We Like...
This is the page where we share our current enthusiasms (for those of you who - like Fiona S - have so far resisted Twitter. And besides we can ramble on for more than 140 characters about them...)
Bruno Loubet
We’re not sure we should admit we can remember going to Bruno Loubet’s restaurants in the ‘90s (we were of course children at the time) but we have fond memories of his inventive take on French bistro food. After 8 years in Oz it’s great to see him back at his new restaurant Bistrot Bruno Loubet though we can’t decide whether we prefer the hare or the veal. Suspect we’ll be back several times to find out.
Custard tarts
A warm custard tart is food of the gods, with its crumbly, buttery pastry and whisper of nutmeg. We love the Portuguese pastel de nata made by chef Maria at her Portuguese Taste stall at St Nick’s market in Bristol, who wakes early to make them every day, along with Algarve speciality fig and almond cookies. But we think we’ve found the best custard tart ever – at Marcus Wareing at the Berkeley – the pastry is crisp and nutty, the filling seductively creamy. Sublime.
Roast chicken with (or without) 40 cloves of garlic
Everyone loves roast chicken and we Fionas are no exception but we have a specially weak spot for the Keith Floyd-style chicken with 40 cloves of garlic at one of our favourite hangouts Terroirs (though only in the evening, presumably out of consideration for their customers' work colleagues). Seriously even we couldn’t demolish a whole one between us. Take a tip from us: they’ll serve 3.
Homemade croissants
We would kill for a good croissant. Fiona S has even done a comparative
tasting, buying up croissants from a dozen London bakeries in an effort
to find the best. It never occurred to her to make her own until she
went on a Artisan Patisserie baking course at the newly opened School of
Artisan Food, near Nottingham, and nibbled her first croissant straight
from the oven. We pay homage to the wondrousness of butter.
American cheese
Think US cheese consists of Kraft cheese slices and industrial-sized slabs of white
cheddar? Think again. America’s artisanal cheese movement rivals our
own as Fiona B discovered when she did a crawl round New York's cheese shops a couple of months ago. Not only that but they have some
rock’n’roll cheese labelling as you can see from her recent report on Times
Online.
Opinel Couteau à Pain no. 116
We wouldn’t have thought it was possible to get excited about bread
knives but that was before Fiona B was sent one by Richard Bertinet
after doing a tasting at his Bath cookery school Bertinet Kitchen. It cuts the finest,
most perfect slices - better even than a pre-sliced Poilâne. We look
forward to the cucumber sandwich season.
The Grenada Chocolate Company
Mott greets you bare-chested, with bare feet, wearing cargo shorts.
He’s the owner and chocolate maker at the Grenada Chocolate Company –
the only quality organic chocolate outfit in the Caribbean (he’ll tell
you). He lives above the tiny factory, where his fruity, intense
chocolate is made. His latest is an 82% bar – pruney, with coffee
notes, and a lingering finish. Buy it in Waitrose.
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