Jon Tseng

If your £60 is all inclusive there's little chance of swinging a reasonable deal at an upmarket joint (Petrus, Nobu, Gordon Ramsayalikes). In that price range think about one of the better Asian/Chinese places in town. They tend to have lots of private rooms (weddings etc) and that style of shared food is maybe better for bigger parties anyhow. Haven't a clue about restaurants though. Best thing would be to get the Time Out London, flick to the map at the back and start looking - all restaurants are marked on the map - damn useful when you're trying to find somewhere someplace. J

hasn't morgan meunier got a stack of them in his dining room? and the point is he isn't (or wasn't) in it has he got his * yet? if not he should be a tip for * given his status (shared with andrew turner of the bentley) as Most Underacknowledged Posh Chef in London

Angel Mangal on Upper St is an old board favourite. Kicks Tas into touch by some distance. J

Nah, LML would have said the Fat Duck is an evil conspiracy theory by Heston McBlumenthal to sell snail porridge which was actually invented by a spanish chef. Or words to that effect. Ah well. There only seems to be a few of us antediluvians left who remember the good old days... ;-) J

yes glas is probably your best best in terms of distance the closest place would be the peasant gastropub on st john and percival. J

Evening pop-pickers A quick report post-Xmas week on the sun-drenched slopes of the Three Valleys. Lots of sun. Fantastic weather. Crap snow. But that's fine as less skiing means more time for dining! The place I'd like to flag is L'Oxalys (http://www.loxalys.com/loxalys/), a new * this year L'Oxalys located a bit off the main drag in Val Thorens. Now Val Thorens, an ugly-as-hell purpose built resort more notably for its altitude than its architecture (think Tignes or Les Arcs!) is the last place you'd expect a classy joint, but this was outstanding. First the chef - Jean Sulpice. He's young - 28 - and looks it. He's a native Savoyarde and has been at L'Oxalys a couple of years. Before that notable for a few years with Marc Veyrat. Other experience includes Adria, Gagnaire, Ducasse in Paris, Pierre Herme (mainly stages I think). The thing that struck me is he cooks with both technical skill and his combinations show a great deal of maturity. Def one to watch. - First starter was a chestnut soup with parmesan foam, topped with slices of black truffle. Reasonable chestnut taste - one thing I was worried about was that it would just taste of cream. Lovely combination. - Second starter showed the chef was really serious. Poached oysters with hazelnut puree, brunoise of chicken breast and artichoke lurking in there, bacon-flavour foam on top. This was a top-notch combination where all of the ingredients sang well together. Only criticism - the chicken brunoise was probably unnecessary. - Main was a pigeon breast en croute, fantastically tender pigeon (I checked with the chef after if there was any sous-vide action going on - no just straight roasting). On the side a sauce flavoured with berries and one of those uber-smooth cauliflower purees. Notable how puree and sauce blended well and complemented the pigeon. - I also slipped in a winter vegetable tart from the starters just to check how the chef handles his veggies. The tarte came as a precise square of polenta a couple of mm thick topped with perfectly arranged winter veggies - dinky brussel sprouts leaves, turnips, tiny cauliflower florets, this and that. Integrated well with the vinaigrette and the coarse salt on top. Not outstanding, but definitely good. - Pudding was a deconstructed banana split thing. Mason jar with rum jelly, roast banana, peanut ice-cream and other goodies layered in. Really good. - Obviously various pre and post-carte doodads. Among them with the pre-deserts was a sensational little creme caramel flavoured with maize topped with a piece of popcorn - in retrospect such an obvious combination - but who knew? E100 for the lot, plus they comped me a thick slice of the pate en croute they were serving on the du jour menu to take away (they even vac packed it for me). Along with Abac this was my meal of the year and by far the most impressive haute joint I've found so far in the Alps (OK, not necessarily great competition). Keep an eye on this chef. I'd tip him for at least ** in the next couple of years. ta J PS Note that Trois Vallees is well provided with haute dining options, if you're the sort of person who'd rather kill yourself with a nice thick tranche of foie gras rather than by busting a guy on the piste. *** Chabichou is Courchevel 1850 is recommended. ** Bateau Ivre just opposite is also OK. * Le Farcon in La Tania overreaches itself with some dodgy fusion. There's also a * St Martin way I never made it to.

With respect (and I suspect in London this syndrome may not be as commonplace as in NYC) I would disagree with the views above. There are several reasons why I, personally, couldn't care less when or in what order the food comes so long as it comes well cooked in hot. Obviously these are specific to myself - it is clear others disagree. 1) Order is overrated: To be honest so long as the savoury food comes before the sweet stuff getting food in a dictated hot/cold/soup/salad/main etc order is wildly overrated. There are two aesthetic reasons to want food in a particular order. Firstly small dishes (starters) before entrees - obviously this isn't an issue in a small-plate context. Secondly progression of flavours cold/hot/soup/entree etc - again this is overrated - as evidenced by the willingness of billions of people across Asia to scoff multiple dishes all at once. If you want to clear your palate between courses have a glass or tap water. Or go to the restroom and gargle with mint mouthwash. or whatever. 2) Pity the poor kitchen: OK you have a small plate restaurant with, lets say 80 covers in. 5 dishes per customer. Two sitting. Heck that's 800 plates going out through the swinging doors on Friday night. That my friends is a logistical nightmare. To be honest it strikes me a churlish to start carping about not having an expeditor or a well organised kitchen in that context. If you can get 800 dishes out a point in any order during a three hour service, believe me you've got a f**king organised kitchen, expeditor or not. 3) It may be just me but so long as the food as well-cooked hot and tasty that's enough for me. After all at the end of the day its all going to get masticated and come out the other end together, regardless of what order it goes in. As I said that's just my view. The joy of the free market is that those who disagree are quite welcome to vote with their feet... J

Errrr you're looking for advice for Jan 3??? Isn't that today? (or probably yesterday by the time you read this).

Good point. Few remember that almost everything written about Keller in the early 90's was what a tyrant he was in the kitchen. ← Flipping heck! I trust we are being ironic here... Either that or eGullet has lost all sense of historical perspective... In brief Joel Robuchon was the most influential French chef of the post-nouvelle cuisine era. From the mid-eighties first at Jamin and at his eponymous restaurant on the rue Poincare he was acknowledged as the primus inter pares of Paris' *** chefs. He was renowned for the relentless perfectionism of his cuisine and a number of glittering signature dishes, notable his cauliflower cream with caviar. However his significance was much more than beign a great technician. His food was seen as instrumental in leading French cuisine away from the excesses - and excesses reductionism of la cuisine nouvelle. In particular his cuisine was seen as hearkening back to a more authentic, even bourgeois French cuisine - the "cusine actuelle" of Patricia Wells' book (re-published as "Simply French") which focused on making each ingredient taste of itself. It is notable that his most famous signature is, of course, his fabulous pomme puree (or, to be more accurate, butter puree with a smudge of potato) - ostensibly a humble dish. Quite the anti-thesis of conventional haute. His greatest significance was thus - that he changed the direction of culinary thinking. That is why, incidentally, he was more significant than a Thomas Keller or Gary Kunz. They worked within a culinary paradigm. Robuchon (like Bocuse before him and Ducasse and Adria after him) worked to reshape the culinary paradigm. Put succiently: he is significant because he broke new ground. That's a brief summary - obviously there are a number of omissions (particularly his second incarnation as the purveyer of Atelier de McRobuchons). I'm sure those with more experience can add more, but it should be a start. regards J PS With regards to his written output Robuchon is, yes, far less prolific than modern-day peers such as Adria or Ducasse. Patricia Well's Cuisine Actuelle is a notable attempt to translate *** cuisine to the home kitchen, though I believe that some recipes are simplified for the same reasons. There's a Four Seasons book which is a translation of French newspaper columns. I think there is a greater corpus of work in French - see amazon.fr for more.

Oh no idea about barcode scanner. haven't got one. looks cute though. Putting the books in by hand remarkably quick. Took two evenings to do mine - very useful they are also plugged into amazon.fr which takes care of a lot of the more obscure frenchy cookbooks ta J

You mean one of THESE?

Kewl Trick is get a laptop with wireless internet so you can wander around and catalog books as you do so And add tags as you go along - seeing how parts of the collection relate via tags is part of the beauty of the system J

My latest fascination... The Library Thing... a dead easy way to catalog and compare your book collections. Of obvious applicability to those with burgeoning cookbook collections - this is mine: http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php?ta...ery&view=jtseng Extremely easy to use and surprisingly addictive. Enjoy J

No I've heard of it in UK. Think naff 1960 and 70s dinner party food. Chicken corden bleu - stuffed with ham and cheese. Think breadcrumbing and frying may also be involved but don't quote me on that. J

Probably the champignon sauvage book, though I'll need to check back on my bookshelf and see if anything else came up. Overall its been a very good year for cheffy cookbooks.

Bacchus - agree! ← Note to Pip: Make sure Nuno is tied in with a barrow-load of equity, and you keep him very very happy. I suspect in twelve months or so he'll have any number of offers from employment from elsewhere in the capital. I don't need to tell you that if he skips you'll have a b*stard of a job replacing him. J

- Bacchus: Cos the chef's a f**king minor genius. And I like fine dining in trainers. - Greenhouse (post-Bjorn): Unlikely to ever start a culinary revolution, but simply one of the slickest haute cuisine operations I have seen in a very long time. The high-end chain restaurant every Gordon Ramsay joint would like to be. - Bar Shu: Cos the food is delicious, savoury and unusual. J

Auslese - late harvest and mildly sweet. Probably not sweet enough for desert - the old standby by a slice of pate de foie gras? Or perhaps some white fish lightly braised in some more reisling? Arse knows about the survivability. Normally whites don't last 30 yrs - because its a sweeter wine may last longer. Ta J

Normal goose liver per se isn't like foie gras. Lacks the fattiness and ability to melt away to nothing in the pan. Its comparable to normal duck livers (as opposed to duck foie gras) - its bigger and more tender but still prononuced "livery" flavour. You don't see plain goose liver that much around, but I have had it quite a lot in Hungary. re the question of can you make foie gras without the gavage (force-feeding) I'm not sure but I think not. I do remember seeing a passing reference once to Americans having developed a breed of bird which gorges itself naturally without force-feeding. However I've never seen this confirmed, and the Ginor foie gras book doesn't mention it (you'd think it would do if this was practice in the US given they are such a high profile US producer). I suspect it may be confusion with the fact that in the wild geese do gorge themselves naturally ahead of migration, but this is different from artificial gavage. AFAIK force-feeding is still the only way to make proper foie gras. Also given the controvesy about foie gras, banning it etc in recent years, you'd have thought that if there was a way to produce foie gras without artificial force-feeding it would have received a higher profile in the ongoing debate - but I haven't seen this really raised yet (anyone else?) ta J

PS so where does one get this simmental beef from in london or is it only available if you have a special handshake or a eurostar ticket? i seem to remember seeing it on the menu at the oh-so-francophile sketch but dont think i've come across it anywhere else australian "wagyu" seems to be all the rage to be honest...

Click. ← Ah yes, I remember your notorious northfields farm marbled longhorn thing. very appetising it looked too. I find occurence of uber-marbled beef (normally rib or ribeye) is entirely random. Sometimes waitrose have it, sometimes Northfields have, sometimes ginger pig (don't think I've every seen any of the really good stuff at farmer sharps before). At its best it gives that wagyu stuff a good run for its money, at least on the looks front. I always guess there may be some some seasonal variation (wld you be more likely to have good marbling in summer maybe? dunno what impact eating grass vs. hay has?). No idea whether this is true or note. ta J

Far Breton - custardy clafoutis pastry tart thingy J

And can I also add that I got an exceedingly fine veal chop from the meat counter at waitrose at canary wharf yesterday. They also have good, ocassionally excellent beef. Interestingly the "standard" aberdeen angus often seems to have better marbling than the posh dry-aged stuff. J

Was in the very fine organic butchers on Lordship Lane, East Dulwich (end of the parade, on the right hand side heading out towards Dulwich library). Well worth it. Queue out the door. Fantastic rib-eye steak - more marbling than the Great Court... J

They have restaurants outside of the M25???