UK Media Round Up

[culinary bear]

Terry Durack gets fed before everyone else at Wizzy. Have a read, and tell me if you think the rating of 13/20 reflects the main body of the review; I remain unconvinced.

There may be a small delay to next week's update, as I'm moving house at the weekend... Have fun...

[horton]

Jan Moir in Saturday's Telegraph reviewed Amaya. An absolutely terrible review for such an acclaimmed venue.

What intrigued me though was Jan's question as to whether or not Amaya had benefitted from what she called the restaurant world's "shadowy patronage". Does anyone possibly what she could mean by this?

[jamiemaw]

Terry Durack gets fed before everyone else at Wizzy.  Have a read, and tell me if you think the rating of 13/20 reflects the main body of the review; I remain unconvinced.

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Clearly, the art of the hand-pulled noodle personified.

[Dirk Wheelan]

What intrigued me though was Jan's question as to whether or not Amaya had benefitted from what she called the restaurant world's "shadowy patronage". Does anyone possibly what she could mean by this?

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She is alluding to the intimate relationship between some national newspaper critics (you know who you are), some restaurant PRs (ditto) and some restaurateurs (ditto).

[culinary bear]

Considering that a positive restaurant review is one of the most effective forms of advertising, it must be tempting to try and positively influence the tone and content of said review.

Apart from the archaic tactic of actually producing good food in good surroundings, of course.

[culinary bear]

The review from last week's Guardian is up on the site. It's the 'How to Wear Clothes' column's Jess Cartner-Morley's turn in the barrel.

Guess where she reviews? Go on... guess...

[camp_dick]

Jess Cartner-Morley's eaten mini-haggis with Dita Von Teese!

That's almost as impressive as snorting coke in the next cubicle to Donatella Versace

Do I understand from my close reading of the Grauniad that Lord Matthew of Fort and my brother, Sir Charles Campion, are soon to replace TV's Trinny & Susanah?

[Andy Lynes]

Do I understand from my close reading of the Grauniad that Lord Matthew of Fort and my brother, Sir Charles Campion, are soon to replace TV's Trinny & Susanah?

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Well, I don't know about that, but they do have a TV series coming up next week:see this thread for details.

But if you are brother to Charles, I assume you know more than we do.

[camp_dick]

But if you are brother to Charles, I assume you know more than we do.

All I know is that you'll need a bloody wide screen TV to capture the full glory of the more corpulent Campion in action

[culinary bear]

Nigel Slater is Sue Lawley's castaway this week on Desert Island Discs. I'll put up a link once the BBC put it on their 'listen again' page.

edited to add : Desert Island Discs isn't available on Listen Again, presumably because it contains copyrighted music. Oops.

Edited June 5, 2005 by culinary bear (log)

[Stephen B]

The bloody Ledbury - Fay Maschler, Jan Moir, Tracy MacLeod, Terry Durack, Giles Coren.

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Does anyone actually buy the Telegraph on Sunday? I really wanted to read Matthew Norman's review which I would guess was this week and I completely forgot to pick up a copy. For some bizarre reason Norman's reviews are never on line.

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The Ledbury is MN's topic this week (5th June).

SJB

[culinary bear]

Right... so far, the Ledbury's been reviewed by : (pause for breath)

The Independent, The Independent on Sunday, The Telegraph, the Sunday Telegraph, The Times, The Guardian, Metro, and the Evening Standard.

Have I missed anyone?

[PS]

Desert Island Discs isn't available on Listen Again, presumably because it contains copyrighted music.

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I've never understood this, as you can happily listen again to the Beeb's music output from Radio 6 or Radio 2, for instance, which will have a much higher copyrighted music per minute ratio. In fact, they rarely, if ever, play more than a snippet of the selected tune on DIDs, so you wouldn't go there for illicit copies of music.

[culinary bear]

Here's a possible - tunes on Radios 1/2/6 etc might be bought in expecting multiple live playings, whereas DID excerpts might be bought in as a 'one-off'. Alternatively, they may have a standard clause negotiated which might allow 'listen again' (which in itself is only available for seven days) for these stations.

It does seem a bit odd, though.

Edited June 5, 2005 by culinary bear (log)

[Andy Lynes]

The Ledbury is MN's topic this week (5th June).

SJB

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Thaks Stephen, I'll see if I can get hold of a copy now.

[Andy Lynes]

Norman awards the Ledbury 9 out of 10 and the review has an excellent picture of the dining room. Norman repeats Coren's assertion that "There was never any really first-rank stuff around here (Assaggi, perhaps, but even that’s low-key and folksy despite the cold-sweat menu prices) because, I guess, the locals were too sophisticated or too cool or too media or too stoned to want it." by saying "The ledbury is the first truely grand restaurant...Notting Hill has known."

Both are wrong and have obviously forgotten all about Leith's and its Michelin star. The room was at least as grand, if not more so, as The Ledbury's, Alex Floyd was an extremely talented chef, the wine list was compiled by Nick Tarayan and it was bloody expensive. I hear good things about its replacement The Nottinghill Brasserie (you can see a 360 tour of the dining room which will give you some idea of how leith's used to look although its had a refurb) although whether it is as ambitious a restaurant as Leith's was I don't know.

[culinary bear]

I have a feeling the Ledbury's going to do quite well; if it doesn't, it's certainly not going to be for a lack of press coverage.

[Matthew Grant]

Right...  so far, the Ledbury's been reviewed by : (pause for breath)

The Independent, The Independent on Sunday, The Telegraph, the Sunday Telegraph, The Times, The Guardian, Metro, and the Evening Standard.

Have I missed anyone?

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I think the restaurant is promoted by Maureen Mills - she's obviously done a good job!

[nicola]

Nigel Slater is Sue Lawley's castaway this week on Desert Island Discs.  I'll put up a link once the BBC put it on their 'listen again' page.

edited to add : Desert Island Discs isn't available on Listen Again, presumably because it contains copyrighted music.  Oops.

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But it will be repeated on Friday at 9.00am

[Andy Lynes]

I think the restaurant is promoted by Maureen Mills - she's obviously done a good job!

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I don't think Maureen has had to do an awful lot of leg work on this one to get critics through the doors. Anything with NPM and Phil Howard's name on it was always going to cause a critical stampede. I would also imagine that Jay Rayner will be alone in reviewing either The Ledbury or Maze. I think we can safely assume that there will be similar blamket coverage of the place, led by Fay Maschler who has already gven it the thumbs up.

[MobyP]

The Perfect Pie - possibly the best review Coren has ever written.

"To eat an out-of-season polytunnel strawberry in lieu of one of these is like screwing a cabin-boy in a ginger wig because you miss your wife."

[Gary Marshall]

i thought that was a good 'un too.

[culinary bear]

We'll have a double update tomorrow - if anyone on here gets wind of a future plan of mine to move house again, feel free to shoot me.

[culinary bear]

Sorry about the tardiness on this update... I have had the week from hell, it seems...

Gareth McLean reviewed La Potiniere in Gullane, East Lothian, this week in the Guardian. General findings are that the food is good but the ambience leaves a lot to be desired, not least the hooray henrys and henriettas he finds himself dining amongst.

Last week Ledbury Guardian Ledbury Jess Cartner-Morley Ledbury Ledbury Ledbury Ledbury Ledbury.

I've decided to start posting the food column from the Saturday Guardian 'Guide' section; we'll start with last week's Guide, which has Jeremy Wayne's review of Gordon Ramsay's new outpost, Maze, and Graze, in Maida Vale.

This week's offering from Jeremy concerns palindromic restaurants, hence AKA, 202 and Umu.

Last week's Raynerish piece was Cheltenham's Brosh, evoking a positive response from our resident baggy-arsed critic (his term, not mine!). Fans may like to note that I have in my possession a photograph of the intrepid Jay judging the 2004 Roux Scholarship. In chef's whites. It's rather good. :)

This week, as promised, he goes to Taiwan Village and again, as promised, refutes La Maschler's verdict on the place (columns passim). Fay herself is treated to rather lavish coverage as part of the Women's Special in this month's Observer Food Monthly.

I have finally managed to track down Gillian Glover, so here's her latest two. This week is Vermillion, the fine dining restaurant of the Scotsman Hotel in Edinburgh. I've eaten there, and found the food a bit hit and miss. Unforgivably so, considering that it's the most expensive meal I've ever had in Edinburgh. Starters hovered between 10-15 quid, mains 20-25, and puddings 5-7. Can you tell that my keyboard doesn't have a pound key? When somewhere is more expensive than both the Michelin starred offerings of the City, you expect food of a comparable level, and this, sadly, isn't it.

Last week, Gillian ate at Morningside's Le Bistrot des Arts, murmuring approvingly about, well, just about everything.

Oh-ho... I sense a Ledbury-esque repeat here. Last week, Jan Moir reviewed Maze, and if she didn't actually climax during the meal, she probably wasn't far off. Let's just call it a positive review. No review for this week as the techies at the Telegraph website don't get around to updating until later in the week.

Maze Maze Independent Maze Maze Thomas Sutcliffe Maze Maze Maze Maze. Amazing.

Last week, Terry Durack ate at Chair, and it's fair to say he wasn't exactly on the edge of his seat.

Ah, Coren. Gems of literacy in a sea of untrammelled excrement. Glas last week, trailing behind everybody else... and a genuinely good review (as in well-written and original) of Norfolk's Samphire this week.

If you can't guess by the sound of my head whacking against the desk (I'll post an mp3 of that shortly), AA Gill writes about.. No, I can't even bring myself to tell you. Go here and find out. Let's just say it's not a resoundingly positive review of a place that everyone else (and I do mean the majority of the english-speaking world, it seems) is in a frenzy of adulation over.

This will have to be a two-parter as it's past midnight; I'll do the Metro and Evening Standard lot tomorrow...

[circeplum]

If you can't guess by the sound of my head whacking against the desk (I'll post an mp3 of that shortly), AA Gill writes about..  No, I can't even bring myself to tell you.  Go here and find out.  Let's just say it's not a resoundingly positive review of a place that everyone else (and I do mean the majority of the english-speaking world, it seems) is in a frenzy of adulation over.

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everyone else apart from little ol' me....

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