The Guardian, 10 September
Matthew Fort discovers great use of prime ingredients at the King William in Bath.
I had the brawn with green sauce and toast. It was beautiful, closer to the old alternative name for the dish – head cheese. Layers of mellow, mild porky bits were close-packed with minimal jelly to give it a soft density, set off by the sharp green sauce. The fillet of wild venison that followed had the same marks of a kitchen that knows what it’s doing. The meat was sweet and delicate, and the port and juniper gravy gave it aromatic support.
The Times, 10 September
Giles Coren steps out of town to the Mulberry restaurant at the Charlton House hotel in Shepton Mallet, Somerset
After a jolly little foie gras soup in a coffee cup and second teaser of raw tuna, I had lean cylinders of rabbit saddle wrapped in pancetta, moist and dense, with a scattering of couscous coloured with tomato and parsley.
New head chef Simon Cranage follows a Michelin-starred predecessor and is clearly after grabbing the gong for himself – with the help of a sous-chef who, I saw on a noticeboard, has just won the regional final of the Gordon Ramsay Scholarship. Whatever that is – presumably some sort of swearing competition.
I had cannon of pork that was clean and true, with a really good, dense little chunk of smoked belly to pep up the pigginess of the plate. I also spotted and envied a bright-looking John Dory dish with mussel “rogon josh” and salsify.
For pudding, I had the darnedest thing: a “cannelloni” in which a sort of port jelly “pasta” was wrapped around a hefty, creamy roll of Stilton and served with a spelt wafer.
The Observer, 11 September
Jay Rayner is bemused by the inconsistency of Portal in London’s St John Street
At the start, we were brought a platter which included a pleasing octopus salad. It also had some very unpleasing squares of feta cheese drizzled with a fruit coulis. “Never trust a people who pickle their cheese,” food writer Jeffrey Steingarten once said of feta and the Greeks, and I’m with him. Finally, there was a shot glass of nasty carrot soup, which, according to my companion, “had the rotting vegetable smell of the washing-up water after a dinner party”. But then came three dishes from the tapas menu, and they were great – sweet clams in a wine-rich broth, a platter of perfectly kept charcuterie, some light salt-cod fritters.
Main courses were also uneven. A very good and gamey caramelised duck breast served pink for her, some over-salted fillets of John Dory, with even more salty fried ravioli of cuttlefish, for me.
Sunday Telegraph, 11 September
Elfreda Pownell encourages people to flock to north Norfolk and, if you’re there, try dining at the Vic in Holkham
My rare-cooked pigeon from the Holkham estate (£14), was tender and gamey, and came surrounded by batons of delicious salsify and a slightly oversweet five-spice flavoured jus. It was a dish of emphatic flavours, slightly muddled by the mushy sweet potato disc on which it sat – the whole effect rather more rough-and-ready than expected.
Flavours here are mostly strong, and sometimes it works well, but if it misses you certainly notice.
Time Out, 13 September
Guy Dimond finds the menu at Zvika in London’s Soho a mixed marriage of dishes served in New York’s Jewish delicatessens
Kosher or not, we liked our dishes. A matzoh ball soup was clear and made with a richly aromatic chicken stock that was perfectly seasoned. The matzoh balls (made from a type of breadcrumbs) were also light, not sticky and stodgy in the way that inferior versions can be.
Good heimische (home-style) Jewish cooking is hard to find in London, but this dish passed the Friday night test.
A main course of goulash “cooked in the Hungarian style and served with tomato” was another winner, the chunks of beef simmered in a spicy paprika and onion sauce. The salt beef was also meltingly tender, cut thin in the New York style.
Our side order of latkes (grated and fried potato cakes which resemble Swiss rösti) was the main disappointment, as they were not fresh from the fryer and had gone soggy.