Nottingham

[jamiemaw]

In a week when crisps and fizzy drinks were outlawed in schools across the realm; government 'traffic light' healthy eating labels were given the cold shoulder; organic baby food was found to be deficient in 'essential nutrients'; the chairman of the Food Standards Agency warned against eating raw eggs (avian flu hazard); and Pizza Express alumni Luke Johnson (Giraffe) and David Page (Gourmet Burger Kitchen) squared off against each other to acquire Urban Dining (Tootsie’s); something even more apocalyptic happened to alter the landscape of British dining, perhaps forever.

And as soon as I get my breath back I'll tell you about it. . .

That, of course, was the declaration that Nottingham has emerged as the culinary capital of Great Britain.

The Frequency of Overseas Dishes (FOOD) study, undertaken by MSN, found that Nottingham had six different “world cuisine” restaurants per square mile. FOOD found that diners there “can visit an Indian restaurant every month for three years, a new chippy shop each week for 18 months and a different Italian restaurant each month for two years.”

The report named Glasgow as Britain's Little Italy and Southampton was hailed as the country's traditional food capital.

As it appears Nottingham has but 36 curry shops, how do you like their math? Or is this simply another case of robbing from the rich to give to the poor?

Edited March 12, 2006 by jamiemaw (log)

[Champagne Sadie]

Nottingham also has the highest rate of gun crime in the UK - I'll be sure to hurry there.

[camp_dick]

undertaken by MSN,

←

WTF?

[Emma M]

Nottingham also has the highest rate of gun crime in the UK - I'll be sure to hurry there.

←

And you'd need to put one of the aforementioned guns to my head to get me to even consider going to Nottingham.

[transfattyacid]

Nottingham also has the highest rate of gun crime in the UK - I'll be sure to hurry there.

←

Easiest place in Europe to buy an Uzi , or so i hear of my home town.

But Nottinghams food scene was all but non existant till the back end of the `90`s.

Believe me, i cooked some of the more suspect items there at one time.

Come on i know i haven`t been in the counrty for a while, but Nottingham beats Ludlow ? London ? Leeds ? L.. L.. L.. L...Lace market ? Doh .

Okay so whats all the fuss about ?

Harts ?

Sonny`s ?

World Service ?

What else .. apart from some damn good cheese made not too far away, And a mammoth Sainsbury`s at Castle Marina ?

Do tell ?

[Matthew Grant]

In a week when crisps and fizzy drinks were outlawed in schools across the realm; government 'traffic light' healthy eating labels were given the cold shoulder; organic baby food was found to be deficient in 'essential nutrients'; the chairman of the Food Standards Agency warned against eating raw eggs (avian flu hazard); and Pizza Express alumni Luke Johnson (Giraffe) and David Page (Gourmet Burger Kitchen) squared off against each other to acquire Urban Dining (Tootsie’s); something even more apocalyptic happened to alter the landscape of British dining, perhaps forever.

And as soon as I get my breath back I'll tell you about it. . .

That, of course, was the declaration that Nottingham has emerged as the culinary capital of Great Britain.

The Frequency of Overseas Dishes (FOOD) study, undertaken by MSN, found that Nottingham had six different “world cuisine” restaurants per square mile. FOOD found that diners there “can visit an Indian restaurant every month for three years, a new chippy shop each week for 18 months and a different Italian restaurant each month for two years.”

The report named Glasgow as Britain's Little Italy and Southampton was hailed as the country's traditional food capital.

As it appears Nottingham has but 36 curry shops, how do you like their math?    Or is this simply another case of robbing from the rich to give to the poor?

←

Wow! and Indian restaurant every month for 3 years! They have 36 Indian restaurants thats.....not very many actually is it? They've also got approximately 24 Italian and 78 Chip Shops!

I'm pretty sure we could find a lot more than that in Croydon, in fact a quick search reveals 56 Indian restaurants (that presumably have paid up to be on the Touch Croydon website) I imagine we could probably find a few more if we looked a bit harder! I can also find 51 fish and chips places in Croydon but I think there is probably more than that if I dug a bit deeper, another quick search highlights 25 Italian joints as well. Those Nottingham stats aren't looking so good now!

[Andy Lynes]

I was in Nottingham on Thursday. As I was driving into the city in slow moving traffic at around 7.00pm, a group of three youths walked into the road in front of the car ahead of me (a Hillman Imp in case your interested). When the driver sounded his horn in order to avoid a collision, the group "surrounded" the car (well, as there was only three of them they didn't actually surround the car but you know what I mean) and one of them attempted to open the passenger door. Nice.

In stark contrast, after driving around the ciy's infuriating and bewildering one way system for a very long time, I pulled into a side street to try and get my bearings. A couple of students happened to be loading up a van with some equipment so I asked them for directions to Hart's Hotel where I was staying and dining that night. Rather than try and explain the complicated route, one of them jumped on his moped and led me to the hotel. What a wonderfully kind thing to do.

I was impressed with Hart's, especially a dish of turbot with salsify and red wine sauce - it could have been ripped from the pages of Marco Pierre White's White Heat, but it was a faultless plate of food and totally delicious. The wine list is very well priced, a bottle of 2003 Picpoul de Pinet was a bargain at £16.

Edited March 13, 2006 by Andy Lynes (log)

[Pille]

The April 2006 issue of Olive has a 2-page food map for Nottingham. It says that "in recent years, a fledging restaurant culture (demonstrated by the city's first restaurant awards in 2003) has seen new venues opening to match the already legendary nightlife".

It lists some 'hot hotels', 'cool shops', 'best bars' and 'great eateries', the latter including Geisha, Alley Cafe Bar, Shaw's, Cast, Hart's, World Service (as guessed by transfattyacid above ), Restaurant Sat Bains with Rooms.

As for the MSN quoted in the article, then that must be the company who carried out the research - Guardian quotes "The Frequency of Overseas Dishes (Food) study, conducted by MSN Local Search".

[Timothy Burke]

Okay so whats all the fuss about ?

Harts ?

Sonny`s ?

World Service ?

What else .. apart from some damn good cheese made not too far away, And a mammoth Sainsbury`s at Castle Marina ?

Do tell ?

←

Sat Bains with a Michelin star for one. Then Matias Carlsson at La Toque in Beeston.

Then there's some excellent modern Indians , such as Memsaab, and some excellent fusion such as Geisha and Chino Latino.

Forget about the MSN thing which was a complete non-story as has already been suggested. I think for a relatively small provincial city you can eat very well in Nottingham. What concerns me more is the feeble prejudice on show about the place in some of the the posts above. You'd hope that someone from Ireland would know better than to stereotype a place for its violence.

[Brownbear]

In a week when crisps and fizzy drinks were outlawed in schools across the realm; government 'traffic light' healthy eating labels were given the cold shoulder; organic baby food was found to be deficient in 'essential nutrients'; the chairman of the Food Standards Agency warned against eating raw eggs (avian flu hazard); and Pizza Express alumni Luke Johnson (Giraffe) and David Page (Gourmet Burger Kitchen) squared off against each other to acquire Urban Dining (Tootsie’s); something even more apocalyptic happened to alter the landscape of British dining, perhaps forever.

And as soon as I get my breath back I'll tell you about it. . .

That, of course, was the declaration that Nottingham has emerged as the culinary capital of Great Britain.

The Frequency of Overseas Dishes (FOOD) study, undertaken by MSN, found that Nottingham had six different “world cuisine” restaurants per square mile. FOOD found that diners there “can visit an Indian restaurant every month for three years, a new chippy shop each week for 18 months and a different Italian restaurant each month for two years.”

The report named Glasgow as Britain's Little Italy and Southampton was hailed as the country's traditional food capital.

As it appears Nottingham has but 36 curry shops, how do you like their math?    Or is this simply another case of robbing from the rich to give to the poor?

←

Good evening,

I'ts nice to know Nottingham has got a lot of you disapproving over a piece of data collection.

I believe it read that Nottingham came top for it's diversity in offering cuisines from around the world, I have never read anywhere of claims it was the best.

I personally thought it was great, some positive news coming from a City where it gets it's fair share of bad publicity, can only be good surley.

I can only thank you all for reminding me of the 'Gun crime capital of the UK' tag.

I suppose I've become desensitized, for example whislt driving to work this morning I realised what a good investment part exchanging my VW Golf for a Sherman Tank was whilst driving down south central........... avenue.

Not forgetting the day I had to sell some of my most prized knives for a shiny Dessert Eagle which by the way never leaves the pass during service as you just never know!!!

I am also very grateful to the Police force who very kindly escort my Foie gras,

Goosnargh ducks and other fantastic produce into Nottingham so I can keep feeding my guests.

P.S. I've got great deals on body armour for anyone wanting to make a visit to this exciting, vibrant and dangerous City where I call home...

Sat Bains.

[fisherman]

Not forgetting the day I had to sell some of my most prized knives for a shiny Dessert Eagle which by the way never leaves the pass during service as you just never know!!!

←

fine for dessert, what about the other courses?

[Brownbear]

Shoot me.... so I'm gonna have to employ a proof 'reeder'.

[Andy Lynes]

Shoot me....

←

That maybe isn't the most advisable expression for a resident of Nottingham.

[Tim Hayward]

The report named Glasgow as Britain's Little Italy and Southampton was hailed as the country's traditional food capital.

As it appears Nottingham has but 36 curry shops, how do you like their math?    Or is this simply another case of robbing from the rich to give to the poor?

←

I started a reply to this but it got completely out of hand. If you have time on your hands, it's posted here.

As a side issue, I would warn anyone reading this stuff from outside the UK to take it with a large pinch of salt.

Our newspapers, appalling chip-wrappers that they are, like to use any pseudo-statistics they can find to create a story. UK PR agencies are increasingly expert in generating this kind of reasearch as it's much easier to do than actually coming up with a real story and writing a decent release.

Apart from the Royals, soap stars engineered feuds and upskirt shots of reality show microslebs, 'A recent survey has shown...' pieces are all we have in our blats.

In a previous life I worked for the agency that claimed to have invented this technique with a fantastically spurious piece of 'academic' research into the friablity of dunked biscuits - funded, as you'd have noticed in the penultimate par, by a biscuit company

Whenever I see a bit of coverage based on a claim as totally bloody unlikely as 'Nottingham as Food Capital' I find myself asking who funded the research.

In this case, MSN, attempting to improve their image as a local listings service, have produced 'research' that 'proves' they have intimate knowledge of local eating establishments in a conveniently representative spread of UK small towns.

Edited March 17, 2006 by Tim Hayward (log)

[Brownbear]

You guys are sharp this morning.

Anyway Andy how was your meal at Harts, It's good to know you survived what sounds like a traumatic experience.... following a moped around Nottingham.

[camp_dick]

What about Leicester?

I've heard that this is another city in the Midlands with a substantial Asian population.

Do they have restaurants there also, or is it mostly crisps?

[Andy Lynes]

Sat - overall I thought pretty much everything about Harts was spot on - great bar, lovely rooms, great location (once I'd found the bloody place of course. But a good nights sleep in a city centre hotel is a rare and wonderful thing). The restaurant seems to me perfectly pitched for the very wide audience it attracts. There's enough to keep foodies like me interested but its not so full on as to scare away the more casual punters and business people. I had a couple of issues about the starter and the dessert, but nothing serious and that turbot was just great.

I think some of the service in the restaruant could afford to be a bit warmer, but I think that's to do with confidence rather than any whiff of snootiness. They struck me as mostly quite a young team and just a little hesitant to engage with the customers, but that was just my impression.

[Andy Lynes]

What about Leicester?

I've heard that this is another city in the Midlands with a substantial Asian population.

Do they have restaurants there also, or is it mostly crisps?

←

I have been to Leicester and can report back that they do in fact have restaurants, and not just ones run by the Asian population. I went to quite a nice one which I now can't remember the name of and which appears to have dropped out of the Good Food Guide (dead useful this post isn't it?). I can tell you however that Entropy is causing a bit of a stir and got Leicestershire Newcomer of the Year in the Good Food Guide, although I can't imagine there was a massive amount of competition as there are only two entries for the whole of Leicester in the book.

[Timothy Burke]

What about Leicester?

I've heard that this is another city in the Midlands with a substantial Asian population.

Do they have restaurants there also, or is it mostly crisps?

←

As Andy Lynes points out we do have restaurants. The asian restaurant scene is marked more by quantity than quality. There are some fantastic cheap and cheerful dhabas offering home-style food, a wide range of vegetarian options and countless tandoori restaurants on a scale from poor to good. In the last three months there have been two very intersting openings Red Veil , which is at the fine dining end of the scale, avoiding huges lists of slightly different curries and offering items such as sea bass, scallops in goan dressing, lamb shank in kashmiri spices etc. Then there's Halli which offers first rate Southern Indian vegetarian from Karnataka. Both of these are less than three minutes walk from the Station so timid types who fancy trying them won't have to walk through strange city.

In other cuisines Entropy is definitely worth a visit and also very close to the station. There are some other decent restraurants but much of the best food follows the money out into the county, such as Firenze in Kibworth Beauchamp, The Grayson in Quourn, Horse and Trumpet in Medbourne and of course Hambleton Hall in Rutland.

Oh, and right on Sat.

[erica graham]

I'd second the Firenze recommendation www.firenze.co.uk . Have to say its run by my first ever boss, and now good friend-but the food and welcome are both fantastic and yes, they moved out from the centre of Leicester.

[camp_dick]

Entropy is definitely worth a visit

and is my nomination for the restaurant with the most inappropriate name, meaning:

* A measure of the disorder or randomness in a closed system.

* A measure of the loss of information in a transmitted message.

* The tendency for all matter and energy in the universe to evolve toward a state of inert uniformity.

* Inevitable and steady deterioration of a system or society.

If the owners of Entropy were to open a sister establishment - perhaps in Peterborogh? -what would they call it? Dyspepsia?

[adt]

Matias Carlsson at  La Toque in Beeston.

am giving this place a go for lunch on Sunday, will post how I get on, any recommendations?

entropy sounds promising (in spirit if not in name) too, if I can actually get a w/e booking.

If the owners of Entropy were to open a sister establishment - perhaps in Peterborogh? -what would they call it? Dyspepsia?

'Eat Death

[britcook]

...Harts was spot on - great bar, lovely rooms, great location (once I'd found the bloody place of course.

←

Finding Hart's is easy (at least on foot), but getting there through the tortuous one way system is slightly more difficult. At least it's on the map, which is more than you can say for Sat's place which is somewhere off of the edge of the world beyond Clifton Bridge. Still, worth hiring a few local guides and mounting an expedition to find it as the food is top notch.

[Mrs Woman]

I shall be in this fair city tomorrow with the mother. Although I was brought up in Notts(escaped, sorry left about 12 years ago) , I haven't been to its 'capital city' for about 3-4 years. Can anyone recommend somewhere for lunch? Nothing too expensive please, and in the centre. Somewhere that does a good value, quality set lunch would be good. Probably smething tradionally French or British (mother doesn't do curries or anything asian except Chinese, bless her).

Ta, me duck!

[Brownbear]

I shall be in this fair city tomorrow with the mother. Although I was brought up in Notts(escaped, sorry left about 12 years ago) , I haven't been to its 'capital city' for about 3-4 years. Can anyone recommend somewhere for lunch? Nothing too expensive please, and in the centre. Somewhere that does a good value, quality set lunch would be good. Probably smething tradionally French or British (mother doesn't do curries or anything asian except Chinese, bless her).

Ta, me duck!

←

Try French living on Queen street, the onglet is great.

Edited March 24, 2006 by Brownbear (log)