almostwitty

Ob. disclaimer – we went to a Qype event and the soft opening of the new Hawksmoor in Covent Garden

Good luck on actually finding the place (psst: it’s pretty much opposite the famed Pineapple Dance Studios) – and once you do, you’ll find a very imposing set of double doors.

But get past those and there’s a friendly host who offers to take your coat. Not many places do that these days for free, so there’s a good start!

Down the steps, and as someone else mentioned, it’s a throwback to urbane 1950s New York, with a dark bar thronged with people supping cocktails and generally being fabulous. There’s not really any such thing as a bad cocktail, but the Hawksmoor Julip was tastily bitter, and the Concealed Weapon certainly was.

The bar snacks on offer are highly recommended – the lobster roll are oozing in gorgeousness and something slightly Oriental, while the lamb cutlets were very easy on the stomach.

Of course, all it did was whet the appetite, and we’ll have to come back one night for the steaks in the dining room, which looked opulent, spacious, gorgeous and well-lit.

Definitely somewhere you’d take Christina Hendricks on a date *swoon* and far more visually impressive than its predecessor.

Check out my review of Hawksmoor – I am almostwitty – on Qype

London – Eating & Drinking – Restaurants – Steak Houses

Mirrored from almost witty.

Chinese Christmas dinner

Originally uploaded by almost witty

While you all prepare to tuck into your cliched turkey & cranberry Christmas dinner and bemoan that it’s the same meal every year, bear in mind that I wish, that just for one tiny year, that I could have a turkey & cranberry dinner with all the trimmings. Especially roast potatoes!

Not because it’s particularly tasty – any meat that dry should belong in the Sahara, surely? – but because when my parents do Christmas dinner, it’s … rather different. Fantastically tasty, and as with all home-cooked food it’s heartwarming and fantastic, but for once, I’d like to try a turkey’n'cranberry dinner that wasn’t mass-cooked in a canteen or microwaved in a local pub.

They’ll probably cook the same sort of thing this year, but I really must ask how they produce all that food…

Mirrored from almost witty.

Borough Market

Originally uploaded by jo_evs

I ended up popping down to Borough Food Market (with ex-flatmate @ifenn), which has got to be a top spot for any foodie-loving people in Londoners. It was packed full of stalls selling top quality food at relatively high prices. There were stalls of seafood, eggs, coffee, muffins, granola - and there was even one stall dedicated to seasalt.

Yet, as I sniffed and tasted some of the various little delicacies that came out (for some bizarre reason, I didn’t have much of an appetite after eating a fishfinger buttie and chips - rookie mistake), I kept wondering whether the food was actually worth the price they were asking.

Sure, it tastes nice - but then so does the 2-for-1 Brie I just bought from Tesco’s. Sure, it’s better for the environment, but economically speaking, is a venison burger worth the extra £2 they’re asking?

And really, is there any difference? I’ve been suspicious for a while that my taste buds are slowly dying off, and I’m reasonably sure if anyone subjected me to a blind taste test between, say, Tesco’s Value Burger and a £10 Gourmet Burger Kitchen burger cooked the same way, I’m not 100% sure I could tell the difference.

Is there any way of improving or testing your taste buds?

Originally published at almost witty. You can comment here or there.

A while ago, thanks to a sudden Twitter from Annie Mole, I found myself invited to a Qype event of a brewery tour and ale tasting, washed down with some oysters.

The directions from Clapham Junction took me to an anonymous industrial estate - aside from the sign at the front proclaiming Sambrook’s Brewery, there was nothing to indicate that there was a brewery inside. No pipes, no steel tubing, no huge plume of smoke, nothing.

Inside, aside from a presentation and tasting room, the entire space was dedicated to the arcane art of brewing, although it seemed more like a scientific slaughterhouse than a brewery farm - hosing everywhere, a grey concrete floor, and huge steel tankers. Fortunately, the master brewery took us through the process of turning hops (which tasted nice), malt (which tasted terrible), yeast, and London water into a freshly-brewed beer. Of course, it also takes a few other ingredients - including sturgeon swimbladders to make the whole thing clear - but otherwise, they use all-fresh natural ingredients for a natural brew. Which you could tell in the final test product.

After that, as if drinking one fresh beer wasn’t enough, we made the long trek to the warm and welcoming Westbridge, where the landlord Charlie took us knowledgably through a variety of beers and ales, all washed down with some lovely oysters. With the interesting titbit that you should only eat oysters when there’s an ‘R’ in the month, so I’ve only got a month left to find more oysters in London…

Unfortunately, I’m not someone who can describe what they like, I just know when it hits my taste buds whether I like it or not. And I didn’t taste a single terrible thing all night. If I happened to live or work within striking distance of Battersea, the Westbridge would definitely be a high contender for my favourite local.

During all this, I was surrounded by the glittering taste buds of London’s blogerati, which seemed to include beer genius James Cridland, anniemole, londonelicious.com and hollow legs, who is painstakingly trying to recreate Chinese recipes from her childhood. I really must develop my tastebuds sometime.

Originally published at almost witty. You can comment here or there.