Duncan

No rolled up trouser legs here, just some rather strange French rituals with swords cloaks and large quantities of champagne. I just found the Confrerie website with more photographs demonstrating how well sharp weapons and alcohol mix.

i can appreciate the fun aspect and the drama of it all. but i'm of the thought that disrupting a bottle of sparkling wine to the point where it will come to a quick head and perhaps come out of the top of the bottle (or broken neck in this case) is not the best approach (and from what i've seen on tv, this is what happens...although i suppose if the wine is super-chilled you could retard that reaction a bit if not completely), and could probably be considered wasteful on some level. I still don't think its any worse than letting the cork fly out of the bottle: not as controlled as removing it gently, but the bottle itself doesn't move so its just a sudden release of pressure. Anyway, I thought you might like to see the evidence. First a picture of one of my attempts to sabrage a bottle (I know I had at least two goes, because we've got two photographs of this). The people in the background are Mike (proprietor of The Fish), and the representative of the Confrérie du Sabre d'Or. The champagne was Philippe Brugnon premier Cru, non-vintage. And just to prove I did eventually succeed, the opened bottle (with the cork beside it):

two words: drama and tradition Our local pub/restaurant does champagne evenings with sabrage. So add a few more words: its fun (for us), and it makes money (for them). You don't actually lose a noticeable amount of champagne opening the bottle this way: provided it is well chilled, and you get the bottles to the glasses reasonably quickly it's no worse than any other way to open champagne.

It's good to see the Guardian picking up on this (I must admit first reaction on reading the paper this morning was to wonder whether someone on their staff had spotted my rant earlier in the thread). They do point out that Coop, Asda and Sainsbury also do similar things to their pork, and that Tesco have been prosecuted for selling other pork with added water that was not declared, but Tesco's 'Finest' gets favoured by the detailed description of the ingredients.

Here, I didn't actually buy the ones from Tesco. I just spent long enough looking at them to start getting funny looks from people. I did a quick price comparison as well: Tesco Finest Pork Chops, £6.99/kg for 89% pork High street butcher: £4.35/kg Butcher where I actually bought some chops (because I think they are a good butcher[*]): £5.79/kg. I'm told the pig came from near Swindon. I probably should point out that the chops from the butcher were actually more expensive (£3.04) than Tesco's (£2.79 for the pack where I noted the price), but that's because they are larger. [*] This belief is based at least partly on one of my early visits to that particular butcher's shop when I asked for two pork chops and the butcher went through the back of the shop and returned with a half pig (head and tail attached) which he proceeded to joint in front of me. I knew chops came from a pig, but before that I hadn't really seen exactly where they came from. I also got to choose which end of the loin I wanted (this was back in the days when they could legally sell you a chop with kidney attached). The place has changed hands since then, but it is still a proper butchers.

I had some concern expressed over whether I could back up my claim that Tesco Finest Pork Chops contain glucose syrup, so just to clear things up: The reason I may have sounded doubtful was that I thought they also claimed added water and salt, but I couldn't remember for sure so I just went and checked. On the front of the packet it has 'Finest' and 'Pork Chops'. Under the 'Pork Chops' in smaller letters it says with added water, glucose syrup and salt. It then has a short paragraph in the same size text about how they have been specially reared and matured longer. On the back of the packet is the full ingredients list: Pork 89%, water, dried glucose syrup, sodium diphosphate, sodium triphosphate, salt, sodium citrate, sodium ascorbate, sodium acetate, partially deoderised rosemary extract. (The various chemicals are under subheadings such as preservative, but I was getting cold writing it all down next to the chill cabinet) They also have pork steaks with added water, glucose syrup and salt in the Finest range, and ordinary pork chops and pork steaks with no additions.

I'm equally devoid of data, but I would dispute your figures. I find that while for some things supermarkets are cheaper, for others they are much more expensive. The problem is that while my local butcher may be cheaper and better quality than my local supermarket, they are also several miles in the opposite direction, and not open at such convenient hours. When I can get there though they are cheaper. I'm not saying that either price or quality follow a particular rule. For some things the supermarkets may even do better quality, though I now make a rule never to buy meat from Tesco since I spotted that their 'finest' range (which is supposed to be better) has an ingredients list for pork chops: their ordinary pork chops seem only to contain pork, but their 'finest' contain (if I remember correctly) glucose syriup.

I think Judy volunteered me to write up our visit to Tom Aikens, so here goes. To keep life simple for myself, I'm going to rely heavily on quoting. For wine we had a bottle of Chablis which lasted us until the cheese course after which we relied on the wine waiter to supply us with appropriate glasses. The champagne trolley is a great idea (great for the restaurant too, I'm sure it does their profit margins no harm). From a selection of three we chose the pink champagne so had the fun of watching the wine waiter open the bottle and pour a small sample glass. He also had an impressive technique pouring the glasses sufficiently slowly that he could do each glass in a single pour without the bubbles going over the top. We had the same amuse, described as a potato soup, but actually some sort of foam, and topped with truffle. Excellent. Yes, my notes say I'm not convinced that the scallop contributes much, but taken as a tomato dish it was very nice. The foie gras may not have been essential in this riot of colour, but it wasn't superfluous the way that the scallop was. We both thought it was a very nice way to present it, with the breadcrumbs providing a nice contrast on the texture, and the balance of sweet and acidic flavours from the rest of the dish went well with the foie gras. I thought my sea bass was too salty, but only if I picked some out to eat on its own. The combination with the fennel in assorted forms worked well. Cheese can often be difficult. If the cheese board is sufficiently complex (and this one was) it can be hard to know how to choose, so I think encouraging you to specify in general terms what you like is a good thing. On the wine waiter's suggestion we left the choice of wine to him, so he had a look at our cheeses and returned with a mystery bottle of something sweet and red which he eventually revealed to be Pineau des Charentes made from Cabernet Sauvignon. I thought the desserts were very good, although the chocolate cylinders are a bit peculiar. We let the wine waiter have free reign again. He gave us half glasses of Banyuls for the hazlenut and coffee cake, and Muscat de St. Jean de Minervois for the lemon dessert. I don't know if this was the same Muscat, but I thought it held up well. Perhaps the lemon balance has been adjusted. I feel that the nibbles supplied with the coffee are just a little bit over the top, just when you think you are into the home straight they bring along those madeleines... Service was good throughout, I'm sure they know the procedure for the tasting menu off by heart, but at times they seemed to be communicating telepathically. The only bit that seemed to throw one of them slightly was at then end when a waiter first took a bill to the table next to ours where the man declined it saying 'its my birthday', and then came to our table where I had pleasure in saying 'mine too'. I think he may have felt ganged up on.

We were near Inverness for a week last summer. Try the Rocpool (1 Ness Walk) in Inverness. It's definitely a cut above the other restaurants in the area. If you can, go on a Friday evening as they have a special seafood menu on that evening in addition to their usual menu. It was probably the only restaurant we visited in the area which did not have haggis anywhere on the menu. The other place I would recommend, although it might push your budget too far, is Boath House at Auldearn a few miles east of Inverness. It is much more traditional Scottish country house hotel style, but at a higher level than most such establishments.

Roy Joiner of the Observer ditto.

I don't think it said who actually did the spraying, but I believe it was stated as being a legal requirement. All I'm going on here though is one remembered paragraph from a weekend paper, so if anyone can point me at further information on this point I'd be grateful.

Yes, I agree that there are other reasons for buying organic, but most of those are already invalidated buying imported organics from a supermarket: It is arguable whether organic vegetables have better flavour or more nutritive value than other vegetables. I would think that variety and time from picking to consumption would have far greater influence here than the presence or absence of an organic label (so I'll prefer the local farm shop even if it doesn't claim organic). Likewise I don't see what relevance the organic status of a product has for how much it supports the rural economy. Surely its more down to whether the supermarket screwed the producer for every penny they could, or gave them a fair price? Again for local produce, the local shop or market should be better, and for imported produce I buy fair trade when I have the option.

I'm pretty sure it does go off faster - which is fine. The problem is when these organic shops keep this stuff on the shelves. People - who know less than we - are going there believing they're getting a top quality product at top prices, when in fact it's only suitable for the compost. A recent copy of OFM had an article which pointed out that much of the organic stuff in supermarkets is produced outside the UK. It then claimed that all organic fruit and vegetables imported from abroad are sprayed with anti-fungal agents when imported to the UK. I have no idea whether this is true, but if so it would explain why supermarket organic food lasts longer than locally grown produce, although it seems to me that it also defeats any point to buying organic from a supermarket in the first place.

I think you are being a bit overly pessimistic here. There are tiny Oxfordshire villages (such as Great Milton) which have pretty decent restaurants. You are right about it being mostly pubs though. I think the one Judy couldn't remember is the Perch & Pike, but its in South Stoke not North Stoke. The Crooked Billet is definitely worth a visit. It describes itself as a country inn rather than a pub: it doesn't have a bar, but that's because it never had one built, not because they ripped it out for some ghastly modernisation. Their website has sample menus.

Maybe it is different in the States, but generally a "director" would be an investor and not be on salary. Any money returned to them would be after all expenses were paid (return on investment). What would a "directors" job be in the everyday workings of a 15 table restaurant (other than scarfing up free food, which is a bad thing if it is allowed)? I don't know about the catering world, but in most small businesses the directors include the people running the business as well as (sometimes) investors. If Heston isn't a director I would be most surprised. His job probably involves something to do with the cooking and the running of the place. Without checking the companies house records, I would guess his wife is probably another director, and quite possible the only other director.

My parents' reply:

The only restaurant in Aberdeen that makes it to the Good Food Guide is Silver Darling which is a seafood reastaurant literally on the quay by the entrance to the harbour. The food is supposedly pretty good, but its been some years since we went so I can't give a personal opinion (though it was nice when we went). Go during daylight to make the best of the view. I'll ask my parents if they have any suggestions (they lived in Aberdeen until last year). I think you'll find there are plenty of good places to eat, although you might have to go outside Aberdeen, and you'll probably find some of the places that locals might recommend specialise much more in large portions rather than quality. Last summer we were up near Inverness. If you head that way, try Boath House, Auldearn. Its a country house hotel and members of Slow Food. Also, in Inverness itself is Rocpool which is a cut above the other Inverness restaurants --- go there on a Friday evening if you can as they have a special seafood menu then. It was also almost the only place we ate out that didn't feature Haggis somewhere on the menu.

I would say the exact opposite applies. Very many people, even if they drink wine quite often, don't know how to tell if a wine is corked, and they know that. If you speak up, then you have an instant topic for conversation, and if you get the staff to leave at least one of the faulty glasses everyone can have a good sniff of both wines, learn the difference, and decide for themselves which they prefer. If you have enough people at the table for the situation as described, then the chances are that there was more than one bottle poured, so the people who declare themselves happy maybe got wine from a good bottle, and the chances are that other people who might be unsure will let themselves be talked out of complaining.

In case anyone is thinking of going to l'Ortolan, you had better make it sooner rather than later. They are closing after 21st February 2004 for 6 months to build a new dining room.

I tend to ignore most of the cheapest wines and all the expensive ones and go for moderately priced compared to the other bottles on the list. So at an expensive restaurant I'll be expecting to pay more. I realised that this was what I did when a few years ago I caught myself doing it in a restaurant in France: the most expensive bottle on the list was about the same as a cheap bottle in the UK, and I was about to go for a bottle in the lower half of the available prices. Nowadays I try to work on the basis of paying a similar amount for wine in a restaurant in France as I would in a restaurant of similar quality in the UK, and as a result I tend to get much better wines. One exception to this is a local restaurant down the road from where I live. I know he takes care over choosing his house wines (and has a good range of them), so I'll often just go for a house wine even though its the cheapest.

I said I would report back on how our weekend in Padstow went. Mostly it was very good. We went to the Seafood Restaurant on Friday evening, and Judy and I both had their tasting menu which that evening comprised oysters served with spicy sausages; skate wing 'with the sunny and aromatic flavours of Morocco'; scallops in coriander and hazlenut butter; sea bass with a tomato, butter and vanilla vinaigrette; passion fruit pavlova & coffee. We had a bottle of white Chateau de Cazeneuve to accompany this. The wine was suggested by the waiter and was a good choice. Judy isn't too keen on leaf coriander, so she wasn't too happy when it turned out to be one of the 'flavours' on the skate, however it was just scattered on top so was easily removable. The scallops on the other hand had loads of coriander, but very little taste of it (the butter had been grilled to melt over the scallops which I think killed the coriander although it brought out the hazlenut flavour). The sea bass had a wonderful aroma of vanilla, although strangely again it didn't come through for me in the taste, except for the pieces of tomato. All told, a very nice meal. Service was mostly good, though we had to ask twice for the bill. Margot's is of course very different. Much smaller and more personal. Toy tortoises on the tables. I won't list exactly what we had, because I wasn't taking notes and we didn't take a copy of the menu away with us. For main course I had skate, this time served with a caper/anchovy/parsley/garlic sauce, so that gives me something to compare directly, but all I can say is both restaurants are capable of cooking a nice bit of skate. The main course in Margot's was of course several times bigger than the 'tasting menu' piece, and Judy was a bit concerned that I seemed to be finding it hard to finish. I did manage a nice poached pear with plum compote for afters though.

My Wife, for reasons I don't understand, has always wanted to go to the seafood restaurant. Despite his cooking leaving me cold, based on recipes and insufferably smug tv presenting, I rang to try and attempt a booking. Now I appreciate it may be very busy, but I suggested a date (saturday night) about 2 months in advance, to which I was told no. I then suggested another saturday night further on, again no, yet again I was recommend to their cafe. I went through a similar procedure recently. It turns out that the Seafood Restaurant has quite a decent automated system online for booking their accomodation, but of course that isn't linked to their restaurant, so you still have to run the gauntlet of their telephone booking for the restaurant. I managed to wear them down by asking about a long list of dates: Friday, Saturday, Sunday on a particular weekend, no good, how about Friday, Saturday or Sunday on the weekend following... If its going to be hard for customers to book with them, I'll at least make them work for their money. By comparison, booking at Margot's was really easy. The phone was answered promptly and politely. By a human no less. Thank you. Anyway, we're off for a weekend in Padstow in a week's time, so I'll be able to report back on how both Margot's and the other place treat you when you eventually get there. Oh, and after saying that the online accomodation booking is quite slick, they didn't actually have any rooms for the weekend when they had a table, so we're staying in the Metropole. (DB&B because that was the best rate we could find, but we'll skip their D!)

A quick search with Google came up with various page such as this one: link One page I found said you could remove the poisons by cooking, another one said:

Can you remember any of the dishes on that menu? Does it sound similar to the one I described?

We arranged to visit Christian Etienne on our last evening in Provence (Saturday 6th September), I had better explain that this had some direct effects on our visit: We were booked on the motorail train from Avignon, so we were able to load the car onto the train late afternoon, and then had the evening free until the train left just before half past ten. Unfortunately the left luggage at the station closed at ten, so I felt it advisable to carry our overnight luggage with us in a small rucksack, and since we were also dressed more for the comfort of travelling than for a posh night out, I think we got a rather suspicious look from M. Etienne when we arrived. Fortunately, once he had checked that we did in fact have a reservation, we were shown to a table on the terrace. One side of the terrace looks out on the imposing south wall of the Papal palace, but the main view was of a building with many blanked or fake windows with painted scenes. We ordered a couple of glasses of Champagne as an aperitif, and I explained to the waiter that we had to be back at the station by about ten. I was very impressed by the staff throughout the evening, they managed to serve us quickly, even when the restaurant became busy later on (amongst others there was a wedding party of about 14), and we finished in good time to get back to the station about 20 minutes before our train left. We chose to try the special tomato menu, so that means we got through 7 courses in record short time. I would say though that anyone else going there should try to have a bit more time available so as to be able to enjoy the meal at a slightly more leisurely pace. I’ve copied the whole tomato menu here. The web site also lists a tomato menu, last updated in June, but it is slightly different, so I guess that all through the season there is a continual fine-tuning of the dishes. To accompany this we decide to go for a bottle of white wine, and since we’d previously enjoyed a red Vieux Télégraphe (see the thread on La Prévôté), we ordered a bottle of white from the same producer. This went very nicely with most of the courses, although in retrospect it might have been better to order a glass of red to go with the lamb course (especially if we had had a bit more time). The sommelier gave the impression of being everywhere at once, giving people advice, opening wines, topping up glasses. I didn’t notice (because he was directly behind me at the time), but Judy says he used a small tasting glass to check the wine before serving it, which is a nice touch. One slight worry I had was that, nice though tomatoes are, 7 courses of tomatoes might just be too much of a good thing. I needn’t have worried. There was enough variety in the flavours to keep us interested throughout. First course was a tomato jelly with diced cucumber. This had a nice crisp flavour. Next we had three small piles of diced tomato, each flavoured with a different herb (and a roquette salad alongside). Serving it this way as three separate mini salads meant we could have fun trying each on their own, or as combinations. The fish course also showed a variety of separate flavours, which combined well. I especially liked the basil cream, and the slice of dried tomato had a very intense flavour. The next course comprised three small stuffed tomatoes, each with a different stuffing. At this point the waitress had a bit of trouble remembering exactly what was in the third tomato, and lost it completely when the sommelier helpfully said on his way past ‘they are all different’ (we’d already figured that out). I see from my tasting notes that I failed to work out at the time that the hazelnut flavoured stuffing also had aubergine, wondering if it was mushroom. The meat course was a lamb tatin: pastry, meltingly soft slow cooked lamb, covered with intensely flavoured tomato. This was topped with a puree of onion and surrounded by a sauce. Next, the cheese course was slices of goats cheese interleaved with a layer of tomato, and one of leek. Having a set dish here relieved Judy of her usual task of choosing from a large cheese board. It was nice, but I think this course did the least for me; somehow it didn’t have quite the same excitement as the others. Even the dessert course continued the tomato theme. The bavarois of tomato and black olives was delicious, and I thought the olives went surprisingly well in a sweet dish. Both the passion fruit and the sorbet provided a nice contrast. Instead of coffee we asked for tea (Darjeeling), which came with an orange jelly, almond something, pistachio something-else, and a very nice ganache with lavender. The total bill was €214. It made a wonderful conclusion to our holiday, although if given the chance I think I’ll want to go back sometime when we aren’t so rushed.