cooking with Verjuice'. It may be useful if you have a lot. She has a recipe for a whole chicken poached in verjuice which I have cooked before and it's wonderful. Here is a link to it at Amazon sorry if I've gone off topic...

Forgot to say - the food I miss most over here in the UK is BBQ and pizza shapes - and mint slices mmmmmm I'd also kill for a cherry ripe but I refuse to pay £1.75 for one at Harvey nicks (yes you did read that number correctly) Oh - and my mum gave me that fish mould when she was last over. I made the salmon mousse for a BBQ on the weekend and they demolished the whole thing - couldn't wait to tell my mum.

The things I remember best are my mum's cooking from women's weekly cookbooks (during the week and baking) and Margaret Fulton (for dinner parties and special occasions). The things that most stick in my mind were: Chicken and asparagus casserole Margaret fultons (I think) salmon mousse complete with fish mould and an olive for the eye women's weekly lemon slice Pumpkin scones with homemade jam and whipped cream Steak Diane I know these aren't all necessarily authentic Australian but a couple of them I just identify with the Australian dinner party scene in the 70s and 80s. I remember my parents having everyone over all dressed up and eating this great retro food. Did anyone eat weetbix as a snack with margarine and vegemite? And it has to be asked - Can you fit a SAO in your gob in one go???

Have booked in for a last minute dinner tonight on toptable. We are booked for the £25 dinner which sounded like a great deal but I bet we weaken and go for the ALC... really looking forward to it.

Wow - that sounds really wonderful - and if the idea was to inspire then it sounds like it worked SethG (with good results from your description) Will have to buy that book.....

I second the George Inn - it's a fabulous place just oozing atmosphere and charm. Have whiled away many an evening there and not known where the time went. oops.

I second Australian Gourmet Traveller - it's outstanding also Delicious. which is a bit more informal with often more simple recipes. I subscribe to Vogue Entertaining and travel as well which is great but is not just cooking - all three are Aussie but I have them sent over to London. they do a delicious. publication in London as well and it's by the same people but I think the Australian one is much better. I don't get Donna Hay but have heard it's great

Am slightly embarressed about the brick lane thing now - just showing my ignorance - I think in hindsight it was the equivalent of asking for the nearest macdonalds! Lucky I had some caring egulleteers to put me on the right track I never thought I'd have a reason to be happy about working in Aldgate - now I do

Went for dinner at NT last night. First time for me and had 10 others in tow. What can I say? This place is a revelation. We ordered lots of each of the following: tandoori chicken chicken tikka seekh kebabs lamb chops some vegetable dishes various naans and rotis followed by: large dry meat large chicken keema large bindhi gosht a chickpea dish an okra dish specials had run out unfortunately won't go into detail as these dishes have been described before but everything was as good as I have read and the place was heaving. Only had to wait 10 mins for a table (even though I booked I expected it would be a longer wait). Service was efficient but friendly and the atmosphere was great - oh but the food.....

Thanks a lot Gary and Clerkenwellian - seems to me there's no decision to be made. just rang NT and they agreed to take my booking (for 10 people) tonight and the person on the phone was lovely. and I didn't even mention egullet

I've read all about NT on the thread and it sounds amazing so maybe we should just go there - I was worried though that we wouldn't be able to get a table with a large group and it sounded like their booking policy is pretty relaxed - thought it would be too late to book anyway. should I risk it and take them to NT and just hope for the best table wise??

Wondering if anyone can help me I have an Aussie friend here at the moment and had planned to go to Brick Lane for a curry this evening. Does anyone have any suggestions of places we should either head for or avoid? I wouldn't know one place from the next unfortunately. There will be about 8 or 10 of us I think. Or should we just go to New Tayyab instead?

craftman - Forgot to mention one more thing about Queenstown. There is a bar at Eichardt's Hotel down next to the water. We went one evening before dinner and it was such a lovely place. Very swanky, great service and fabulous cocktails. I'll be in Melbourne in November as well so will report back on our eating experiences when we return.

I have a pantry challenge of sorts - it's more like a garden challenge though. Am feeling bit harrassed as my enthusiatic planting efforts a few months ago are now coming to fruition - all at the same time (must sort that out next year). I love the idea of making a meal entirely from my own garden or at least a component of the meal (don't have any fish or cows out there) but am currently up against it just finding ways to use them up that doesn't involve soup and a pretty uninspired salad. I would really appreciate any ideas of what to do with gluts of the following: - beetroot (these are still quite small so could use them as babes or wait til they are bigger) - courgettes - spinach - raddiccio - aubergines - loads of herbs - rosemary, thyme, mint and basil (parsley died) in a few weeks will have masses of tomatoes as well. I am close to a good market here in london so can shop for anything else I need there if extra ingredients are required. Any help would be warmly welcomed

And the times this morning - front page as well - duncan you should consider freelancing as a journalist. Although you may never be allowed to browse the ingredients of supermarket products again without being thrown out edited to add - duncan apologies if you are already a journalist!

Hi craftman - have to say I am so envious of your pending trip! I love London but going home to Sydney and visiting Melbourne makes me hopelessly homesick. We actually stayed at the George - to be honest I though it was really overpriced for accommodation. However we didn't eat at the restaurant and I have heard it is excellent. We did ask a few people and they all said it was top notch - unfortunately we were exhausted and fancied a pizza! (which was fantastic incidentally). Again we didn't visit Gantley's but we stayed at a hotel called Mountvista which was lovely and they recommended that restaurant - I had already booked Saffron though so we didn't get there. There's a place in Nelson called the Mussel Boys or something - anyone? It was great - fabulous fresh green lipped mussles prepared to order. Tables outside - delicious and recommend it. Also along the coast around Kaikoura is fabulous lobster so I recommend going to a cafe at one of the main bays and ordering a whole one if you are in the area - not sure what the season is though so would have to check. Just a couple of hopefully constructive comments. Feel free to jump on me all you new zealanders but this is not meant to a dig or patronising in any way. We only visited the South Island. New Zealand is not cheap and the upper end dining is the same price range as Sydney so don't go expecting a bargain. I think fine dining is still well and truly developing there and it's important to go with an open mind. In my humble opinion, with the exception of Saffron, even the best places were not of the same standard as Sydney or Melbourne but they were in the same price range. I am not suggesting for a second you don't book into the high end places just make sure you go with the right expectations. It may sound obvious but I would go for dishes using local produce every time and I would enjoy the sometimes more informal nature of the service. Make the most of the cheap places as well (like mussel boys) as they will sometimes be a better food experience because of the produce - ie they specialise in one thing and don't tamper with it. The best thing is you'll be supporting the industry and they have such a fantastic dining scene over there with so much potential it is nice to be part of it as a tourist. Their produce is second to none and I am not surprised lots of chefs move from the big cities to live and work there. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did. Promise you'll report back in detail

They also have Isreali cous cous at Waitrose - in the pasta/rice/normal cous cous section

We didn't actually stay in Nelson but we stayed in Blenheim at a place called the Hotel D'urville. Here's the website - am not very techy so sorry if it doesn't work Hotel D'urville Anyway - It really was fantastic. They have this thing called the cook's discovery tour. They will tailor it to what you want as well We spent a day touring around the area - we visited a winery, an olive grove, a crayfish and salmon farm - they were all organic and the head chef from the restaurant, Gary Clark came with us. He previously cooked for Conran over here in London. We chatted with all the producers and learned about production and the area, sampled their goods and also enjoyed a fantastic picnic lunch with fresh local produce, wine and cheeses. We also collected ingredients for the evening as we went. Gary spent the entire evening with us in a purpose built kitchen and produced a 6 course degustation as a cooking demonstration (which was our dinner) - I can dig out the menu if you are interested - top food. The sommelier was also in and out between the kitchen and the restaurant and matched all our wines. It was such a great experience. The produce over there is of such a high quality and having the chef to ourselves was great fun. We didn't get a lot more time to tour more than a few wineries and didn't dine at any but if you fancy a special day you should perhaps consider doing what we did. Was also a really nice hotel. You can email Saffron to make a booking - I did well in advance and it wasn't a problem - they were actually expecting us when we arrived and remembered we were from London and on honeymoon which was such a nice touch. Regarding Tetsuya - understandable about the mixed reviews - however I disagree about the big bucks thing. I have visited Gordon Ramsay RHR and various other top restaurants over here in the last few years and I think it is comparable to at least a two M star experience. Hope you change your mind as I'd be surprised if you'd regret it. Depends on what you are after in a dining experience I suppose. Don't think you can go too far wrong with food in Sydney regardless of what you decide - I am very envious!