Restaurant food at home
I am so pleased to say there is finally a mini top class restaurant revolution in the North West of England. Hispi is a relatively new restaurant from the people behind the Sticky Walnut in Chester. There are also a few new high end restaurants afoot in the city centre. […]
It’s always a good time of year to look back and contemplate on what has been good or not so good this year. Interestingly my most popular dishes this year are my most popular of all time. Does this mean I haven’t cooked anything good this year? They are: 1) […]
It was my next significant birthday this week. My lovely wife organised a great twenty four hours in Manchester City centre for all the family. It started with a visit to Breakout, Dinner at Mr Coopers and brunch at Refuge. Breakout is a brilliant idea, as you get locked in […]
The Allotment Vegan (and gluten free) Restaurant has opened in Stockport with quite a lot of noise. I’ve never known a new restaurant get so much attention without paying for it. All of this is good and very worthy. Anyone who opens a vegan restaurant certainly gets a big pat […]
Further to my earlier post about the Bean to Bar Chocolate revolution, I had the great pleasure of meeting a fellow blogger, Eva, and her husband, John, from Kitchen Inspirations. They had come from Canada for their 30th Wedding Anniversary for a tour of London, Spain and Paris. Eva asked if I […]
It’s been that time of year when we’ve been on our annual cycling/gastronomy tour of France. This year we returned to the Loire Valley. This was our first holiday together 8 years ago. A saga I’ll never forget as when I arrived at CDG airport, AirFrance had kindly left my […]
The French is a fine dining restaurant at The Midland hotel in Manchester city centre. We’ve been wanting to go since it opened under new direction in 2013. Simon Rogan (L’enclume, Fera) has overseen the restaurants transformation. We were lucky enough to visit L’Enclume with its two michelin stars a […]
There’s a chocolate revolution going on under our feet. It’s called bean to bar. Artisanal crafters have been buying sacks of cocoa pods and going through the whole process of roasting, grinding, conching and tempering the beans. This has actually been going on for a few years, but more […]
Our second Michelin star dinner of our holidays brought us to the beautiful Hostellerie De Plaisance, perched atop a hill in St Emilion. To say this place was beautiful is an understatement. We had to get three lifts to get to our room as the hotel is built into lots […]