Paul Bell

We went to Pied a Terre a few weeks ago, just after they got their second star. We found it slightly underwhelming, reading the posts here it appears to be very much a restaurant that you like a lot or don't. (Granted our views were not helped by the fact that that they managed to make our reservation for Friday instead of Saturday but eventually found us a table.) Neverthelees we thought the food good rather than great, not up to the standard of say The Square or Petrus. Service was good but rushed (as they squeezed us in I think they wanted rid fairly quickly). Paul

A quick summary of the restaurants eaten in on our recent trip to Rome. Saturday lunch - Myositis a good solid choice in the middle of Rome, serves refined trattoria food, spaghetti with tomato sauce and swordfish and tagliolini with octopus followed by sea bass in a rosemary and potato crust and roast lamb, all very good. Wine list has a good range and is very weel priced. Saturday diner - La Rossetta, fantastic seafood at a price, seafood antipasti to start followed by turbot with potatoes and a dessert selection (I like the fact that a dessert wine is included), all very good with the antipasti being stunning, the room is not particularly inspiring, service is OK not great, wine list is overpriced and only tourists until about 9.30. Sunday lunch - Al bric, very enjoyable and very good, another trattoria style but with considerably better than average food including good desserts, excellent wine list. Sunday dinner - Taverna Angelica near the Vatican, almost deserted but it was Sunday night, good food, slightly more inventive than some, a couple of dishes could have been warmer, very good cheese, excellent orange ice cream, Ok wine list. Monday lunch - Macceroni - very lively place to sit, like a smart canteen, and we wanted a bit of liveliness after sitting on our own on Sunday night, food was OK but wouldn't really recommend it, OK tonnarelli carbonara, grilled chicken slightly underdone in parts, tasty chicken cacciatore, rubbish spinach. Decent cheap house wine. Monday dinner - Agata e Romeo, very good, largest antipasti I have ever come across, three fillets of cod wrapped in panchetta on a cauliflower sauce, very good but huge, followed by rigatoni with ham and leeks (very good), risotto with radicchio, roast lamb cutlets, suckling pig with spiced honey and an orange mousse for dessert. Service very good, wine list excellent with some absolute bargains. Tuesday lunch - Fischetteria Beltramme very nice place to sit, just had a couple of pasta each, tonnarelli with cacio e pepe very good, rigatoni all amatriciana also good. Tuesday dinner - La Pergola excellent (see separate post coz I am running out of time). Paul

I believe the online Telegraph updates its 'wine' page including food stuff twice a week, with the Sunday review appearing on Wednesday or Thursday. Paul

Just a quick thank-you for your advice. Paul

The Caterer has confirmed that JG and the Savoy group have not been able to agree on a deal for Vong to remain in the Berkeley hotel, and the space is being taken over by Gordon Ramsay, no details as to what it will be though. Paul

I am going to Lyon at the end of May and am intending to go to a number of the 'michelin' restaurants in the area, (Troisgros, Georges Blanc, Alain Chapel, Pyramide etc). I have read most of comments on the board and some clarification would be helpful. Firstly how good is Marc Veyrat? I do not get a sense that people have been there and been hugely impressed and that it is a must go to place (like Troisgros) (but I may have missed this?) more that it is a good three star restaurant. Secondly Paul Bocuse, I get the impression that this restaurant is best avoided in so far as there are many better in the area. Finally restaurants that do not appear to have as many comments as others, I am considering going to Pic in the south of the region and Lameloise in Burgundy, any comments? and is it worth going further north to Bernard Loiseau's restaurant? I am sure some of these questions are difficult to answer e.g. is it worth going to a restaurant? depends if you want to go there! But any comments appreciated. Paul

God help us, they even have one in Vienna Paul

Not certain I want to prolong this but it is Friday afternoon. What?? The worst flight delay I have had (Thats tempting fate isn't it) was at Charles de Gaulle, when Air France had to fly a plane up from Spain to fly us from Paris back to London because they did not have one in Paris!. Not forgetting the recent occurence when Strasbourg airport was closed due to deer on the runway. And of course, the French make the most bloody awful coffee in Europe (a generalisation admittedly, but nonetheless generally true). The French are as incompenetent as the Italians (who I like) just more miserable with it. That being said Heathrow is possibly the poxiest airport in Europe with constant flight delays so who are we to complain? Been to London recently? Although I was particularly impressed when we arrived in Rome last year, trundled onto the train to Termini, thought it was rather busy, and it kept getting busier, finally two armed carabineri appear to tell us the train drivers have just decided to go on strike. How do we get into town? On yer own mate! (Still nice ride in a Mercedes, wife was impressed with young chap in sunglasses and expensive suit driving us, a £50 bargain). Paul

For afternoon tea I would go for Browns or Claridges, they are not cheap, but you get the whole experience pianist, log fires etc (in Browns) plus they will bring more sandwiches, cakes etc. The 'cheaper places' such as The Capital (about £15 a head $25) (and I believe Fortnums) are nowhere near as good. You get your tea, a sandwich, a scone and a piece of cake and then out of the door. With regard to restaurants J Sheekeys would be good with children, and it can cost whatever you want it to. St John is very good with children, but can get pricey, ditto Locanda Locatelli. Two to irritate Simon, both Drones and Racine are also both very good with children, although the food is not in the class of the above. Paul

If we're entering Hampshire, JSW in Petersfield merits a visit (it is on the Surrey/Sussex side of Hampshire). Very good food (in that 'modern british style' i.e. french), good wine list, wide ranging and some bargains. Possibly the smallest kitchen in the country (about half the size of The Merchant House, although the chef has someone else helping him I believe). Paul

La Trompette is indeed good value at £23.50 for three courses (albeit even better on Saturdays when you get the same menu for £19.50). Le Trouvaille on the other hand was definitely not good value at £22.50 for two courses of average food. I wasn't saying the la Trompette was not as good as before just that when we have been before we usually come away thinking at least one dish was really excellent. This did not happen this time but they were all very good (and the Lamb was pretty close to excellent). The leek fondue worked well with the salmon, although I guess it did make for a slightly 'sweet' tasting dish. The chicken is very good, it is just that it is often on the menu and both of us had eaten it before. The baked alaska was good because of the spectacle. I am not certain how keen the waiting staff are on people ordering it though. Paul

Final post re: last weekend. Lunch on Saturday was at La Trouvaille, it was the first time we had been back for about a year and the first lunchtime. The start was not promising as they have a Christmas lunch menu which is exactly the same as the menu outside their door three weeks ago but £6 a head more, someone is taking the piss! Food was OK smoked salmon on a warm slightly rubbery potato pancake, steak with Ok chips, service was rubbish albeit there were three staff, two were very good one who was was a complete tosspot, guess which we had. Overall the food was nowhere near as good as it used to be, I guess it is now at a good pub level (Angelsea Arms, Havelock etc) at considerably higher prices. Sunday lunch at La Trompette was very good, it didn't hit the heights of previous meals but was very well rounded and enjoyable. Grilled salmon with fennel fondue, followed by seven hour shoulder of lamb followed by baked alaska. Salmon perfectly cooked nice and light and fresh, the lamb rich and unctuous, the baked alaska was flamed at the table and was pleasant enough, with hindsight not really my thing, but it was worth ordering for the spectacle. Paul

Is Pierre Gagnaire the greatest chef in the world? Paul

Who are they? He maybe but I am not aware of that many people saying that he is. Gary Rhodes thinks that Guy Savoy is, If you said that many people thought that Adria was the greatest chef, that would seem plausible as his name regularly appears in such concersations whereas Gagnaire iis often mentioned in conjunction with a number of other French three star chefs. If he is that good, why? I can't get a feel for his food it appears to be a cross-beiween the molecyular stuff of Adria. Heston Blumenthal etc, and more classical French cooking, or am I way off here? Paul

Saturday dinner at Pigalle, a couple of spare table when we arrived at 9.00 but they were full half an hour later. Francois was running around madly, charming and friendly whilst being grumpy about others (not happy about the table of twenty, the waitress who wasn't doing anything or that his last customer left on Friday at about 2 in the morning). Fish soup was good, better than I expected, goats chesse sald was large, coq au vin good, frites excellent, and were indeed very salty which I like but some would not. Plus mark to the chef who served the coq au vin with taglaitelle (can't spell) instead of potatoes coz we ordered chips (he may of course have run out of new potatoes but never mind). Two bottles of very decent cahors, which were preceded by Kirs au chocolat They had run out of creme de cassis, but the waitress said they had creme de cacao so we though we might as well try them and to be fair they were not horrible, different, interesting etc. Think it might start a trend though Paul

Having been so impressed by lunch a few weeks ago we returned for dinner on Friday night. In short it was excellent, at present the cooking is well up there with the best two star restaurants in London. There are differences in the menu between lunch and dinner, starters are slighlty more complex, there are a number of different main courses, amuses are different, although the desserts are the same. Stareted with Kirs - very average For the amuse we had lobster ravioli on a lobster bisque, white bean soup with truffle and tomato jelly. The jelly was OK, the taste was good but it was quite a large amount of cold wobbly savoury stuff. The soup was excellent good deep earthy flavour. The ravioli was also good, decent chunk of lobster, nicely made pasta well flavoured sauce/bisque. Starters we had white onion tarte tatin (again and see above for views but it is excellent, the only difference from the lunch version is the addition of some saffron potatoes) and langoustine and crab raviolo, a large pillow like raviolo filled with shellfish mousse surrounded by langoustine and more lobster, good fresh tasting seafood, very good. Main courses were turbot (roast with cabbage, pot roast with pork and raviolo). This was fantastic a piece of roast (pan fried) turbot on top of some lightly cooked cabbage (sauerkraut lite), a large piece of pot roast turbot on top of a larger piece piece of pot roast pork belly (really excellent both were really succulent and combined very well with each other and a red wine reduction and the raviolo minced turbot and herbs (also very good but was lighter and thus suffered in comparison to the other two). The other main courses was partridge with bacon and cabbage, a very meaty well rounded dish, the partridge was full of flavour the whole dish helped by large (1 inch) cubes of bacon and well flavoured red cabbage. Pre dessert was strawberry souffle, lavender (or violet can't remember) sorbet and a square of chocolate mousse. The whole thing was bigger than some restaurants actual dessert. The stand out part was the souflle, full of strawberry flavour with none of the egginess which often carries through in sweet souffles. For dessert we had raspberry ice cream, lemon chibouste (again as at linch above) and banana creme brulee, chocolate truffle and salted caramel ice cream. Again this was really enjoyable not flashy it was after all a banana creme brulee but perfectly executed and very satisfying. The chocolate truffle was well chocoalte truffle and the ice cream tasted excellent not too salty, the only problem was it meklted really quickly, despite not being near anything warm, I guess the salt content stops it freezing as well. All this followed by excellent petits fours and good coffee. We had a bottle of NZ sauvignon quite good, and a bottle of house red (cotes de ventoux) which was very good. Overall an excellent to fantastic (bit excited here) meal, we got the sense that at the moment the kitchen here is at its peak and it must be one of the best restaurants in London. Paul

I may very well regret this but, does Gagnaire attract so much reverence among chefs and diners? On his own terms three starts etc yes but to me and others Alain Ducasse (of a few years ago) and Guy Savoy seem more significant (which may not be the most appropriate word) and seem to gain more recognitions as the best chefs in Paris (I am leaving aside the world at present) . (This is merely a question as I have never eaten at Gagnaire I do not know the answer). Secondly Gagnaire opening in London may be significant but to most people in England he is considerably less significant than the Roux brothers, Ramsay etc. Or even Gary Rhodes. Or for that matter Jamie Oliver (oops here we go again) Paul

Mmm well lots of stuff going on here including conflation of a huge number of issues. Firstly I imagine Jan Moir has never written a review that has provoked so much interest before, on the whole I have found her to be OK, informative enough but tends to carry rather too much baggage (like a lot of them). As has already been remarked upon what was that rubbish about not being able to afford dessert? I sense it was one of those times when she felt the needed to relate to her readers! That being said I got a reasonable impression of what the restaurant might be like, although this impression may not of course be a valid one. The review was not helped by trying cover too much ground in considering two of the restaurants in one review with limited space. However my impressions are that the cheaper restuarant is not that great and the Library is hideously expensive (for London, for me etc) but that the food delivered might be fantastic. That for me delivers about as much as I expect from a restaurant review. I need further information to see whether I can justify say a meal at Sketch instead of two meals at Foliage, Capital et al or of course X number of cheeseburgers at McDs. On more general albeit related issues, what do you think restaurant reviews are for/about? They are entertainment, most people in this country would never consider going to many of the restaurants reviewed, so why are any of us surprised that the reviews are written in the various styles that they are. We all (myself included) have a tendency to lose sight of certain realities for many people. Comments such as price has no relevance to quality, for example is in essence a correct statement, and for a number of people on this board the price of a meal is largely an irrelevance, which is fine. However for other people it is a consideration to a greater or lesser degree, I for example would spend £300+ on a meal but I would want to know/have an expectation that it would be the best meal in London, in order to do so I might have to forego two meals at The Square, so I have to make a value judgment that includes consideration of the price, as do I am sure a number of other people on this board. anyway bored now so I shall stop rambling. Paul

You ate at Locanda Locatelli then There is no specific regulation upon restaurants charging for tap water Paul

I was impressed with the high end meals in Prague, but I was comparing them to my last visit 4 years ago and the one before that about 8 years ago. At that time most of the more expensive restaurants did not exist and you were lucky if you food was hot. I enjoyed David but then I had the traditional roast duck with red cabbage and my wife and I were the only ones there, although it was lunchtime. Bellevue was the most disappointing of the restaurants it was pleasant enough but not as good as David or V Zatisi and more expensive. Paul

a) I accept this no use to you whatsoever (but you never know someone else might be in Nice on a Sunday) and b) You may loathe the chain of brasseries of which Brasserie Flo is one. But, Brasserie Flo in Nice is open on Sundays (or was last year), the restaurant is in a converted theatre/cinema and is very well done, kitchen on the stage etc. The food was pretty good in a brasserie way, very good fish soup, good sea bass and rubbish rhubard crumble (ha something else we English are better at). Granted it is not Chantecler, Univers de Christian Plumail etc. Paul

Now I'm confused but then its way to early on a Tuesday morning for me. If Tony is suggesting my implication was that Jon et al has wasted their money then that is not the case, I am in no position to comment on that, in fact it is nothing to do with me. (God I'm beginning to sound like others on this board). My comment was that I cannot justify £250 on a nice meal when I can have a very good one for £150 across the road, partly because of limited cash and partly because of limited opportunities. Do I want to go to LTC yes, but I would like to know if my expectations of having a very good meal are likely to be met and from the postings above that does not appear to be the case. Do I think I might have fun there yes, but then I could say the same about many other places. Paul

Jon/Magnolia Well that's very unhelpful, just about to cancel my reservation at LTC and things are improving? That being said I get the impression that you enjoyed the meal but that it was not great rather it was nice/pleasant. I confess I am not prepared to pay that sort of money for anything less than excellent especially when I can go across the road to Foliage. Paul

It is one of those London restaurants (Tante Claire, Pied a Terre) that I will probably never get around to going to. The menu always looks really good, its got Fish Soup . But the room is rather strange and I really do not have any sort of feel for how good it is. Paul

Went to the Providores when we needed a break from from the standard modern british/french etc food. It was on the whole very enjoyable, can't remember exactly what we had, as I recall the more unusual combinations worked better than the more standard items on the menu, except we had the sweet potato mash that loads of reviews recommended and it was horrible, nasty gluey sickly sweet stuff (but I guess we do not like sweet potatoes). Service was good wine list not bad and decent cocktails. The downstairs as others have mentioned gets very busy, the tables are v close together and consequently very noisy also. Its a good place to go for something different, decent food while not being great. Paul