MobyP

Despite featuring in Savuer magazine, are we really sure that Jay Rayner is the best person to answer the question, "why are British restaurant critics so crap?" ← Doesn't this fall under the "pleasing all the people all the time" scenario? Do you have a better local in mind where the critics are clearly superior? In my naive, nay Heidi-of-the-Hills ways, I happen to be a fan of Mssrs Rayner and Coren.

Saveur can be bought at the magazine shop next door to The Grocer off Portobello Road, as well as on Marylebone High Street, and I might even have seen it once at W.H Smiths - though that could be the drugs talking. Congrats Jay on getting a piece in - it's by far the best food mag of the bunch.

Maybe I'm getting grouchy with age... Ramsay's Dim Sum.

Is ADNY as good as some of the European 3 stars? Certainly not. But to say it is on par with Babbo is ridiculous. I don't understand the opulence critique. Has Bruni ever been to Paris?

Thanks for this Allan. Nice job.

Frontier restaurant is one my favourite destinations in the world. Their fresh tortillas and green chile stew are worth the cost of the plane ticket alone.

Slightly out of focus, but a fair effort for a Sunday... I'd heard of a recipe from the ex-Robuchon Sous-fella where he sloooow cooked it for an hour - hour and a half, so I thought I'd give it a go. Oh, and I had some puff pastry that I'd made earlier.

For as bastard of a kitchen to work in, and a man without the stars, what about Piege at Crillon? Also, I hear Le Maurice is supposed to be an excellent up-and-comer. L'Enclume is obviously going to be very special. But couldn't Ramsay (if you're still on speaking terms) get you into Guy Savoy (or Daniel in New York for that matter - or Cafe Boulud, which is supposed to be superior cooking)? Surely from there you could get a placement almost anywhere.

Had the pig tails in question at St. John's, and very nice they were too. Gelatinous and crunchy and fatty, striated with that lovely meat.

Jon Tseng had the paperback, which I think he picked up for about 70 pounds UK. It is somewhat smaller, and I think it might not include all of the same prep photos. In London, Books for Cooks just got a shipment off the full-sized English version - only a year behind schedule. At £180, my incredibly loving wife (yea let us giveth her all high praise indeedy) just bought it for my birthday.

That makes two of us. What's for dinner? Wih Chavot or Aikens, you at least find a connection back to Koffman. Why London? What about applying to L'Enclume or Anthony's? And if not there, then perhaps it's worth thinking about across the channel.

Yin - are you a Leedsy sort? I fort you were farva Saf.

Cambio de Tercio - it's not that it was bad bad. Just relative to the vast range of Barcelona places, it wasn't good good. In the way that, having been to Italy, you can (in my opinion) go straight to the River Cafe and have a very good meal.

Allan - do you make your own puff pastry? If you could take pictures of all the stages - or as many as you feel like - up to the finished product, I'm sure that would make us very happy.

No. I apologize to all of them.

Went here (as it is around the corner from me) when we returned from Barcelona, and had a very plain meal. So - deservedly popular amongst whom?

Rents in London are expensive these days - from 10-25% up on a couple of years ago - as people are waiting out the housing boom.

Mathew - I saw a large one at Harvey Nicks about a week or ten days ago. Possibly Harrods will have one. Both will be exceptionally expensive.

Caw, why do I have to live in bleedin' London?! Why can't I live in a PROPER food town like Leeds!

Doom.... Gloom.... borsht for everone... forever....

Have you posted him a link?

I was intersted to see in a couple of Ducasse books that they don't use wines in their Jus. I thought this would have been mandatory - but I guess they're going for as pure a concentration of the bone/meat maillard flavours as possible.

So this was "an etherial puff of pastry coated in caramel and filled with the sweetest apple filling. it rested on a small shooter of vanilla milkshake. "tarte tatin a la mode" "

Patrick - they look great. Which recipe did you use, and how did you lay out the apples? Cut in half and standing upright, or on the rounded edge?

Another question: If you decide to braise cut X at 200 F for 7 hours, can you break this up into two times? For instance, 5 hours the first day, and then 2 hours to finish it on another day entirely (not counting that the in the cooling off period, it will keep cooking for a while...). So, if the total time needed at the 'temperature stall' is (for example) 2 hours, can you do the first hour on one day, and the second the next, or is it a cumulative effect of heat on collagen?