The Editor's Hospitality Blog

Spare a thought for our embattled pub and bar operators. First, there was the bureaucratic headache of the updated Licensing Act to negotiate, in 2005.

Then, in July of this year, there was further upheaval and an increased burden of responsibility when the ban on smoking in public places went live.

Now, we learn that smoking ban and Licensing Act are conspiring together to place some high-street operators in a legal cul-de-sac.

The smoking ban dictates that customers have to head outside to light up, either in a dedicated space or outside on the pavement. If they don’t, license holders are held to account.

But then who is to blame if clusters of smokers act noisily or rowdily outside and become a nuisance for local residents? You guessed it: it’s the license holders – and the Licensing Act empowers local authorities to suspend licenses and impose enforced periods of closure upon them.

In other words, compliance with one law is, in some cases, directly leading to non-compliance with another.

Of course operators need to be mindful of their duties to their local community; but for local authorities to take such a Draconian approach so quickly (and examples are already emerging) is unfair. They should cut operators some slack as they come to terms with the huge changes to their commercial landscape in the past year.

Read more news on the licensing change on Caterersearch.com

Today, I had lunch at Texture, the new London restaurant set up by Le Manoir graduates and current Caterer and Hotelkeeper cover stars, Agnar Sverrisson and Xavier Rousset.

There's quite a buzz around Texture, and it's easy to see why. Under the beautiful mouldings of its high ceilings, I enjoyed a spectacular meal. Sure, there were enough confits, emulsions, cracklings and wafers to justify the restaurant's name. But what impressed me most was the clarity and intensity of flavours. My first dish, Tomato and Artichoke Textures, grabbed me by the lapels and transported me back to summer evenings spent watering the tomato plants in my mum's greenhouse. And, if the sensation of being on a fishing boat on the South China Sea, brine on your lips and sea wind in your face, could be captured and served on a plate, it would probably taste something like Texture's Mediterranean tuna smoked with Asian flavours.

Lunch done, I popped into nearby Selfridges to see my friend, the store's food and restaurants director, Ewan Venters, and to check out his new Wonder Bar. The Wonder Bar is based around a wine tasting dispenser that allows customers to choose from 52 fine wines in three measures: 25ml, 75ml and 125ml.This 'wine jukebox' means you can sample wines you might not have come across before (some 25ml nips cost less than a pound), or which you might not be able to afford by the bottle (top of the list is a 1996 Chateau Mouton Rothschild Premier Grand Cru, which markets at £70 for 125ml).

To use it, you buy a credit card that can be loaded up to a value of £1000, and which can be topped up. Then you insert the card into the juke box, choose a wine from the wine list, and press the button corresponding to the measure you require.

I whacked £10 on my card, opted for a warming 175ml measure of 1998 Castillo Ygay Gran Reserva Especial Marques de Murrieta Rioja, and still had 20p credit left for another day.

The Wonder Bar is a brilliant idea that empowers customers to drink however much they want of whatever wine they want. What a pity then, that Trading Standards Officers have tried to spoil the party by raising concerns that the dispenser contravenes UK alcohol measures legislation.

Oh dear. Judging by the radio phone-ins I caught on the way into work this morning, pub chain JD Wetherspoon seems to have shot itself in the foot over its decision to prohibit adults accompanied by children in its pubs from having more than two alcoholic drinks.

A Wetherspoon spokesman said the move is intended to limit the length of time adults with children stay on the group's premises after they have eaten, and so avoid having bored kids running around and making a nuisance of themselves. He admitted that parents might even be refused soft drinks or coffee to shorten their stay.

It strikes me that the chain is taking an overly moralising stance. Wetherspoon pubs are happy enough to take money off dining families - as previosuly reported on Caterersearch, they have taken steps to woo families wishing to eat out of home - but once the last mouthful of cheesecake has been eaten, they make it painfully clear that it's time to go. If kids are misbehaving, staff should speak to parents, but this should be the case regardless of how many pints have been sunk, or fish fingers munched. You can't help thinking JD Wetherspoon have a problem with kids in pubs - but can't resist charging them for cheesy pasta and peas before showing them the door.

The policy is clearly unworkable. Apart from anything else, bar staff are going to have some very difficult conversations to negotiate, as they attempt to refuse grown men and women a glass of coke, never mind a beer or a glass of wine, in a public house. And what happens if a swift-drinking father brings in his slow-eating children for a spot of lunch? According to the group's spokesman, he'll be refused any form of drink - alcoholic or not - after he has downed his first two pints. What right does a public house have to stipulate that he can't even sip a coffee while his children polish off their meals?

What do you think about the pub chain's decision? let us know.