It felt just a little bit naughty today to be taking an extended lunch break to meet Laney for lunch at Michelin-rated La Trompette in Chiswick. Even though I was legitimately away from work I had the same feeling that I would get if I’d been wagging the day off from school (not that I ever did that of course ;-))

Lunches are a great way to get that fine dining experience for a lower price – sure you’re not getting the full experience of a sumptuous tasting menu but three courses is certainly more than enough to give you a flavour at least for a restaurant. We’d chosen a beautiful day for lunch at the La Trompette and we were happily seated right by the floor to ceiling windows/doors so had great natural lighting and view out on to the road.

Food at La Trompette was not only gorgeous to look at but it also gorgeous to devour. I had a tough time choosing my dishes by the way as everything sounded equally delicious.

Here are our starters of Rare Grilled Tuna with sauce vierge, celery and black pepper crème fraiche (Laney’s dish) and Roast Quail with spiced aubergine couscous, orange, pomegranate, pine nuts and coriander. I love how they did the quail two ways on my dish. Doesn’t everything look just so scrumptious!

The mains that followed were Parmesan gnocchi with ceps, cauliflower polonaise, baby artichokes and truffle pecorino (Laney’s dish) and Daube de boeuf a la bourguignonne with pomme puree and spinach. I was actually torn between the gnocchi dish that Laney ended up with and my dish but the fact that I generally dislike gnocchi pushed me over to the beef choice. To be fair the gnocchi was pretty good for gnocchi as it had been infused with the parmesan and, if not fried, toasted to a good consistency. My beef was perfectly tender and juicy.

Finally we finished with Crème brulee and Lemon grass panna cotta with passion fruit, pineapple and coconut madeleines. A very lovely finish to our meals! Oh, but wait, they also presented us with petit fours of miniature warmed melty chocolatey cakes (okay I don’t know the technical term!) Not the grandest of petit fours granted but enough for us after the very rich meal we’d just consumed.

Service at La Trompette was efficient and friendly but it did suffer from that thing that seems to happen when the restaurant gets busy – somehow we kept losing our waitress and the service dropped off every so slightly (but noticeable enough) in terms of how slow/fast they were. On the plus they didn’t rush us to leave the restaurant long after we’d finished our meal.

So technically my birthday is right around the corner but, except for my 30th, I’m not normally one who likes to celebrate. On the other hand, I’ll take any excuse to go out for a nice meal. Heh heh. Groupon had nicely co-operated by offering an excellent deal (half price on their tasting menu before service) on 1-Michelin starred Rasoi Vineet Bhatia, a very small and intimate, well hidden, Indian restaurant in Chelsea. Rehana had cause to comment it was almost like having a meal in someone’s dining room. You even have to buzz to gain access like you’re visiting a friend’s home for dinner. I quite liked the vibe, and despite the fact the weather wasn’t the greatest, appreciated the sky light that sat above our table. As a result of the intimate surrounds you are a lot closer to your fellow diners than is comfortable but with about 20 people in our room max it didn’t get too loud or overwhelming and thankfully no shouting required to be heard.

Rasoi Vineet Bhatia’s Indian style is best described as fusion in the way that Benares is, but more.

We started off with our “bread” course of pappadam with Mint and Mango Chutneys and two amuse bouche – which was a short of watermelon with spices mixed in and this beautiful mouthful of something which I unfortunately cannot remember the name of but Rehana said was the restaurant’s posh and refined take on some typical Indian dish. Incredibly delicious. If every dish was as good as these pre-starters then we were in for a real treat. And we were!

Spinach tikka chaat and warm potato-pomegranatea chaat were our first courses. The potato-pomeranate chaat in particular was a winner in this dish (the one on the left) – it was both sweet and spicy and tangy and all ingredients (not sure what the mysterious green sauce was) were so well in combination together. I wanted more but new that with six dishes to come, even if they weren’t going to be huge, I would have to pace myself.

Lamb dominated the next course and though not a fan of the meat found myself liking Gilafi lamb seekh kebab, lime lamb samosa served with herb and olive chutney respectively. Interesting ingredients to use in this dish.

And we come to what undoubtedly was my favourite dish of the night Wild mushroom and truffle oil laced khichdi (rice with lentils or simlar) sitting below Tomato “Makhni” ice cream. I could not go into just how amazing and exquisite the khichdi was and the tomato ice cream surprisingly did well to complement the dish. Incredible.

Apologies for the lighting on the next series of photos. The restaurant decided that it would be a good time to start some romance! Grilled Gun powder crusted sea bass, curry leaf upma, Moilee sauce, coconut chutney. After the amazing dish that had come before, everything following was going to pale in comparison to be honest but the sea bass did try its best. Taken alone it was a solid dish, sea bass was perfectly cooked and again had that touch of sweet and sour in the moilee sauce and the coconut chutney. Really good-sized portion on the sea bass too. Normally you’d get only mouthful sized portions on a tasting menu.

A melon and black pepper sorbet came next to cleanse the palette. I was happy that the chef continued to use distinctively different ingredients from the norm.

Then, as the finale to the savoury dishes, a bit of theatre with our Smoke cloud-Punjabi herb chicken tikka, Biryani rice, Sambhar sauce and “Salli” potatoes (though Rehana swapped her chicken for a paneer. Again another good solid and fun dish. Chicken was so tender and juicy and just the right level of smokiness leant to the tikka.

We were really quite satisfied at this point but had our final dish, dessert, to go. Cheekily called the Chocomosa: Warm marbled chocolate samosa with fresh rose petal-vanilla bean ice cream. Sooo good. Think fondue but inside a samosa wrapper and also mixed in white chocolate. The rose ice cream worked very well with this dish.

Petit fours wrapped up a pretty incredible dining experience at Rasoi. Food-wise there can be no complaints – all top-quality, well-thought out dishes that tasted incredible. Its not the kind of place that mixes ingredients just for the sake of being different – every ingredient was truly considered to see what it would add to the dish. From a service perspective the wait-staff were incredibly efficient and friendly and gladly not in our faces at every moment! Just the right level of service with the commitment to adjust our menu and their service to our needs.

The only minor drawback I would have in recommending this place is the price. At full price the restaurant is tre expensive – at £85 the tasting menu brings it up into nearly the same price category as such 2-Michelin starred restaurants as The Ledbury (http://www.thekua.com/sista/?p=13436) which is a big promise to deliver on something big. And they do deliver, only people might be reluctant to pay that much for Indian food, however fine it is. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend as a special occasion venue.

When Viajante hit my to-eat list it was before it was awarded its Michelin star, and the reason I added it to my list was that it promised El Bulli / Fat Duck-esque type exploration of food without the El Bulli / Fat Duck-esque prices. It was supposed to be exciting, innovative, challenging. It’s a shame I didn’t get to visit before it was awarded its star this year, so I can never really know what impact the award has had in the restaurant.

Nevertheless, I thought it would be a nice restaurant to take Sandra to for her birthday.

Viajante is located in what used to be Bethnal Green’s Old Town Hall – a beautiful edifice, now also converted to a Hotel – and inside it is light and airy and actually a lot more casual than you would imagine. The kitchen is an open kitchen though those in the second room, like us, can only catch a glimpse because of the wall in between.

Rather cutely the wine list is incorporated into a “100 Great Wonders of the World” book to reinforce the “Traveler” theme of the restaurant (viajante is traveler in Portugese.) The personal touches of the restaurant came in little things like being given a bag hook … though rather oddly we were only given one … and bringing out free champers to celebrate Sandra’s birthday. 🙂

The first innovation that was evident in the restaurant was the bread. We were served hot potato bread served with two brown butters – one with crispy potato and black pudding and one with crispy chicken, iberica ham and potato powder. Neither were overwhelming in flavour but were sufficiently different to put them into a nice for a change category.

We were then served two amuse bouche: “Thai Explosion II” which consisted of crispy chicken skin on one side, coconut something on the other and chicken confit and quail egg and the second this Home Made Cheese with Peas and Spring Flowers. The first dish was great but the second dish was, despite how pretty it looked, was very plain tasting, except for the crust of salt! It was like tofu it had so little flavour.

Then it was on to our 6-Course tasting lunch. First course was Mackerel, cream sponge, preserved lemon and wood sorrel dressing. Not a fan of this sadly. The cream sponge rather oddly had the consistency and taste of the home-made cheese from our amuse bouche (namely flavourless and rather like tofu), and the mackerel was much too strong tasting for me, and I like fish! Both Sandra and I agree that the best part of this dish was the preserved lemon. It was the tiniest part of the dish but the best tasting!

The second dish continued on with the looking pretty but containing mild flavour concept. White, green and wild asparagus with milk skin. Very disappointingly bland! Though the clear jelly like “sauce” poured at the table around our dish did have a good asparagus flavour.

A photo break

And on to more food. This is a better close-up of the dish that is sitting in front of Sandra. Acorda de camarao (Confit egg yolk, Japanese prawn, fennel, and bread salsify.) This was very interesting and very rich. The egg yolk had been perfectly cooked and the prawns were fresh. Not sure I was feeling the bread salsify. I’ve had a bit too much of that this year.

The next dishes came as a pair – Bacalhau dos Mundos (Cod of the Worlds). The first thing to come to our table were two orange peels which was part of part one of the dish. Cod influenced by Japan, orange and tomato water, dill , seaweed, orange peel spritzed. Yeah, I couldn’t see the code either.

Part two was nicer – Cod from Portugal with crispy onion and potato and caramelised onion. This was really really lovely! The texture from the crispy onion did well to offset the silken texture of the cod.

Moving on to our meat dish (and our final savory dish) – lamb with coffee, macadamia and broad beans. I’m not a huge fan of lamb but this was actually my favourite dish at lunch. It was so full of flavour and contrasts. Everything that had come before it, with probably the exception of the second part of the cod dish and our amuse, was just too sub-par on the flavour levels.

Desserts were a delight. First a pannacotta ice cream with shiso granite and green apple cubes. I just didn’t like the bowl it came in – because it felt horrible to scoop from, it was like someone running their nails down a blackboard.

Reduced ilk ice cream, condensed milk, cucumber raw, smoked and pickled and black sesame made up our final dessert. I was rather surprised that, despite the different ingredients, that it was very similar to the first dessert. Thought it could have been taken into a totally different direction.

The petit four were interesting – there was a shot glass of cinnamon something, a jelly and then a mushroom (cep) truffle. What? A really odd flavour on the tongue!

So, food was quite below my expectations at Viajante. I was expecting to be stunned, to be surprised, to be excited but I wasn’t. Sure, I could see that there was an attempt to challenge our preconceptions of how food should be delivered and combined but from a flavour-perspective it just didn’t deliver. This was the greatest disappointment of the day. In all other aspects it was an enjoyable experience – the food looked good (though was quite minimalist), the restaurant had a nice relaxed atmosphere, food was pricey (£50 for the 6 courses) but filtered water was free and they didn’t overcharge on our soft drinks, and finally service was great throughout the meal, everyone made an effort to say happy birthday to Sandra and we were each given a menu upon leaving.

Perhaps we just visited on an off day for the kitchen. Reviews seem mixed as to whether food delivers on taste – would I come back again? The jury is still out on that one.

Ristorante Semplice is a one-michelin starred rated Italian here in London that I hadn’t really heard about until the offer came upon on groupon. £35 for the seven course tasting menu (normally £85) was too good a bargain for Jenny and I to ignore. I was surprised at how easy it was too book a meal – normally with these offers it’s a near impossibility!

Upon first sitting down we were given these very thinly sliced baked vegetables (so thin and fine that it was almost like eating air), parmesan puffs and thin crisp bread. A couple of the pieces were threaded with olive or tomato juice. All very cute but I particularly enjoyed the parmesan puffs which were at one strangely sweet and salty.

Then the bread came! Options of foccacia (rosemary and thyme), tomato bread, and brown bread and another which I can’t remember. Interestingly bread offered right up until it was dessert time. Conscious of not getting over full on breads I tried to resist the bread but it was so delicious … lucky we didn’t have to wait too long for …

Carne di manza Fassone all’ Albese – Fassone carpaccio ‘Alba Style’. When this was brought to the table it was also served with salad “mash”. I know. The carpaccio itself was not very strongly flavoured for me. Jenny detected the hint of lemon or citrus which she enjoyed – but I felt it was bland.

The next dish had more flavour. Coda di rospo alla Milanese con panzanella di lattuga cappuccino e uova di quaglia or Baby monkfish “Milanese” served with gem lettuce “panzanella” style and soft quail eggs. Individually quite delicious though I didn’t understand the necessity of having the monkfish breaded and fried, and the panzanella was slightly too vinegary. Oh and it might have been nice to have both halves of the quail egg …

The Passata di carote, tortelli di ricotta di bufala e arancia – Carrot soup, buffalo ricotta cheese and orange tortelli we received next was one of my favourite dishes of the night. Great taste in the carrot soup and the tortelli had an interesting hit of cheese chased by the orange. Very different!

I love love love ragout so the next dish of Sedanini all’uovo con ragu’ di capriolo e salsa al cavolo nero – homemade egg sedanini pasta with venison ragout and black cabbage sauce was right up my alley. Gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous flavouring – all three items worked very well in balance. The black cabbage sauce was strangely verdant!

From quite a high to something a little less dramatic and exciting. San Pietro con passata di ceci di Spello e spinaci saltati – John Dory served with “Spello” chickpea sauce and sautéed spinach. Chickpea would not have been my choice to go with this but overall a well cooked dish.

Desserts started with Frittella di mela golden, crema inglese alla canella e gelatina di mela. Apple fritters (there was only one!) with cinnamon custard cream (delicious) and apply jelly (very fresh and strongly flavoured). Disappointing that the fritter tasted very strongly of oil so not sure it was fresh.

Of course the finale had to be something with chocolate. Fondente di cioccolato Domori, pannacotta alla grapapa, pan di spezie e sorbetto al cioccolato. “Domori” chocolate fondant served with grappa pannacotta, crispy spice bread and chocolate sorbet. Perfectly melty fondant and surprisingly light. I particularly liked the croutons which were nice and caramelly.

Some cute, if not exciting, petit fours.

We had an enjoyable time at Ristorante Semplice. The name might be simple but the food tonight certainly wasn’t. Complex and intense flavourings for the most part in the food gave us a different spin on traditional Italian dishes. The service was efficient (pleasingly water was topped up without noticing – except towards the end) and friendly with lots of preggos, you’re welcome, pleases, etc. however I felt they didn’t properly explain the food to us. Food was delivered with a nice “Here is your monkfish and quail eggs” when actually it was more than just that and I felt it would have been better if they had gone into more depth about the food. Great value for money on the groupon deal, probably a touch on the expensive otherwise.

I’m slowly but surely making my way through the New York food scene and today’s victim was Gramercy Tavern as we took our cousins out for a nice meal. Gramercy Tavern is a very popular “American tavern” as it describes itself and comprises the casual Tavern and the formal Dining Room.

The Tavern’s menu, today at least, did look a little bit more interesting but it was looking pretty busy (its where they get most of their walk-up customers) and our booking was for the formal Dining Room. The Dining room was a little quieter and though less laid-back than the Tavern still had a quite quaint cosy comfortable feel.

Okay, so be prepared for a few pictures of our food here with four meals to consider! In clock-wise order from the top left are Kathleen’s, Penny’s, Pat’s and my dishes:

• Calamari & Carrot Salad, Toasted Pine Nuts and Preserved Lemon Vinaigrette
• Red King Crab, Sunchokes and Apple
• Red Kuri Squash Soup, Brussels Sprouts and Apples
• Cauliflower, Red Quinoa, Prunes and Peanuts

I can’t speak for the other dishes, but the Cauliflower dish was amazing. You wouldn’t think cauliflower could feature as the main and primary ingredient in a dish but it can – and I think its definitely a vegetable that I’ve seen feature more and more often.

Our mains

• Sea Bass, Squash, Pumpkin Seeds and Currants
• Pork Croquette, Red Cabbage, Aji Dulce Peppers and Spiced Port Sauce
• Braised Lamb Shoulder, Heirloom Beans, Wild Mushrooms and Brussels Sprouts
• Roasted Hanger Steak, Fingerling Potatoes, Red Russian Kale and Bourbon Sauce

The dishes all looked super lovely and I would have been happy with eating any of them. I was happy, however, that my hangar steak made a nice contrast to my vegetable starter. Steak was cooked pretty much to perfection though perhaps the bourbon sauce could have had slightly more of a bite.

And then of course we finished with dessert.

• Warm Chocolate Bread Pudding. Cacao Nib Ice Cream
• Sticky Toffee Fig Cake, Coffee Ice Cream
• Peanut Butter Semifreddo, Chocolate Macaroon
• Dried Cherry Cheesecake, Black Pepper Butter Cookie and Cherry Lemon Sorbet

Brilliant creations by Pastry Chef Nancy Olson. I went for my dessert mainly because of the black pepper butter cookie (there wasn’t as much pepper as I was expecting) but really loved the cheesecake. Rich without being overly heavy. I think Pat’s peanut butter Sandwich was certainly the most interesting dessert but, like the mains, I would have been happy with any of the other desserts too. I’m so greedy 😉

Petit fours were extremely cute an included a peanut butter truffle, orange and dark choc square and a mini macaroon.

Service overall at Gramercy Tavern was friendly if not particularly excellent (on this occasion at least.) Negatives included the fact they were stingy with the bread for our table (only one bread roll brought at the beginning and we saw another customer basically grab the waiter so he could ask for another), sometimes slow on filling up water, no explanation of food being given and really slow to bring out menus (especially between the end of our mains and delivery of desserts). The attention from waiters started to drop off as we slowly got to the end of our meal, which is always a frustrating thing. Positives included replacement/additional drink – upon making a mistake with one of our drinks (which we didn’t realise they’d even made) they were quick to bring an additional quick replacement, staff being good at directing you to the toilets and they didn’t mind photos being taken.

Overall I would recommend Gramercy Tavern on the strength of its food, even if the service was slightly hit and miss.

Pat and I could hardly believe that Tom Aikens came back on offer so soon after our last visit. Having said that we hadn’t intended on going again for a while as it just seemed too indulgent to have the same rich meal again within three months. However, checking the menu the offerings were going to be different (Christmas theme) so we were in like a shot!

We both said from the outset that despite how fantastic the bread offerings were at Tom Aikens (and they were still really fantastic tonight) that we would try to resist eating too many of them throughout the meal. I was able to resist to some extent but between us we still ate enough to require requesting a second butter patty. At one stage Pat declared “no more bread” but then the next second when the waiter came around offering more bread Pat immediately said yes! Ha! He just couldn’t resist.

For our amuse bouche we were familiar with two of them (the Polenta and Parmesan croquette and the Olive “Bubble”) with the new kid on the scene being the truffle soup. Divine much? A touch on the salty side I still could have eaten the truffle soup all day long. Mmmm …

Our first dish last time was a scallop dish and this time it was also scallop but served very differently. Roast Scallop, black pudding, and parsnip purée. As fresh as the scallop was last time I think I enjoyed this one much better. The black pudding went surprisingly well.

For a Christmas treat next up was Venison Carpaccio, fig purée, toasted walnuts. Very festive and very fun dish. Very colourful – lucky I wasn’t wearing a white shirt!

Poached and Roasted Foie Gras, cassoulet Haricot beans. Not a fan of beans but the foie gras was tasty. I’m scared by just how much I’m starting to fall in love with foie gras. Not that I would go out of my way to get it … but I have no problems now chucking it down.

A fish course of John Dory, with chestnut ravioli, cabbage, bacon was one of my favourites tonight. The sweet and the salty played off the John Dory really well in this dish.

The next dish was really cute. Not sure if it was plated intentionally but I love how it actually looks like a bird! Roast Partridge, pear purée, choucroute, winter truffle sauce. Truffle. Check. Partridge cooked right. Check.

Desserts followed our savoury dishes. Two types: Confit Red Wine Plums, vanilla parfait, red wine sorbet and then the more Thanksgiving Pumpkin Pannacotta, pumpkin cake, candied kumquats. Yum.

And finally, what we had been waiting for, the petit fours! Tom Aikens really knows how to start and finish a meal!