A marriage made in heaven – Peach Melba Tart. Two historic dishes come together in this peach melba tart with Courvoisier cream, a delicious and easy dessert that can be made almost entirely from store cupboard ingredients. The lynch-pin is Opies Peaches in Courvoisier – something I keep on hand in the larder because straight […]
Caxton Grill at St Ermin’s Hotel – Review
Caxton Grill – a Relaxed Dinner in Refined Setting St Ermin’s Hotel is a rather grand hotel with a lobby which always reminds me of a wedding cake, resplendent with white stucco plaster with a sweeping marble staircase running up the centre of the space. Despite the grandeur though, it’s a remarkably accessible place, one […]
Roast Restaurant – Borough Market – Review
Classic English Dining at Roast – Borough Market. You might never realise there’s a restaurant upstairs at Borough Market. Even if you look up, from inside the Market, there’s little to see and from outside even less. But, it’s definitely worth searching out – especially now, with a recent refurbishment. There’s a comfy bar area […]
Homemade Beef Wellington From Scratch
Homemade Beef Wellington Recipe with Donald Russell. Gentle reader, I am not a great follower of recipes. Most of what I cook I’ve made in one form or another for years – and what I do has evolved to suit my palate, culinary expertise (or lack of) and patience. I’ve made individual beef wellingtons for […]
Park’s Edge Bar and Kitchen – Excellence in Herne Hill
A Classy Kitchen and Bar near Brockwell Park. As you may guess, the name of the venue indicates where it’s located. Yes, Park’s Edge Bar and Kitchen faces onto the lovely Brockwell Park. This is an area of London with which I’m very familiar. My father was born and grew up on a few hundred […]
Lamb Crown from Donald Russell and a red wine and mushroom jus.
Stuffed lamb crown with red wine and mushroom jus: There are few dishes that celebrate Spring better than lamb. Donald Russell, Scotland’s finest butcher and by appointment to the Queen, has created this stunning celebratory lamb crown stuffed with a light earthy mushroom duxelles. Made from English lamb, a crown is one of the best […]
Clifford’s Restaurant – Fetter Lane – Review
A crime not to try – Clifford’s Restaurant (#Ad:Press Review) This is a place I know well of old. Fetter Lane, right in the heart of Legal Land was my stomping ground. Today it seems to have become even more focused on the world of law – the newspapers are almost all gone from nearby […]
The Savoy Grill with Red Letter Days
Lunch at the Savoy Grill: I was something of a regular visitor to the Savoy Hotel before the refurbishment completed in 2010. The Savoy Grill was like a comfortable pair of expensive, traditional all leather slippers, worn down at the heel and so easy to wear that you put them on whenever you wanted to […]
Discovering Dartmouth
Dartmouth – Heaven on Earth in Devon “Ruby’s going to Heaven for her holiday” announced my young daughter, not registering my look of shocked concern. Further probing clarified that rather than departing to a celestial paradise, Ruby (our trusty motor) was hitting the highway and heading to Devon, a destination which, as I recently discovered […]
Essential Cuisine Partridge in Red Wine and Medlar Sauce
Seasonal Cooking – Partridge in Red Wine and Medlar: It’s the game season – one of my favourite times of year for food. I tend to overindulge in Game with the justification that it is healthy (naturally organic and lower in fat that farm cultivated meat and poultry) but with a genuine love for the flavours […]