29 January
Richard Johnson heads out to the country to sample the food at the Black Boys Inn in Hurley, Berkshire
Despite the soft furnishings and the paint effects, there's still a good deal of pub about the Black Boys. There was Brakspear's beer on tap, and the food was reasonably priced. The salad of warm pheasant (£5.50) was bland. It hadn't been hung long enough. I personally like game to have a deep gamey taste, otherwise you may as well eat chicken. Which is what this pheasant tasted of - a farmed fowl fed man-made pellets. The highlight was steak and kidney pudding (£8.95). The pastry was made with real suet, and its claggy texture was lifted by the inclusion of fresh thyme. The dish's real triumph was the meat. The beef (shin, I would guess) melted away to a buttery nothing.
29 January
Gillian Glover enjoys a day out at the seaside - in the city - at the Mussel Inn, Edinburgh
Its mission is simple: to bring city diners the freshest west coast shellfish, farmed in Loch Etive by the same people who own the restaurant. There are six starters, and I chose grilled prawns with chilli butter (£6.50), while my rival architect of sandcastles in the air preferred seafood chowder (£3.60). The spoonful I stole reminded me more of cullen skink than chowder as it was dense with flaked smoked haddock. My butterflied prawns were excellent, the chargrilling hadn't toughened the sweet flesh at all and the little puddles of chilli butter added just a hint of spice. (Dinner for two £45.15, excluding drinks)
30 January
Matthew Norman gets greedy at the latest Patara opening in London's West End...
Patara is desperately difficult to fault. The wine list is fairly brief and basic but the menu is long and suffused with enticements. The soups, a menacingly chilli-laden prawn hot and sour (£6.75) and a sweet, creamy concoction of chicken and coconut (£6.50), were both marvellous. So were several starters, most notably a salad of garlicky, wind-dried Isaan sausages with ginger, lime and mint (£7.50) and barbecued, marinated slivers of lamb (£7.95), both dishes encapsulating well-defined flavours that do so much to make Thai one of the world's great cuisines. (Score: 8.5 out of 10)
30 January
... while Jay Rayner is disappointed with the offering at Chinese Experience in Chinatown, London
The decor really is different; clean wood tables, a pinkish sheen to the walls, a funky area for quick and casual meals and a noodle kitchen by the front window to add a little theatre. The service, though, was the genuine Chinatown article. A couple of waiters spent 20 minutes leaning over our table so they could chat to their mates on the next one. The food is meant to bring in dishes from both Szechwan and Shanghai, as well as Canton. A quick read and it became clear this meant there were about half-a-dozen unusual offerings and then 50 or so that could be found any place within a two-minute walk. (Meal for two including service, £60)
30 January
AA Gill is seduced by words and inexpensiveness at Mohsen in west London
This restaurant is really, really inexpensive. Not cheap, mind; they just don't charge much. The menu is deliciously lyrical, full of great words. What, for instance, do you imagine kookoo sabzi is? A famous almond-eyed courtesan and double agent, who once won the Persian oilfields on a single hand of canasta from Khoresh Bademjan, the charismatic but dissipated warlord? Actually, kookoo is a souffl‚ of parsley, coriander, dill and barberries, and khoresh is a stew of aubergine, lamb, dried lime and spice with rice - for £7. It's a simple, elegant and comfortable cuisine; a combination of textures and flavours that are older than the Bible.