An authentic NYC deli with authentic (abrupt) NY service, well worth 20% just for the Fawltyness.  Carnegie plays a bit too much on its considerable reputation, the walls being plastered in rarely recognised Very Important Patrons. It is also expensive.
“This is a traditional New York Italian family restaurant” said our Pacific Island looking waiter pointing at a huge canoe full of pasta being delivered to the next table. A random walk around the pleasant residential areas of the upper west side had allowed us to use the antiquated predecessor to www.stumbleupon.com to find an eaterie.
My favourite gastro-pub in the whole wide world is situated in the Yorkshire Dales near Skipdale (for Emmerdale fans that is just a few miles from Hotton). Back in the real world, Hetton village is a mere cockstride from Rylstone, famous for bra-less jam-makers.
Some stories go on and on. I suppose you cannot blame people for desperately trying to wring every last sou from their fifteen minutes of fame but I had to smile when I read that Peter André has signed up for a cook book. I try very hard not to overuse exclamation marks, the vulgar back street Pot Noodle of punctuation. But WTF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Perhaps we can look forward to digesting “101 recipes for over-ripe melons”?
Langan’s Brasserie has been around as long as I can remember. Certainly it has endured more than its fair share of Andy Warhol’s allocation and draws good and bad reviews. But generally I find it very well patronised for a place that by many estimations is several eons out of fashion.
I was going to review this place next year when I could have titled the post, 4030 2010.  But on the 40th floor bar of 30 St Mary’s Axe the view could not wait and, verily, it must be one of the most stunning in the whole of London.
I have a theory that the more a place is off the beaten track the harder it has to work to get custom, the more it relies on regulars and, therefore, the better the food and wine.
32, Great Queen Street is on, well, you’ve guessed it. Â Just off the main streets of Covent Garden and close to the Freemason’s Grand Lodge, I suppose I could have negotiated a discount had I rolled one trouser leg up and hopped inside holding a kipper to my ear.
I’ve heard many reports of London Chinatown’s demise. Shame when Manchester’s equivalent is thriving so well. I found myself in The Big Smoke on business with nothing better to do than check out the rumours, so I selected a random place on Lisle Street just behind Leicester Square.
Hotel restaurants always give me a slight sinking feeling. Reminders of 1980s boil in the bag meals; they always smell of stale cooking, probably because breakfast buffets are when they get 90% of their traffic.
The Hotel Russell probably counts early risers 99% of its clientele. It’s easier to get a table at The Ivy than a breakfast table here. Dinner, however, was predictably quiet. A few lonely foreign travellers and one table of two couples from Yorkshire who were asking for more gravy – gravy shortages are punishable by death north of Watford Gap.
Marketing null points! The sign makes it look like a Hungry Hippo All-U-Can-Eat Sunday lunch with foam balls and cheap beer. But step inside and nothing could be further from the truth. Fine seafood, fine wine list, fine (but relaxed) service and with just enough quirkiness and kitsch to make you smile.
La Réserve de Quasimodo is self subtitled: Le plus vieux bistrot en l’ile de la cité.  Seven centuries of history. Did Asterix the Gaul possibly eat here?
Stumble It!
