Gavin Jones

How about this. The Dog forces the child to make shoes or cash-crop or work in a sweat shop so that the Dog has enough money to go to the best French restaurant. The Dog proceeds to order Fillet steak (off-menu). What further investigation could be needed.

Mar i terra is in Gambia st - I've not eaten at that one But there is a (single) other branch in Air? St near Piccadilly. They had an interesting Spanish wine list and decent food. I had some parts of a pig and some wine & then a large Carlos I. Who could want anymore?

But the blue is only in veins. This is because historically Aristocrats have been the most nutritious class. Mouldy aristocrat is less delicious - have you ever tried to bite into a rancid Duke? Disgusting. I generally prefer to have the aristocrats I eat presented without a head - luckily the French understood this issue as they began to develop their excellent cuisine.

Not busy - but I'm going to have a proper go soon. Seemed to me somewhere between Fergus H. & Jeremy Lee on the Modern British continuum.

In England they put left-over cabbage and mashed potato together and fry it in a ton of bacon fat and call it bubble & squeak. Welsh Rabbit. And let me vote for Jaymes' Jellied Moose Nose. I have a friend who reads the recipes of Fergus Henderson's Nose to Tail eating as slightly frightening bedtime stories to her child. (there'd be some good ones in there - Haggis is particularly explicit - drape the oesophagus over the side of the pot...). Jellied Moose Nose pisses over all of them.

This is a children's story - maybe they will be too young for Pie. In France they forcefeed corn into ducks and call it foie gras.

Spotted Dick (or any one of the steamed puddings) - they are easy to cook, tasty (as contents are sugar, fat, flour & flavouring in that order - so loved by everyone).

Wanted to go to the pub for lunch today, but they barred the child in our party. Ended up having Dim Sum at Gerrard's corner. The child put away a plate of prawn cheung fun but turned their nose up at tripe in black bean stew.

I'd give it another go. Decent blinis, vodka. Big lump of pig - reasonably priced. Not a haute cuisine destination but a modern european (eastern section) London restaurant done better than some. Actually I read your post as Balic. Help - an eGullet themed restaurant. What would it serve: Chicken omelette Belly Pork Spleen & eyeball Cholent

I am very much suspecting that the purpose of eGullet is to turn the one into the other.

I had lunch there in the pub a couple of weeks ago. Decent IPA and a good beef sandwich (marinated skirt or somesuch w. horseradish), generous plate of cheeses from Neal's Yard. I'll likely try the dining room soon. Looked good menu - (modern traditional British).

Elsewhere I saw this explained as Extra Virgin Olive Oil. I use the strategy of categorising such cuts of chicken as a vegetable. They may therefore be served 'on the side' of genuine food. As befits a non-connoisseur, wandering through Borough Market on Saturday I picked up a 11/2lb piece of best end pork belly. Having simmered it for a bit then slow roast for 3 hours, with a spot of honey to caramelise on top. I ate it all. Then had to have a nap.

I wondered when connoiseur politics (Politnicks) would rear its head. Italian food - dreadful due to corruption, extralegal social organisation &c Spanish Food - Repressive regime 16thC to 1975 (Amazing that they managed halfway decent art - obviously food is not art) France - a shining beacon of democracy & totally uncorrupt (just like the current presidential incumbent, or Mitterand, or Valery Giscard d'Estaing) thus explaining its brilliant food. Scandinavia - social democracy = excellent smorgasbord but dire eugenics activity means fails to win 3rd Michelin star. China - Histoire de la longue duree account as essentially an imperial coalition means great regional cooking but no sense of proper identity to synthese great cuisine from the constituent parts Iran - I think this should have great cuisine on this argument (all the unities) until fairly recently - my conclusion here the CIA deliberately destabilised Iranian food. USA - should have the best food but at what cost? Britain - we make the argument a l'inverse. As the polls clearly establish the UK has the worse food we can form some obvious conclusions about its political system. Clearly corrupt, anti-democratic. What can a gagged population put in its mouth?

You would not let it lie.

I think some of the participants should ask for their money back.

Yes, Old dining: Dinosaurs New New dining: (focus on P&L) - Reptiles New Old dining (Alice Waters tendency) - Mammals

This is my reading too. The history of connoisseurship is an interesting one. I always think of Bernard Berenson having to attribute paintings he liked to painters they weren't by to maintain the consistency of his description of the world. For British readers (especially of london's Evening Standard) there is an obvious counterpart to SteveP . Thankyou Wilfrid for this insight, I will now imagine SteveP's postings in the unforgettable tones of Brian Sewell.

It depends what you like. I found the 7eme to have the anodyne quality wealthy neighbourhoods often have which much of the life going on behind closed doors in private residences. This might be your thing or not. As everybody has said public transport is excellent and Paris is pretty small so nowhere is prohibitive. I've lived in some less fancy areas (edge of the 14eme, in the 18eme on top of Barbes-Rochechouart - ). The thing I liked was where there was some residual neighbourhood feel and you got a sense of people living and working together at various social levels. My feeling is that this is being pushed very rapidly out from the centre, But Marc's suggestion of the 10eme is probably a good one - easy walk into the middle but a neighbourhood feel.

I think John may have been addressing the 'more interesting' bit of the thread title. On that basis he has produced evidence (the most interesting writing about food) is about cheap eats. Of course he ignores the fabulous prose underlying our very own 'ortolan' thread. On the issue of 'best' - and it's a point SteveP made implicitly. The only systems where there is a well-defined order are essentially one-dimensional. So it is possible to compare financial quantities at a fixed point in time. If anyone argues that there is a well-defined and order preserving map from food categories to financial quantities they have shown that food category to be one-dimensional. This is presumably a reflection on their palate - or their mind.

That's a nice menu. Are there any dishes which you would anticipate being slightly less in demand than others? Are you ever tempted to put on dishes which might prove difficult to shift?

So on the price to quality relation. If it is possible to show that a better quality version of a product (in a fairly liquid market, say) commands a lower price than another version we have two conclusions: 1. (SteveP) The first product was not as good a quality as the second, it costs less and is therefore worse. 2. (Not(Steve)P) Attempts to measure quality (yes within the confines of general cultural agreement etc) by price is pointless and this bit of the argument is somewhat redundant (as per various previous posters). For example beautifully shaped fruit commands a premium price over 'better' tasting fruit (though not a premium over 'organic' well shaped fruit). I agree with Steve that it is damn hard to get a decent steak in Britain - I generally stick with steak pie.

Are we really agreeing the dominance of French cuisine in Italy, Spain, Central Europe, Scandinavia? I'm happy to yield to the more knowledgable amongst you, but though in London or New York if I asked somebody the best place to go for dinner they might well say a French place (i.e. within the confines of Michelin's macaronic inferno, or a Hotel within the Franco-Swiss tradition), were I in Budapest, or Graz, or Barcelona or Bilbao or Milan or Rome or Uppsala would I really be steered towards a French restaurant? If the triumph of French cuisine is less than total then a far more partial explanation may be in order.

I think this is maybe close to the appeal of the French. It's not individual French dishes it's the whole caboodle. This is the argument of A-B Berurier of San-Antonio. (possibly in Certains l'Aiment Chauve) The argument for the uniqueness and totality of the French nation is made through the food, thus: The wines of the Beaujolais go great with the saucisson seche of another region. One drinks a sauternes from Bordeaux with the Perigordine foie gras etc etc In Italy or Spain I do not believe that the individual foodstuffs are any the less fine or complex or whatever, but they are local to the area and one drinks the wines of the area and so on. The key dining form for the argument is the Brasserie (I know, beer), but there one can order a 1. Choucroute 2. Plateaux de fruits de mer 3. Pate de Foie gras 4. Gratin etc etc This is the irreducibly 19thC expression of the Republique. Spain & Italy by contrast express the state of their dining through difference: The idea of the equivalent of a Brasserie in Spain or Italy offering the politically unified dishes of the nation strikes me as incongruous. A possible deduction is of course the fragility of the state in Italy & Spain. An interesting corollary might be the greater homogeneity of the local cuisines through the central european states and the evident political consequences. The expression of the political unity of the USA is clearly through the international fast food franchises.

I quite like the wines of Madiran which I believe are mainly dependent on Tannat. Had a bottle of Ch. Bouscasse (Alain Brumont makes it I believe). Had a kind of burnished quality and depth of flavour. But not much in terms of fruit quality say. So not much at the front of the palate but fills back of mouth. I think the levels of Tannin mean food often assists the integration of the wine - so if you're drinking the wine on its own one can end up with a rather furred up tongue - not that that isn't good in the right context. I think a more general discussion about the wines of the South of France - in particular the less favoured grapes you instance would be interesting.

Porridge?