PhilD
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Posts posted by PhilD
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What a brilliant idea. Couple that with a 3G iPhone and we can throw away the restaurant guides. Heaven. I will try and do my bit next time I am in France - many thanks to Dave.
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Bumping this very old thread as I'm looking for cookbooks. More than a recipe collection, I'm looking for something that will have lots of information about products, techniques, maybe even some history. I'm probably at least as interested in knowing the "why" as the "how".
An example of what I consider a good one is the Pierre Herme "Secrets Gourmands": there are pages about basic products used in pastry (what makes a good one, how to use it, etc.), and the recipes are simple enough to do at home and all-in-all very good.
Are there similar cookbooks for all-around cooking? It doesn't really have to be in French, BUT if it's a foreign-language book or a translation, I'd like to have something that is exempt of translation/unit conversion errors and that uses products you'll find at every other store here in France.
I'll try to browse through a few books that were recommended in this thread, but in the meantime, if anyone knows about something that I could like, please share!
Elizabeth David was mentioned in the original 2005 thread, but she is worth mentioning again. Her books are still in print (Grub Street Books, London) and are really worth reading. She wrote her first one in the 1950, and her classic French Provincial Cooking in 1960.
The books read well, being a combination of anecdotes, obserevation and recipes. The style of prose is slightly dated but it opens a window on the traditions of French food and she covers a lot of ground with many recipes. No pictures, a few black and white drawings, but lots of good information. I can sit and read rench Provincial Cooking rather than simply use it as a resource in the kitchen.
She was the English cookery writer who inspired many people to cook, and is often held up by modern cookery writers as their original inspiration. It is interesting to note that she was awarded the Chevalier de l'Ordre du Merite Agricole by the French government in recognition of her work.
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Hi all
I currently get a meat box delivery from Well Hung Meat limited and the meat is indeed very nice - but i'm looking for some meat for a special occasion, and want something very special.
Any recommendations? Any type (non-game, not that it's in season I'd have thought) is welcome, mail/internet order as I wont be able to travel too much.
Thanks
Kutsu
Kutsu - where do you live, it may help with recomendations.
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I had wanted to try Les Ombres when it first opened, but after hearing from several friends that it was a see-and-seen kind of place, with average food, I lost interest. I did try the Mini Palace with John and while we both liked it, I don't remember being overwhelmed and neither of us rushed back.
Thanks John, but there is not actual comment about Les Ombres in the thread simply a note that it was included in a Conde Nast list. I had searched the site but all the "hits" seeem to be for mentions in lists rather than board members reviews.
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We are planning our trip to Paris and wanted to add in a couple of places we have not visited before. Whilst I have read about Mini Palais and Les Ombres I can't recall any reviews on the site. Has anyone tried them? If so what are your thoughts?
Or are there any other new restaurants (opened in the last 12 months) for a funky, grand night out?
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Just a heads up as the Gherkin meal is being screened tonight. I haven't looked but would assume it is in either the 6pm or 6.30pm slot.
Cheers
My TV guide has it for 6:00pm on BBC2 tonight - although strangely my Sky box has decided it is on at 11:30am on Sunday - I assume this is a repeat.
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Great review Phil
Wish I could say our experience was the same
I really liked the room. The food was good (but not great). We all had the a la carte 3 course lunch.
Service was dreadful. I got so fed up with this one waiter who insisted on literally slamming everything down in front of us - felt like I was being assaulted.
Sommelier couldn't really be bothered. Recommended a pedestrian sancerre and a pretty uninteresting pinot noir.
We moved to the bar for coffee. No petit fours materialised (despite the hefty £20 pricetag). I requested some and was bought (with some reluctance) a little box each to take away.
We spent close to £600 with a bottle of bolly to kick things off.
A disappointing experience. I feel sorry for Mark as his food was quite good really but the front of house totally lets him down in my opinion.
Romaney - when did you go? From my research it seemed the older reviews/blogs had poorer experiences than those that had been more recently. I wonder if it has had a staff revamp. The French maitre'd who orchestrated the floor during our visit was very particular, had a real eye for detail and the staff seemed to be very well drilled.
Did you have the £70 ALC? As I said we chose the £30 menu and I thought the cooking was very good for this price point. I would hope the three courses you get for £70 would be more complex, more refined.
We didn't test the sommelier - I wanted a light red (it was very hot outside) and the Fleurie seemed to be the obvious choice. It turned out to be pretty good value as it was a good representation of the type - good flavour, not weak and flabby like some.
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Quite a few Indian restaurants seem to be closed on Saturday lunchtime, but the Bombay Brasserie near Gloucester Road tube has a buffet lunch, so we thought we would give it a go. It. like Quilon is part of the Taj Hotel group so it should have potential.
I first ate here in the late ‘80’s and it was a glamorous venue for a long Sunday lunch. Today it has the same decor, and is in need of a bit of TLC. The welcome from the staff was good, which is often a positive, and it did indeed bode well for very professional, and attentive service. I don’t often say this but our every need as anticipated and we were looked after very well.
The buffet consists of a number of sections and I am sorry I can’t do justice to the correct names of the dishes . To start they had a split pea soup, potato pakora, spicy grilled chicken kebabs, papadums and good chutneys. The non-vegetarian mains included, a spicy fish in a rich tomtor sauce, creamy nutty chicken with istachios, a lamb saag. The vegetarian options included a paneer in a sweet creamy sauce, curried aubergines, deep fried potato balls, a complex dal, tomato rice, and plain rice. The salad table had a spicy chicken salad, carrot/vegtable salad, and a cucumber/lettuce salad. The desert choice was a creamed rice with nuts, fruit salad, and what seemed to be dried fine noodles with nuts and current. And throughout the meal really fresh nan breads are brought to your table.
Each dish was wonderfully different, with each having an individual flavour. They were well spiced, not overly hot, but with good depths of flavour. The staff keep all the dishes topped up with freshly cooked refills and you can go back as often as you like.
Most of the other diners were indian, with a few tables full of large extended families. We arrived at about 1:30 and te restaurant was quite emply but as we ate it filled up.
Overall an excellent meal, far, far better than the average high street curry, and still challenges some of the new higher end Indian restaurants. It is really great value at only £22 (plus 12.5% service) per head. Highly recommended for an excellent buffet lunch which I believe is on offer everyday.
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Reviews I had read seemed fairly mixed, but we had a really good meal. It is a very elegant ‘grand hotel” dining room and so it creates a very special feeling when you walk in. The service from all the staff was faultless, and they made every table feel at ease, including the group of 20 year olds celebrating a birthday, who clearly had never set foot in a place like Claridges.
You have three menus to choose from, the Menu Prestige, a lengthy tasting menu, at £80, the a la carte at £70 (for three courses), or the special weekend lunch menu at £30 (all menus have an additional 12.5% service charge). We chose the weekend special which I think had a choice of 5 entrees, 5 mains and 5 deserts.
To start they served a chilled mint and pea soup with a dollop of fromage frais, really great flavour and nicely refreshing. The bread seems home-made with a choice of a wholemeal roll, or a breadstick and both salted and unsalted butter.
My partner and and my father both had the chicken, foie gras and leek pate with brioche and a mushroom salad (incredible intensive flavour) - a good example of this classic dish. I chose the Kent asparagus, with poached duck egg, parmesan and pata negro - again well executed, simple with top ingredients.
For main course, I had a lime roasted poussin, jersey royals, wilted watercress and green beans, my partner had pollock, razor clams, herb gnocchi and purple sprouting, my father went for the traditional roast beef, excellently cooked, full of flavour and meltingly tender. All dishes had good well balanced flavours and were nicely cooked.
For desert we had a ginger fancier, with milk ice-cream and marinated clementines; a passion fruit creme brulee, bitter chocolate sorbet and pistachio sable; and a melon ice-cream, strawberries, black pepper pannacotta and a almond biscotti.
We rounded off the meal with coffee and petit fours which included a mini cherry ice-cream coated in a biscuit shell....really good.
The bill for three including a £30 bottle of Fleurie, was £151 (the coffees and petit fours added £15 to the bill - which is quite steep). Overall it is great value, quite simple food but with top ingredients executed very well (I have had pub meals at close to this price). I imagine if you had the ALC the dishes would be more complex with more expensive ingredients.
The service is faultless, with every member of the team working really well together. I had almost come to the conclusion that good service was impossible to find in the UK, how I wish other restaurants could learn from this.
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We had a very good lunch at Gordon Ramsay at Claridge's last Sunday. The weekend lunch menu is £30 a head (+ 12.5% service) for three courses. Although watch out for coffee and petit fours as it is £5 a head extra.
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I am delighted to report that Ze is even better today* than it was when it opened, can it be five years ago?, indeed, as I said to the chef today, things have changed since he/they got the macaroon/star, it's even better.
John sorry I have to put an opposing view.
I have been perplexed by the rave reviews Ze Kitchen Gallerie receives from so many posters. We ate there a few years ago and were distinctly unimpressed. Were we unlucky? Was it an off night? Has it changed? A quick day trip to Paris gave me the opportunity to give it another go and to try and reconcile my experience.
I started with a marinaded tuna sashimi, with artichokes, asparagus and a kumquat sauce. The tuna was good; nice and “fatty”, and the artichoke and asparagus were fine. However, I found the kumquat sauce dominated the dish, it sort of jumped off the plate and hit you around the head, it was so strong in comparison to the rest of the dish.
Next I tried the young rabbit, with thai style sauce (the real name is a lot longer). The dish consisted of two tender pieces of rabbit with a classic mustard glaze; a ball of rabbit meat, deep fried like a croquet; and a thai green curry sauce with peas, a spring onion and (I think) another leafy vegetable. Oddly the flavour of the thai green curry was so subtle it had almost disappeared - almost analogous to a homeopathic remedy where the active ingredient is so diluted only a molecule or two is present. My guess is it that t is a short cut thai green curry sauce without a lot of the key ingredients that give it depth and balance. The dish appears to be a a “western fusion deconstructed” green thai curry with peas instead of pea eggplants, and spring onions instead of thai aromatics. This was OK, if bland. However , the main issue I had with the dish was that the mustard coated rabbit simply didn’t work with the thai style sauce. The tastes simply jarred.
Two things strike me. First, does the kitchen really taste the food before it leaves the kitchen? The flavours of my two dishes were so out of balance that I couldn’t believe they had. If they do then their palates are quite different to mine and I really don’t think my is that bad. Second, I wonder if the reason the food appeals because it has such big simple flavours. The contrast to the subtleties of traditional French cooking is refreshing for those that live in Paris (when we lived there we often yearned for different tastes), and a novelty for people who have not tried this style of food before.
My overall conclusion has not changed from my first visit, I don’t really think the cooking is that good. To be frank I believe Paris has many better places than this, both traditional and innovative. If this is the best of “east/west fusion” in Paris then give it a miss and take the opportunity to try this food elsewhere - although I think the east/west fusion stye has evolved a lot from where still ZKG is.
Finally why did Michelin award it a star this year? My suspicion is that Michelin is very strong on traditional cuisine's, but less so on Asian influenced ones and I think their ratings of London Indian restaurants proves that point.
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A good tactic will be to select a hotel that has a "named" restaurant on the premises. Chances are you will be able to order from it on room service. I did this at the Crowne Plaza in St James and had curry from the Michelin starred Quilon - very tasty.
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The lady and I had lunch yesterday, it was cracking - a selection of oysters showed real variety in size (the Malverns were monsters), texture & flavours, the duck's egg with asparagus was beautiful; creamy duck's egg with meaty salted asparagus and lamb sweetbreads, swimming in a rich buttery broth full of fresh sweet peas was perfect. The mains of barnsley chop - pink and plump, with incredible crispy fat was to die for, whilst the skate knobs (a very generous starter size portion) were light, creamy, crispy and all in all pretty exquisite! Pudding of walnut and whiskey tart was fairly forgettable and lemon and apple sorbet tasted like one of those sparkle lollies from way back when, not in a bad way. It was a treat, and the service, which everyone has complained about was fine, not the best, but it was good enough - helpful and fairly attentive, Mark Hix was there, he seemed jolly - and only bloody Heston was eating lunch on the other side of the room.
How much was it? Do they do a set lunch menu or is it ALC?
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I suspect there are a number of factors that will contribute:
Economic - when you can charge €300 to €400 a head and get high levels of occupancy for most services I guess you will cover your fixed overheads quite quickly. Couple this with the fact that quite a number of restaurants are well established, in premises they may well own and thus have minimal rent or mortgage payments. And then throw in interiors that are nurtured and evolve rather than multi million dollar designer ego trips. I imagine the pressure to fill the seats twice a day, seven days a week isn't that strong.
Economic x 2 - a lot of wealthy Parisians escape to the country at the weekend, if your prime market decamps at the weekend, it makes sense to follow suite. Close the restaurant and head to your home in the country. The same happens in the Summer/Christmas - those Parisians that can afford to leave, leave. Thus it is not worth opening shops and restaurants (and it is a good time to dig up the roads).
Tradition - the French love and respect tradition. There is little pressure to move towards an "industrial approach" the craftsman is respected and admired. In-fact there is a lot of resistance to what is termed the "anglo saxon" influence (UK/US socio economic models), instead there is a strong preference to retain the traditional French approach. The long summer breaks, bridging the days between bank holidays and weekends, not opening shops on Sunday (although this is threatened with change and I hope it is resisted), and restaurants keeping idiosyncratic hours. I love it and would hate France (and Spain, and Italy) to lose these traditions - it made living in France really civilised.
And as Julot says it really does help to keep the standards high, the team is fresh and it is likely that the chef with their name on the door may actually be behind the pass - thankfully no one has gone as far a Adria and closes for 6 months a year..
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We are heading up to Surrey shortly (Kingston/Richmond) and are looking for recommendations for a good lunch on Sunday (does not need to be "Sunday lunch").
Thanks,
Phil
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Best cheap meal ever would be at Vue de Monde in Melbourne, about 5 years ago. I think 3 courses with a glass of wine was between $AUS26-29. At the exchange rate back then, that works to around 10 pounds.
I am afraid they have put their prices up a bit - we paid $600 (aussie) for lunch for two there about a year ago.
We had a tasting menu with matching wines. I always put my trust in the sommelier and 99% of the times it is repaid - this time we were served lots of (average) French wines at horrendous prices. In fact the whole meal was trying to be too French, with imported French ingredients rather than better local Australian ones. I am sorry to say I think it is now a bit overrated and overhyped.
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i think if darroze had a faultless restaurant in paris and nothing but good reports then it would be unfair to knock her before she came to town but as it seems that she should be spending more time in the kitchen with her name above the door then what on earth are we meant to think when she is branching out in another country? or is she closing up shop in paris?
petit four trolley sounds good
and before we start to think it appropriate of ourselves to decry her efforts, we should also remember if her place was as shambolic as some would vicariously have us believe she'd never have 2*'s or the deal with the Connaught.
Well I have eaten there and it was pretty poor. I would certainly question how it got two stars - I have had many better meals at places with lower ratings. She is very much the darling of the French press and I think this and her image make Michelin reluctant to demote. It is often said that Michelin are quick to award but very slow to remove stars especially in Paris.
However, I am intrigued that Durack gave her a high score as he is a reliable critique - maybe things have improved. It will be intersting to see how it turns out.
Maybe the more intersting French import this year will be Jean-Christophe Ansanay-Alex from Auberge de I’lle in Lyon who is opening in South Kensington early in the summer. Anyone have any further news?
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Oh, also got the croque monsieur blt, quite surprised on their presentation. Was served in a martini glass 'decomposed' per se.
Was that the BLT and Croque that Jason did on the Great British Menu - if so isn't it the BLT that is in the martini glass...?
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We headed to St Ives in Cornwall for the weekend armed with some restaurant recommendations which all turned out to be pretty good.
First stop was lunch on Saturday and we headed to Blas Burgerworks (The Warren, St Ives), we nearly passed on this when we got to the door as it seemed very expensive with basic burgers starting at £6.50, to £9.50 for a Kiwi Burger (beetroot, cheese, pineapple, egg, salad, and mayo), and chips at £2.50 extra and a side salad at £3.00. However, we were hungry after a long drive, and it looked good, a small funky “eco -restaurant” with a good big professional grill. I had the “Beet Burger” at £8.50, which is a fresh cornish beef patti, cooked nice and crispy on the outside and rare and pink in the inside, the quality of the bun was good and nicely toasted. On top of the burger there was a big mound of cruncy watercress, lots of beetroot and a large dollop of creamy garlic mayonnaise. My partner chose the BLT, all good ingredients and very generous portions at £5.50. Overall verdict - burger bliss. I was nearly tempted to order a second burger as it was so good. The portion size, quality of ingredients and standard of cooking make it good value for money. This is really an excellent place and I highly recommend it.
Saturday night was Alba (The old Lifeboat House, The Wharf, St Ives). This is quite an upmarket restaurant, with sleek furnishings. It is on the sea front with great big picture windows giving a good view over the harbour. Comfortable seats, well set table, with quality linen. It has a good menu with a balance between fish and meat.
We started with a amuse bouche of apple and celery soup, and a basket of two breads, one wholemeal the other with sun dried tomato - good bread but a slightly under flavoured soup. My first course of cornish asparagus, with poached egg and dijon mustard sauce, was well cooked but slightly under seasoned. My partner had a very solid game terrine, which we believed was mainly rabbit, garnished with sultanas that had been soaked in armagnac, nice but overall lacking punch. My main was a well cooked duck breast (good and pink) with puy lentils, a dense quenelle of apple sauce, and a date(?) chutney, again under seasoned so lacking punch. My partner had a nage of John Dory with mussels and scallops, on a bed of spring vegetables which she thought was very good. Total bill was £63.85 including a £18.50 bottle of good Aussie Shiraz, but not including service. The service was really nice, friendly, chatty, and professional. Overall a good local restaurant, the food is fine but a little pedestrian - nothing really wrong, but equally nothing outstanding. The location, decor, and service make it a nice venue for night out rather than simply a quick meal.
Sunday dawned with rain and strong winds so we abandoned sightseeing and booked lunch at The Gurnards Head (Treen, near Zenner). First ipressioin was that this is a standard gastro pub, rustic bar area, and tarted up restaurant area with modern “magazine” decor (coloured feature walls etc). The greeting was good, and service is friendly and efficient. I started with a pint of Betty Stoggs a good medium strength beer from Skinners Brewary which really hit the spot. Into the restaurant to peruse the menu, and a slight disappointment, only three choices per course and one of them was the roast beef Sunday lunch. I like a roast as much as the next person, but I am always disappointed when I see it on the menu. I wouldn’t mind a roast as an addition to the normal menu, but what usually happens is that they serve a roast with a couple of token alternatives. I find this frustrating because I like to explore good eating pubs on a Sunday and and like to sample the menu their reputation is based on. Instead I get a convienient short cut for the kitchen, pre cooked food quickly plated up, which no doubt adds significantly to the profit margin for minimal effort.
I chose a Pork Terrine to start, served with cornichons and a good home made chutney. This was served with first class home-made “oat” bread, and good butter. For main course my partner had the beef, which was local and very good (again nice and pink). Vegetables though were not great, some soggy, others half cooked. My first choice was Mullet but that had sold out so they substituted mackerel, served with new potatoes and a very good fennel and orange salad. The food bill was £39.95 for one starter and two mains, which isn’t bad (the beer was extra). Overall an OK pub meal, I have had quite a few worse, but also quite a few better. I had also read that the pub was one of the new breed that “foraged” in the hedgrows for interesting and different ingredients. The only evidence of this we noticed was a large clover(?) in the garnish of the pate, and some nastersium leaves(?) in the fennel salad - maybe there is more evidence of this in the normal menu, rather than the limited Sunday lunch one. Overall it is worth a visit if you are staying close by, but not worth a significant detour.
For Sunday dinner we had booked the Porthminster Cafe (Porthminster Beach, St Ives), this Cafe was recommended by many people so we had high hopes. It is a great location, literally on the beach. There is an indoors restaurant and a great deck with windbreaks, a retractable roof, and patio heaters. The decor is modern “beach shack”, with lots of blues and whites, and with quality aluminium chairs/tables on the deck. This is a good sign as I always try to avoid places with cheap plastic outside furniture as I find it is usualy illustrative of the overall quality of a restaurant.
But first a word of warning: the tables with the best views can be booked, and apparently the best ones right in the windows book a few months in advance. So if you want the best view specify when you book (although all the tables are pretty good). We sat on the deck, and even though it was a bit breezy it was fine - they do give you rugs if you feel the cold.
The menu has a lot of fish, with a few meat dishes, all the dishes are interesting and it was tricky to make a choice, in fact my partner chose three entrees to get a better spread. She kicked off with three very large oysters (No. 1’s), very fresh not to salty and nice and fatty. Next she had a bowl of mussels cooked with chorizo, again very well executed. My starter was a crab salad with glass noodles and lots of asian flavours (Vietnamese and/or Thai), it was very fresh and not to strong to overpower the crab meat. For main course I had Plaice, with small crab cakes, and a salad, again really good flavours and a very good dish. My partner chose the Chilli Squid with salad, it was nice but lacked the chilli punch you would expect with this dish. One flaw with the meal was that they used the same salad for all three dishes, it was a great salad but it became repetitive. We then shared a cheese plate which had three cheeses in perfect condition - Yarg, a cornish blue, and a local brie like soft cheese - served with a variety of lavosh’s. We followed this with a Tamerillo desert plate - tamerillo jelly with space dust, a tamerillo ice-cream, a raspberry shortbread, a creme brulee, and a poached tamerillo - the plates were licked clean which says it all..!
The bill was £113 for two (without service) but we did have some good wine including a Kiwi Pinot which made up at £47 of the bill, so the food was only £66. It is a fantastic location, the service is great, and the food matches perfectly, simple, very well cooked, but with interesting combinations and twists (it reminded me of modern Australian cooking, and we were told many of the chefs were Aussies).
St Ives is a good destination for food; four contrasting restaurants and all good in their own way - although on my next visit I will spend all my time eating Blas burgers for lunch and enjoying a long relaxing dinner on the deck of the Porthminster Beach Cafe. Heaven....!
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doesn't sound like it's changed much from my visit then.
i find these multicourse affairs are becoming a rod for restaurants back, they can't possibly make 25 stellar dishes and when you get say 3 in a row that aren't up to scratch it colours your view, when you could have 5 and think it's the best thing since sliced bread.
my own visit there produced the same reaction the hits diluted with poorer dishes lingering in the mind longer even the poor bread! and following a recent trip to el poblet where i had a similar menu in length it made me reconsider my own menus to which ive cut down the number of courses to make the experience more fluid and help consistency.in a sense it reminds me of the petit four,while dining at a 1star awhile ago i was given 15 petit fours with 3/4 actually any good the rest stale or bland or ill thought of but yes they looked impressive!
though el poblet had 20 chefs they dont all have dacostas taste buds or skill, or i should imagine rogans skill level,when i eat out i love the theatre of it and the suprise element though after 20 courses im sure we become too weary and over exposed to more tastes textures and techniques in one sitting,or am i alone in this thought? and the service plays a huge part in this scene of multi course dining for your visit, a lot more than serving dishes from the roof or the bathroom yes ive seen it
it makes all the difference to be looked after and not talked down to or lectured how to eat all your courses, and not to be bid good night is a poor show after spending £300Marc - we had a 30ish course menu at the El Bulli Hotel which worked well. It started with a mass of small tasting dishes that came quite quickly, followed by 7 or 8 fuller sized dishes, then 4 or 5 deserts in decreasing size. It all worked really well, the rush of surprises at the start balanced by good pacing in the middle with time to savour the more complex dishes. I also think a lot of the initial dishes can be prepared in advance and therefore the chefs can concentrate on the more complex dishes during service.
However, it would have been a little better if we understood the pacing of the meal as we were fearful the early pace would keep up and the whole meal would be over in 45 mins - it actually took closer to 4 hours.
A couple of days before we had eaten anorther multi course meal at Tragabuches in Ronda, this one hadn't workes as well because the pacing was wrong.
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This is from a recent Guardian interview with Darroze:
Could someone with a bit more experience explain how this works? Presumably they either do give it to the man, or they ask "who's paying?"
We ate at her Paris restaurant and the whole menu/ordering system was strange. My partner booked the table as a surprise for me, she got the priceless menu and I got the one with prices. We then played an interesting game with me trying to deflect her from the most expensive items on the menu (it is her bank account as well as mine).
OK this isn't unique for France with other top restaurants having a similar system. What was strange was having to order the whole meal, including cheese and dessert at the outset. By the time we had eaten the cheese course we couldn't really manage dessert but it was on its way. It also meant we couldn't do justice to the petits four cart that comes round with coffee - an enormous, magnificent array of treats to choose from. Hopefully they will replicate that in London as it was the best bit of a pretty dire meal.
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It's a shame you didn't enjoy your visit as much as you had hoped. I have been twice now and was also lucky enough to be at the opening and I think the place is fantastic!
The food is wonderful and the service is relaxed but professional and just what Cartmel needs. I think what is also nice for the village is you can go just for a drink
and I know it will be my local from now on.
I think Simon and Penny have got it just right and it knocks spots off places like The Punch Bowl and The Drunken Duck.
Good luck guys
Interesting you should compare it to the Drunken Duck/Punch Bowl. I find both way to £££££ for what you get, espcially the Drunken Duck. I am always a bit confused by them. Are they gastro pubs, restaurants, pub, bar, hotel, restaurant with rooms?? I prefer the Punchbowl of the two. Rogans is more a restaurant, its more focused. I look forward to returning there.
I would agree with your thgoughts on the Duck. We ate there recently and had quite miniscule portions. First a black pudding salad with a poached egg - tasted great but only two minute cubes of black pudding. It is hardly an expensive ingredient - especially in the lakes. Next lamb rump and confit, the advertised vegtables were artistic smears on the plate.
Two courses into a meal and I am still hungry. I filled up on a shared cheese plate and shared desert. At £86 for two (including the non-drinking driver) I felt it was pretty steep - the cooking was good but the portion sizes are a rip off. The next night at he Punchbowl was far better value.
Looks like Rogan & Company will be on the list for the next visit.
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Sorry, PhilD, I guess she has gotten press in the UK - hard for me to keep up with all that it's published, being a Brazilian living in Canada. Still, I was surprised to find that there weren't any topics on Egullet about her. So for foreigners, I say she's still a hidden gem.
Sorry made the assumption you were local. I suspect the trouble with the board is that it doesn't have a vast number of contributors - quality over quantity - but it does restrict coverage.
BYO in London
in United Kingdom & Ireland: Dining
Posted
Wow - a wine list to make me homesick. Where were they from; a local supplier in London, an importer or a private cellar?