A busy week

 Quite a lot going on recently. Here are some quick summaries.

Foodie friends T&K are visiting so we are off to The French Table where we choose the tasting menu. As it's the evening the prices are little higher, or maybe they have just gone up. Three of us start with kir, and T has G&T. Then we move on to our usual Viognier, now £30. 

We are then served our amuse bouche, a cucumber gazpacho with truffle oil and peppers. Excellent. First course is smoked mackerel mousse with pepper salad - not as fishy as I had feared. Next up was a strange little course of terrine of confit potato with cheese - that didn't really work, though with more cheese it might have done. 

The fish course is roasted cod with curried cauliflower and smoked almonds - a good size portion of solid cod. The highlight is the roast rose veal with truffle risotto, girolles, oyster mushrooms and parmesan crisp. Beautifully cooked, very tender. Before dessert we are served a freshening sorbet and compote, and finally we have the chocolate moelluex with blackberries and walnut ice cream. They were somehow under the impression it was our anniversary, so B and I had plates with "Happy Anniversary" written around the rim. 

With two bottles of wine and sundries this came to £400, rather more than usual, but still good. 

T&K stayed overnight and as they like a brunch we took them to Hideaway at the bottom of the road. It's a bit damp so we have to sit inside. It's surprisingly busy for a weekday, and naturally we increase the average age considerably.  The menu is a bit odd - "Bennie's" are eggs Benedict. The three others have the chorizo Bennie - two buns, smashed avocado, slice of chorizo, poached eggs topped with Aleppo chilli.  I have the Shakshuka - peppers and onions with baked eggs and feta and a mountain of sourdough on the side. It is served in an iron skillet and is far too hot to eat for ages. I decant some onto the bread to cool down. When it does it is very good but perhaps needed more seasoning or spice. With coffees for T&K and two mimosas each for B and me the total comes to £89, but of course you could get away with a lot less.

Saturday was Surbiton Festival day -a (very short) parade, brass band and lots of stalls. This means we up the top end of town near the station, so decide to try out the Japanese restaurant just there for the first time - Boat.   It calls itself a Ramen and Sushi restaurant, but it's the "kitchen dishes" (starters) that appeal most. We have our favourite edamame beans, salted and the seaweed. This is remarkable, soft and gooey, nothing like the Chinese crispy seaweed you get. We also have the chicken karaage - deep fried chicken with mayo dip, very good; pork belly - rather ordinary; prawn gyoza - unusually not fried, and could have done with more prawn and less veg; and a tuna sashimi (fresh, with wasabi and pickle).  Secretary Bird SB from South Africa is £22 a bottle; we also have two glasses. Total without service is £70. Overall a positive, though we'd try some different things next time.

G comes to stay, her first visit. So we are back at TFT again. We are welcomed back very warmly.  G is not keen on fish, so we don't do the tasting menu - it is the same as Thursday anyway, so we're happy with that. Instead we choose from the £58 3 course menu. 

For starter, G has the pork pate en croute. This is a big slab of pate in a thin crust - very acceptable if perhaps not ground-breaking. B has the quail "coq au vin", which though it has some bones is also very tasty. My ravioli of trout, prawn and smoked salmon comes in a foamy shellfish sauce. Excellent.

For main, G has the rose veal that we had in the tasting menu the previous week. Again it is really good, melt in the mouth with rich mushroom flavours. B has the stonebass - a solid piece of white fish with coco beans (?) - good. In the dish I chose the fillet of beef had been replaced by beef brisket. The sauce was good, but brisket was a little ordinary, a bit stringy.

G has the chocolate dessert we had last week; B has a mango delice and mango sorbet - very fresh and cleansing; I have a pistachio and raspberry eclair - the topping sitting on a crunchy biscuit rather than choux pastry. 

With two bottles of Viognier, some prosecco and a sherry this all comes to £100 a head again. 

Japanese in Wardour Street

 We're meeting up with a gang of old friends, so need somewhere interesting that can fit in 10 of us and two kids. B had spotted a Japanese place in Wardour Street  - Yatay - that had featured in the Guardian "Blind Dates" column, so that is where we end up choosing. 

With that number they ask that you book one of their set menus, at £45, £65 or £95. Unsurprisingly, we opt for £45. So after a quick drink in O'Neill's across the road, we fetch up at 1pm. It's not very busy downstairs, but we get shown upstairs where we have the place to ourselves. Downstairs had high tables and stools but upstairs is better for us old folk, with normal tables. Plenty of room for the pushchair too.  It's a dark, sultry looking place, with quite loud music - natural blind date sort of place - but also some interesting abstract art.

The charming maitresse d' welcomes us and explains the menu. Basically it comes down to five courses. First up is "Bites".  Edamame beans are common enough - a large portion. "Dirty fries" is an unusual mix of gyoza skins fried with jalapeno mayo - very good, spicy and crunchy. Plus a selection of pickles that went far beyond what you might expect.

Then there are "Small Plates". These are an interesting -and again spicy - seaweed salad, a raw salmon tataki - less interesting- and chicken karaage. This last is super, spicy chicken nuggets fried in garlic and ginger supported by a stunning yellow/pink tofu dip.

Next come Robata, in two waves. First there is a trout skewer, beautifully done, crisp on the outside, melting inside. This is matched with a pork skewer - large pieces of tasty pork - and a surprisingly good beetroot and garlic skewer. 

Plates are cleared away and larger ones replace them for the last main dishes. These are "hen" supreme (a large dish of chicken in a sticky sauce), charred sweet potato and a mouth-tingling spinach in sesame and chilli. Plus portions of steamed rice. By this time most of us are struggling, and we end up getting quite a lot to take away in cleverly wrapped foil parcels. 

Finally there is a house dessert, a fairly dull sponge cake with a tooth-achingly sweet sauce. 

The wine list is short but not cheap, so we end up with the house white, a Spanish Verdejo at £30, plus a few beers and soft drinks. Service has been very attentive, a bit swift if anything, and we get used to the volume of the music. Dishes have been served so that each pair of us has the full range, so it would be quite easy to replicate in a smaller group.  Total £740 with service between 10, including a few bits for the children. Very good indeed.