culinary bear

So would you say that primarily you're going to be running a restaurant where the chefs wait the tables, or one where the waitstaff cook? If you're planning a mixture of both, which would you say describes your plan better? I'm just trying to clarify in my own mind the angle that you're coming from, that's all.

Ohhhhhhhh... *cracks knuckles* This is one of my personal bugbears. There are two types of perfume I find particularly offensive in a food environment. One is that heavy, sweet vanilla perfume so beloved of the middle-aged cougar, and the other is a piercing floral top note that makes you think you were in a florist's shop. It's difficult for the management, of course. They can't be expected, as much as I might like it, to march over to the offender's table and deliver an impassioned tirade about why it's inappropriate to come to dinner smelling like a whore's handkerchief. In the past, I've called the manager over and asked to be reseated, saying that I have a sensitive nose (in truth, I do) and that the perfume is making it quite impossible to enjoy the food. A veiled threat to leave after the starters usually lets them know you're serious about the matter. It's just as unacceptable as coming to a restaurant stinking of body odour.

What type of food are you planning to serve at this restaurant?

I once had a request from a hospitalised friend to bring in cold chicken curry. :) A side point - it's always a good idea to be discreet about bringing food in for patients; not because the staff may not approve of the idea but it can be unfair to triumphally waft a steaming casserole full of something good through a ward full of people who don't have the luxury of friends bringing in nice things for them.

I've had a very tasty result by incubating single cream (18% butterfat) with a tablespoon of live yoghurt culture. If your starter yoghurt culture is of the set variety, your consistency will more closely match the shop-bought version. In addition to the Leuconostoc and Lactococcus spp, you'll also get Bifidus and Lactobacillus spp, which in my experience tend to give a more rounded flavour.

Every year for the last few years I've made a large batch of marmalade. This year's batch was made with organic Sevilles from the Unicorn grocery in Chorlton, and Billington's unrefined organic caster sugar. To give you some idea of the size of the batch, it's residing in vac-pac bags, because despite two trips to Lakeland, I've insufficient jars for it all. I'd be willing to release some for eG consumption in return for nothing other than karmic goodness.

You might all be pleased to know that this is the result - my second ever sourdough loaf, and no sticking! :)

Cuisine en Dix Minutes, Edouard de Pomiane... Simple French Food, Richard Olney... Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery, Jane Grigson... I shall have to restrict myself to three, however painful the brevity.

Oh, there were worse ones to choose from. More next week.

A bit of a fishy review from Marina O'Loughlin at Deep, reviewed by Jan Moir last week, and, erm, Fay Maschler. Last week. What I find unsettling is that she describes the food as “mostly good” and then proceeds to describe the dishes she has as, variously, “splendid, intriguing”, “perfectly roasted', “fine”, “appealing”, “I liked this a lot”, “used to excellent effect”, and “princely”. “Everything encountered at Deep was as it should be”. So why “mostly good”, Marina? Giving added weight to my Ten Restaurants in the UK theory is Jay Rayner, this week visiting Glas, reviewed a whole three weeks ago by Terry Durack, and broadly agreeing with the big Aussie. Well, you would, wouldn't you? While we're at the Observer, it's OFM time this weekend... This is getting remarkably silly now. Jan Moir goes to the Ledbury, reviewed a fortnight ago by Fay Maschler. If all this cyclical nonsense doesn't stop, I shall be forced to turn to the Aberdeen Press and Journal for original coverage. You've been warned. In fact, I might just do that to get away from Moir's use of the word “yumsome”. I mean, really... Actually, as she fawns over the restaurant like a schoolgirl, it might just fit the tone. Would anyone that has a 6'x4' colour poster of Brett Graham, the Ledbury's head chef, be kind enough to forward it to the Telegraph offices? Thanks in advance. Gillian Glover has two fairly horrible meals at Oloroso and the Point Hotel, one of which I've eaten in and don't wish to eat in again, and the other I had no wish to eat in in the first place. Scotland does have some quality restaurants, you know, it's just that the locals tend to station large clouds of midges at the doors to discourage auslanders from dining there. Sejal Sukhadwala tried Leon for the first time and had chicken nuggets. No, really. Healthy food can indeed by stylish and tasty, apparently. Definitely Aberdeen Press and Journal time next week, as Tracy MacLeod goes to, dear god, the Ledbury, praising it in tones slightly less gushing than Jan Moir. Four paragraphs about the restaurant and its food, the other eleven full of wibblings. Yes, it must be Giles Coren. The condensed message regarding the Garden Cafe – although, to be fair, I didn't really need to condense the relevant passages much – is that it's moderately shit, and that you shouldn't go. Durack, praise be, doesn't review the Ledbury. He goes to Bray, and samples Heston Blumenthal's 'other place', the Hind's Head, where everything is rather as it should be. The beguilingly named King Sitric is Charles Campion's choice (they have a choice?) of venue this week, but the food falls way below the promise of “modern Irish” cuisine. Your man Corrigan isn't exactly going to be quaking in his boots. Fay Maschler went to Lanes Restaurant at London's Four Seasons Hotel, and was appalled – frankly, I'd be as well – by the pricing, for rather dubious food. Nearly fourteen quid for a salad of mozzarella and tomatoes? Maschler again, this time at Chico Latino, finding it a very poor cousin of Asia de Cuba. In her mini-review, Marina O'Loughlin manages to avoid reviewing Deep twice in one week and is instead disappointed by the rice at Kurumaya, though she does say thanks for all the fish. And, just because it's not the Ledbury, here's what we have to put up with from the Paisley Daily Express. I'm going to make it a personal goal to garner at least one very obscure review a week. I wonder if Pig Farmer Monthly has a food column?

Congratultions on the job! I had an interview today, for a sous chef's position. The head chef, on the phone, had said the following reassuring line : "oh, and don't worry about any of that suited and booted bullshit - I'm not going to employ you based on your dress sense". This from a man who gained a michelin star for two of his own kitchens and worked for a long time in a 3-star kitchen... :)

My first attempt with a naturally leavened sourdough bread was a success, but it brought up something of a procedural issue. I rubbed a linen cloth with ample flour, and left the dough to prove in the lined basket for the allotted time. On turning the loaf out on to the baking stone, the dough adhered to the cloth at various points, necessitating something of a delicate operation to remove it. I used enough flour; the cloth had a lot of free flour left on it when I put the dough in to rise. Do such cloths acquire a non-stickiness with repeated use in the manner of the patina on a black iron skillet? Like pancakes, does the first one always stick? Answers on a postcard, please...

Gillian Glover vows never to return to The Marque Central, in Edinburgh. This raises an intersting point - if the fire alarm goes off between your starter and main, and you're prevented from even getting your main course, never mind eating it - are the restaurant entitled to charge you the full 2-course set menu price? Still marooned in Orkney, poor woman, is Jan Moir. The Creel is an entirely missable experience, she maintains. Scampering back to London, she finds that Deep, on Imperial Wharf, is actually worse. Ten points deducted for using the phrase 'deep doo-doo' with sincerity. We're all accustomed to the word 'shit', Jan, even the most blue-rinsed of Telegraph readers. Giles Coren has obviously taken Terry Durack's notes with him when he visits Silk. In essence, pretty much the same verdict as Durack arrived at last week. Durack himself reviews Michiaki in London. Toro! Toro! Toro! (sorry)... In the relentless merry-go-round of restaurant reviewing, I can only assume that there's a Central Department of Assignments, one which sends plain manilla envelopes, ones which self-destruct in five seconds, to various offices in Faringdon Road, Canary Wharf and the like every week. Sometimes there are mix-ups, as we shall see later. Thomas Sutcliffe rips in to the food but not the reputation of Santa Maria de Buen Ayre, and takes his son, who apparently attends a 'strictly vegetarian school'. The number for Childline is 0800 11 11. Are there only ten restaurants in the UK? Fay Maschler goes Deep, and considers much of the food ill-judged. Considering that owner Christian Sandefeldt is on the cover of this week's Caterer doing a Richard Corrigan with a zander, it might be safe to say that the pomp and publicity is covering an outfit whch thoroughly fails to deliver. Charles Campion's Mantra for the week is to avoid overpriced curries... Marina O'Loughlin encouters a mixed bag at London's Mestizo and a thoroughly horrible one at The Bingham in Richmond. In a horrific oversight at the Central Department of Assignments, Messrs Rayner and Granleese both review (and fawn over, with justification) New Tayyabs in London's East End. If neither boy will admit to copying, I'm afraid it's lines for both. Maschler again at Wizzy's in Fulham Road, happy to report that there's a lovely, darling, sweetie Korean restaurant to be found. Toby Young finds cosmetically enhanced ladies-who-lunch at Lucio's in Fulham, but don't get excited; he certainly didn't.

Possibly off-topic, but has anyone here tried guinness punch? Similar to a stout float, it's a West Indian favourite, made by taking guinness foreign extra, condensed milk, egg yolk, coconut milk, ice, nutmeg and allspice...

It's not the first time I can recall that the Grauniad and Observer have reviewed the same place on the same weekend. I think Jay reviews about 4 weeks ahead of press; I've no idea about the schedule at the Guardian. If they did, did Granleese know he'd be writing a review of it at the time? :)

Andy, are you going for a grand slam of all Martin Hadden's places on here? :) Lovely review.

How wonderful that restaurant EHO reports can be accessed under the FOI Act, but not documents more, shall we say, pertinent to government policy? I digress. Tony - bacteria can indeed equate to flavour, in certain circumstances.. If EHO guidelines were followed strictly to the letter, many restaurants would go out of business. To give you a ludicrous example, I am not allowed, strictly speaking, to hold confit duck vac-packed and in duck fat in the fridge at 1-2C for more than three days. Similarly with terrines, even refrigerated and kept under clarified butter. I'm not allowed to use sterile, boil-washed linen oven cloths (not even washed in house, but handled by a national company) as liners for boxes in which tuiles are kept (they support them and stop them breaking in storage) despite the fact that we make tuiles daily and use a new clean cloth every time, for reasons of 'cross-contamination'. They're porous and that's that, apparently. Sorry, that was quite a rant. So, unless they start having outbreaks of food poisoning, I'm not going to be too bothered about hygiene at the FD.

First up this week we have Gillian Glover's rather weighed dismissal of Malcolm Duck's new outing, Duck's at Kilspindie, in Aberlady, East Lothian. Malcolm runs a half-decent French restaurant in Edinburgh - which translates to 'really good' in the arcane local rating system - and after the closure of 'Ducks de la Gare' at Waverley Station has decided to branch out into the suburbs. Incidentally, his father (born in the late '20s before Walt made his mark) is called, yes, Donald. Jan Moir dons her sealskins and treks all the way to Orkney to review Hamnavoe. Despite bought-in desserts, she reckons the locals are on to a good thing. Now that la Moir has opened up the island to culinary exploration, expect a McDonalds Drive-Thru to open up at the Skara Brae car park in the near future. If you'd like to concentrate on the food while reading Giles 'I've just won an award you know' Coren's review of Foliage at the Mandarin Oriental in London, simply skim past the initial six paragraphs of self-congratulatory wanking. Oh wait, most of you do that already. Fresh from a stint as head chef at Lola's - not that the statement narrows the field down very much - Elisha Carter is now heading up the kitchen at Silk in London, offering Asian, Middle Eastern and Italian food. All on the same menu. Under headings. Oh god. "Yes, I'll have the pho to start, followed by the lasagna al forno and can I finish with the baklava, please? I'm joking, although not as much as I wished I was. Terry Durack, in a moment of magnanimity, agrees with me. You'd think Scotland was some sort of culinary Mecca (and I can assure you that with a few notable exceptions it surely isn't) but Gareth McLean heads up to Mar Hall in Renfrewshire for dinner and finds that their aspirations exceed their capabality by some margin. Rather like the man who was keeping the seat warm ever since Matthew Fort vacated it. Cay Tre is the sort of place whose tableside service, in stark contrast to the gorilla with the gueridon of old, delights Jay Rayner. Good ethnic food at a great price, while we up north have to deal with, well, Vernon's. Marina O'Loughlin goes to the Broadway Bar and Grill, formerly Osia, and finds the place a shell of its fomer self. Bodeans gets Helen Nicholson's seal of approval, mainly for its meaty attitude and, as a certain pretentious tosser would write, 'Brobdingnagian' portions. Fay Maschler went to The Ledbury, and finds that the standard is almost there, but not quite. Head chef Brett Graham was Philip Howard's sous at The Square (the Ledbury s part of Nigel Platts-Martin's group) and, while he'll take time to find his feet, Maschler is hopeful that the food will eventually match the rather hefty bill. Oh, and if anyone can point me in the direction of any Welsh reviews, I'll be very grateful, is it?

E J camp_dick, Aged 17 1/2 :)

that's interesting... Neil (nightsctosman) posted this in the other thread : I've seen corn syrup used, and it was much less viscous than glucose. I always use a 50:50 mix of glucose and trimoline in i/c and sobet recipes anyway, it was more for other uses I was thinking.

Can one tradmark one's own name?

The post on invert sugars in ganache led me to ask this, a question that I really should have asked a while ago and which I can't find having been asked on eG before. I'm in the UK, where light corn syrup is fairly hard to come by. I've never managed to track it down; even specialist catering suppliers like West Country Fine Foods, who supply all the other patisserie requisites I use, draw a blank. A lot of recipes and cookbooks I have use light corn syrup, and I'm wondering how best to substitute other invert sugars to achieve the best result. I know that none of them are directly equivalent, but there must be some rough rule of thumb which would give me a good idea of what to use in a given circumstance. I have the usual suspects available, i.e. trimoline and glucose (also acidic sugar solutions of whatever density I choose to make). Can anyone help?

Maldon as a table salt; the same company now markets a really good rock salt for cooking...

Jason, just as a matter of interest, how much do you pay for a bottle of Sam Smith's Imperial over your way?

Proof that daring innovative cuisine can be found in Ulster is decidedly not found in Janet Devlin's review of, wait for it, Frenchie's Restaurant in the Belfast Telegraph. Ironically, this seems not to bother her too much. The Irish Independent's Alan Stanford finds commendable 'Hiberno/French' cooking at Quay Cottage in County Mayo, including the "teddy bear of desserts". I shan't spoil it for you, you'll have to allay your suspense yourself. After registration... Gillian Glover indulges in hubble and bubble with apparently neither toil nor trouble at the imaginitively named The Restaurant, in Roseburn. Jan Moir manages to talk about Santa Maria del Buen Ayre for nearly half her column in the Telegraph. Editorial censure is sure to follow. I can't say I've been too impressed with Argentine beef in the past, but she seems to think it surpasses the European article. Jay Rayner finds quiveringly awful food at La Sapinière, Center Parcs Sherwood Forest. Giles Coren is distinctly unimpressed with everything bar the lamps at Shanghai Blues, with cruel and inhumane post-mortem treatment of his lobster coming in for especially heavy flak. The Independent's Thomas Sutcliffe thinks he should have kept on going on the road to Leeds and not stopped off at the Box Tree in Ilkley. The normally uncuddly Terry Durack's sap is obviously rising, as he goes all doe-eyed over London's Glas. Sons of Glyndwr can rest easy, as this is not the second invasion of London by the Welsh, but an establishemnt of a more Scandinavian bent. Toby Young doesn't recommend Selfridge's Lab Cafe as the best part of the store for picking up company, but finds the 'pick and mix' salad rather worth the effort. Charles Campion's visit to Urbane, sorry, Aubaine results in a pretty lacklustre impression of an overpriced also-ran. If his description of the food is correct, why are they serving rib-eye when the menu describes it as "alloyaou (sic)", or sirloin? Does trading standards cover French? Anyone know? Fay Maschler gives a mini-review of five of the Best of British to celebrate St George's Day. What was it that Mark Twain said about patriotism being the last refuge of the scoundrel? That aside, this particular top five contains about as many surprises as Restaurant Magazine's global effort earlier this month. It's time to put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves, as this is Victor Lewis-Smith's last column for the Guardian. Cue weeping and rending of garments throughout the country. Just in case anyone's interested, he reviewed Audrey's Fish And Chip Shop in Bridlington, East Yorkshire. Go gently, it's my first time... :)