Man

This and this were the final straws. I booked, back to back with Roganics. Looks like it will be an interesting London trip.

A few days ago we went to Number One, the only star in the Michelin Edinburgh firmament that for some reason we hadn't had a chance of trying. There were some hiccups in the beginning (rabbit bone in an amuse, shell in a crab amuse), probably due to the ongoing changes in the kitchen, but the rest of the dinner was a great experience. It's pretty straight, French style cooking with wonderful Scottish produce. One of the best dishes was this 'Nicoise', the rabbit very tasty, with many layers of flavours supportig it (e.g. anchovies): The fussy might complain about the seeds left in the tomato, but we were not bothered. Less satisfactory was a starter of scallops, but the mains, beef fillet with sweetbread and a lamb were very impressive, deep flavours that stay in the memory. One special mention is deserved by the patisserie, this slow cooked cherries with goat cheese and fennel and honey sorbet achieved a quite rare elegance and balance. Perhaps overall not quite at the level of elegance of Martin Wishart and missing the raw power of The Kitchin, but this was excellent cooking indeed, and definitely the most comfortable eating environment of the three, with acres of space between tables just as we like.

In fairness to Gauthier, I'd like to add a couple of points, especially in view of the fact that I wrote that 'no concrete gesture of goodwill was offered'. Gauthier has now communicated with us in a very civilised and sensible way (following a comment we made on another site), and did make a concrete gesture by way of apology. He also made us reflect on some of the comments we made on our blog (we'll comment there as appropriate). Not all chefs react in this way to criticism and so I think credit deserves to be public as was our criticism. Also, with a cool mind, it is equally fair to emphasise that of the four times we have been there, we only made public comments on our bad experience, and not on the three previous good ones. So, while our accounts of that night are totally accurate, they do not present a balanced view of the overall experience. We should have emphasised this more. (For the record, we did not accept the invitation, both because we would find it awkward to be served by staff we so heavily criticised, and because in general we find it a good rule to always pay the bill if we aim to write public comments - mind you, not that we pretend (or aspire for that matter) to be anything more than the nobodies we are in the food world, but even the minuscule influence we may have on anybody, we do take seriously and that's the rule we have set for ourselves. Needless to say, we don't criticise others for having different rules).

Right, leave those ignorant CC fuckwits with no integrity (using just some of the epithets from this ugly thread) waste their useless time dining and discussing food with the likes of other poor souls like Brett Graham, Pierre Koffmann, Alyn Williams, all people who also, having chosen to cook in the UK, have totally fucked their tastebuds and forgotten what a true turnip tastes like and just keep piling the shit that is available in the UK on the plates of their gullible customers. What do these CC ignoramuses know after all? They have only sampled most of the best restaurants in the UK, and elsewhere just Ferran Adria' (the idiot is even closing down, so what was the point anyway), the Rocas, Bottura, and Redzepi. How could they possibly have any reference points to express their judgements? Have they had cuisine explained to them by the true masters of gastronomy, the arbiters of taste, from whose pontifications on jus gras we so much benefit, they who can compare, they who have known the flavour of a really great turnip, they who, surely unlike the rest of humanity, have had the truth revealed to them by reading a book by Ducasse (will the CC even be able to read, one wonders given how poorly they write - but then again have they had the benefit of learning the art of food writing by a master of the pen like Chef Hermes? I rest my case). No! Those useless CC haven't! Unbelievable! How do they dare waste our time? No...wait a minute...they are not wasting anybody's time - except of course the unfortunate chefs who are forced at gunpoint to endure their unpleasant company and the equally forced readers of their unsufferable blog - and they are even ignoring vulgar and gratuitous insults. What fuckwits. Oh, it's past 12. Time to end the rant and go down to the harbour to buy the Anstruther crab and lobster just off the boat, and maybe on the way back some Angus beef from the village butcher, feeling sorry for the shit I am forced to eat in the UK, but also thinking of those poor guys in France who will never have tasted the splendor of a burrata still warm from preparation, nor the unmatchable intensity of Italian tomatoes and peppers, nor the velvety minerality of Lazio artichokes...

Yes but the ultimate verdict is still missing

Aside from the culinary merits, I think it would be at least courteous - and pretty normal too - on their part to check beforehand with the customer that rare pork would be OK. For me it's a failure of service before a failure of cooking. Given that it is a safe assumption that many people in the UK don't like rare pork (nor in Italy, for that matter), it seems to me they are deliberately trying to shock. For me, not a good sign. Anyway, thanks for sacrificing yourself for the community.

Oh, I just saw that they have replied...what a pity, an Olympian detachment would have been more in character.

Just to clarify Chef, I wasn't thinking of you when I mentioned envy (rather of the tenor of some other comments). That said, the concept that the CC have any obligation whatsoever to 'defend' themselves for anything strikes me as bizarre - and I really don't think it's a matter of 'guts' or 'b*ll*cks' (I can just imagine them reading such requests with amusement while sipping some vintage Krug ).

The silence was deafening. There are things I like and things I don't like about the CC. Their non-participation in yet another navel-gazing debate among food bloggers counts as a thing I like In at least some respects they do what they do well, they are smart in using other sites for self-promotion rarely but cleverly, they have the rest of the food bloggers talking about them and not vice-versa, they seem to enjoy themselves enormously, and they don't give a damn about the rest. And if that were not enough, they are even wealthy! No wonder envy raises its ugly head...

I love David's reviews, but all I needed to know was your 'we had a couple of large espressos that were unfortunately devoid of crema' - made me shiver

You probably know that already...but the website is now up (with the menus as you indicate)

In the limited experience of this Italian in Scotland, it's very unusual, I've never encountered it (for the life of me I can't imagine the need for cold food up here, but maybe, down south...)

No way. Fifteen quid is way lower than the supp you'd pay for alba truffles. I would consider forty quid supp the starting point at a decent starred place. Fifteen definitely points to summer truffles rather than melanosporum or magnatum. J PS Does the angle of the table really matter than much?? If the table is wobbly or creaky maybe, but a couple of millimetres more sauce pooling one side would make zero difference to the taste of a dish. I'd venture to add the amount the food cools while it's being photographed would have a bigger impact on flavour As I wrote, they were fresh Summer truffles (how could they be Alba truffles in this season???). Re. the photograph it takes me about three seconds to take one (as is evident from the poor quality with zero artistic pretensions...). As normally the temperature of the room is above minus thirty Celsius, I find that the dish remains reasonably warm during the process. The pooling of the sauce doesn't affect the taste of the dish, but it does affect the way it looks, which matters to me (when I'm in a fine dining mood and paying a corresponding price).

Dear me, my Summer truffle risotto was 557 calories! I'm also not sure it's such a great idea to remind diners of that.

I am glad you liked it, I'm also a huge fan. There is a lot of joy in those dishes, the pure pleasure of putting something damn good in the plate, cooked with immense technique, but without the straightjacket of 'fine dining' rules of presentation etc. (last time we tried the roast chicken, another dish which is quite unique at that level - one has to allow 45 mins cooking time, giving the opportunity to sample several other nibbles in the meanwhile...).

Let's not take a jocular analogy too far... But your second point is relevant. There's a choice to be made. I have also lost passion for describing every single dish in great detail. That said, I don't mind when others do.

I had a very pleasant, fulfilling, uncomplicated lunch at Ondine, a crustacean feast with dishes like this: Service was smooth, prices kind given the quality (and quantity) of the offering. On the basis of this experience, I would also recommend, and I will be back (more details and photos in the near future at my place!).

Very enticing dishes! Thanks for this report, it's an area of Italy I know very little, gastronomically and otherwise.

Do you remember the 'I'm telling everybody!' Fosters beer ad with the guy who had had sex with two nymphomaniac twins jumping around and telling everybody, including the priest? More than from vanity, I think writing reviews (either on a forum or on one's own blog, I don't think that psychologically there's much difference) comes from a similar impulse: you just want to tell everybody. It's a natural desire to share experiences. This is not to say I want to compare having sex with two nymphomaniac twins with the ultimate meal - I have had neither experience.

They replied pretty swiftly to my email enquiry. I'm due for July 26th, I've never been to any place so soon after its opening, normally I like to wait until things have settled down, ...but after those photos and reports, how could I resist? (PS: do you people use Dropbox? it's great for travellers like us. if you join through this link http://db.tt/H8pHo7i we get extra space)

To be honest Matthew this is one of the few aspects of that disastrous evening that, angry as I am, I am not sure I can complain about...I don't know where the truffles came from (service was so busy it was almost impossible to talk to them), but they were abundant and freshly shaved black Summer truffles of exceptional quality. The supplement is perhaps a fair proportion of what restaurants charge for the white ones from Alba (or supposedly so). But I want to add a negative note: from this photograph you can see how slanted the floor of that room is: the sauce accumulated in one corner of the plate! (for the curious, the dish is veal sweetbread).

Has anybody been recently? I had a shockingly disappointing experience there last Friday (my fourth visit). The truffle risotto (at a £15 supplement) was as good and luscious as ever, but they are now packing the place to a point where the service suffers, and the cuisine too. Our dirty plates were left on the table for an eternity, and it took another eternity to be served the next course. It was unbearably noisy, courtesy of a couple of large tables (we tried to retaliate by flashing them, but they didn't seem to notice ). The small, full room felt oppressive. We were unhappy. A wild seabass was massacred, I couldn't believe how poorly it was cooked. At least they said 'sorry for tonight' at the end (though no concrete gesture of goodwill was offered...). There are zillions of other places I want to go to in London. Therefore I think my experience with Gauthier ends here.

In those photos the dishes look so enticing that I needed just a gentle push to be convinced they also tasted great - well your narrative has more than done the job!

Hi Hathor, I hesitate a little to go back to the vexed issue of tradition vs modern... Personally, in Torino I felt very clearly the difference between 'unreconstructed' places and places that have embraced the modern world while still serving the classics. If I could just take you around and show you it would be so obvious. I am not only talking about high end places like Crippa's. If you have the chance, go to Consorzio (Via Monte di Pieta'), a fantastic value trattoria (tasting menu 30 euros) that does all the old Piemonte classics with modern lightness, eye for presentation and small extra original touches that show understanding of flavours (talking about pannacotta, theirs is the best, served in three small portions, each topped by a small amount of different sauces of different acidity - e.g. barolo chinato, orange..., a gem). Back to high end, the Crippa Agnolotti had all you might want from traditional agnolotti, plus an elegant presentation and the elimination of any stodginess, an absolute precision of flavours and a number of small touches, such as the crumbly dimension, that for me make this a great dish to eat. As to your remark on temperature, no: the plate was very hot and the service was performed efficiently, which means that the pasta didn't get cold - it got colder in some traditional places were it was served in the napkin, as tradition wants it... OF COURSE there is an Italian cuisine, it may be regional, but it is Italian. When I go around the numerous 'Italian' London restaurants I immediately classify them as true and fake Italian. It may be a factor difficult to express in words, but it is there. Crippa for example may be 'internationalised' but his menu could not be described as anything but Italian.

During a four month stay in Turin, one of the most impressive experiences was our trip to Piazza Duomo. We had the 'traditional menu', which is Crippa's magical reinterpretation of some Piemonte classic flavours and preparations. It's an experience I'd recommend to anybody who wants to understand modern Italian cuisine, and how the opposition between tradition and modernity can be simply stepped over. This is the most beautiful dish we had, a reinterpretation of pannaccotta (the most beautiful though not the most successful! This version loses a crucial feature of traditional well-made pannacotta, i.e. its lovely wobbliness) On the other hand, these agnolotti not only had a modern elegance of presentation, they were also unbeaten by any other agnolotti we've had (and we've had many!) My advice is: go! On a Saturday lunch you won't have much difficulty booking: only one other table was occupied beside ours, with one person. Three front of house people for three customers!