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London Turkish: Mem & Laz

8 Theberton Street
N1 0QX
Tel: 020 7704 9089

Date of Last Visit: Friday, June 8th, 2007

The Vicitms: Feathers, Matt

The Damage: £35?

The Background: Feathers and I headed over to The Albion for some Proseco, and were greeted by a very rude bartender who really wanted to charge me £36 for a £22 bottle of Proseco. He made me REALLY angry. His argument was that the bottle goes for £36 in Chelsea. My argument was that the menu clearly stated that the bottle--vintage and all--was £22. I won, but he was a real jerk.

But I digress. We were hungry. Matt arrived from a conference down the road, all about the Internets, and I told them about Mem & Laz and how fun it looked. And then we had some more Proseco, which in hindsight, was not the best of ideas.

The Entrance: Mem & Laz is cute and it reminds me of Sacre Coeur, which is right next door so maybe that's it. I love the lights hanging from the ceiling.

The Starters and Drinks: We get some hummous and it is served with delicious bread. And then we get 1/2 bottle of white and it's perfect. It's served in a carafe and I am very happy. Not enough wine is served in carafes in London.

The Mains: I go for the spinach filo and salad and it's just what I needed. Feathers gets a lamb dish that is so delicious I am still jealous 24 hours later as I write this. Matt gets the lamb special--the one in the puff pastry--and to be honest, it is only average. Actually, it's less than average. It's plain. But it's just lamb and pastry. Needed some salt.

The Verdict: Loved the atmosphere. Felt the service could be friendlier and more knowledgeable. Might go back, if only for the pretty little lights.

If I were them...
1. I'd give away free pastries with the bill.
2. I'd serve tap water with lemon slices. Or maybe cucumber.
3. I'd be friendly with my guests.
4. I'd make sure the servers could describe all the food and knowledgeably recommend dishes.

Happy 3rd Birthday, My Little Blogling!

Yes, today my humble little London restaurant blog turns three! My first post ever was about my visit to The Providores, on Marylebone High Street, a locale I've returned to many times since--most recently with Howard & Ben--and enjoyed equally each time. 

You know...I didn't set out to write a blog about London restaurants. I actually planned on blogging about the weird and wonderful things I found as an American in London. But to be honest, I just couldn't drum up the material. (See, this country isn't so weird after all.) So while I'll occasionally throw something up over on my other site, I don't, really.

I debated throwing a party for my blog's birthday...my friend Sarah suggested returning to the scene of my initial posting. Others suggested a "best of" or a "lessons learned" or setting out a manifesto for the next three years. But the vast majority of people--the non-Internet types--just looked at me like I was crazy. Non-bloggers, they just don't understand.

So I think what I'll do instead is spend a quiet night at home. I'll pop open a bottle of something from Barry, and I'll toast my little blog and then maybe I'll tell you about it. Later.

And then I'll take a break for a bit. (You shouldn't be able to tell.)

It's been a good and entertaining three years. Perhaps a few too many servings of foie gras, but thanks for reading, just the same.

London Lebanese: Lebanese Lounge

50-52 Hanbury St
E1 5JL
Tel: 020 7539 9200

Date of Last Visit: Thursday, June 7th, 2007

The Victims: Ben, Gerry, Sarah, Matt, Andrew

The Damage: Hmmm...£20 each? We were quite pleased.

The Background: So, I really wanted to go to First Thursday...the east end late night gallery night. If you're not a Time Out subscriber, you might not know that on the first Thursday of each month this summer, all the galleries in and around Shoreditch will be staying open til 9.

I managed to convince some people to come check stuff out with me, and although there were some odd bits (naked men, blood, etc.), all in all, I'd highly recommend checking it out. (The odd bits make it worth it, no?) We wandered from Old Street to Whitecross Street to over by the Holiday Inn Express (where I ran into Howard & Ben during a beer break at The Reliance, funnily enough) to down through Rivington Street and then over to Brick Lane, where it was time to...

EAT.

Yes, and I didn't fancy a curry. So The Lebanese Lounge it was.

The Entrance: Oh how very sad. There is no one there. They are so happy to see us. But you know who is there? The shisha kids. The shisha/hookah room is PACKED. But no one is eating and that is just too bad because...

The Food: The Babaganoush is AWESOME. So too the Labneh and all the little sausages. We are happy. On the advice of our Bangladeshi server, I go for the lamb and it is fantastic, although I was disappointed in the white rice...now that's a high margin dish. Then again, they brought us free baklava at the end of our meal...

The Wine: Lebanese all the way. And only £13 a bottle.

The Verdict: I think the Lebanese Lounge is best done in groups. We had the place to ourselves, which was okay because there were six of us and we cracked each other up. Had we been four, we would have been bored.

If I Were Them...
* I'd play cool Lebanese music. Maybe through a DJ on Thurs/Fri/Sat nights.
* I'd try to get the hookah guys to stay for dinner.
* I'd see if I could do anything with Vibe bar...like give out baklava at Vibe Bar to convince people to come in for dinner.
* I would offer a starter platter of some sort...combine a couple of things into one order.

London Ethiopian: Addis

42 Caledonian Road
N1 9DT
Tel:  020 7278 0679



Date of Last Visit: Tuesday, June 5th, 2007

The Victim: Feathers

The Damage: 20 quid each?

The Background: It's a Tuesday and we are going to a show. Guster. By King's Cross. It doesn't start til 9 and work ends before that. So we go out to eat.

And I get to choose! And I so want to have Ethiopian food in London. It's been ages.

The Entrance: We enter and it is not very crowded. But for those that are there, they seem infinitely familiar with Ethiopian cuisine. I have a feeling we've made the right choice.

The Service: Painfully shy, and she forgot our drinks. We asked for Ethiopian recommendations, and she did not help us.

The Food: Delicious, really. We had the traditional chicken dish--the one with the hardboiled egg--and it was really really good and just the right amount of hotness. And then we had a mixed veggie dish that was exactly that--a number of different veggie selections--along with a chickpea dish which I also really liked. Feathers was not a huge fan of the chickpea dish--she thought it was a bit dry--but I didn't mind so much. It was like Mexican Pintos, only thicker. And we both loved the spongey bread it was all served with.

The Decor: Clean, neat. Someone gave this some thought. On a sunny afternoon, the sun streamed right through the windows and washed everything in a very lovely kind of way.

The Verdict: I'd go back, for sure. I can forgive the service. I liked the food. And I liked doing something different. And I kinda get this feeling that Kings X is the about to be the new hot spot.

Latin: Sabor

108 Essex Road
N1 8LX
Tel: 020 7226 5551

Date of Last Visit: Thursday, May 24th, 2007

The Victim: Nick

The Damage: £35 per person with two margaritas each.

The Background: Nick is in town for work and wants to know if I want to go anywhere new. Is this a trick question?

I do want to go somewhere. Sabor. I've read nice things. And I have a hankering for empanadas. Plus, Sabor is a convenient bus ride away.

The Entrance: I order a house margarita and it is GREAT. It has passion fruit and lime juice. Very tasty. Nick turns up a few minutes later and orders the same. He too is happy.

The Starters: I get my wish and go for the empanadas. They are very tasty. Nick goes for the quesadilla and he seems satisfied, but I want to say that something was missing from his  quesadillas...I am not sure what. Yes, she fails once again in her London-food-blogging-task.

The Atmosphere: In the background, they are playing Buena Vista Social Club. At 8 p.m. on a Thursday, the place is buzzing. The wine list is mostly Chilean and Argentinian--and there are descriptions! (Oh how I do love a wine list with descriptions. Such an easy thing to do, but alas, few restaurants do it.

Heck, if you are a London-based restauranteur and don't have any descriptions on your wine list (or don't like the ones you do have), I will do it for free. For the first ten restaurants that ask me to. The only caveat is that you'd have to give me credit and include my blog's URL. Plus, you're going to let me do some pre- and post-list analysis. Oh, and if you have like more than 20 wines, we're both in trouble. )

The Mains: I am intrigued by the chimichangas. But here's the rub--they are vegetarian chimichangas. Our server assures me that they have a very strong flavor and he'd really recommend them. So I go for it. And these are so not TGI Friday chimichangas. They are light and flaky and full of all sorts of delicious things. I wish I could tell you what, but I am a very bad food blogger and neglected to go for an in-depth inspection. What struck me, however, was that these were not deep fried, but rather wrapped in a light and flaky phyllo-like dough. They were good.

The Verdict: I can never speak for my guests, but Nick wiped his plate clean and gave the restaurant strong marks across the board. I think we both agreed that the service was a bit too preoccupied. And they didn't trust me with the tap water jug. But all-in-all, I'd go back.

Tapas: Sangria

88 Upper Street
N1 0NP
Tel: 020 7288 0954

Date of Last Visit: Oh, I don't know. A few months ago. I'm sorry.

The Damage: £20 each?

I have been remiss in writing up Sangria. It's been ages (well, a few months) since I've been, but it was just so very decent and nice that I did not want to neglect it. Particularly when a nice May bank holiday weekend gives me some time to catch up on things. (Did you know that the Brits only get eight public holidays while Americans get 10? I'll leave the UK-government-mandated-minimum of 20 vacation days aside. But I gotta be honest, I like 10 public holidays spread throughout the year a lot better than 8 days squished up in April and December.) But back to Sangria...

The Context: One night after work, Feathers and I had gone to my Thai ladies at the Thai Massage place on the Essex Road. Feathers had never been. I think she's a convert. They are just so very sweet. I don't remember if we had had a rough day or anything--isn't it funny when you do have a rough day? It seems like the worst thing ever, but then a few days later, you totally forget about it. I think we just wanted massages. Yes, our needs are simple.

So we were wandering, limp and aimless, around Islington after our head-and-shoulder kneading, and we thought that some sustenance would be nice. But not a lot. So tapas it was.

The Islington Tapas place on the Essex Road was closing down for the night, but that was okay because Sangria was still packing them in.

The Entrance: It is dark. Very very dark. I can't see. Add in the massage and well, I'm ready to go to bed.

The Food: Well, our plan to eat lightly didn't last very long. Before we knew it, we had six dishes in front of us. I don't remember any of them except one (BAD food blogger! Bad!)--the bean dish (broad beans to the English, Lima beans to the Americans). I believe it was a special. I loved the texture and the mix of flavors...there was some sort of smoked pork mixed up with the beans, and it just worked really really well together.

The Verdict: I keep thinking about Sangria...and I keep thinking that I will go back there and eat some more beans. But I haven't. Soon, I promise.

South Ken Whole Foods

63–97 Kensington High Street, London W8 5SE

Date of Last Visit: Saturday, June 9th, 2007

The Victim: Me.

The Damage: £60 plus public transport.

In Chicago, I used to live about a 15 minute walk from the Lakeview Whole Foods and I would drop in all the time. I loved their salad bar. And I loved their artichoke dip. And their wine section. And their cheese section.

See, Whole Foods employs people who are either experts in things like wine or cheese or who want to become experts. So it was always a pleasure talking to the staff about wine. And about cheese. They always had a recommendation.

On-site food and wine experts don't exist in Dominick's or Jewel in Chicago. Maybe behind the meat counter, or the fish counter. But not anywhere else.

So I was excited when I heard in 2004 that Whole Foods was planning on opening a shop in London in 2007. Three years seemed like an awfully long time to wait though!

But here we are, three years and one London food blog later, and here is Whole Foods South Ken. And I've just dropped £60 on all the goodies I could carry back on the tube.

Here's what I liked about the Whole Foods on Kensington High Street...
1. The staff are friendly and omnipresent. I saw tons of people asking for particular products, and Whole Foods' team members were practically holding their hands as they led people across the store.
2. You're not just staring at food on shelves, it's all around you in stacks, particularly the fresh fruit and vegetables.
3. The fish counter is beautiful.
4. I loved the way the eggs were displayed...it was pretty much serve yourself.
5. When I went to check out, the salad dressing I bought was not on the register. So they gave it to me for free. My cashier noted that it was their fault that it wasn't in the register, not mine, so why should I have to wait while they sent someone to check the price? He said they are really good at making sure that once that happens once with a particular product, it doesn't happen again. I thought this was a fantastic piece of marketing/customer service...because you know, I bet you at other stores when stuff is not in the system, once they manually key in the price, the product probably still doesn't get into the system. By taking the loss on my dressing, they give themselves an incentive to solve the problem. Permanently.
6. The baskets. Rather than just plain old hand baskets, they have little baskets that you tote around behind you like carry-on suitcases. This is clever. Because hand baskets get heavy. (I think these would be even better if they were like those newish suitcases that you roll along right beside you, as opposed to behind you.)
7. The cheese room.
8. The sun-dried tomato pesto from the antipasto bar. DELICIOUS.
9. The marcona almonds. YUMM.
10. The coconut macaroons.
11. I liked how they took a Disney World approach to the queue at the till...as you enter the queue, they tell you how much time it's likely to take. I didn't time them, but the 3 minutes they noted seemed about right.   

What I didn't like about the Whole Foods in South Ken...
1. I kept going to the wrong side of the store to get to the right escalator. They need better Up/Down signage.
2. The wheelie baskets are GREAT, but every five year old in the store seemed to have one. So it was a bit of a traffic hazard.
3. People who don't get the "no sampling" thing. As I was filling up on sun dried tomato pesto at the antipasti bar, an American woman was considering the regular pesto with her daughter who was about eight. She gave her daughter the serving spoon and let her stick her grubby little fingers in it. I gave the mother a "You are a disgrace to my country" look.
4. They didn't have my artichoke dip. They had another type of artichoke dip, and although it's nice, it's not great.
5. The checkouts make you feel like you should have your passport and boarding card ready. They need something going on while you're standing in the huge queue.
6. The crowds. I wish I had gotten there at 10 on a Saturday instead of a little after 11.
7. Despite my request to be invited to their launch events, I wasn't. :( If I were them, I'd want me there! Their loss.

Well, as I write this, I've just boiled up some Whole Foods linguine and I'm getting it ready for the sun dried tomato pesto. And then I've got Whole Foods salmon steaks in the frying pan, crackling away. And I've made a nice Whole Foods baby spinach salad with my free Italian dressing. (Yes, I do cook occasionally...when inspired!)

Restaurant in Tallinn, Estonia: Troika

Raekoja plats 15
Tallinn, Estonia
Tel: +372 6276245

Date of Last Visit: Tuesday, May 15th, 2007

The Victim: Dad

The Damage: Unknown! Dad paid.

The Background: I had narrowed down dinner to two locations and asked the concierge for the deciding vote. Troika it is! Particularly, I was excited because all the write-ups mentione pelmeni--and I have a soft spot for pelmeni after visiting Russia with my friend Aileen in 1998 and eating lots of delicious pelmeni everywere we went. Pelmeni, btw, are dumplings...they are like pierogi, or gyoza, or pot stickers, or well just dumplings.

The Entrance: I like it. It is busy and loud and fun. There's live music and singing coming from somewhere. Our server asks us if we'd like some vodka and pickles--we say yes immediately because my dad's new best friend--the server at Gloria--told us that we must have the vodka and pickles.

The Drinks and Starters: The vodka arrives and our server puts on quite a show pouring it for us. He raises the bottle about three feet from the table and pours the vodka in. It's a cool display. Now the pickles...I am not a fan of pickles...but give me some pickles, honey, and sour cream, and you've got me, maybe forever. Our server at the Gloria wine bar had arleady told us what to do---take a sip of vodka, dip the pickle in the honey and then in the sour cream, eat. And drink some more vodka. This was a clever little trick. Too bad it wasn't free! You can tell we liked this dish...

The Mains: My pelmeni were boring. They were served with three types of sour cream that were just not so very exciting. My dad's fish was only okay. We were disappointed.

The Service: The service started off well, but quickly went downhill. It took forever for our mains to arrive, and our server just wasn't so very charming. After the service at Olde Hansa and Gloria--which was just so very very good--we were disappointed.

The Verdict: Eh. Although off to a good start, Troika didn't deliver.

Wine Bars in Tallinn, Estonia: Gloria Wine Bar

Müürivahe 2, 10146
Tallinn, Estonia
Tel: +372 6 446 950

Date of Last Visit: Tuesday, May 15th

The Victim: Dad

The Damage: Unknown! Dad paid.

The Background: I really am the BEST daughter ever. My father (likes to think he) is a simple man: he likes red wine, fish, and the cha cha. Knowing his fondness for red wine and my appreciation of a comfortable venue, I made the Gloria Wine Bar our destination, cha cha aside.

Now you must imagine me guiding my father down a half-deserted street in Estonia, looking for Number 2. He is VERY cranky. He is convinced that I do not know where I am going. He doesn't want to walk anymore. He wants to stop and go back and go somewhere else. (History has taught me NEVER to let give in to pressure and let him take me to the first place he sees. It will no doubt be awful, utterly charmless and with disasterous food.) I have never heard an adult man whine so much.

But there, off in the distance, is the entrance to the Gloria Wine Bar. I enter, my father behind me. It's so wonderfully lovely, he immediately stops moaning and complaining. (The moaning and complaining, however, is immediately replaced with the phrase "I am very impressed." Repeatedly. Non stop. Parents...sigh.)

The Atmosphere: The Gloria Wine Bar is settled in a little bit below street level, so there are lots of low ceilings and nooks and crannies. Wine is stored everywhere, and the wine list is impressive. I think they could probably offer a few more wines by the glass, but it was entirely acceptable. Oh, and I really could have used some nuts or something, and there were no snacks to be had. Sigh.

The Service: The young man who served us was awesome...chatty, interesting, informative. He told us all about the background of the riots a couple of weeks earlier. My father peppered the poor kid with questions, but he answered them all with aplomb. This guy is a keeper, for sure.

The Verdict: Absolutely lovely. Would go back in a heartbeat.

Restaurants in Tallinn, Estonia: Olde Hansa

Vana turg 1
Tallinn, Estonia
Tel: +372 6279020

Date of Last Visit: Tuesday, May 22nd

The Victim: Dad

The Damage: Unknown! Dad paid!

The Background: In my endless quest to keep my father amused, I took him to Tallinn for a few days. I am the best daughter ever. OK, I wanted to go too.

All the guidebooks say you have to try Olde Hansa. It is, apparently, the Hofbrauhaus of Tallinn. But classier. Being a sucker for the Hofbrau, I marched Dad over to Olde Hansa for lunch.

The Service: My father dropped his plan to find a Korean girlfriend, and instead decided to find a nice Estonian girl instead. Really, our server was super sweet and charming.

The Drinks: We started off with a little schnapps, which was quite nice. It was called "Monk's Bride" and was meant to keep the monks warm in cold months. From here, Dad switched over to wine and I ordered an Olde Hansa spiced beer, which was quite nice.

The Food: A notch above pub fare, but below gourmet. It was interesting and different. I had the mixed sausages--wild boar was one of the sausages on offer. My dad went with the salmon. We were both very pleased with our lunch. Nothing too fancy, but just a little bit different enough to keep things interesting. 

The Atmosphere: Truly lovely. Olde Hansa is lit almost entirely by candles...even the loos are candlelit!

The Verdict: I'd go back! This assumes I go back to Tallinn at some point, of course.