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Arabica Bar and Kitchen
You’re supposed to feed a cold, or so the saying goes. So when my birthday rolled around and I was feeling less than fabulous, it made perfect sense to go to one of the few restaurants where I could easily eat pretty much everything on the menu. Arabica Bar and Kitchen regularly features in Time Out London’s Top 100 Restaurants list, and it’s been on my radar for some time. With food “inspired by the sun rise nations of the Levant”, it offers more than your bog standard mezze restaurant. The menu features dishes such as whipped feta with chillies, mint and pumpkin seeds, Lebanese style roasted cod, and sticky…
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The Best Food and Drink of 2015
Yep, it’s the end of another year so time for yet another list. Here is my round up of the best things went into my mouth over the course of 2015: Chicken Berry Biryani from Dishoom I visited the Kings Cross branch of Dishoom all the way back in January but I still keep raving about their biryani. Tender meat, fluffy rice, a good amount of spice….it ticks all the biryani boxes but has the added bonus of cranberries. Plus the restaurant itself just looks so, so sexy. Spaghetti with Cuttlefish and Ink Sauce from Osteria Alba Nova Good food can be hard to find in tourist-ridden Venice, but venture…
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Duck and Waffle
After spending quite a bit of time hanging around in establishments at the top of tall buildings, I have realised that a pattern is emerging. The higher up in the sky you are, the worse the service usually is. Which is a shame for many reasons, not least because most of these places seem to implement a kind of “sky tax”, meaning you pay through the nose for the privilege of being there. True, the views are spectacular so at least you have something nice to stare at while you wait half an hour to get served at the bar (Hutong, I’m looking at you). However, is feeling like you’re…
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The Manor, Clapham
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Flat Iron
I’ve been watching a lot of “Parks and Recreation” lately and have fallen a little bit in love with Ron Swanson – the deadpan, mustachioed, all-American red blooded male. Ron Swanson has no time for nonsense such as salad or kale smoothies. He likes his meat rare and his whisky neat. He is probably my soulmate…. So I paid a visit to a restaurant that Ron Swanson would most definitely approve of – Flat Iron. There is just one thing on the menu here and that’s steak. Really really good steak. Flat Iron is part of the annoying “no reservation” trend that seems to have swept London lately, so I played…
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The Manor, Clapham
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10 Greek Street
I started this blog with the intention of working my way through Time Out London’s top 100 restaurants. Well, it’s now April and so far I have managed to visit just one restaurant from their list. I fail at converting intentions into reality. However, I have broken the seal with my visit to 10 Greek Street. In fact, the seal was veritably demolished, along with my lunch and my waistline. 10 Greek Street is as discrete and unassuming as its name. Small and spartan, with white walls, wooden flooring, and the dishes of the day chalked up on blackboards, it has that whole effortlessly chic thing down to a tee. Even the menus are…
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The Manor, Clapham
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Adam Handling at The Caxton
My best friend has found a new best friend. And that new best friend isn’t even an actual person. It’s the rather brilliant Bookatable, purveyor of shiny restaurant bargains. There’s no way I can compete so, as the old saying goes, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. Our first foray with Bookatable took us to Adam Handling at The Caxton. As a huge fan of Masterchef, I was very excited to eat at the restaurant of one of my favourite former contestants. Handling was a finalist in the 2013 series of Masterchef: The Professionals, and right from the outset he impressed with confident and competent cooking. I adored him even more after…
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The Manor, Clapham
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Dishoom, Kings Cross
I’m always slightly wary about venturing outside of Tooting for a curry, but last Saturday I found myself in the freezing wilderness of a redeveloped Kings Cross and on the hunt for something that would warm the cockles. Cue a queue free Dishoom. Stepping into the cavernous converted warehouse was like entering another world. Tiled floors, lush palm plants, ceiling fans lazily spinning; it was as if we had gone back to a more elegant time. We had to wait for around 10 minutes before a table was free, but this was hardly a chore as we relaxed in the sophisticated lounge chairs and perused the menu. The main restaurant is…
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Spice Village, Tooting
Was it the screaming baby right behind me? Was it the two drunks next to me who only stopped slurping cans of Carling to pass out? Was it the food so smelly that it assaulted my nasal passages and walloped my sinuses? Or was it the person playing their music so loudly that I’m sure they were only wearing headphones as a fashion accessory? It was shaping up to be the journey from hell, and by the time I arrived in London I was feeling about as festive as a turkey on Christmas Eve. Returning to an empty kitchen and having already made myself sick after gorging an entire box of Quality Street…
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The Manor, Clapham
“This drink tastes of plants” declared my dining companion. Our lurid green sorrel and elderflower bellinis were perhaps an inauspicious start to our meal at The Manor, as was our rather over-keen waitress who had seemingly been told to push the tasting menu for all it’s worth or risk pain of death. At one point, we did think that she was going to hang around the table while we perused the a la carte options, but thankfully duty called elsewhere. However, things only improved from then on. The Manor is owned by the team behind The Dairy, which has had rave reviews and full tables since it opened in Clapham last year.…
