Tag Archives: restaurant

It’s always tricky trying to decide where to have my and Melanie’s birthday meal. Do I plump for the easy – La Margherita or thereabouts – or try to find somewhere we haven’t been before for this particular celebration. I usually opt for something new, sometimes deciding months in advance (as last year). This year I couldn’t make up my mind.

Eventually I settled on the Fleur, having finally rejected the Punter after one tedious risotto too many on previous reconnaissance visits. I knew the Fleur would do decent food and one or two people attending hadn’t previously eaten there. Sadly we had to pre-order – tiny kitchen versus fifteen diners – but that went smoothly, my simple spreadsheet printout of who-and-what deemed “the most organised pre-order we’ve had” by the barman. The final tally was seventeen, with latecomers Nadia and ex-ANT colleague Simon squeezed in and allowed to order on the night.

A good mix of people, I thought; the usual suspects bolstered by former ANTers and more recent chums Andrew and Doron. There was even, astonishingly, some mixing between the groups.

The food was, as usual, excellent. I was slightly worried that my creamy tagliatelle would cause me some difficulties in my present confinement, though those worries were misplaced; possibly doused in alcohol. I declined dessert, since I never eat dessert (© Chef).

To round off a fine evening, the presentation of a magic voucher got us 15% off the bill for the entire table. And it doesn’t get much better than that.

Avaragado’s rating: fifteen peas

It was Chef’s birthday last week so he invited us down to London for a quiet drink and a few light bites. Ahahahaha. In fact he booked a table at Enoteca Turi, which apart from being a very poor anagram for “Caution: Tree” is apparently one of the best restaurants in London. Or best Italian restaurants. Or best Italian restaurants in Putney. Or something. Chef said so.

I trained down early on Saturday afternoon and braved the crowds in the Apple store on Regent Street, successfully not buying an iPhone (not sure how long I can hold out though). Then I skipped across to Goodge Street, sidestepped loonytunes Scientologists recruiting outside their HQ near the station, and checked into the (rather posh) hotel in Bloomsbury that Mikey had booked, neither of us much fancying a night on Chef’s floor.

Chef’s detailed itinerary for the evening suggested 6pm at A Pub In Putney before 7pm at the restaurant. Mike and I made our own way to Putney, quickly discovering that neither of us had bothered to click on Chef’s link to find out where the restaurant actually was in relation to Putney Bridge tube. Chef then texted to say that they were running late; we unilaterally decided that a place called The Temperance successfully matched all important elements of A Pub In Putney and settled in with a couple of pints of Deuchars in old-man-style mugs. Flat caps, pipes and whippets were not provided.

We’d just started our second pint when Chef rang to say that his mob were going straight to the restaurant, and told us where it was: apparently we were the wrong side of the river. Putney Bridge solved that problem once we’d finished our pints, with Chef increasingly fretting via the medium of text since it turned out we only had a limited timeslot at the restaurant.

We arrived at Caution: Tree and almost immediately had to order. Proper Italian-style courses, too. I had some antipasti (v nice); something like wholemeal pasta with bits in oily, salty water (not v nice); and a pumpkin/cabbage lump arranged inside a pasta cylinder looking not unlike a big fat sushi thing (not bad). Accompanied, of course, by several bottles of wine chosen from the £££ end of the wine list. (Universal Poshness Indicator #94: new wine glass for each bottle.)

No dessert: our timeslot was up and the bill arrived with a hefty clunk. Nine of us, £606. Chef decided to pay half and our wallets were suitably grateful. God help us when he really decides to push the boat out.

Avaragado’s rating: 2 breadsticks

Back over the bridge we tubed to Tottenham Court Road and walked to Soho, having a beer or two outside in the cold at the Dog and Duck. When that shut we were directed across the road to an establishment called Garlic and Shots. In a downstairs bar we drank more beer and several of the party – but not I – moved on to shots. I did take a sip of one particularly evil concoction, I believe called a Bloodshot: like drinking fire. Chef’s friend Mark downed it in one, bless him, and spent the next ten minutes in tears.

Spirits exhausted, various flavours of bed beckoned. Chef headed home with several people in tow, and on past form they probably watched an entire series of Extras back at his while glugging more wine and with Chef cackling over all dialogue until 4am. Just a theory.

Mike and I walked back to the hotel to our beds. Here I learned the day’s amazing football results and decided that England still won’t qualify, obviously.

This morning, after checking out we wandered the streets for ages looking for a cash machine and somewhere to eat breakfast. We eventually found an acceptable little Italian cafe just off Oxford Street. Then Mike suggested the Science Museum, and it was so.

Hadn’t been there in, um, 25 years? Shocking.

Bizarrely it was Stephenson’s Rocket that got me, I guess because I wasn’t even sure it still existed. But there it was, behind ropes, the “ROCKET.” nameplate complete with punctuation in that funny way they used to have, with “No. 1” on the front. Cor.

Most of the other historical stuff was great too: the Apollo 10 command module, a V2 rocket, a 1958 Ampex video recorder, the 1919 Vickers Vimy that flew to Australia, Babbage’s actual brain, cuddly toy…

I wasn’t taken by the for-the-kidz newer interactive stuff, not being one of the kidz. I can tell you, however, that no kidz are interested in tedious Flash-like educational games even if they are projected onto a circular table. Two entire floors in one wing were closed without signage to that effect until you reached the entrance, which was pretty poor. Shame, I wanted to see someone’s laughable attempts at predicting the future.

The shop (sorry, “store”) was packed with oversugared children. We avoided buying anything; a low-tech mug was tempting but undersized, and I really don’t need a USB-powered plasma ball. I tutted disapprovingly at a “stationary set”; yes, as Mike pointed out, it wasn’t actually moving. But anyway.

Finally we took a packed tube to King’s Cross and the world’s longest WH Smith queue before boarding our respective trains home, feet complaining all the way.

On Friday night Andrew and I decided on the spur of the moment to go for a meal at Cambridge’s (allegedly) first gastro-pub, The Punter (né Sino Tap, né The Rope and Twine, né The Town and Gown). Unlike previous name changes, which were accompanied by a lick of paint and a quick dust down, this latest refurb cost a bit more than a trolleyload at B&Q; the entire pub has been gutted.

Whereas previously the bar sat in the middle of two separate seating areas, it now lives where the old fireplace was, with one large seating area. The toilets have moved, the kitchen is now out in the old back bar (unused since the T&G era), and the former dancefloor is now a proper dining room, alongside a wood-panelled function room.

The transformation is amazing and extremely well done, if not entirely wheelchair-friendly (it’s a listed building and several hundred years old, there’s only so much you’re allowed to do). This was apparently a controversial redevelopment, but I reckon someone visiting the pub for the first time wouldn’t realise how much has changed.

On arrival Andrew and I looked around, retrieved our jaws from the floor, checked that the 10%-off voucher that came through my door the other day was still valid, and bought some drinks. We found a table off to the right, in a relatively unchanged area, and reminisced about the olden days.

To eat, Andrew chose the duck with bean cassoulet (verdict: excellent) and I tried the garden pea risotto (unusual, fine, no complaints). None of yer generic pub grub here. For dessert Andrew had the tart, I the spotted dick, and we made all the jokes ourselves thank you very much. My only complaint would be that the beer was on the turn. No, not that kind of turn.

Avaragado’s rating: two runner beans

The new-look Fleur Bar and Bistro finally opens its kitchen from September 3rd, completing the superhero triplet of Captain Alcohol, Entertainment Man and, er, The Food. Tonight it held a taster evening where interested punters could sample the dishes to be unleashed next week and the chef could make a start on the paracetamol.

How unlike this time last year, as Andrew said tonight, when landlord Malcolm would sit grumpily on his chair by the bar slowly wilting along with his customers, all held up only by the cloying fog of cigarette smoke. And where the concept of a taster evening would quite possibly fall foul of some law or another.

There was a palpable feeling of stress as we arrived. It felt as though the kitchen and the management weren’t in complete agreement about the food they were offering, but for a taster evening that didn’t matter. As expected it wasn’t a full menu, everything was bite-sized rather than plate-sized, and you got what you were given: but it was all free. Free is good.

We took a seat and wondered what would happen next. Some time later, the cellar door opened – a trap door inside the bar, health and safety field day, etc – and various staff went caving, emerging moments later with plates of meze. One of these made its way to us. Marinated artichokes, sundried tomatoes, humous, parma ham, pitta bread, cheese and black olives. We probably had enough for four, but we just kept eating; I think we left an olive and a dollop of humous.

Marinated artichoke dipped in humous tastes like porky turkey. FACT.

Next were some loud Americans. Oh, and some home-made roasted vegetable soup. Perfect: thick, textured, flavourful (yes, I am talking about the soup).

By now the pub was filling up. The soup was followed by some crostinis: a fig/goats cheese concoction (best), a beetroot-oriented pepper thingy (OK unless you’re beetroot-phobic) and a horseradish/smoked salmon lump (which I didn’t try but was apparently pretty good).

Food deliveries slowed to a crawl, possibly because we were the wrong side of the pub from the kitchen. When service came our way Andrew had a go on the pan-fried scallops on a prawn mash (in a tiny taster pot) and pronounced it good, and a much larger pile of Thai green chicken was declared “succulent” before being spirited away to another table. At that point Andrew had to leave, and as I fancied a lift home we missed out on the grilled seabass with lemon and cream and the bruschetta with peppers, cherry tomatoes and mozzarella.

It’s a very promising start indeed, given that I’d anticipated semi-plastic food and at least one Big Gay Strop™. If they can keep up this quality and drag in sufficient paying customers to make it viable, I think they can make a mark. Well worth a night out with the usual suspects once service starts for real next week.

Avaragado’s rating: one panino and another panino makes two panini

The Spade and Beckett: a place known today only in legend wherein, so the elders say, Barrie gave Julian Francis the nickname Geoffrey after the beer made him incapable.

Today it’s now La Mimosa, an Italian restaurant – another Cambridge pub lost to the overwhelming might of garlic bread. One day only the Eagle shall remain, a beercon of hope fighting to last orders against the invading hordes of Starbuckiana and the Islamic Democratic Republic of Carphone Warehouse. With Toby propping up the bar.

I seem to have digressed.

Chris, Andy, Louise, Lynda and I spent a pleasant few hours at La Mimosa on Friday night (Melanie laid low by a greek salad, apparently, and Chef unwilling to leave London on a Friday). Our conversation included, but was not limited to: facebook; the upcoming amazing Avaragado Pictures dual-action premiere night; men; women; the Mini Cooper now belonging to Andy; kittens; pants.

Avaragado’s rating: asparagus tips

After the meal Louise went home while the others accompanied me to the Fleur. We sat in the beer garden, Chris not wanting to sit inside that sort of establishment in case an act came on stage. There followed another couple of hours of nattering, interrupted by several people I knew and some I didn’t (everyone has an opinion on a Friday night), before the 1am chuck-out.