It is no secret that I have a taste for innards. Long before guts became trendy, I grew up munching on bone marrow (my favorite), fish eyes, tripe and I once ate some delectable sheep’s balls at the age of seven but my aunty didn’t tell me because I was scoffing them with such glee. My brother had to later reveal to me the true essence of what I was eating simply to gross me out.
There has been an offal renaissance in the UK and chef Fergus Henderson, has led the way for pure, simple, whole animal eating ever since opening his restaurant, St. John Smithfield, in the nineties. After traipsing around Shoreditch for the day, Jim and I sat in the glorious garden at the Geffrye Museum (a gem of an old Almshouse converted into a museum showcasing English interiors of the “middling” class from the 1600s onwards) and called St. John on a whim. A table happed to be open at seven. We walked through the maze to Clerkenwell, taking a trip through Smithfield Meat Market, a spot that perpetually smells like iodine and raw meat.
In the stark white dining room that is St. John we eyed the wine list, spotting wines from Eric Texier and Pierre Breton. We honed in on the Robinot Cuvee Bistrologie 2005 (a VdT Chenin Blanc), an amazing, weird, textured, cloudy and truly delicious wine and it faired well with our repast of cured beef and celeriac, butter beans and cauliflower (big meaty beans tossed in aromatic olive oil with leeks and capers) and heart (like a cross between liver and flank steak) with green beans.
We had to order Ferguson’s signature dish, bone marrow and parsley salad, which I’ve had a couple of times before and attempted to cook myself from his Nose to Tail Eating cookbook.
This particular dish brings back memories of the buttery, gelatinous goodness my parents would extract from their own plates of lamb or mutton bones and proffer to me with love when I was a wee thing.
More innards came my way at Hereford Road.
Jim and I arranged to stay in Notting Hill at Miller’s Residence for one night, courtesy of Martin Miller (owner of Martin Miller gin). Dinner reservations were a no-brainer once I’d read up on London-based food blogs and media reviews, which all raved about Hereford Road restaurant, a mere block away from our accommodations.
Upon entering Hereford Road, I noted that the décor was hideous but the menu sounded fantastic. Chef Tom Pemberton is a St. John alumni and the menu reads so faithfully from the St. John school of cooking. We ordered a plate of salty, crispy sand eels and a headcheese terrine for starters,
followed with pigeon and kidneys for mains. Now, I am not the faint-at-heart type when it comes to food but the kidneys…man those kidneys…they were FUNKY.
I had to take a deep breath before I dared stick a forkful in my mouth because the dish reeked of pee you see. I have fairly decent knowledge of biology and I’m fully aware of the kidneys functions but to have it so brazenly displayed on the plate turned my stomach a tad. Jim reckons it was my mood. He says that typically, a dish such as this would be right up my alley and he, of course, LOVED it. Admittedly, my belly wasn’t happy that day and Hereford Road may well have been bad timing on my part. I did, however, respect its unadulterated meat parts. Who else serves kidneys medium rare, unhindered by sauces and not stuffed into a pie?
I would go to Hereford Road again. And as Martin Miller remarked (he admitted he isn’t a fan of the restaurant) at least I can say I’ve been there – all I need is a t-shirt: “Been to Hereford Road: Ate kidneys.”
My mother used to shop at Brixton market a couple of times a week for Indian and Caribbean food supplies that she wasn’t able to find in Balham. Years later the same neighborhood became my nightlife outlet (The Dogstar and The Fridge for after-hours), now I visit Brixton whenever I’m in London and the memories come flooding.
I recall this cute little restaurant (if you can call it that – it had about 3 tables on premises) housed in Market Row, one of the many shopping arcades in the neighborhood that made decent pizza. The owner vacated the premises and an Italian from Naples moved in and set up shop. His name is not Franco – Franco Manca means Franco is gone…a reference to the previous owner.
Now, nestled among African fabric shops and stalls selling plantains and yucca, there is a line of Guardian-reading Brixtonites and gastronomes from all over London (and further) salivating for a bite of sourdough pizza with the most minimal of toppings. Some say it’s the best pizza in Britain.
Jim and I shared a basic mozzarella, tomato and house-cured ham pie.
I’m no pizza expert but I can say that I really enjoyed the weight and texture (not too thin and nowhere near thick) and tang of the dough. The menu consists of about six different bare-bones pizzas and you can either drink water, lemonade, a choice of one organic beer or house red or house white.
I opted for the house white, served at room temperature in a small glass tumbler. All I could muster is that it was a Cortese (probably from around Piedmont) and is sourced and bottled by Wild Caper, a cute little deli across the way in Market Row, also owned by Franco Manca proprietor and pizza man, Giuseppe Mascoli. The label indicated the lemony-tasting vino was low in sulphites and at something like £1.75 a glass it was one of the most palatable bargains I’ve had. The bottle sells at Wild Caper for about five quid and it blows the supermarket shit (at the same price) that most Britons drink out of the water.
Mr. Mascoli must have a good sense humour too. Check out the wall art. Another memory I have of growing up the the UK are the Thatcher years…but let’s not go there, shall we?
The spirited dinners at Tales take place on the same night at various restaurants in New Orleans. For the most part a guest mixologist creates a menu of drinks to work with the chef’s 3-course dinner. It costs 100 bucks per person and it’s a major deal. Jim joined me this year and we attended the Calcasieu dinner, which is the private space above Cochon. The menu was delicious and the drinks were stellar because Eben [Klemm] and Eben [Freeman] were our bartenders for the night. The first concoction [created by Freeman] was a sumptuous drink called the Cornbread Old Fashion’, which offered a distinct sweet corn taste within a body of warming bourbon. It was weird and brilliant. Freeman’s next potion was the, faintly celery-tasting Lovage Sour, a mix of Beefeater Gin, dry vermouth and the lovage herb. The drink was paired with baked stuffed gulf oyster with bacon.
Klemm gave us a lighter, aromatic cocktail in the form of Bay Brees, a blend of St. Germain and bay leaf syrup. It was as delicate as it was pretty and was served with seared jumbo shrimp with port risotto and lemon salsa verde. Klemm’s next drink, Earth, was a twist on a dark n’ stormy, made from dark rum, averna and beet juice, garnished with ginger [dehydrated] jerky. It was intensely hued and had a lovely earthy savoriness about it. Earth’s edible partner was a plate of roasted duck breast with duck boudin and figs.
To top it all off, both mixologists created nutty, postprandial cognac drinks. Klemm’s was a creamy poppy seed tipple named The Karzai (an interesting reference to Afghanistan’s poppy seed cultivation) and Freeman’s was an amaretto-like drink of cognac infused with walnuts.
TOC’s parties are mostly fabulous though some are getting cheesy now big (and not necessarily good) brands are getting involved. The best shindigs had to be Hendrick’s Burlesque party, alas I got there too late and missed the action but the drinks were good and the crowd was fun. Later that night the party moved onto Donald Link’s Herbsaint, where we sat outside with a bunch of industry folk and sipped whatever was going around.
On the last night we partook in a funeral procession from Hurrah’s into the French Quarter. The Red Headed Slut [cocktail] had kicked the bucket, or rather Simon Ford, brand ambassador for Plymouth Gin, shoved her into a coffin, declared her dead and a bunch of other bartenders rejoiced. She was a drink that shall not be missed.
The jazzed-up funeral was led by an excellent second line band, Plymouth Gin drinks were handed out along the way and our shuffle through the streets of New Orleans ended at Latrobe’s for the Bartender’s Breakfast. An event I took to literally mean a sit down affair involving a plate of eggs benedict. It turned out to be the best party I’ve been to in years. Milk and Honey, 
Employees Only, Contemporary Cocktails were among the stands making cocktails. We boogied the night away and then rounded up TOC 2009 at the Old Absinthe House…
Tales of the Cocktail makes you wish you could be at two, nay make that three, places at once. With too many cool and relevant seminars, fabulous dinners, lunches, offers to meet with master distillers, brand owners, mixologists and, throw in meetings with an editor or two – it’s a dizzying affair of too much going on at the same time.
The How’s and Why’s of Cocktails was a good basic seminar led by Audrey Saunders of Pegu Club and Tony Conigliaro. Conigliaro is a bartender based in London who just opened a new cocktail bar in Islington, that I’ll be checking out when I go to London in a few weeks, called 69 Colebrook Row. Audrey and Tony made a good team, encouraging bartenders to think outside the box. Turns out Audrey is friends with Harold McGee and sometime consults with him on food science and lore when trying to create a new drink. Apparently it can take her two years of trial and error before she feels a cocktail is ready for the menu. Such was the case (though not sure if it took at long as 2 years) for her infamous Earl Grey MarTEAni, a drink she originally created for the Ritz Carlton in London.
It was particularly interesting when they talked about Europe VS US trends. Tony described the Brits as liking tall, refreshing, lighter-style drinks, while Audrey emphasized New York’s love for boozy classics and bitters. You can make that same comparison when it comes to the West Coast and the East Coast. SF drinks tend to utilize moor fruit. A visit to Death & Co, Mayahuel or PDT proves that we love our gin, whisk(e)y and tequila with bitters, herbal liqueurs, sherry and amaro, lemon or lime juice tends to be the only fruit present.
I had to make the Cognac from Vine to Shaker seminar because I have a soft spot for grape distillates and several of my favorite industry people were there, Jack Robertiello (my once editor turned friend), Jean Louis Carbonnier (he represents a number of great wine and spirits regions) and Jim Meehan from PDT. Guillame Lamy from Pierre Ferrand cognac was also on the panel. There was a lot of talk about trying to get cognac out of its bling image and into a more accessible role. Meehan talked about classic cocktails using cognac. He acknowledged that selling a cognac cocktail isn’t easy but there are a few tricks up his sleeve: list the cocktail high up on the menu, cucumbers in a mixed drink always seem to sell well, case in point is the French Maid served at PDT (muddled cucumber, mint, lime and cognac).
Angus Winchester and Simon Ford ran The World’s Best Bar Crawl seminar. It was a case of two industry Brits sharing their list of the best bars in the world. Clearly, I have a lot of traveling and drinking to do. I’ve been to the bars marked with an asterisk. Here’s the rundown.
NORTH AMERICA
PX, Vancouver
Westin, Calgary
Flatiron Lounge, NYC *
Milk & Honey, NYC *
PJ Clarkes, NYC
Old Town Bar, NYC
PDT, NYC *
Pegu Club, NYC *
King Cole Bar and Lounge, NYC
The Rainbow Room, NYC
Death & Company, NYC*
The Florida Room, Miami
Bourbon, Washington D.C.
The Gibson, Washington D.C.
Drink, Boston
Vessel, Seattle
Zig-Zag Café, Seattle
Bix, San Francisco
Bourbon and Branch, San Francisco
Tommy’s Mexican Restaurant, San Francisco
The Doheny, L.A.
The Edison, L.A. *
The Carousel Bar, New Orleans *
The Old Absinthe House, New Orleans*
Alibi, New Orleans
Bel Ami Restaurant and Lounge, Oregon
Churchill Downs, Kentucky
SOUTH AMERICA
Café Tortoni, Buenos Aires
UK
Merchant’s Hotel, Belfast
Quatch Bar, Speyside
Bramble, Edinburgh
Salvatore at Fifty, London
The Dukes Hotel, London
Quo Vadis, London
Milk & Honey, London
The Lab, London *
The Savoy Hotel, London *
EUROPE
Apoteke, Norway
Ruby, Copenhagen
Door 74, Amsterdam
Barfly’s Club, Vienna
Widder Bar, Zurich
Paparazzi Bar, Bratislava
UFO, Bratislava
Widder Bar, Zurich
Le Lion de Paris, Hamburg
Schumanns, Munich
Becketskoff, Berlin
Hemmingway Bar, Paris *
Hotel Costes, Paris
Harry’s New York Bar, Paris
Dry martini, Barcelona
Boadas, Barcelona
Nottingham Forrest, Milan
MIDDLE EAST
Burj Al Aran, Dubai
MIDDLE EAST
Burj Al Aran, Dubai
EASTERN EUROPE
Sky Bar, Moscow
ASIA
High Five, Tokyo
Tender Bar, Tokyo
Captain’s Bar, Hong Kong
China Club, Hong Kong
Raffles, Singapore
Tippling Club, Singapore
Constellation, Shanghai
Olives, Mumbai
Rick’s, Delhi
DOWN UNDER (According to Simon Ford, the Aussies have the most fantastic cocktail culture than anyone else on the planet)
Der Raum, Melbourne
Tiki Lounge & Bar, Melbourne
Bayswater Brasserie, Sydney
Matterhorn, Wellington, NZ
EURASIA
Sky Bar, Moscow
ASIA
High Five, Tokyo
Tender Bar, Tokyo
Captain’s Bar, Hong Kong
China Club, Hong Kong
Raffles, Singapore
Tippling Club, Singapore
Constellation, Shanghai
Olives, Mumbai
Rick’s, Delhi
DOWN UNDER (According to Simon Ford, the Aussies have the most fantastic cocktail culture than anyone else on the planet)
Der Raum, Melbourne
Tiki Lounge & Bar, Melbourne
Bayswater Brasserie, Sydney
Matterhorn, Wellington, NZ
