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BertieWooster

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Posts posted by BertieWooster

  1. Recent reports even before that have suggested standards are slipping though. Has it been a case of 'eye off the ball' (love my football metaphors) with the combination of new hotel, new restaurant space and domestic problems? Hopefully they'll work their way through, would be shame to lose such awonderful place

  2. THey're good. Well, the suite we were in was lovely. Bathroom was a bit small, but the room itself was huge, all mod cons. Weirdly they charged for mineral water which is unusual at that level. We always sleep in room five at The Star (where the pool table is getting a bit knackered admittedly) and the bathroom there isn't that great either. Less modern feeling than The Star, more olde worlde decor. But very happy with them. Expensive. Actually, very expensive, but lovely.

    Never liked the Sportsman--very stand-offish when we've been in. The Angel is not a patch on the standards of five years ago.

    Try staying at the Yorke Arms, worth it for the three+ hours of the tasting menu...and the breakfast.

  3. Just to withdraw my previous comment. Rapidly becoming our favourite country pile (over-taking The Star which has got very erratic IMHO). Overnight on Saturday. Pol Roger chilling in the room. Tasting menu. Terrine of partridge; wonderful combination of glazed salmon, white crab meat and fish soup (when I say combination, the three fish elements were all on one plate, but quite separate...), probably the best dish I've had this year; Hare in sausage roll form, as fillet and as leg meat in gravy, the fillet particularly dripping and moist and stunning; souffle as dessert. English cheese board.

    All excellent, not a weak dish amongst the eight. And generous portions for a tasting menu. John, the maitre d', is far too friendly for Yorkshire, chasing us back to our room with petit fours as we were skipping coffee.

    Breakfast featured a gorgeous Black Pudding from local butcher's in Summerbridge. Much better than The Star's (which I'm still convinced comes from Lancashire unless I misheard). Walk around Gouthwaite Reservoir on a clear, bright winter's day, watcing the hen harriers play. Word with Ms Atkins on our return, and almost tempted to stay for SUnday lunch.

    A fiver under £500 for the room and food and drinks. Food was £75ish each. Worth it in every way.

  4. I'm not a big fan either, but needs must...and it obviously depends on the particular day. We have an individual issue that we do a lot of trade from the MEN Arena, so big gigs will lead to a large number of bookijngs that finish at 7ish and then another load that want to start at 10-30ish, which really restricts ability to deliver in the middle.

  5. Lemon tart with fillet steak?? What? It could be im missing something here but what is so clever and creative about that?  Maybe its the purist in me but for fu.k sake.

    What was he trying to do, clear out his fridges?

    I thnk you've just solved the mystery of 'avant-garde' cooking. Its all about clearing out the fridges. Thats a truly brilliant idea. I shall not look at Heston's work quite the same ever again.

  6. Nope, struggling with that [edit to make self clear--'struggling with that being a problem] if it's a weekend night....have to say The Modern isn't the epitome of 'relaxing'.

    Hi Bertie, are you trying to say that we should be happy with this hour and 45 minute slot then? Would it be the same at Harvey Nics or elsewhere on a Friday? I'm not necessarily looking for somewhere quiet when I meant 'relaxing' - I just didn't expect such table turning at The Modern.

    Hey ho better try somewhere else then.

    Probably would be a little different at Harvey Nicks as I don't think there's quite the pressure on tables. The Modern is quite a, uhhr, modern setting so, when busy, is fairly loud. And the bar (more so on a Saturday admittedly) gets fairly crowded and noisy upstairs.

    What I'm saying is I'm not unhappy with it as the boss. If I started saying, well you need to extend those hours, we drop from 130 covers being done in a night to 110, income starts dropping and as its funded through public money, there's a major issue there. We also explicitly are not a 'fine dining' restuarant, as should be judged from the prices (£22 steak notwithstanding). I've never found 1hr 45mins not to give time for three courses without being in any way rushed. Orders taken (usually) at the bar, no amuses, coffee back in the bar. Whole trip could still be three hours depending on your drinking...(!)

    Wherever you end up, hope its good.

    [Edit for spelling snafu]

  7. I actually started my cooking life off in Bottesford many moons ago, at the very restaurant, now know as Pauls!! I wouldn't make a special trip to go there now.

    Had Mrs W's grandfather's wake at Paul's a couple of years ago. Bottesford is worth visiting for (alongside one of the best churches in the country) its butchers though. Not sure if they still are allowed to slaughter out the back, but the meat, so I'm told, is exceptional

    Grantham's not THAT far from Sat Bain's surely?

  8. Would also love to know about any great pub food in the downtown area or around Manchester Regional Arena.  Any suggestions you guys can offer would be greatly appreciated.

    Best pub near the convention centre is the Britons' Protection; real ales, proper victorian mirrors and room layouts, usually amusing company.

    If you mean the MEN Arena, a short trot from there is The Angel, which offers both great beers, lovely waiting staff and British food (but take cash), and just beyond that is the Marble, which is a micro-brewery and has chronically under-rated nosh. All google-able

  9. FFS fish cakes?  any moron can make fish cakes fresh, they do not need to be bought in.  and again, this central facility apparently supplies many other non GR establishments too.  so it can, and should, be seen as a standalone operation.  I don't care which other operations buy in their fish cake or coq au vin or whatever - they are not promoting a different, quite explicit value system to all and sundry.

    again, to reiterate its not what you do, its what you say you do.  and I don't believe anyone who goes into the Narrow or Foxtrot Oscar believes their food is bought in from outside.

    Or, FFS fish cakes, they're so easy to make, why not centralise the process so that quality and margins can be standardised and guaranteed across a number of venues? Why waste venue chef's time making everything, risking differing standards and potentially changing GP?

    You're completely mis-representing what has happened, and making unjustifiable claims for what Ramsay has been saying. He has always talked extenisvely about managing margins AND consistency, both of which he's doing in this case. IT simply isn't the same as buying in from an external supplier. I see no difference to what a company like us do--we have two kitchens, one on the ground floor, one on the fifth floor. Because the ground floor kitchen is bigger and less busy outside of core hours, we use that for pre-prep and some storage. Stuff is then transported all the way upstairs as and when needed. If that ground floor kitchen was a) off-site and b) in accountancy terms a separate trading arm, we've just replicated GR's business model. Bet it's also, as others have said, what the FD do.

  10. if you can show me a single example of him, on TV, suggesting people outsource food prep then I'll accept he is not guilty of hypocrisy.  but he doesn't, he promotes his values all the time, and it appears he doesn't stand by his own words.

    He's not outsourcing it though, is he? He's having it centrally prepared under his company's control at GR Logistics. The allegation isn't that he's bringing it in from a separate supplier like Brake's, but that he's benefitting from economies of scale and scope. Which seems simple economics.

    Given that one of his cardinal rules is consistency of output, this strictly follows that line. Its not hypocritical, it's absolutely to the letter what he preaches. And it doesn't stop the food being regional or seasonal. If he was centrally producing food that was flown around the world or sent to other parts of the country, the complaint might be valid, but he's not.

    Seems like GR can't win here. If he develops a chain of gastropubs, a good percentage of people will go to them knowing who owns them and expecting a certain quality and consistency of food. If the pubs are inconsistent, or lacking in quality, he'll get kicked.

    This story relies so much on the shock horror of most punters

    a) not understanding 70% GP as standard ('they're selling a £4 bottle of wine for £13, how dare they?')

    b) believing that all the food they get at pubs and restaurants is ALWAYS freshly prepared from scratch, which we all know (with a couple of exceptions in very small places) is patent nonsense.

    I'm with Tim on this one. THis story came out mid-week, so its possibly a spoiler for a story a competitor has got. Its fairly small beer, but it's part of a longer campaign. Look to the Sundays over the next week or so for the real story.

  11. THE MODERN, URBIS, CATHEDRAL GARDENS

    (EDIT: In spite of the less than stellar experience, one has to wonder why the Modern has not yet found its way into the Good Food Guide when a number of dreary places within an hours drive manage to keep their place year on year)

    Well, we wonder too...but thanks for the positives.

    Flippant answers to some of the other comments: The candle holders may well have come from Poundland, not sure. Our re-fit cost, well, not very much at all. We could have gone massively in debt to finance the restaurant designer who, being told our budget, promptly doubled it and said, 'now, for that I could do an excellent job.', but we didn't. Public money and all that.

    Fat chips is my fault. I make few demands on the management team beyond the vision and branding of the place, service levels and hitting their %ages, but three rules are simple: There shalt be fish pie on the menu; we do fat chips rather than thin; and no Coldplay. Thin chips are an abomination.

    [EDIT to add: I would say this, but the homity pie is great. If you do a lunch, the bubble n squeak cakes have taken over from the fish finger sarnies as the first choice of men of a certain age]

  12. [

    I look at Ithaca - 25 restaurant covers and four midweek-lunchers on the 50% discount menu, and Vermillion - marooned by the cancelled "supercasino", and wonder where that £4+m million return is going to come from over 5 years, 10 years or possibly even over eons...

    Cheers

    Thom

    I hesitate to say how much The Modern cost.

  13. Other problem is that it is on what is rapidly becoming the wrong side of town in a new build flat development that is dying on its arse a recent £2.5m italian closed its doors as have others

    £2.5m for an Italian restaurant in Leeds? In LEEDS?

    ?? Financial capital of the north--that Leeds you mean? With serious old and new money? That Leeds? Surrounded by some seriously expensive village property? That Leeds?

    Or was it some other Leeds you were thinking of? ; - 0)

  14. Well excuse me all over the place....  I put this to the inspector, citing that I believe Michelin too has become nothing more than a world wide brand, which supports the various chefs brands out there. Guess what, he didn't wholely agree with me but at the same time didn't disagree either. Probably didn't do myself any favours of getting a star but so f..king what. I'd rather stand for something than sell out for anything.

    Thank you, I enjoyed the sudden flashback to all those discussions in the late eighties in music. 'But we play our own instruments, we've paid our dues, these people who treat it as a business, they're just sell-outs.'

    What, exactly, do you stand for? Desiring to return to a pre-capitalist idyll of the artist in an age before mechanical (never mind digital) reproduction is lovely. But fantasy.

    I expect the INspector was very impressed by your rant and will be explaining to Mr. Michelin why everything they do is wrong.

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