Gavin Convery

Sarah, How do you think de Karmeliet rated in terms of other 3 michelin star restaurants - I don't know if you've been to any in France or the UK but would you say a similar standard. Is the restaurant situated in Bruges itself? Can you get to Bruges on Eurostar?? Tks Gavin

Try Le Choiseul - it has a michelin star and is right below the chateau on the banks of the Loire - the food is excellent and the hotel is very comfortable. Also Domaine de Hauts Loire at Onzain is good rather than exellent within its two-star level. Forgot to mention Le Choiseul is in Amboise

I can second all recommendations relating to Roellinger - Cancale is anyway a nice place to stay with some other good reasonably priced restaurants on the front - I seem to recall La Vague as a place for Fruits de Mer. Not sure about the hotels as I've usually stayed in gites but I did stay in the house hollywood is referring to, it is right on the cliffs overlooking Mont St Michel in the distance and I seem to recall was about 800FF a night (whatever that is in Euros) and the main hotel which is just at the south-west corner of the bay is about 1350FF - the rooms are nice and many have views over the bay - there is a simple but good restaurant in the hotel. Website: http://www.maisons-de-bricourt.com/ Other good places to eat are along the road from Mont St Michel to Cancale serving simple seafood. But if you love food Maison Bricourt is the only place to go...

I checked out both Deca and Bonds on the This is London website. Deca gets two stars and favourable write-ups - they have a £12.50 lunch and early evening menu and the chef is Paul Rhodes who was chef at Chez Nico. Looks like it would definitely be worth a punt. Bonds got no stars and a write-up indicating that if the teething troubles were sorted out then things could be good. The chef is Tom Ilic who worked with Richard Corrigan while at Searcy's, hence lots of offal on the menu...

A perusal of this weeks Time Out brought two new restaurants to my attention. Deca is a new restaurant from Nico Ladenis - Chez Nico has finally closed and this is supposedly a substitute being French, upmarket and expensive. Bonds is a restaurant down Threadneedle Street - Timeout indicated that the Chef would be a star to watch, although I hadn't heard of him. As this one is round the corner from work I'd be very interested in any experiences.

Eric Chavot is head chef at the excellent two-star Capital...so I guess he is probably pretty happy at the moment....he wandered around various one-star gaffes, the most famous being interludes de chavot in Charlotte Street (now some horrible pink ethnic restaurant) where an episodes of Friends was filmed.

And yet it has a Michelin star....shurely shome mistake!

It's called the East Dulwich Deli and is at the bottom of Lordship Lane near the roundabout by Goose Green. The owners live in East Dulwich and said that they were sick of travelling in to town to get nice food - given the sort of people who live in East Dulwich and Dulwich village it appears to be a surefire success...

I could have got the name wrong but it's that really nice chocolate they sell in Borough Market with unusual additions like cardamon and chilli, comes in a white pack with blue illustrations and costs the quite large sum of £2.95 a bar.

We get plenty of Oz sweet wines in the UK now the EU qota limit is lifted, in fact it was Lindemans Padthaway Griffiths Semillon which got me on to sweet wines in the first place. Rutherglen Show reserve muscat (sp?) is a nice drop too.

You obviously don't mean that as port is from Portugal, the fact that the British were heavily involved in shipping it back to blighty is no argument to consider it bad as they were also heavily involved in keeping the Claret/Bordeaux industry afloat in the past. Anyway anybody who has ever tasted Gould Campbell crusted (and experienced the subsequent hangover) could not possibly argue against port.

We have a fantastic new Deli in East Dulwich on Lordship Lane, it sells St Johns bread and Artisanal chocolate, their own olive oil which is dispensed from a huge vat, an interesting selection of Italian wines and some of Francis Ford Coppola's wines, great olives etc....anybody like to recommend any new places to try.

Strangely enough I had my first experience of synaesthesia last night - I was in a semi somnolent state and could distinctly smell baked goods of some variety. I was aware of having the experience although aware of being in that intermediate state between sleep and awakedness...I think I'm spending too much time on this board

John, I am indeed a member of the wine society, although don't use them that much - but I will take your advice and contact them...

Steve, That is exactly the wine, although the 97 which was a fabulous year for Saussignac (as was 98). I do recall the wine being organic - it is quite clear from the label but no big deal was made about it. We tasted the whole gamut of wines red and white and Mr Doughty was charming throughout, probably because he was a bit tipsy from lunch. He told us about the wine faring well against Yquem but unfortunately I don't remember the details although it was a local wine show in Bordeaux - he was referring specifically to the 97. We brought back a few bottles but they have all been drunk now. As I said earlier, if you can get the Clos du Verdots 97 then this is perhaps an even finer wine although perhaps less refined than the saussignac but super-intense, but only three barrels were produced and I drunk a fair amount on holiday

Thanks for the suggestions, some of them familiar, others not so. Certainly I'm a big lover of German sweet wines - anything from Kurt Darting which is occasionally available in Oddbins. Also some wines from Saussignac and Monbazillac are superb and great value too. I visited Richard Doughty in Saussignac last year - an englishman in France making sweet wines which apparently beat Yquem in a blind tasting - available on some wine lists in the UK. Clos du Verdots also made a fantastic sweet wine in 1997 under the Bergerac appellation controllee. I have had Inniskillen - in fact I was bought a bottle for my fortieth and very nice too. Good to see other sweet wine fans out there...sometimes you are hard to find.

I love sweet wines and I'm always looking for something new to try. Does anyone have any suggestions to share, especially European wines as I may find it difficult to source US wines in the UK.

moqsob, I don't know much about Kracher but love sweet wines - is this a Riesling based TBA. Was that price for half a bottle?

Cabrales, Is there a special number for the restaurant or is it just the usual Connaught number??

As it happens this weekend is the Waitrose Food Festival at Canary Wharf, starting Friday 23rd...so maybe you'd be better off wandering round there and grabbing some stuff off the food stalls, unless you need a sit down meal.

There is the Orrery on Marylebone High St. - Conran's best (michelin-starred) restaurant - depends on whether you hate Conran or not but the food is fine. Near Borough Market is Vinopolis which is not so good for food but they have lots of wines by the glass and a big Majestic Wine for stocking up at....and there's always Pizza Express under London Bridge.

Restaurant of the moment in Lyon is meant to be Les Loges - the chef was voted chef of the year in the Gault-Millau. But Leon de Lyon is good in a classic french style. You could also try Alain Chapel or of course Paul Bocuse, both a short drive outside Lyon.

An interesting subject which no doubt will divide members. Your options are: Michelin Red Guide (London and Great Britain guides available) Good Food Guide (covers the whole of the UK - used to be reliable, now??) AA Restaurant Guide (covers the whole of the UK) Timeout Guide (London only) Harden's guide(different versions mostly London-centric, a cheap eats version available- in the Zagat format) Zagats Rough Guide (covers London - never used it myself) Egullet.com - the best and most informed! Personally I either use the Good Food Guide or Timeout guide - as Simon says the TO guide covers London comprehensively and has a lot of write-ups from high-end to low-end. I disagree with Simon as I think some of their views are accurate - but that's probably only when they concur with my own In terms of saving the pounds, that is the difficult part. In some ways the higher end restaurants can often be better value than the lower end ones because you are more certain of what you are going to get. But a pertinent question on this board will provoke a flurry of answers. Welcome to London!

I'd agree about City Rhodes...zero atmosphere - a bit like being sat at my desk. The food was passable but not I would argue Michelin star standard. Also having eaten a few years previously at the Greenhouse which was wonderful (bread and butter pudding!!) this was a big disappointment. It was trying too hard to be french whereas GR's USP is that he champions British food (which is of course much better that French food ). Rhodes in the Square from reports on this board sounds more like it....

Gavin, Any other recommendations in SE London - I live in SE22 East Dulwich and am always on the look out. Great firstname by the way