You can't open a newspaper, turn on a TV channel or read a website without stumbling across someone categorising the year in some aspect or other. Order must prevail. Awards must be handed out. Opinions must be opined. So I thought I should join in. Here's two Top 5 lists that will mean very little to anyone else but me. Both are in chronological order.
Top 5 Meals of 2007
1. St John in February. Langoustines and Mayonnaise, a whole loaf of foie gras, suckling pig for 12, Eccles Cakes and Lancashire Cheese and 24 fine German Rieslings. Obscene and worth every penny. I'd do it again tomorrow. In fact, we should do it again tomorrow.
2. A Parisian market picnic on the sleeper train to Milan. Saumur-Champigny from a beaker washed down an oozing St Marcellin, wafer-thin speck, sour, chewy baguette and - most importantly - Jen.
3. Cambol Zero, Rivoli outside of Turin. Only one star but three times the experience we had in L'Astrance in Paris. Proof that there is more to a great restuarant than great food. Give me humour, humility, enthusiasm and warmth over cold-blooded perfection anyday.
4. The River Cafe in August with Jen, Jen and Greg. One of this year's few summery days and the perfect place to skive off an afternoon at work. I remember multi-coloured baby beets with horseradish, silky pasta parcels, spanking-fresh fish and a wholly unneccessary bottle of Moscato d'Asti in the sunshine longer after we should have gone home.
5. Ben's Birthday in November. Ben tells me his abiding memory is twirling bread dough into grissini whilst covered in flour and half-cut on Champagne at 11 o'clock in the morning. How weekend lunches should be.
Top 5 Dishes of 2007
1. The foie gras and mushroom cake at L'Astrance with its 'roasted lemon' and pool of hazelnut oil. A perfect dish of just four ingredients. The sweet-sharp lemon was the ideal foil for the foie gras whilst the hazelnut turned the raw white mushrooms into fungi heaven. I never said Pascal Bardot couldn't cook.
2. A foie gras risotto with fried artichokes at Cambol Zero. Indecently rich.
3. A humble Panzanella made from ripe tomatoes and stale sourdough baguette in Uzes.
4. Another Uzes afternoon: leftover ratatouille, fried sardines and ice-cold Provence rose. Then a nap.
5. Pheasant and Trotter Pie at St John Bread and Wine. A December lunch of champions to fight off the 4pm nightfall.
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2 comments:
can we save the riesling dinner until i have at least digested the new years eve feast? maybe the second week of January....
I was cursing the usual rash of definitive end-of-year lists, but that does sound like a mightly fine year of eating - let's hope that next year is as good. i'm not sure that you can ever have too many uses for sundry pork products (I am still mourning the last of the rillettes) and Mr Hopkinson's Jambon Persille sounds exemplary.
Have a great new year, and catch up with you (and Jen) soon I hope...
Dan
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