The Independent - 11 October
RICHARD JOHNSON decides not to frequent a Little Chef and heads to THE YEW TREE in Lower Wield, Hampshire, instead
The gratin of plaice fillet was an elegant surprise. The fish - the nicest I've tasted in a long while - came with a light dusting of cheese. It gave an altogether fresher, cleaner flavour, that didn't rely on cloying hollandaise or beurre blanc. The warm artichoke bottom, hollowed out for two delicate nibs of cucumber, was just the right choice of vegetable.
(Lunch, £25 for three courses, excluding wine)
The Sunday Telegraph - 12 October
MATTHEW NORMAN observes the pomp and ceremony at the "new" PETRUS at the Berkeley hotel, Knightsbridge
Two of us began with delicately marinated, quite delicious slices of salmon with dill, a chilled rock oyster and a horseradish cream vinaigrette. Omelette Arnold Bennett, with chunks of lobster added to the smoked haddock, looked exquisitely brown and bubbly in its copper pan, but was slightly oversalted. Crispy chargrilled veal sweetbreads came with braised marrow, and drew a "bloody good, bloody good", from a friend who seemed oddly to have metamorphosed into a blazer-clad, rugby-loving East India Club hearty.
(Rating: 8/10. Dinner for one with half a bottle of wine, £70)
The Observer - 12 October
JAY RAYNER comes clean about his penchant for restaurants a stone's throw from his house and duly reviews FRANKLINS in Lordship Lane, London SE22
The menu is about solid flavour, good ingredients and, most of all, simplicity. Nothing could have improved my starter of cold sliced salt beef, with good crisp pickles and a pool of pungent mustard. A dish of "scallops and peas" brought four fat scallops on a dense minted pea pur‚e. I've seen restaurants in London's West End charge £14 or more for a dish like this. Here it was £7.50.
(Dinner for two, including wine and service, £65)
The Sunday Times - 12 October
AA GILL escapes the traditional Sunday lunch brigade and heads for SELFRIDGES on London's Oxford Street
As a pair of single fathers, we took our children to the fourth-floor cafeteria at Selfridges. It doesn't look like anything much (except a cafeteria), but it serves freshly made food from Lebanon, India, the Far East, and English fry-ups - all of it exceedingly good and marvellous value, considering it's a self-service canteen in a shop. What I liked best was that there seemed to be no English people here. And afterwards, we could go for a strolling shop, which is a titanic improvement on the traditional wrap-up yomp through some dripping mushroom wood to the top of some blasted sheep-shit hill.
(Rating: four star. Lunch for five, £60)
The Daily Telegraph - 11 October
JAN MOIR bemoans the overuse of the word passionate, but finds justification for using it to describe the cooking at LATIUM in London's Berners Street
This is a really lovely restaurant; the kind of place where customers enter as strangers, but leave as friends. One man has been seven times already - he happily moaned to me that he is addicted to the sea bass carpaccio. Perhaps there is a tendency by the kitchen to over-garnish some dishes - flowers made of carrot petals, zigzag saucing, etc - but do not let this distract you from the big rustic flavours that course through every course. Latium may have a low-key, minimalist interior, but it beats with a big, passionate heart.
(Lunch or dinner for two, excluding drinks or service, £47)