phil_v

I went to Hibiscus last August and it was certainly one of the most disappointing set lunches I've had in London. Firstly, literally half of the items on the menu had surcharges, none of which were for particularly 'luxury' ingredients that you might expect for particular truffle / lobster dishes etc. Either offer a set lunch, or don't, doing half and half it just annoying. Firstly, the amuse bouche was a cocktail of (from memory) some kind of watermelon and basil, with a pineapple foam on top. As a long time bartender and now a bar owner, this really was one of the worst cocktails I've tasted in a long time. Overly sweet with the balance of watermelon and pineapple, and the foam was sickly. Not great as a pre-dessert, let alone an amuse bouche. Secondly, whilst I may be ordering the set lunch menu rather than the a la carte, I am still a paying customer in a restaurant and expect to be treated the same as everyone else. When the main courses were delivered to our table, the waiter didn't stop to say what they were. As a result, we were slightly confused as to what we had, which I then realised was because I'd been given the mutton cottage pie with feta from the set menu, and not the fish that I'd ordered. After trying to get someone's attention, a waiter came over, whereupon I explained what had happened. He looked at me, and I swear was about to argue that I had ordered that, but then just took my dish away without apology. So we sat there, with my girlfriend's food going cold, waiting for my main dish. I persuaded my girlfriend to start without me, and a little while later my dish arrived, still without an apology for it being incorrect, or seemingly any realistion that my girlfriend's food could have been taken back to the kitchen. And when the food arrived, nothing really excited. The only dish that I really remember was the Fish (grey mullet) with peach and beetroot, which was a scattering of bits of peach and beetroot across the plate, with such a small drizzle of something as to be unnoticeable. Just small bits of food next to each other, which didn't work as a plate of food. My girlfriend's Chicken (surcharge £10 I seem to remember) was equally uninspiring. I go to top restaurants expecting to pay more than average for better than average food and service. There have been many great reviews of Hibiscus, but perhaps these were for people dining a la carte rather than set lunches, although I can't believe that anybody would have appreciated the amuse-bouche. The food and service here were way below any other 'fine-dining' restaurants that I've eaten in. Very disappointing.

You could use egg yolks in a flip - classic recipes - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flip_%28cocktail%29 Egg yolk is also the main ingredient in Advocaat - Snowball anyone?

Definitely agree with the Two Fat Ladies. Wonderful. And if we can mention critics in this, I'd have to nominate AA Gill and Jay Rayner from this side of the pond. And Michael Winner for that matter. He's a pompous idiot, but a fantastically entertaining one...

Heston Blumenthal's series about perfecting classics on BBC culminated a couple of days ago with his perfect Christmas meal. I missed it being at work as usual, but fortunately caught the signed repeat in the early hours of this morning... Wow. Absolutely incredible. And fortunately, available on demand for the next 5 (I think) days, on the BBC iplayer - http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/b008kj81.shtml - I urge you to watch him create one of the most amazing experiences imaginable. Basically, Heston invites 6 celebrities for a special Christmas meal, which encompasses many of the techniques he has become famous for. But what takes this to another level completely is the phenomenal amount of thought that goes into each course in relation to the psychology of the 'perfect christmas'. This is about the experience as a whole, with specially created sets, perfumes, smoke and yes, snow to work with the food. I was lucky enough to have the tasting menu at the Fat Duck a few years ago, but I would chew off my right arm to have been invited to this. Never have I been so envious of 'celebrities'... Richard E. Grant especially was absolutely bewitched by it, his face registering sheer amazement and wonderment. Watch the programme if you can (you can download it for 30 days as well). I haven't found any record of the dishes online yet, and don't have time to post all the dishes, but would love to read the full menu if anyone's seen it. Cheers Heston - amazing.

Hello, Just wanted to agree with a couple of things, and add a couple more points that haven't been made... Reviews as advice on where to go: If a meal is going to cost £100+ and a very infreqent event, then I want to be pretty sure that I'm going to like it. So consulting reviews in whatever format is going to be helpful. Guest reviews on websites like www.london-eating.co.uk are as has been pointed out, generally a bit hit and miss. Yes, you can average out the pros and cons, but it's hard to trust them in a way that you could regularly read a restaurant critic and trust their comments. That's not to say you should take their word as gold and not make a decision on the restaurant yourself, but it is useful in deciding where to go. The question of a the importance of a critic and their worth is a long-runnning discussion and certainly not limited to restaurant critics, as anyone with a knowledge of the film industry and criticism particularly in the UK will testify. Can critics make or break a restaurant? With small or local restaurants then a review can make a big difference, but I would think that with the development of the media and the status of restaurants in the UK over the years, certain establishments are relatively immune to the critics' knives. In the same way the latest critically-slated blockbuster will continue to do well at the box-office, some of the celebrity chefs will still attract diners, as will any 'attraction' be it the restauranteurs (Chris Corbin & Jeremy King in London for example) or the design (I think the restaurant at Sketch would probably have done ok without Pierre Gagnaire). So yes, maybe the importance of the critic reviewer as opposed to the more standardised rating has been diminished in recent years. Lastly, and personally, I like reading reviews! I only get to go to a handful of restaurants in London, and very few further afield, but I still enjoy reading about restaurants, particularly if it is a well-written review. Perhaps a more pertinent debate for this list is how much the critics actually write about the restaurant itself, as opposed to say how often they feature their girlfriend in their writings. But that aside, as a 'columnist' in a paper or magazine, the reviews are primarily entertaining. There was a whole debate on here a while back about the Observer Food Magazine, and the same argument applies here - the majority reading aren't 'foodies' or aren't planning to go that restaurant. On one final note, I'd just like to mention Michael Winner. As most of you will know I'm sure, Winner trades on his particular reputation and probably has more people who dislike him (which even spawned the popular Winner's Letters page) than any other. Personally, I wouldn't want to have dinner with him and would think twice about going to any of the restaurants he reviews regardless of whether he liked them. But his reviews are wonderful reading and I never miss one! Phil