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.
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?
Cafe de Luna, on boulevard de Clichy is a bustling bistro that caught my eye on a cheeky weekend visit. We were staying round the corner in the ninth and needed a reasonably priced dinner. That is a challenge at the moment for Brits in Paris due to the parity of Euro/Sterling.
I started with Bourgogne escargots in garlic and mopped up every last morceau! Eating snails is always a bit like chewing on rolled up condoms but it is the sauce that makes the strange texture so appealing.
Chez Clément has many branches in Paris and one in Nantes. Is this the French version of Chez Gerard? Je pense que oui!
I’ve got my comeuppance for slagging off Mark Hughes. Man City announced that the UEFA Cup quarter final home leg would be a “reward for the fans” and tickets were priced at only £5 so “ordinary fans” could come and watch. I am obviously not an ordinary fan since, despite numerous calls to the ticket office (engaged tone) the match is sold out and I have to watch on some backwater internet channel. Shame – I am in Manchester on 16 April when the town turns into a Hamburger for a night.
So perhaps I should be more complimentary about people I have never met.
Everyone knows that it is impossible to mass produce and mass market a decent wine – especially a Pinot Noir. Trouble is, nobody told Alfred Hurtado. His Chilean Cono Sur brand is taking over the world and rightly so.
If West Yorskhire is within striking distance and you think you might enjoy looking out over the River Aire at a regatta of swans following a canal barge of revelling diners (I waved to them – birds and blokes alike) then Brasserie 44 is a place you might want to try.
Brasserie 44 shares a converted Victorian grain store with infamous hotel, 42, The Calls, one of the early entrants on this refurbished homage to modern city living. The Calls has turned the industrial past into the post-modern future – lofty living, dining and drinking quarter of Leeds city centre.
I was at Sam’s Chop House in Manchester earlier this week. Pat and Martin were kind enough to chip in and buy me a decent bottle of wine in memory of my birthday. One from the year of my birth and reduced by an impressive £50 from the normal price.
Riojanas Monte Real Reserva 1964 had a dodgy cork, took an age to decant and was served too warm for me (about 23 degrees – I would serve at 18). But it is probably the oldest wine I have ever drunk, so I was intrigued.
I wonder what went through Claudio’s mind when I asked how warm the wine was. I reached out my hand to touch the bottle. Claudio winced. Another stupid and ignorant Englishman? Even worse than an ignorant Scotsman. I grinned. The bottle was cool. Claudio nodded approvingly. He had served the Primitivo Da Castello di Puglia at the recommended 16-18 degrees. Probably even cooler actually, which suited the wine rather well. Sweet flavours of cherries, cherry lips and bubble gum collided with the not unexpected tannic youth of the Italian stallion.
You may be sick of me carping on about wine temperature, or you may be a staunch supporter of my unfortunately acronymed WART campaign. Personally I am getting ever more fed up of the ignorance of British bar and restaurant staff bringing me Beaujolais from the wine oven and Chablis from the beer freezer.
But what worries me more is the attitude I get when I ask for a red wine to be chilled. Replies range from the polite but sardonic “That’s a red wine, sir, it should be served at room temperature” to the downright rude and sneering “You’re wrong, sir, it should be served warm”.
As it is Christmas, I dug out one of last year’s presents, a wine thermometer. It is quite enlightening to read the instructions and I hope I am not breaching copyright by reproducing them verbatim.
The single most important factor of serving wine at its optimum is the temperature. The enclosed thermometer will give you an exact reading for you to follow on our guide and eliminate the need for guesswork. We recommend you serve wine one degree lower than the guide indicates to compensate for the wine glass warming up to room temperature.
16-17°C – Vintage red wines when mature Bordeaux type
15-16°C – Vintage Burgundy type
14-16°C – High quality or vintage red wines still young
14-16°C – Vintage dry white wines
11-12°C – Light fruity or young red wines
10-12°C – Dry and young white wines
10-12°C – New or young red wines
10-12°C – Very fruity rosé wines
8-10°C – Light or local white wines
7-8°C – Champagne or sparkling wine
5-6°C – Sweet or aromatic wines
Whilst you may quibble about some of the individual detail, and I could find a case to change one or two recommendations by a degree or two, the range of recommended temperatures is valid.  When you consider that most restos serve all red wines at 25 degrees and all white wines at 5 degrees Celsius, it is clear there is some education required out there.
By the way, if you don’t own a thermometer, about an hour in my fridge gets a wine down to about 15-16°C.
Now I have had my rant I can get back to the Xmas festivities and a particularly feisty yet lithesome bottle of Riesling. Can I take this opportunity of wishing you all the highest compliments of the season. May your food be warm and tasty, and your wine chilled and dandy.
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