Babbo

I had a superb lunch today at Babbo - babbo means daddy in Italian, and with the wall of family photos and charming staff, it did have a homely feel.

First, we tried a special cheese made by a family of cheesemakers in Italy to the specifications of head chef Carlo Scotto. It's a 50:50 mix of cow and sheep milk so had an aspect of that crunch and tang characteristic of parmesan but also an interesting sheepiness (like pecorino) and subtle overtone of truffle.

I started with seared scallops, elegantly prepared with a delicious browning, served with a (slightly weird) purple cauliflower puree, piquant beetroot and very pretty bows of home-made pasta.

I loved the squid-ink black tagliatelle which was tossed with spicy crab meat. When I asked Carlo Scotto how to reproduce it at home, he said I should practise every day: make the pasta, get the best olive oil available, and hand-pick the meat from the best crab available - maybe one day!

For dessert, I really liked the burrata which was delicately encased in milk skin, and served with a strawberry sauce and fruit. The creamy cheese went very well with the fresh fruit and tangy sauce. I couldn't resist trying the profiteroles too - a yummy and decadent treat!

The Dairy

On Tuesday evening for my birthday dinner, my mum took me to The Dairy in Clapham. The restaurant was buzzing with people, and the low-key décor made for a relaxing atmosphere. The staff were very friendly, and I'd heard that they have a kitchen garden on the roof, so I was expecting great things.

I really liked the menu: it's split up into Snacks, Garden, Sea, Land, and Sweet, reflecting seasonal ingredients highlighted under each category. The idea is to order several of the very reasonably-priced starter size portions, and so try lots of different flavour combinations.

Bread is a good judge of a great restaurant, and The Dairy certainly passed that test. A mini sourdough loaf arrived at our table in a little hemp bag, along with butter served on rocks. Having spent the past few months trying to master the time-consuming art of sourdough baking myself, I could appreciate a great boule. Combined with intensely-flavoured seaweed butter, it was very moreish - we had to ask for another loaf!

This 'rustic' approach to presentation was exercised with great effect - each dish came with a different plate which complimented it both visually and texturally. Potted salmon came with Guinness soda bread on a diamond-shaped stone. The fish was absolutely wonderful, fresh and delicate, supported well by the bread.

My favourite Garden dishes were asparagus & hen egg, and pea & sorrel. The asparagus had a good bite, and were delicious with the creamy smoked custard and oozing hen egg. Then, a fantastically rich pea purée was served with sorrel ice, crunchy crumbs and jellies for an interesting mix of texture and temperature.

From the 'Sea', monkfish was perfectly cooked and served with crunchy radishes and chutney. The octopus was also lovely, with soft fennel, broad beans and a flavoursome broth.

Pudding was equally exceptional: Gariguette strawberries came with vanilla whey and cheesecake ice cream for a sweet treat, and apricots were drizzled with home-made honey (they keep bees on the roof!) and sprinkled with honeycumb for a crunchy contrast to the soft flesh of the fruit.

With stunning presentation, the best seasonal ingredients, and the creative Robin Gill as chef in the kitchen, The Dairy must be one of the best local restaurants - even worth a trip if you're not in Clapham. I'll certainly be returning, especially to try the new dishes next season!

Mozzarella & more

Last Friday, I went to check out Mozzarella & more on King's Road, the latest opening from 'Made in Italy', a family-run group sharing their love for southern-Italian cuisine. The restaurant was made up to look like a traditional trattoria, with their fresh fish proudly displayed in the window and their vegetables and meats hanging over a deli counter filled with delicious-looking food. It was very popular, with a good buzz of people, and the charming staff made for a great atmosphere.

I was pleased to have some proper olives, boquerones and good bread to whet my appetite, before tucking into an amazing platter of mozzarella, burrata, ricotta, caponata, artichokes and Parma ham. The cheeses are made locally, at a kitchen in Battersea, so they were wonderfully fresh - I loved the creamy burrata especially. The bread was great topped with caponata and rich ricotta, or simply dipped in olive oil and balsamic.

Crispy prawns and squid were well done, with a nice, light batter and a chilli mayo, but I wasn't so keen on crunching through the prawn shell.

The highlight of the meal were ravioli stuffed with crab and Amalfi lemon ricotta - the subtle lemon aroma really complimented the fresh Devon crab meat. They were served with a beautiful cherry tomato sauce and fennel for a nice crunch of texture.

Dessert was a tough choice, with a mouth-watering array of cakes and puddings - a different selection every day, depending on what the chef felt like making! I went for the 'caprese al limon', a fantastic lemon cake with a distinct almond flavour and soft spongy texture - very good.

Everything on the menu sounded tasty, so I hope to go back try some more of their homemade pasta, local cheese and fresh fish. Delizioso!

Sticks'N'Sushi

Last night, I went to Sticks'N'Sushi to try out their re-designed menu. The set plates are now humorously split into sections ranging from Economy Class through Business and First Class to Private Jet, with funny sarcastic comments - nevertheless, jokes aside, all of the food looks stunning and it's clear that everyone gets the same charming service.

We started with iras-shai (or 'welcome' in Japanese), which was like a Japanese/Danish take on mezze: edamame hummus was wonderfully refreshing atop wafer-thin black bread; Danish cheese was combined with seaweed to produce a crispy and very moreish snack; a sweet and salty miso dip accompanied yasai (vegetable) sticks. It's beautifully simple but so delicious, just like the tomato salad which although modest-looking turned out to be a real delight with a great dressing which included soy sauce, ginger and spring onion.

The sushi was very good too. We had traditional gunkan (battleship), a special type of nigiri with a nori perimeter which allows loose ingredients such as roe to be included in the sushi. The halibut was excellent, fresh-tasting and delicate, but my favourite was the spicy tuna - not too spicy, with the interesting added flavour of quail egg yolk which broke as it was eaten, and black tobiko for a balance of texture.

The 'coal crab' maki looked really cool, with black rice and towering tempura of softshell crab. The batter on the crab was perhaps too thick and crunchy, but with soft avocado and a delicious spicy sauce, still made for some great sushi.

We finished with sea bass yakitori which was highly impressive. No messing about with unnecessarily complicated sauces, these were served with seasalt and lime, allowing the full taste of the fish to come through. Complimented by the smoky flavour and crisp skin from the coal grill, these were divine.

Yet again I was very pleased with my meal at Sticks'N'Sushi, and hope to return soon!

The Lab 2013

Last night, I was very lucky to be at The Lab, a incredible event from the creators of Taste Festivals bringing together the best chefs from around the world to share exciting new ingredients, flavours and techniques. There was a great buzz about the place, perhaps from the moody dim red lighting, but more likely the anticipation of Monday's news: The World's 50 Best Restaurants.

After a warm 'ciao' and hug from Massimo Bottura, I watched Alex Atala as he finished preparing dishes at the AEG Experiment stage. The food looked stunning, with coconut apple and seaweed brought over from Brazil where his restaurant D.O.M. is located, and an oyster fried in brioche crumbs and served in a little Japanese sauce dish with a soy sauce emulsion, tapioca and roe.

I then went on to try a couple of 'The Dishes'. The mackerel tartare was wonderful: beautifully fresh mackerel well seasoned, with a touch of caviar bringing out the flavour, and combined with crispy bread and beetroot made for a treat.

I really liked the Lukas Pfaff's (of Sartoria) asparagus risotto - it was very creamy but had a slight citrus tang cutting through from the mystery ingredient, Bergamot (which my mum guessed!). The quail's egg melting on top also added an interesting dimension to the dish. Unfortunately it wasn't served very warm, so I didn't have long to savour it!

Roasted rice from Kolkata Street Food was perhaps the best, with sevpuri, mung beans, chickpeas, cucumber and spiced with Indian onion, chili, coriander, lime and tamarind, all combined before me and served in a paper cone.

The highlight of the evening, however, had to be taking part in the 'Noma Flavour Test', for which my mum managed to secure only a single ticket (they went in a flash) which she generously gave to me!

Lars Williams, head of research and development at Noma, talked about the excitement of discovering a new flavour combination, comparing it to an artist discovering a new colour and the ways in which Noma is changing, from re-designing their kitchen to be more dynamic to employing a full-time forager. 

We were lead through several ingredients - Danish-grown seaweed which was dried into a thick crunchy crisp tasted distinctively like soy sauce. There was barley, some fermented and used to flavour potato like a sweet sauce, some colonised by mould which released amylase enzymes and could rapidly age cheese. My favourite were woodland ants (not sure if they were alive) which tasted exceptionally sharp and acidic - I'll be looking out for them in the supermarket (... or not!).

Bird of Smithfield

Last night I went to Bird of Smithfield, the new restaurant just a stone's throw from the famous meat market, started by Alan Bird, veteran of The Ivy. On my visit, it was still almost a building site in parts, but despite the odd wire dangling like tentacles from the ceiling, the restaurant was already looking stylish, with armchairs surrounding the bar and interesting paintings around the dining tables on the cosy restaurant floor.

Everything on the menu sounded delicious, and although I was tempted by the treacle cured salmon or a fresh salad with goat's cheese, I couldn't resist the Dorset crab which came with fantastic crispy thin slices of bread. The rich mayonnaisey dressing covered delicate crab meat and fresh avocado - I found myself asking for more bread to enjoy every last morsel of this creamy delight! My mum's asparagus were cooked to perfection, with a superb hollandaise.

Mains was a tough decision too, although I was very happy with my slip sole, served with brown shrimp and samphire. The texture of the fish was great, and the intense flavours brought about in combination with the almost earthy shrimp and salty samphire transported me to the coast. With such a rich dish, I struggled to finish the extremely generous portion - one fillet would have sufficed for me! I would have preferred the triple-cooked chips to be much more crispy (admittedly my standards based on Heston's Hind's Head are high), but they were wonderfully fluffy inside.

The chocolate pot, made with Original Beans' Cru Virunga, was a hit, topped with a powerful salted caramel cream, and hiding a little surprise of popping candy.

Having not had trifle for a long time, I was mightily impressed by the rhubarb trifle with 'Bird's Custard': decadent, but refined - I'll be returning to Bird of Smithfield, if just for some more scrumptious desserts!

El Pirata Detapas

Earlier in the week, I had dinner at El Pirata Detapas, a Spanish restaurant with a menu that aims to play with traditional tapas dishes, giving touches of modern flavours and textures.

I was delighted to be presented with some really good olives (they had an almost anchovy-like flavour), given that so often restaurant olives can be disappointing. Despite the obvious contemporary trends running through the menu, I felt compelled towards my favourite tapas and couldn't resist getting the black risotto and the piquillo pepper and idizabal cheese croquetas. The risotto was delicious, with a great consistency, amazing black colour and deep flavour. The croquetas were unfortunately a let-down: inside the crispy case was a strange spongy filling, not the oozing delight that the dish needs.

I particularly liked the seared tuna served with an ajoblanco sauce. The fish was wonderful, very lightly seared so that it was like sashimi, and the ajo blanco had a slightly grainy texture and subtle nutty taste which went very well. We were still licking the plate when the waiter took it away!

Roasted figs that were topped with a cheese foam and served with raspberry vinaigrette were quite tasty, but very sweet. I think that this disguised the cheese too much, making the flavour combination less interesting.

I very much enjoyed the cheese board, with a range of different styles of cheese: from a strong blue which was delicious with the thinly sliced apple, to a lighter and more grassy cheese, and of course the classic, manchego with membrillo - unbeatable.

Their crema catalana was served in two ways, one more traditional and the other more light and fluffy. Unfortunately, I wasn't a big fan of either - they both had an overwhelming heap of honey which, for me, make the dish rather sickly. I think I would have preferred the real deal, done well.

It was a mix of ups and downs, but I really liked the good dishes, and with very friendly staff and a warm atmosphere, it was an enjoyable evening.