Out and about again

 As things return towards normal, we started getting out and about and meeting up with friends.  Here’s a few places we’ve been recently.

 Naturally Chinese

This local Chinese has been on our “to-do” list for some time, but it didn’t re-open last summer, doing a refurbishment instead. We planned to go after the farmer’s market, but as it was raining we gave that a miss and just turned up around 12.30.  The place was empty apart from the team eating their lunch, but nonetheless we were asked whether we had booked. We were given a small table for 2, and were a little irritated that later arrivals were shown to nicer, larger tables.

 They advertised dim sum – one of the attractions – but it was quite a limited selection, so we ordered the dim sum platter. This amounted to two pieces each of three different dumplings, prawns, scallops and veg. All fresh tasting and interesting. For main course we went with sizzling lamb and scallops and prawns, supported by Singapore noodles. Good sized portions, all tasty.

 Although several more people arrived, there was little atmosphere, and the décor avoided clichéd Chinese decoration. The bill came to £107 with two bottles of house white.  Worth another visit but perhaps not as exciting as we had hoped.

 Mezzet

Some of my Home Office ex-colleagues organised a break-away lunch at Mezzet in East Molesley (Hampton Court). Ten of us made it along, exploring the attractive little street on the way. The list of cold and hot mezze is quite long so several people chose the selection of mixed mezzes to save time. But B and I decided we would pick and choose. M had recommended the spicy nuts, so chose those. They were quite unlike what you might expect, being finely chopped with a big hit of chilli. We also chose the fig hummus (just hummus with fig in it), chicken livers and lamb sausages. Portions were really quite large so we struggled to finish them and ended up sharing with the others. We had also ordered a prawn provencale, but that wasn’t delivered, which was perhaps just as well.

 The waiter had talked us into a main course too, so we chose to share a mixed grill – chicken, kofta, lamb fillet.  This was a more sensible sized portion. We’d found a reasonably priced white wine, but some people went for Lebanese red, which was a little more pricey. At £132 for the two of us it was good value.

 Oxo Tower

It’s S’s birthday, so with two other couples we’ve arranged to go to the Brasserie at the Oxo Tower on Bank Holiday Saturday evening.  We arrive ahead of time to find S, H&J queuing to go into the bar, which seems very busy. It transpires there are only seats at the bar available, so we decide to go straight on in to the brasserie.

 This too is very busy, with our table being pretty much in the middle of the room. The décor is all hard surface so the acoustics are very harsh, and it is very loud. That’s not helped by our table being alongside the two guitarists, though they do take a break soon after we arrive.  Lots of large groups taking perhaps their first opportunity of meeting up and having a good, noisy time – not a good “setting” if you were still Covid-concerned.

 S orders some wine – Sancerre and a French Cabernet Sauvignon. I didn’t see the wine list, but looking online I’m guessing these were around £50 a bottle – the lower reaches of a frightening list. We’re waiting on the other couple who have been delayed, but get some nice bread in the meantime.

 It’s an intriguing menu, so choosing is a bit tricky. In the end I make the unusual choice of braised beef and oxtail with a Portobello mushroom and Welsh rarebit. It’s hearty flavour but not large; the rarebit gives it a lift. B has the “Josper-roasted” duck breast with rillette and salad.  She thinks this is good too, more delicate and the rillette adding extra flavour. Other choices included grilled goat’s cheese or tiger prawns.

 My main course is roast chicken with fregola and ndjua sauce. Nicely cooked chicken but it did need the spicy sauce to lift it. B was very pleased with her seabass with courgette mash. The other three men all went for red meat: veal T-bone, lamb rump and rib-eye steak. We didn’t make it to desserts.

 With starters at around £14/£15 and mains around £25 the bill came to just under £100 a head. The food probably justified that price, but I felt the experience was a little spoiled by the noise, as it was hard to keep up a conversation, and we were hardly able to speak to the other end of the table at all.

 The French Table

We’ve been showing off TFT to many of our friends but it has been hard to get a table since it re-opened. So when I found a table free I just booked it for 6 people without knowing who would be able to come. We invited M&G, who suggested M&P, who used to live in Surbiton and who knew the restaurant well.

 After some fizz at home, we wandered along and unsurprisingly found it full. Nonetheless we were welcomed warmly. It transpired that M&P knew Madame very well, having held a birthday party there as one their earliest customers 20 years’ ago.  We settled on the 5-course tasting menu quite quickly (everyone at the table has to have it) and ordered our usual Viognier at £28.  A light Burgundy was suggested as a red, but in the end we went with the Nero D’Avola (£24).

 We were all chatting when the amuse bouche came along so we missed some of the description – it was basically a pea soup with hazelnuts. First course was charred mackerel with curried cauliflower and a sliver of crispy,   toasted sourdough.  As usual, this was followed by a terrine – this time rabbit, ham and black pudding, with pistachio. The fish course was cod, with some mussels and smoked bacon – made a change from the usual hake. Next up was a trio of pork – fillet, back, and belly – which was quite filling with a rich Madeira sauce.  The meal was rounded off with a chocolate mouelleux with blackberries.   

 All good quality as usual. We decided it scored about an 80% Chez Bruce, the benchmark of French restaurants.  With 5 bottles of wine overall, some water and coffees this came to £75 a head.

 Sichuan Grand

For S’s birthday we are joining a gang over in Stratford, starting with drinks at a cocktail bar at Moxy’s. The restaurant wasn’t very full, some tables of Chinese people, but we were squeezed in to quite a small table, 3 either side and 2 at each end.

 The menu is challenging to say the least. I’ve seen curried whelks and crispy chicken feet on Chinese menus before, but sautéed cow’s aorta was a new one on me! We eventually agreed to have two portions of each of 5 starters: prawn dumpling, pork dumpling, vegetarian spring rolls, crispy squid (excellent when very hot), and pork belly salad (which we were warned would be cold).  Everyone chose their own main course and rice or noodles. We stuck with a fairly traditional fragrant hot king prawns, which were very tasty and a good sized portion; and an unusual-sounding cumin lamb, which wasn’t as interesting as it  sounded, supported by plenty of Singapore noodles. Others had ordered spare ribs, but not been impressed, though when we took home the doggy bag, they were OK we thought.

 We had a few bottles of house white wine. Service was friendly and helpful, and tolerant of our early indecision. Divvying up the bill made it £45 a head, pretty good.

 

Mondello

More birthday celebrations, this time M over in Shenfield. Mondello is a pleasant unfussy place near the station. M had booked earlier in the day, but the place wasn’t full on a Wednesday night.  I ordered scallops to start – three plump ones on a spinach and pancetta sauce. B had mussels, and M seafood linguine. My main course was veal escalope napolitana (black olives, capers) with saute potatoes – quite a strong flavour. B had king prawns with chilli and lemon – 8 big prawns butterflied in their shells, which she couldn’t finish. M had huge slab of steak, rib-eye I think as it had a chunk of bone.  With a couple of bottles of Verdicchio the total bill was £140.  A good local Italian.  

 

Don Luis, Esher (no website yet)

We decide to take a break and get a bus to Esher, to head to this tapas bar we’d seen once before.  It’s a nice sunny day so the two outside tables are occupied by ladies who lunch, the bi-fold doors are open and get a table just inside. Looking at the wine list, it seems to escalate quickly so I just order the house white – in fact I think we got the next one up (a Verdejo), at much the same price (£28).

 The challenge with tapas bars is how many dishes to order. We decide on 4 plus a salad. The garlic and chilli prawns were an automatic choice – there were 8 of them in a sizzling dish of oil and burnt garlic, hot and tasty in both senses. We also went for chipirones – battered baby squid with aioli. These were less successful, being mainly batter and not enough aioli. On the meat side we had the pinchos, lamb skewers. These were excellent – two skewers of three pieces of succulent lamb fillet, with a remoulade sauce making it all look attractive. Also the ham croquettes, which though crispy, didn’t really have enough ham in them. The salad choice was “Heritage” tomatoes and onions. This was a selection of dark red, yellow, cherry and ordinary tomatoes in a dressing with cumin seeds – these gave the dish a very interesting tang.

 With two bottles and 12.5% service we got away with under £110. The chatty manager said they were usually very busy on Thursday to Sunday evenings, though after the LWL left we were the only ones in there for most of the time.  There were lots of other dishes to try, so I expect we will give it a return visit some time.

 

 

Lovely spot by the river

 We're meeting up with D who lives in East Molesley, so we have booked into 1665 at the Mitre at Hampton Court. We had been due to go the previous week, but D had been "pinged" and had to self-isolate. No matter - the weather was better this week. We'd asked for a river view, and expected to be seated inside, but in fact we are taken outside right down to river-level. We'd read it had recently been refurbished, but seated outside we couldn't reach a judgement on that.  The sun is shining, the river is sparkling, geese are swimming around and various kayaks, sculls, launches etc pass by. There's even someone skimming along on a strange James Bond-like hydro-board. It is really a lovely spot. 

I order their South African Sauvignon Blanc at £32, but they have run out. Prices on the wine list escalate rapidly (there's a French SB at £53), so instead we just settle for the house white, an Italian Malvasia at £26. 

D arrives and we chat away. Service is attentive, but we have not decided what we want  until their third attempt to take our order.  There is a good range of choice, especially of starters, D has the roast duck with watermelon and cashew salad, which is a good sized portion. B's yellowfin tuna with pickled ginger and wasabi was more modest, but tasted very meaty. My crab "toastie" was full of flavour, and cumulatively the harissa sauce was quite a zing. 

The selection of main courses was a bit more ordinary, but did include special dishes such as a whole lobster or a rib of beef for 2. B was tempted by the crab and lobster tortellini with lobster bisque, but instead went for the pan-roasted trout with crab. This very red fillet of fish was also quite large - it must have been a monster catch. My chicken Milanese came with a deep yellow runny fried egg and "heritage" tomatoes, with which I'd also ordered truffle and parmesan fries. The meat was still juicy, the batter crisp and dry - and a size such that I struggled to finish it. D had the herb-crusted lamb fillet with "crushed" potatoes - another sizeable dish that she put away without difficulty!

We sit there for ages, enjoying the view and the wine (which is fine, if a little dull). Then D opts for the Chocolate Nemesis - gooey chocolate slice with honeycomb, marscapone ice cream and raspberries.  We did consider the flaming baked Alaska to share, but were really too full to do it justice.

With three bottles and a 500ml carafe the bill came to £250 including 12.5% service. To be fair the service had been very good, attentive and friendly. We'd had over three hours sitting chatting in a lovely sunny spot, eating and drinking well, so that seemed a pretty fair price. 

DECOR OR FOOD?

Meeting up for the first time since lockdown with M&G, we are booked in to the Wolseley.  We had recently read a couple of reviews of the restaurant which were not especially encouraging: this from the Guardian: "People don’t come to the Wolseley for the food." Now while it's certainly true that the dining room is dramatic - high ceilings, massive chandeliers, loads of marble - it's not my number one criterion for choosing somewhere to eat. Owner Jeremy King had also been highly visible on TV recently, arguing about lockdown relaxations and hosting the London Mayor. 

We got there a little early and, after a high-tech temperature check, sat by the bar to wait. Without being summoned, the barman popped up and asked if we'd like a drink. We ordered two glasses of Sauvignon, and he immediately returned with glasses and the bottle (Ardeche Blanc, £28.50), explaining this was their house white wine. We asked to keep the bottle for the table.  

Another non-food treat of the restaurant is celeb-spotting.  On a previous visit,  we'd clocked Michael Parkinson and Melvyn Bragg. This time we see Mr King chatting to two guests, fairly evidently part of the establishment, but not ones we could identify. 

M&G arrive and help us finish off the first bottle of wine. Then we are shown to our table - coincidentally the same one as last time, up on the mezzanine, back left, giving a good view over the assembled diners. Still no celebs. 

Our waiter shares the specials with us - langoustines are "off", the fish of the day is sea trout. The menu is very appealing, much better than we'd expected, though still very "Middle European" with escalopes and choucroute. 

B scored the best dish of the day with her starter Queen scallops oriental. Beautifully presented in their cute little shells on a seafood stand, the nine tiny pieces sat in an oriental, vinegary sauce - effectively a ceviche. Really delicious. I also have scallops but the more standard ones (four) on a shell with mashed potato. G's steak tartare is deemed fine, and M's choice - "croustade" of quail's eggs - is another visual delight. More than that, they are carefully cooked so as to be soft-boiled. 

G had selected a Corbieres (£36), and this was certainly a class ahead of the white. He chose the house special Wiener Holstein (large), the egg a glorious yellow. Shamed to say he couldn't quite finish it. M had the the sea-trout special which came with veg - another colourful dish, which she really enjoyed. B's selection a duck salad - tasty, though she said she could have done with a sharper knife to cut it.  Sticking with the traditional, I went for calves liver and bacon. I know you can get that at your local greasy spoon, but this was certainly a cut above.

We also had some fries, water and coffee, taking the bill to £373 including 15% service, which had been efficient despite us being in a backwater. So not cheap, but it far exceeded the expectations we'd had at the start. Very enjoyable - and the decor was good too.     

Cinnamon Kitchen 4 course feast

 After Rick Stein last week, we have moved on to Vivek Singh's Cinnamon Kitchen. Their 4-course feast at home is £120, but we thought we would indulge.  The package duly arrives in the morning of the agreed day, and we begin unpacking. One of the sauces has spilled a little in transit but it's not a big deal. Items for each course are labelled with a coloured sticker. There are also cooking instructions for each. 

The first course is Bhel papdi chaat. There are three packs for this - some spiced potatoes, a pack of little popadums and other bits, and another pack of shredded things. The instructions say mix the cracked wheat, spiced potatoes and puffed wheat, so we mix the three together, with tamarind sauce and coriander chutney. It then says to sprinkle with chickpea vermicelli, which we don't have - or more likely have mistakenly already mixed in. Anyway we end up with an amorphous mixed bowl of stuff rather than the layered version in the picture. It's a huge portion, so we just have half. It tastes just fine, but not as good as the version you'd get in the restaurant, no doubt due to our error.

We decide that the portions are too large for one sitting, and think it better to leave the shrimp second course until tomorrow, moving straight on to the lamb shank roganjosh.  The lamb has to be boiled in its bag for 25 minutes, and biryani rice for 15.  There is also simmered lentils (black dhal). The instructions call for the lamb to be fried for 1-2 minutes at the end, but we skip this step.  There's a ginger and onion garnish, and an evil-looking pink raita chilli and garlic. 

It is very tasty indeed, rich oozing, spicy, with a lot of other subtle flavours going on too. The meat falls off the bone easily, and again we leave half for another day. 

The next day we eat the other half of the bhel, and then cook the Madras shrimp pepper fry.  This needs frying for 2 to 3 minutes and then its sauce added (described as a "crust" but it doesn't come up crusty for us).   There is a garnish of fried curry leaves and a vivid yellow curried yoghurt pot. This is also a very tasty and spicy dish, a slightly more modest size, so we manage to eat all of it. 

Then we turn to the dessert - ginger and garam masala toffee pudding. Again, the dish is warmed through in boiling water, before covering the pudding with the toffee sauce and nutmeg custard. It's very sweet, though the spices do shine through, the nutmeg especially.

So our £120 has paid for two full meals each, and we still have some lamb left. It would easily be enough for four people, probably better as you'd get all the different courses.

So: top marks for flavour; over the top portions; some complications in the cooking instructions; not as much washing up as Rick.  

Sea bass menu from Rick Stein

After the success of our French Table meals, we've decided to try out more of the restaurant delivery options. Rick Stein deliver anywhere in the country for around £8, and their three-course menus are a reasonable £50 - £60, so rather cheaper than TFT - the sea bass option was just £50.

The impressively packaged box duly arrived, and was unpacked with some ceremony. A couple of the sauces weren't labelled, so we had to work out which they were. It then dawned that this was more a load of ingredients and cooking instructions, rather than fully formed dishes just needing to be warmed up. The array of pans required was considerable too.

Anyway, B knuckled down and set to work. The first course was mussels with black beans, garlic and ginger.  We had the inevitable debate about what to do about open or closed mussel shells. On the mussel bag it said to "tap" the mussels to close them before cooking, but not to eat ones that didn't open afterwards - Rick's instructions said that didn't matter, and you could just prise them open. The sauce had to be fried briefly first, then the mussels and stock added and cooked for 3 minutes. Finally coriander and spring onion was added.  Luckily all the mussels opened so we didn't have to worry.  There was a whole kilo of mussels, so this made a substantial first course. The mussels were very sweet and tasty, and the sauce was interesting too. There wasn't as much stock as I might have expected, but mopping it with bread was very nice.

We took a little break before the main course. Again this was a good size portion - four large fillets of sea bass between us; two huge bok choy. That needed to be cooked first, while rice was cooked in the microwave.  It needed a very large frying pan to cook the fish, which was supposed to have a crispy skin - that proved difficult to achieve.  To accompany the fish there was a pre-prepared hot, sour and sweet sauce which just needed warming and pouring over, and a sprinkling of crisp shallots and cashew nuts. 

It was all very good indeed. The fish firm and full of flavour, with interesting toppings. Bok choy I can take or leave, but made the dish looked interesting. It was also very filling, so we decided to leave the dessert for another day. 

The dessert was pots of white chocolate topped with mango puree, and accompanied by cardamon shortbread. No cooking involved here. This was good, not as sickly sweet as it might sound. 

B told me to emphasise the amount of washing up that had to be done aftewards!  Overall it was a very good meal, though most of it you could do just by buying the ingredients and following a recipe. The pre-prepared sauces were something that would be harder to replicate, and you'd probably not bother with the fiddly shallots and nuts, which would be a shame as they did add texture. 

Take-away from TFT

 Regular readers will know how taken we are with our local French Restaurant, The French Table.  We'd just managed to squeeze in a visit before lockdown in November.  They had been offering take-aways, but in limited numbers so we weren't able to get anything arranged over Christmas. So as soon as they opened up again this month, I rushed to book us one.

The take-away is their 5-course tasting menu at £42 a head. No delivery, pick it up between 4pm and 5pm, full re-heating instructions included.  Extra bread and petit fours included (as they would be in the restaurant).  It's all very attractively packaged too,  numbered so that courses are clearly identifiable.

The advantage of the take-away is that we can set our own pace. We start with the amuse bouche around 6pm, and don't finish the dessert until 9pm. The amuse is mushroom and chestnut velouté, which arrives in pyramid-shaped pots, and just needs 90 seconds in the microwave. It's lovely, with truffle oil glistening on top, and plenty of chunky pieces of chestnut. 

The first course is terrine of duck, foie gras, and prunes, which comes with fruit and nut bread for toasting.  The green peppercorns give it a fairly hot sensation, and the various elements of the terrine are clearly visible. Full marks, a cut above the usual. .

This is followed by a cold Devon crab roll with leek fondue and samphire, supported by a mango puree and soy dressing. Simply delicious, the roll element being very light, just acting as a vehicle to hold the crab and leek together, and all the other flavours bright and sharp. 

The fish course was, typically, hake as it nearly always is when we've eaten in. It comes with tagliatelle and something called "forkweed", which Wikipedia tells me is algae, and needs just 5 minutes in the oven.  It's the least successful of the courses, being rather salty, though the fish itself is firm. 

The meat course is venison, served sliced, slightly pink with a parsnip purée and a black peppercorn sauce. 8 minutes in the oven. It's served with something called potato darphin, which we'd also never heard of, a sort of French waffle-shaped hash brown, and some pickled vegetables. It all works together perfectly, the venison itself so tender and tasty. 

Dessert is coconut and white chocolate slice with grapefruit.  The balance of sweet and acid is very fresh, and not at all heavy.

We drank Mussel Pot Reserve SB with the early courses and Waxed Bat Cab Sauv led blend with the venison - both from Sunday Times. 

Throughout the distinct flavours have been super, and it has been a very enjoyable meal. I won't comment on the service and ambience (!) - but it did work well as a meal at home.

Pre-lockdown return to TFT

 We had booked into The French Table later in the month for our anniversary, but with the news of the lockdown I rushed to see if we could get in ahead of time. Normally they are closed on Tuesdays, but when I rang they said that exceptionally they would be open, so gleefully I booked us in.

After the usual temperature checks we were shown in to our table. It was pretty busy again, with the upstairs room being used too - others must have had the same sort of idea.  We had suspicions that not all the other tables were from one household, but one can't be sure.  We ordered our usual Viognier at £28 and settled down to choose between the 5-course tasting menu or the a la carte.  We've always done the tasting before, as it is not much more expensive, but this time we opted not to.

That meant I could choose the special starter - a marmite of mussels and cod, with broccoli and celery under a puff pastry top. It looked very impressive - bigger than I expected with beautifully browned pastry. Inside the contents were swimming in a delicious yellow (saffron?) sauce - plentiful and tasty. B chose the crispy tempura prawns and plaice, which was very good - large prawns, plaice full of flavour.  We'd turned down the roasted hispi cabbage with soya and ginger dressing, but it appeared at the table next us, looking very impressive - and collapsing dramatically when attacked. 

After some discussion about the difference between the terrine of rabbit, ham hock and foie gras on the a la carte and the ballotine of the same things on the tasting menu (and why they had different recommended wines), we turned to our mains.  After some dithering, B had chosen the pork belly with salsify, hazelnuts and hazelnut puree. The meat was topped with an intricate and delicate pommes dauphine web, and there was also a pork croquette to accompany it.  She thought it was very good, though the hazelnut puree was a bit redundant.  

I'd gone for the roast lamb, which turned out to be three round slices, glazed with rosemary sauce. It came with spatzle (German egg noodles - I had to look that up), some cavelo nero and a few rather chewy strands of greenery.  Both dishes score very high marks again.  There had been an option of a side order of vegetables which we had declined - at other tables they looked like huge portions. 

I was pretty full, but B pressed on to order a mille-feuille with poached figs and pistachio ice cream. The cream with the mille-feuille was infused with Earl Grey, and the three layers of pastry very crisp and flavourful.

Service was a bit less chatty this time - they were busy and the PPE doesn't make for intimacy. We discussed whether a straight 3-courses was a better option than the tasting (it didn't come with an amuse bouche), and decided there wasn't much to choose between them. Larger portions make the a la carte a more recognisable lunch, but the tastings have always been well judged in their portion sizes too. With 12.5% service and a second bottle of wine, the bill was £136. Not cheap, but we won't be eating out for the next month (at least) so well worth doing.