A Moveable Feast - Five Nights Out in London

25 days into 2008 and one solitary post. Not very impressive. It's easy to please busy-ness but everyone's busy. In my defence, I have eaten out every night this week. All but one with work, putting my health on the line for the job. The roll call of dishes is long: delicately flavoured scallops steamed in their shells, a dull rendering of steak rossini, an over egged bread and butter pudding, a slab of roquefort with a handful of walnuts, pheasant ravioli (decent if a little dry), a perfectly pink rack of lamb, a hunk of parmesan, an overspiced chicken supreme with raw parsnips, more scallops, a prawn, a plate-filling slab of aged ribeye (with unimpeachable bearnaise), an old school chocolate sundae, a dissected and reassembled rabbit, some venison with spiced pears and, (deep breath) finally, at eleven o'clock last night, a course of ten different and delicious cheeses.

Of all the restaurants only Hawksmoor and Chez Bruce were really worth it for the food. Hawksmoor is a steak house pure and simple. I'm not sure the starters and desserts are really worth bothering with. But, god, the steaks are good. Big, beefy, tender, ripe. They are last meal meats.

Chez Bruce is just brilliant. It has everything going for it, not least that it is less than a mile from the flat. Classy service, impeccable execution in the kitchen and a magical wine list put together by a passionate and capable sommelier. I'll write more later.

Fish Pie and Apple Crumble

Saturday was a proper winter's day; all blue skies and biting cold. We took shelter in the hothouses at Kew peering at holey Henry Moore's sculptures through Victorian glass with eighteenth century ferns towering above us. The day cried out for comfort food. A Lox and Cream Cheese Brick Lane Beigel, whilst a perfect example of its type, eaten huddled on a bench with a coot for company did not cut the mustard. We headed home for fish pie and peas to be followed by a bramley apple crumble.

Fish Pie has rules and they differ with everyone you talk too. In this house there has to be both smoked and unsmoked fish, some sort of shellfish and lots of buttered leeks. I think parsley should go in too, but this time the herb lost out to my wife's ambivalence. It goes without saying it should have a thick lid of firm mashed potatoes (butter, salt and pepper only), criss-crossed with a fork to make a crust-able pattern on the top. Peas on the side are obligatory but anything else added inside or out runs the risk of 'messing about': capers, tarragon, mushrooms, boiled eggs are just a few of the options other Fish Pie makers advocate. None made it in to ours. In the end it was just the smoked hadddock, some cod, a handful of mussels (their broth giving a welcome lightness to the fishy bechamel), a packet of brown shrimps and the leeks. It was wonderful.

We finished with apple crumble, and here we did gild the lily. A hearty slug of armagnac went in with the bramleys and pine nuts and almonds added a delicious savoury, nutty note to the crumble. After the restraint of the fish pie making, it felt good to mess about with a recipe and win.