The Caterer Blog

If you like to decorate your walls with murals, how's about livening up a bare space with this little gem. Available as a large tile or wallpaper mural, the somewhat ominous design shows a towering tsunami on the banks of the River Thames threatening to engulf the Houses of Parliament and other London treasures.

The design is based on the famous 10 × 15 inch Japanese woodcut The Great Wave off the Coast of Kanagawa, from Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji by Katsushika Hokusai (1823-1829) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

It's one of a series of contemporary Japanese designs from the Japanese Gallery at Digitile featuring kimono patterns, landscapes and even Japanese Erotica.

Tonight sees the return of the London Restaurant Awards with a big bash at the Grosvenor House hotel, and Caterer will be right there reporting live on the action.

We'll be there live blogging about who's there wearing what as well as giving you details of what's on the menu and, of course, we'll be the first to tell you all about the winners and the losers.

Awards will be presented across 18 separate categories, including New Restaurant of the Year, Outstanding London Chef and Best Restaurant Chain. Shortlisted nominees include restaurants such as Hibiscus, Arbutus, Scott's, Locanda Locatelli and Acorn House as well as individuals including Jason Atherton, Chris Galvin, Marlon Abela and Alan Yau.

So the evening promises to be a great event and unless you've booked yourself a table at the awards, make sure you log onto Caterer Blog from 7pm to find out all you need to know about the 2008 London Restaurant Awards as it happens.

It's been a good month for PepsiCo and Britvic. Not only has its sports drink Gatorade been shortlisted in Caterer and Hotelkeeper's 2008 Excellence in Food and Drink Award's Soft Drinks category, but it is also now the exclusive sports drink of English rugby.

The partnership between Gatorade and the Guinness Premiership will see the energy drink used on the sidelines of the best teams in English Rugby over the next three years.

The Excellence in Food and Drink Awards' judging panel described Gatorade Natural as having a refreshing taste, vivid colour and impressive ability to boost athletes' energy levels. "This drink isn't too sugary, is great for sports and will hit the market well," said one judge.

The isotonic drink was developed in 1965 specifically for American football. It contains water, carbohydrates and electrolytes to rehydrate, replenish and refuel active bodies and replace mineral salts and fluids lost through sweat.

Commenting on the partnership, Premier Rugby's commercial director Jon Varney said: "I am very pleased to have concluded our first central sports drink deal for the Guinness Premiership. When we enter into relationships with partners and suppliers, we always look for the best in their field and in Gatorade we have reached agreement with the best and most researched sports drink in the world."

The Excellence in Food and Drink Awards 2008, in association with 3663 First for Foodservice, will take place on Friday 21st November at The Dorchester on London's Park Lane.

    So here we are at the London Restaurant Awards at the Grosvenor House hotel.

As I'm typing this everyone is making their way to their tables in the Great Room, which is looking very festive indeed.

During the Champagne reception we managed to catch up with quite a few of the capital's restaurant scene's luminaries including Marcus Wareing and his wife Jane (pictured), Jason Atherton (Maze), Silvano Giraldin and Michel Roux Junior from Le Gavroche, Claude and Claire Bosi (Hibiscus), Chris Galvin, Simon Kossoff (Carluccio's) and Richard Corrigan who very stylishly arrived in a limo. Are we name dropping I hear you ask - do you expect any less of us?

The next update will be on the menu so watch this space.

So while we're stuck in the press room with a "pour your own booze" bar (we like it)

and some nice looking plates of asparagus salad, the crowd downstairs is busy tucking into the following menu, which has been designed by Mark Hix:

Salt beef with green bean and dandelion salad and sourdough paired with Jordan Chardonnay 2007

Roast partridge with potatoes, wild mushrooms and red wine jus and Jordan Carbenet Sauvignon 2005

Dorset blueberry cheesecake and Jordan Mellifera Late Noble Harvest 2006

Well, dinner is over, and now it's time for the awards ceremony.

Funny man Jack Dee is presenting the ceremony... so keep checking our blog for an up-to-date listing of the winners as it happens from the Great Room at the Grosvenor House hotel in London.

K

So here's the moment we've all been waiting for.

And the first winner is

Best British Restaurant of the Year: Great Queen Street

The second winner of the night for Best French Retsurant of the Year:

Galvin Bistrot de Luxe

Here's what Chris and Jeff Galvin had to say:

"It's a great honour to have been in the same category as such great London restaurants as Le Gavroche and winning the award is just brilliant. It's a fantastic achievement not just for us but for the whole team.

"We're having a spectacular evening and have met some fantastic people. It's good that these awards have been brought back to life."

The title for the Best Italian Restaurant of the Year went to Theo Randall at the InterContinental Park Lane.

Here are Theo's thoughts on winning:

"This is the first award we have won so it feels great to be a winner. Being recognised as an English chef cooking Italian food means a lot and I'm really chuffed.

"These awards are very prestigious and it's great that they have been brought back to life. Any awards that recognise achievements in the hospitality industry and give our industry a boost are a good thing."

Other winners are:

Iberian Restaurant of the Year: Barrafina

Oriental Restaurant of the Year: Aaya

Indian Restaurant of the Year: Tayyabs

Local Restaurant of the Year: Market, Camden

Here's the third round of winners and they are:

New Restaurant of the Year: Le Café Anglais

Evening Standard Award "60 under £60": Sam's Brasserie

Toptable.com Best Business Lunch: The Wolseley

Outstanding Restaurant Service: The Greenhouse

Restaurant manager Jean-Marie Miorada and executive chef Antonin Bonnet shared their views:

"We are very happy and very proud to have won this award. It's been a great evening, everyone is here including chefs, restaurateurs and journalists and it's fantastic to have everyone together.

"Winning an award tonight definitely gives you a boost over the competition."

Next up is the Best Restaurant Chain of the Year and Catey winner Carluccio's was the winner.

 
Here are managing director Simon Kossoff's thoughts on winning yet again:

"It's brilliant! Some people say the high street is ordinary so it's great to be recognised among all these other fantastic restaurateurs."

The next category is a new one in the London Restaurant Awards - the Top 10 Restaurants Outside of London in no particular order:

Antony's, Leeds
Le Champignon Sauvage, Cheltenham
L'Enclume, Cartmel
Fat Duck, Bray, Berkshire
The Kitchin, Edinburgh
Le Maoir aux Quat' Saisons, Oxfordshire
Northcote Manor, Blackburn
Purnell's, Birmingham
Restaurant Sat Bains, Nottingham
The Waterside Inn, Bray, Berkshire

Right folks, this will the last blog of the evening. We hope you have enjoyed the show.

And last but certainly not leats is the award for the Outstanding London Chef. And the winner is: Jason Atherton of Gordon Ramsay Holding's Michelin-starred Maze, who said:

"It's a great honour to have won this award and I'm really proud. To have come top in a group of such high calibre chefs is a fantastic achievement."

Restaurateur of the Year: Michael Belben

Award of Excellence: The Greenhouse

aAim London Restaurant of the Year: Le Café Anglais

Academy of Award for Outstanding Contribution: Mark Hix

So some of you will have caught our live blogging session from the London Restaurant Awards, which took place at Grosvenor House, last night.

While my colleagues Kerstin and Katherine were delivering you a minute-by-minute account of the evening from the press room, I was lucky enough to be hobnobbing front of house.

Here's a few of my favourite moments and quotes:-

* Jack Dee on ITV's decision to withdraw their support of the awards just days before the event: "ITV appear to have converted to Catholicism - they've pulled out at the last minute"

With Team GB and most of the nation still in shock at our Olympic success, those kind people at the Sofitel London Heathrow have created a new cocktail to bring us back to our senses.

The Gold Rush is available now in the hotel's library bar at £13, just ahead of the predicted Olympic fervour of the winners' parade set for the 16 October in London.

The cocktail, served in a Martini glass and following on in spirit from the recent Pentathalon Pudding, comprises Goldschlager, Noilly Prat (!), and Chambord topped with Champagne and a glacier cherry to garnish.

So go for gold and order one at the bar to get you in the mood for 2012.

Sodexo in Olympic sponsorship>>

British Olympic success will drive tourism to the London 2012 Games>>

Fast food just got faster with the new Brasserie Express hot food vending machine.

Recently installed at two hotels in Birmingham, the Brasserie Express uses technology first pioneered by NASA in order to deliver a range of hot foods in just 90 seconds.

The Express by Holiday Inn hotels in Castle Bromwich and at the NEC Birmingham can now provide guests with hot meals and snacks 24 hours a day without having to employ any extra staff.

The machine works by combining a rotating stock freezer with a high speed combination oven to move air at a rate of over 1200 metres per minute, allowing for heat transfer of up to 60 times that of a conventional oven. And when combined with microwave technology, the oven can also reheat frozen food in record time.

The Brasserie Express can brown, bake and crisp a multitude of foods including the traditional English breakfast, pizzas, pasties, savoury slices and fries.

Clive Nicholls, the operations director of Butterfly Hotels, Castle Bromwich Holiday Inn Express, said: "We are always looking for ways to improve the service we provide our guests to ensure that we are their preferred choice. Since installing the Brasserie Express UK service we are now able to offer our guests a quality hot food option 24/7."

It is often said that the British army is the finest in the world with the best training.

Of course thanks to the politicians it often feels like it's one of the worse equipped as well, with soldiers forced to make-do-and-mend, share body-armour and, one imagines, say bang to scare off insurgents rather than waste expensive bullets firing weapons.

Still, London's Cavendish hotel is concentrating on the former rather than latter and is offering guests British Military Fitness (BMF) sessions in nearby Hyde Park.

The BMF classes are run by serving or ex-armed forces physical training instructors - no doubt with moustaches - and allow guests to run around the park and excercise while a burly man barks orders at them - to each their own, I guess.

Classes are open to all abilities and as they don't require any fancy equipment are about as environmentally sound as you can get, which is fitting for a hotel named Considerate Hotel of the Year 2007.

Compass Group signs £350m army deal>>

Breakfast for the troops>>

I was out in Leicester Square last night meeting a mate before heading to the cinema and in need of some casual dining fast (as was Keira Knightly who was attending a premiere at the Odeon next door).

We opted for the Tragus owned Bella Italia - it's hard not to as there's at least four scattered around the Square - and had a perfectly servicable meal, which had the important ingredients of being quick and - for London's West End - inexpensive.

However, what with restaurant space being pricey there the eaterie was predictably snug with a spiral staircase leading down to "compact" toilets in the basement.

Some bright spark - the sought that flicks a lightswitch to see if the blown bulb is on or off - had decided a busy Wednesday evening was the perfect time to paint said bannister and staircase and erect "warning wet paint" signs everywhere ( yes, transfer any responsibility for your actions in one easy step).

Although soap got the paint off my hand I suspect some of my fellow dinners were not so lucky.

Perhaps Tragus are simply hoping customers will follow the example of their other best known brand and paint the town Cafe Rouge, or in the case of the wet paint in question a far from romantic brown.

 Tragus to double Cafe Rouge restaurant chain>>

Tragus boss confident consumers will still spend>>

You still have time to enter the Caterersearch.com Web Awards. The deadline for entry has now been extended to 19 September - so you still have two weeks to get your entry in.

The awards will recognise the best websites in the industry and reward the organisations and individuals involved in designing, managing, marketing or promoting them.

So if you have a website that you think deserves an award enter at www.caterersearch.com/webawards.

The award ceremony will be held on 17 November at London's Imagination Gallery. 

In the run up to the Christmas party season, events organisers will no doubt be putting the finishing touches to their entertainment plans. But for those who are still looking for something to give their guests an extra treat, Private Drama has launched a range of Bolli Darling five costumed walkabout characters called Eye Candy.

One example is the feather boa-rimmed 'Angel' with a large feathered skirt and a selection of attached skewers for sweet treats such as marshmallows that guests can pick off on passing. The 'Burlesque' character offers a similar theme but with a giant netted collar and ruffled leotard.

Straight out of an Alice in Wonderland-style animation or Gwen Stefani concert is the Miss 'Candy Floss' character with a wig to rival Marge Simpson's and Humbug mint design tights and corset. Unsurprisingly, Miss Candy Floss serves up candy floss and other sugary treats.

Wrapped up like a floral display is the character 'Bouquet' with clear plastic wrapping bunched up and decorated with a big bow and completed with a flowery hat. Or for a real Christmasy feel, the 'Christmas Tree' character comes with long evening gloves, customary swinging skirt to carry treats and even a lopsided Christmas Tree hat.

Beats a tired old Santa Claus outfit any day.

The Oak Club formerly known as the Acorn Club has made the decision to channel all its efforts into the promotion and development of the Acorn Scholarship.

An independent award created by previous winners of Caterer and Hotelkeeper's Acorn Awards.

Now in its 7th year, the Scholarship's objective is to seek out young talented individuals within the catering and hospitality industry and help them realise their ambitions and reward their determination. (For more details go to www.caterersearch.com/acornscholarship)

Consequently, the committee of the Acorn Scholarship would like to offer refunds for any Oak/Acorn Club Members who have paid an annual subscription in 2008.

To receive this refund please contact ljenkins@malmaison.com with your name, email and postal address.

Your support of entries to the scholarship in your capacity as Acorn Award Winners would be great too.

With best Regards
Lisa Jenkins
The Acorn Scholarship

Pride of place in Tom Kerridge's new kitchen at the Hand & Flowers in Marlow goes to a beautiful bespoke island suite by French manufacturer Athanor. It cost £29,000 and the stainless steel chrome titanium alloy top gleams in the bright kitchen lights.

Besides an oven, holding cabinet, planchas and radiant hobs Kerridge insisted on a central gantry for storage of pots and pans much to the disapproval of fellow Michelin-starred chef Anthony Demetre of Arbutus and Wild Honey.

"Why would you have something so beautiful and bespoke and put a gantry on it?" he asks. "It's like buying a Ferrari and putting a roof rack on it."

Well if you put it like that...

The newspapers are full of the demise of investment bank Lehman Brothers, which went into administration in the UK on Monday after its US parent applied for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The knock-on effect is expected to be widespread, with share prices already tumbling and the effects of the credit crunch set to intensify.

The news is also a blow for Restaurant Associates, the fine dining arm of Compass Group, which ran the catering at Lehman's European HQ in London's Canary Wharf.

As well as feeding many of the 5,000 staff, RA provided events and fine dining catering at the rather swanky office block.

RA this morning confirmed to Caterer that it is in discussions with Lehman about the contract.

Since its opening in July 2007, Caterer has followed the progress of Restaurant Alimentum in Cambridge as part of the magazine's Adopted Business series.

It seems the hard work of owner John Hudgell and his team has paid off and the restaurant has this month been awarded a 3 Rosette quality accreditation by the AA.

Commenting on the award, a proud John Hudgell said "We are delighted to receive such a prestigious award, which is testament to the hard work of Head Chef David Williams and his team.  To receive such an important award in our first 14 months is truly amazing."

But before Hudgell sets his sights on attaining his first Michelin Star he could be in line for a further award to recognise his concern for animal welfare at the restaurant.

The RSPCA Good Business Awards takes place at London's National History Museum on the 9th October and Alimentum is on the short list.

You know you're living in tough times when you can't even go on holiday without having to fear that half way through your trip your travel company may collapse and you could end up stranded on some sunny island in Greece.

What's worse, of course, is when your travel company goes bust before you've even left for your week off and you're stuck somewhere rainy, grey and cold, with the dream of sunshine and a tan snatched away from you.

Sound familiar? Then you may be one of the thousands of travellers who had their holiday ruined by the collapse of XL Leisure Group last week. But don't despair, there's hope yet as the Real Greek restaurant chain is putting a smile back on people's faces by offering all those poor sods who had their holidays ruined a little treat.

Yes stranded holidaymakers, there's a light at the end of the tunnel: if you can prove your trip to Greece was cancelled make your way to one of the Real Greek restaurants in London and claim your free meal to the value of up to £15 before 30 September.

It may not be quite the same as a week of lying on a sandy beach sipping pina coladas but hey - every little helps, right?!?

Last week the Royal Lancaster hotel hosted its third annual "Green Day".

Rather than a tribute to the alternative American rock band of the same name the day instead involved a series of events to increase awareness of the luxury hotel's green polices amongst staff and suppliers.

Funnily enough, this October see's the return of Caterer's own annual Green Month full of useful tips and features on how to cut your energy use and save money while helping the environment.

It all starts on 2 October with top environmental hotelier Vanessa Scott checking out three properties and providing advice.

There's also exlcusive Caterer research on the progress the hospitality industry has made to date. And don't forget you can keep up-to-date as the month progresses and read previous articles in our Green Zone.

A to Z of going green>>

Premier Inn to launch its first Green hotel>>

Compass Group gains Marine Stewardship Certification>>

Sometimes people's timing is so awful and events simply perverse that you have to smile at their misfortune (yes, I am evil).

Take Gordon Brown for example. Struggles to get the top job from Tony "Cheshire Cat" Blair and then steps into his shoes just as capitalism hits the buffers. Tough break that.

Also the fella that moved to the UK from France the weekend that the Channel Tunnel went up in smoke only to arrive for his new job at Lehman Brothers on the day it went under, is probably rightly thinking his bad luck for the next decade is out of the way.

So hats off to the staff at City Chinese Restaurant and Takeaway in Charles Street, Milford Haven, who tried to sell knock-off DVDs to a Trading Standards Officer (TSO), there to collect a meal.

Following an investigation the takeway's owners were fined and after the TSO mentioned the case to a buddy at the UK Borders Agency, they raided the place and six illegal workers are now awaiting deportation to China. No doubt the fine for that one is in the post. Top marks for effort.

Economic turmoil to slow hotel industry growth>>

Lehman Brothers Collapse is bad news for Compass Group>>

Have you ever fancied having a a hotel all to yourself? Or does the prospect of spending time all alone in a big hotel remind you too much of The Shining and Jack Nicholson coming at you with an axe screaming "Here's Johnny!!"?

Today I came across some rather unique hotels, I say hotels rather loosely, because these are one-room hotels from across the world.

You can stay in at Kokopelli's Cave, a 65-million-year-old sandstone cave in New Mexico or in fishing hut (which looks like a shed on water) floating on Lake Malaren in Sweden.

Brings an entirely new meaning to spending time alone...