Morfudd

Marlena Mountain Food Co number - phone Yun on 01994 419555 or 07774 949555

the Mountain Food Company provide wonderful herbs from the Welsh mountains and surrounds, hairy bittercress, sea purslane, wood sorrel, pennywort, etc Mountain Food Co Banc y ddol Whitland Dyfed the kitchen at Lolas has the number, I have mislaid it, but we use them quite a lot. Call our kitchen number 77042984 if you would like the number quickly

This is terrible news! I am already being called 'fatty' at home. How do these people expect us to show disclipine when they have all these delicious goodies on offer??? Must keep reminding myself..research, research

I'm not sure if it was MSG (and I wasnt drunk - on this occasion) but I usually get a headache after eating MSG. There was one dish which I ate described as lime noodles but which was actually lime gloop, and I wonder if that was the culprit. It would surprise me if this restaurant used MSG, but then it surprised me that this restaurant could produce a soggy calamari salad and lime gloooop, so there we go.

Thank you to everyone who posted replies and pointed some very persuasive fingers in some great directions - we had what I can only describe as a culinary mega feast in New York last week..inbetween the galleries (MOMA puts our TAte Britain in the corner there with a dunces cap on), some shopping and some touristy things, we dined in a dozen restaurants in six days - almost all of them superb - they were: Sunday brunch at Prune in the East Village, dinner at soba bar Honmura An, Monday lunch Union Square Cafe, dinner at Sushi Yasuda. Tuesday lunch at the Oyster Bar in Grand Central Station, dinner at Gramercy Tavern; Wednesday lunch at Aquavit, dinner at WD50; Thursday lunch at Spice Market; dinner at Le Bernadin; Friday lunch at Per Se and dinner at LES neo-sushi bar Cube 63. The only duff gonger of a meal was at Spice Market, where the staff were listless and the food really mediocre and (astonishingly, but what else gives this sort of headache?) - flavoured with MSG. A small gripe however and nothing to blight the amazing quality of all of our other meals, so thank you for all your recommendations. Morfudd XXXXX

TCA can be quite difficult to detect - it is not a question of 'it is easy to detect because it is either corked or not" since cork taint can affect a wine very mildly so that it is not always iimmediately evident. I have been to numerous tastings where there has been disagreement between experts over whether a wine has TCA. The other interesting thing is that TCA can crop up even in wines under stelvin, because infection has occured from sources other than cork taint. I agree that corked wines are under -diagnosed, for the very reason that TCA does not always reveal itself through the obvious aromas of mustiness etc. Lack of fruit and a short finish are also symptoms of a corked wine, but it is quite hard to distinguish between those characteristics, and a wine that is simply poorly made.

Tony and Bux, thank you so much for all your recommendations - I shall follow some threads on this site too so that I have done my homework before I land. xx

Sorry, I have one more addition to my category - Adrian Ferria influenced style of cooking, or more generally chefs interested in molecular gastronomy...

I have looked at open table - thank you. My categories for styles of restaurants are: 1.fabulous food but not in a 'michelin' style setting/service/atmosphere ie.top of the range grub without the pomposity 2.Japanese 3.Up and coming chef/patron places who cant afford the central location rents but who are cooking wonderful food in possibly out of the way locations 4.Hip/trendy just for the hell of it Thanks!

Hi, London restaurateur in New York at the beginning of April - would love some tips on where I should eat over the course of the week, not only the established restaurants 9even if I can get a booking) but the up and coming places. Could I have some insider tips please? Thank you! ps also the established places - are they still firing on all guns?

Mark Williams was the original Sous chef at Harveys back in 1987. He then returned to Harveys as Head Chef after MPW moved to Hyde Park but it didnt really work out. Last I heard of Stephen was that he had bought (or was buying) a pub in Abergavenny.

Could e gulleteers help me please - I dont know enough about chocolate, especially with regards to making ice creams and sorbets with it...currently use 70% min but I have been told that I may get a better texture from lower % of cocoa solids. Any recommendations, and why?

Hi Silverbrow yes it was a fun piece wasnt it? However, I havnt actually been threatened with my knees being broken or my windows smashed quite yet! Origamicrane, did you receive the pics I e mailed to you?

sorry Andy I know nobody was directing any criticism, it was just a very difficult and very disappointing period for me - life goes on!

Sorry! I need to put in my tuppence ha'penny. Juliet Peston was with us for three years; Gary Lee for two years, then I had my go at going down the Michelin road which was frankly disasterous both financially and in terms of the reputation of the restaurant, since it got labelled with the 'in and out chefs' syndrome (Hywel Jones and Robert Reid both giving the restaurant a mere 8 months between them) when our regulars flocked away from the restaurant because they (rightly) couldnt stand the hour and a half delays between courses, and half the time with one of these chefs I had to bang down the door of his flat in order to wake him up to get him into work anyway. Elisha Carter was with Lolas for eighteen months, followed by Brian Sparks, formerly his sous chef. Juliet Peston was brought back whilst Brian was still here in the casual role of consultant and generally overseeing the kitchen, in order to bring it back to its formerly successful role of being a neighbourhood restaurant with jolly decent food and wines(and incidentally this is still Juliet's role) I know e gullet isnt a forum for gripes and Lola's may be a 'prime location' but it is also bloody hard to persuade people to come up the stairs onto a first floor restaurant with no footfall in an extremely competitive area, and also it is bloody hard just to run a restaurant frankly. I know I have made tons of mistakes and should never have thought Hywel et al would move from Michelin starred hotel restaurants to a humble local restaurant like Lola's and bring it too up to Michelin status, but I really dont want to be criticised for my aspirations, even if they did get flung back into my face. Sorry if I sound indignant Andy.

ate there about a year ago, dont remember individual dishes,I'm afraid, but we had the degustation menu - it was simply superb and I also wonder why it isnt better known

Yes I did (thankyou Circplum!) It was great.

OC yes I got my seeds mixed up! exseedingly silly! Thats why I have never heard of white poppy seeds! The poppy seed ice cream was nice anyway. I will read your recipe correctly next time.

OC have tried your poppy seed ice cream, though I only had black seeds, it was very good. What do the white poppy seeds do to enhance the flavour? The shades of green ice cream I think I will try as a flight in the restaurant first when I have time. I am still considering their order. Ithink I will make them all then see which order they go in. will let you know when I have my act together. x

good market on a Saturday in Northcote Road; great butchers on Northcote road (cannot remember name, look out for the queue outside the door) Fantastic small independant wine merchant called Philglass and swiggit; Pizza Metro on battersea rise; Chez Bruce ten minutes; Ransomes dock ten minutes (great wine list); Tuman Ti on Lavender Hill v good thai restaurant, Gourmet Burger (the original) on Northcote Road..lots and lots of small restaurants on battersea rise and northcote road now, none apart from those mentioned of note but quite happening. Clapham Junction itself still a bit of a dive, but has that organic chain of food stores(cannot remember name) very close, have lived in the area for twenty years, much better now than it used to be.

Helenjp, have you ever tried wasabi and cherry? it sounds fascinating.. Origamicrane, when you say shades of green ice cream, do you mean 'a flight of ice creams? We do wine flights at Lola's and the ice cream flight would be a great idea. would you put them all together in the same tub? would they conflict?

thank you for all the hints re the wasabi ice cream...all of this has become a bit of a time thing...I could have twenty vans out there all selling ton loads of ices in this weather, I simply am not capable of producing enough ice cream, and even if a dozen other restaurants did the same thing, they wouldnt be competition. So far the vanilla with PX is going down very well, also affogato al caffe - a scoop of vanilla ice cream with a shot of espresso on top (adults) As a matter of interest, my licensing solicitor didnt have an answer to my question of whether i was permitted to sell shots of alchohol from an ice cream van (never been asked before!) So I have my bottle of PX in the van and I guess so long as it is only a small shot, there wont be a problem (let you know if I get arrested!) The kids are loving the bitter cherry sorbet and the mint ice cream along with the other obvious ones. So many requests for flakes! Does anyone know how to make them? I love the idea of the desconstructed pesto sorbet with all of the textural stuff, pine nut brittle. Thank you. We have been making some herb ice creams, like rosemary for example, which I think taste rather nice. I think there is a lot of room for other people to do the same thing if they want to start a home production. Pacojets cost about 3K and make ice creams very quickly, but you can pick up the robot coupes for about 700 and they theoretically make a litre every twenty minutes. Register your business with the council, no restrictions for selling except in Westminster, off you go.

I have got pictures but dont know how to post them on this thread. I will e mail egullet and hope they can be added that way. With the wasabi ice cream I thought of just making a simple custard and adding the wasabi to taste. I am sure that is not the correct way though.

There shouldnt be an issue about raw eggs because the custard is cooked first using egg yolks then chilled quickly to get over that danger point. It will be then kept chilled until the liquid nitrogen is added and it makes the ice cream in 20 seconds. At least that is the theory. Heston said that it had a strange texture if it was poured in too quickly but I have yet to see the process for myself and how he solves the textural issue. I had a fabulous meal at El Bulli last year and saw lots of things being produced there with liquid nitrogen but not ice cream! The van is only out 'on the road' at certain points during the day at the mo, unless it is hired for a party, which is either day or evening. Since I am currently the only insured driver (and the only person stupid enough to consider driving it around!) there are a few logistical difficulties, since I am still hands on at Lola's. If anyone has any suggestions on recipes that are either weird or truely delicious and would be a hit, would love to hear about them.

I shall try! But I think my liquid nitrogen comes first. Have you tasted it? Is it delicious?