North Road - Noma in London?

Last night, I had a delicious meal at North Road in Farringdon. The chef, Christoffer Hruskova, from Denmark, cooked up some fantastic dishes, perhaps inspired by the success of René Redzepi's Nordic restaurant in Copenhagen, Noma.

We were greeted by very welcoming staff, and a minimal but tasteful interior, with intriguing lights that reminded me of astronaut helmets!

As hors d'oeuvre, we were presented with a highly Noma-esque smoked quails egg, in a large egg shell. I have to admit I was somewhat disappointed with my first taste of North Road, since the eggs were cold and vinegary like they'd been preserved, as opposed to the hot melting, served over the still warm hay equivalent at Noma. My disappointment quickly vanished however, when I tried the smoked cheese and radish appetizer, beautifully presented on crispy bread, and topped with my favourite herb, dill! It was wonderfully light, and subtly smoky, with a soft crunch from the thinly-sliced radishes - deeelish.

For my starter I chose pickled mackerel, with nettles and horseradish. The mackerel on its own was lovely and yielding and just vinegary enough for my liking! I adored the horseradish 'snow', which had a really intensely pungent taste. Although, I wasn't too keen on the burnt hay covered fish, as I think it was too charcoaly, and the texture was strangely oozy, which put me off somewhat.

My main course was absolutely fantastic! I had monkfish tail and cheek, with Kent broad beans, St George mushrooms, delicious sauce made from intense (I think chestnut) mushrooms, and different greens, including samphire. The dish looked like something you might find on a forest floor, with different shades of green and brown, and tasted wonderfully earthy as well. The fish had a great, giving texture, whilst being wonderfully crispy on the outside. I loved the flavoursome mushrooms, and accompanying sauce, and the greens had great sweet and citrus tastes.

Finally, for dessert, I opted for the interesting sounding birch ice-cream and nettle 'snow'. The ice-cream was gently woody, with subtle vanilla undertones, and the nettle 'snow', which looked bizarrely like moss was in fact lovely and refreshing.

Altogether, it's a great restaurant, with exciting and scrumptious food - almost on par with Noma, and certainly easier to get to for me!

Locanda Locatelli

I enjoyed a delicious lunch at Locanda Locatelli today. It was my first visit to Giorgio's restaurant since I was much younger, when I went to make ice-creams; I can hardly remember it. However, today's meal was a great reminder of truly fantastic Italian cuisine.

I was completely blown away by the gnocchi with morel mushrooms. There will definitely be no substitute for these delicately light gnocchi, made with King Edward potatoes, with their exceptionally light and fluffy texture. Of course the morels were incredibly rich and intense, and their earthly flavour in the sauce went really well with the potato gnocchi.

For my starter, I had some burrata with grilled vegetables, and topped with roasted almonds. The burrata, which is made in a similar way to mozzarella (although is much more runny!), had a refreshing creamy taste and texture. The buttery flavour was great with the soft, grilled courgette, and onion, and crunchy roasted almonds.

I had to opt for sorbet for dessert on such a hot day, so I tried three different sorbets: apricot & passion fruit, apple, and raspberry. They were all delicious, and not too sweet. I especially like the apple, which was very subtle - the apricot & passion fruit was also lovely and exotic.

The restaurant look great as well, I especially liked the glass panels with yellow streaks curling down, which reminded me of tagliatelle pasta! The staff were really kind, and well humoured!

Chocolate Festival and Meza

I had a fun day yesterday, starting at the Chocolate Festival at the Southbank. It's on until Sunday in the square behind the Royal Festival Hall, and there's some great chocolate to taste and buy along with some interesting talks from the people behind the chocolate.

I popped along to do a quick shift behind Original Beans' stall, explaining what I knew about the origins of the bars, the rare Porcelena cocoa beans (named after its white appearance similar to that of porcelain), and the inspiring ethos - a bar plants a tree! It was great fun, and I enjoyed meeting people who knew and were interested in finding out about chocolate. Just before the event started to wind down for the evening, I popped round to have a peek at the other stalls and tried Damien Allsop's mini egg which had a delicious salty caramel filling. He's a great chocolatier who's speciality is water-based ganache, and I love his raspberry chocopop with crackling space dust!

Then, in the evening we visited The Modern Pantry Pop-up at Meza, where I enjoyed the fresh and exciting cooking of Anna Hansen. The menu was really interesting, and everything sounded sensational. I opted for the salmon sashimi to start. The organic fish was so fresh and had a lovely clean taste, and the dressing made from truffled umeboshi, which is a sour fruit, wonderfully complimented and accented the citrus yuzu (a Japanese fruit) and the texture of the crunchy flying fish roe (or tobiko) was great.

For mains I tried the roast butternut squash, tofu and leek filled inari (pouches made from an omelette-like mixture), with crispy walnuts and wild rice, and a salty miso broth. It was a very earthy dish, quite different from my starter, and it had a great rustic sense, but was also highly voluptuous, with a deep aroma and soft-hard textures.

Finally to finish I had the salted coconut tapioca with a green tea and chocolate mouse, with mango, passion fruit and a coconut wafer. I'm not completely sure why I chose this, because I'm not a great fan of green tea, but I liked the crunchy passion fruit with the sweet coconut, and the crispy wafer.

All in all a delightful day, and a delicious meal!

Bennett Oyster Bar & Brasserie

I had a great evening last night at the "friends and family" pre-opening evening at Bennett Oyster Bar & Brasserie (which opens fully on 8th March). Ray, who owns the restaurant was charmingly welcoming and so too were his 1950s-clad waiters. The music was upbeat and jolly, and there was a great atmosphere.

The bread, which they made there, and served in cute little flower pots which reminded me of René Redzepi's flowerpot dish, was delicious - really fluffy and light.

I was very impressed with my starter, the red mullet soup with Gruyère, rouille and croutons. It was a really rich, deep red colour, and the fishy taste matched that intensity - exactly what you want with a fish soup. The rouille, which is made from garlic and olive oil, gave a good kick to the soup, and the saffron flavour was nice and piquant. Together with the crunchy croutons, and one of my favourites cheeses to sprinkle on top and watch melt, I was wary of sharing it!

For mains, I had pollock, which is a great alternative for cod and is much more sustainable, and probably tastier as well, especially how this was done. It had a crusty top, and was cooked perfectly through, so it flaked away easily. The potatoes could have been more crispy, but they tasted fine. I loved the mustard velouté - the velvety and creamy sauce went well with both the fish and the potatoes.

Finally, after two delicious courses came dessert. I was hardly ready for the generous portion of sticky toffee pudding! Unfortunately, it wasn't served quite warm enough and I found it a bit dense, but I liked the toffee sauce, rich and sugary, of course, and the vanilla ice cream was fine.

So, all in all, a very impressive meal, especially for only their second evening running. And I'm sure I'll be going back, if just to try their other fish soups, and maybe even to taste some of their other produce which they sell, like fresh fruit & veg, and home-baked bread and cakes.

Fox and Grapes

Tonight, I had a pleasant evening at the Fox and Grapes pub in Wimbledon. (It was a bit of a schlep from the station, so we hopped in a cab on the way there, but some very friendly local foodies escorted us safely back!)

The pub is the work of Claude Bosi, owner of the 2 Michelin-starred restaurant Hibiscus known for its sophisticated avant-garde cuisine, but in this new adventure, the chef has chosen to go for a touched-up take on British pub food.

I thought that the food was reasonably good, and certainly worth the visit. I started off with a wintry salad which included beetroot, goats cheese, chicory and blood orange. It was elegantly presented in a spiral-type shape, with a wonderful array of colours. I loved the creamy cheese, which seamlessly contrasted with the crunchy caramelised walnuts. The beetroot, as well as leaking a rich red sauce, tasted good with the salad leaves. The citrus lift from the blood orange also added well to the delicious salad. This was my favourite part of the meal.

For mains, expecting the lack of vegetarian-friendly options, I opted for the winter vegetable hot pot, following my wintry trend. I like the rustic serving in the heavy metal pot, and the crispy potatoes crusted on the roof were fantastic, although what came inside was slightly disappointing. Although it was very wholesome, and hearty, I didn't think the dish was very special, and would much rather delve into a Ducasse Le Cookpot instead!

In comparison, I thought that the desert was great. I indulged myself with a rich, intense, and scrumptious treacle and pecan tart. The nutty flavour was quite subtle, but still very much eminent, the pastry just the right thickness and crunchiness, and the treacle of course was devilishly sugary!

My only real criticism would have to be the service, which although fast, was very un-engaging, with our waitress whisking away our food, with an over-enthusiastic 'awesome!', regardless of our answer to her inquiry as to whether we were enjoying our meal. Perhaps they could learn something from Michel's recent television program, 'Michel Roux's Service'!

Aside from this, it was all in all a good evening, and worth a visit.

Pham Sushi

I had a great evening on Friday, after a slightly rushed tube journey to the Barbican, where I tucked into some delicious sushi at Pham Sushi, before seeing some extraordinary mime at the Barbican Theatre - Du Goudran et des Plumes.

I'd never heard of Pham Sushi before, but it had some great food, and was just tucked away a road or two from The Barbican Centre.

We started off with some nigiri - sea bream, mackerel, ebi (sweet prawn), and toro (fatty tuna). They were all great, especially the mackerel, which had a great texture and subtle taste, and the sweet prawn, which was deliciously sweet. The fatty tuna was slightly disappointing - a bit chewy, but the rice was fantastic. It was both sweet and acidic, and of perfect stickiness!

The tempura was also lovely, with a light batter, and tasty veg and prawns. I wasn't particularly impressed with the nasu dengaku (miso and aubergine), which was a bit soggy, and although the presentation of the hot dishes was poor (we went to the bar, so they took the hot dishes from the main restaurant in foil boxes, and served them as that), the soup made up for it.

I had the vegetable tempura soup, with soba noodles, absolutely fantastic. The broth had a great tang to it, and the soba noodles, which I normally don't have (ramen are my favourite), went very well. All in all, it was a lovely meal, and I'll certainly consider going back next time I go to the Barbican.

As for the play, that was also fantastic! The best piece of theatre I've seen for a while, certainly. The skill and acrobats were marvellous - it was even tiring to watch! I also admired the symbolism of human impact on the Earth, and the sounds were gripping and intense!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

I've had a very tasty last couple of weeks, starting off of course with Christmas lunch. As a vegetarian, I didn't have any of the traditional turkey, but chose a recipe from the BBC Good Food website, and made it into more of a tart. It was delicious, especially with crunchy pecan nuts on top! We also decided to not opt for the traditional Christmas cake, instead experimenting with a quite ambitious Chocolate bombe, which consisted of home-made "cheat's" fruity ice cream (frozen cream) surrounded by beautifully buttery brioche bread and enrobed in dark chocolate! Very tough to cut, but also tough to beat!

On New Year's Day, feeling adventurous, I gave my mum a quick crash-course in rolling maki sushi, while she created a delicious aubergine dish from the Nobu cookbook. The sushi was delicious, with fresh tuna and salmon from our local fishmonger's - Moxon's. Unfortunately (or not, depends how you look at it...) I cooked WAY too much rice, and after determining to finish it whilst at its freshest, I could hardly move! The baked aubergine with bonite and dashi ponzu was also a great success. I particularly loved the way that the bonito flakes danced around on the hot aubergine!

Another recent great meal was a squash, ricotta, and sage lasagne, which finished with a wonderful crispy top, which was great to crunch through, and the combination of squash, ricotta and sage was certainly something to try again.

And just this evening, I was delighted by a lovely savoury tart tatin, with goat's cheese, caramelised red onions and chestnut mushrooms in puff pastry. It was so yummy that we polished it off before I could take a photograph! The mushrooms were great in the tart, and not something that I would normally associate with one.