Intercontinental on Park Lane, London. A good effort for a corporate bash

27th June 2013
I was invited to an annual dinner for a trade organisation at the Intercontinental, having been a speaker at their meeting. Their lunch had been a bit of a CHOF disaster, again underpinning the problems of serving hot buffet food, and the fact that apart from me, no one seems to care
Hotel ballroom dinners can be a hit or miss affair. Before our food was served, a member of staff came over and asked if there were any particular dietary requirements. He was probably expecting comments about vegetarianism and peanut allergy, and my comment indicating that I wanted hot food to be served hot evoked the response that they would be trying their best to serve food quickly. In fact, one of the best things about the service was the fact that waiting staff operated in teams to ensure that all seated at a table received their meals simultaneously.This seemed to work well, and I commend their management for at least solving the problem of having to wait until the last person on a table is served.
The meal started with a marjoram marinated plum tomato (?) with a mozzarella fritter and baby gem Caesar.

Had I not been told, I would probably not have guessed. Anyway the fritter was about a 7.9 on the CHOF scale.
The main course was 'Rosemary marinated (lot of marinating going on at the Intercontinental) lamb rump on summer pea puree with pink fir potatoes, pearl onions, baby carrots and soft herb jus (good try just for imaginative menu).

This lived up to the description, and the express service method ensured that the plate scored just about an 8 on the CHOF scale. I thought this was a very good effort for a corporate dinner, and most people engaged well with the food.

Desert was a mango and lime mousse with a coriander shoot (not marinade this time) jelly, raspberry and chilli ice cream and cashew nut biscotti.

A lot of words for not a lot on the plate. Nice enough, but the jelly was a bit viscid.

All in all a good effort from the hotel for a meal with imagination, decent ingredients, adequately cooked and quickly served. I will remember them if I need a similar venue.

Kings Head, Bexley: Pub Grub

25th June
I quite regularly meet ex work colleagues, and sometimes those that still work with me at the King's Head pub in Bexley Village on the high street. On a Friday it is packed with pay-packet drinkers, but early on in the week, it can be a pleasant place for lunch. I have eaten there many times over the years and my favourite lunch there is their smoked salmon salad. Not hot obviously, but a treat.

Its a generous mixture of smoked salmon, cole slaw, hot boiled new potatoes and salad. It was £6.50 last year, but this year has gone up to £7.50, which, whilst not as much of a bargain, is still a very fair price for the quality plate that it is. Comparable with other pubs in the area. I will definitely be going there again, as I have not found anywhere else in the area that matches it. Other food is also available including typical hot pub lunch dishes. Recommended, but not on a Friday lunchtime.

Penha Longa resort, Silves, Portugal: unreal luxury hotel with little hot food

12-15th June.
A little out of sequence, but could not be ignored. A company decision to use this as a conference venue hotel left me with no convenient access to the conference centre in Lisbon, but staying at a hotel which made up for that inconvenience. I have reviewed the hotel on TripAdvisor, but here is some of the food.
The high spot was breakfast. Suffering from the usual hotel disease of lack of attention to detail about the temperature of the buffet, it was compensated for by the variety and quality of other items:

It was worth getting up for, and if you get there about 0700, you avoid the rush. We had dinner once in their Italian restaurant, which doubles up as the breakfast restaurant. A small and somewhat unimpressive menu

I had no alternative but to take this with flash. It shows an artistic rack of lamb. Not much meat, but very pretty. Shame about the 7 on the CHOF scale, but the taste and quality were excellent.

I was very sorry to leave this hotel, as it was extremely peaceful and comfortable, but I wish they could realise that their mainly British clientele like hot food to be hot. It is not really part of the 'abroad' experience that one is looking for.

El Rancho De Lalo: Worth crossing the river for.

22 June 2013
It's got no web site, no toilets and only takes cash, but it is packed on a Saturday (closes at 6). So why is this so popular, as you have to really try to squeeze in? Because it seems to be an opportunity to eat good food in the presence of ex-pats who look as if they know what they are doing.
I first came across El Rancho some weeks ago when I was taking pictures in Brixton, and I thought it would be a good idea for a family outing. It does not open on Sunday, so we found a common ground Saturday. After booking, my daughter was told that we should be there promptly, with the caveat that we were expected to move on (we had a table for 6.5), but on the appointed time, our table was there, which was just as well, as it was packed at one pm on a Saturday.
The food is Colombian in style, and there is a good choice on the menu. Some dishes are only served on Saturday, which I guess is their big day.

It is not a pretty place, it is very cramped, cafe like, an tables spill out onto the thoroughfare of Brixton Village market, but they are all like that in the market.

I ordered a starter, but was told that actually we would be better sharing one starter between 4, as the main dishes were big. We had the beef and potato empanada at £1.30 each. These would have been excellent if they had not been cold in the middle (0 on the CHOF scale) although they were hot on the outside. I can only assume they had come out of a refrigerator/freezer, and had not been properly cooked through.

However, in retrospect, because the main courses were so good, I am prepared to get over it, and suggest that anyone who goes there should forget the starters, as the main plates are simply so generous, you don't need a starter.

For main course, three of us had Bandeja Paisa, which we were informed on the menu is a Colombian national dish with grilled beef steak, fried pork belly, Colombian pork sausage with fried egg, ripe plantain and corn bread. And that was exactly true, accompanied by salad rice and beans.

This was hot, mainly freshly cooked, a huge amount and different and tasty and also scored an 8 on the CHOF scale.This plateful was priced at £10. I rated this very highly, and looking at what the other diners were eating, I will definitely be trying to go back there again. It really was something different.Pity it is not in North London, but there appears to be a pocket of Colombian cuisine in Stockwell/Brixton. They have the Colombian and Portuguese, and we have the Greek/Turkish and Persian.

Federation coffee: strong stuff for the urban spoons of Brixton

22nd June
Brixton Market is many things: it is a source of local style food and clothes for local people, a place for tourists to gawp, and a place to sit and be part of the local furniture with designer artisan drink and food.
There are loads of places to eat and drink, and they start getting busy around noon. I just needed a cup of coffee before going to lunch (see subsequent entry), and this was a random choice:

Not much to see, but a good strong cup of Americano with hot milk. They get so busy that you have to queue to order, and then wait for the coffee to be delivered. Finding somewhere to sit can be tricky.There is home spun snacking food as well, but as I was waiting for lunch I resisted. The guy before me in the queue spent almost £20 on coffee and snacks for three, so it is slightly above average in cost, and the cost for the cup of coffee above was £2.20 which is about average for London at the moment. I wonder what their margins are?

The coffee was robust/strong and was not like some of the mass chains. I think this is a good one. Good and hot too.

They have a fairly non-informative web site on www.federationcoffee.com . Unlike some of the restaurants, they are open on Sunday.

Monte Carlo: Meridien Beach Hotel in a town apparently bereft of hot food

3rd-5th June
For rather complicated financial reasons, I was involved in a conference in Monaco based on the Meridien Beach Hotel. I was told that it was excellent, and I should expect better than the Arts Hotel in Barcelona.
In the event, the Meridien is a victim of its own success and that of Monte Carlo. The hotel is comfortable enough, but is very crowded. The security appear to be somewhat lax at nights, and after the event one or two stories of 'night business operations' emerged which should not have been a feature of this kind of hotel.
But enough of that, because we are only here to discuss the hotness of food.
Because we were a big group, apart from breakfast, all meals were served buffet style. This makes a lot of sense, but I have always commented in the past that this is a good way to guarantee that food is not hot, and in warm climates with mass catering can lead to public health issues.

It was raining when we arrived so this shows the town at its worst.

Breakfast is always an important hotel meal for me as it tells me a lot about what is going on. There are two litmus tests. Smoked salmon and sparkling wine. Presence of both of these is the mark of a top notch buffet breakfast. Whilst the smoked salmon was there, but I could not find the wine. I went and asked and I was told that if I wanted sparkling wine I would have to buy it from the bar.

The picture above would seem to suggest that there was a chef freshly cooking eggs. And in a way it was true. It was possible to get an omelette with a wait, but fried eggs came out randomly and were left standing. Other typical components of the hot buffet were in cast Iron dishes on hotplates and were generally not adequately hot, scoring a 6.8 on average on the CHOF. However the uncooked components of breakfast were excellent, with some novel items and little tasters of smoothies and so on. Bread and cheese, naturally were excellent, and overall, I would say that the quality of ingredients and cooking were excellent, but mostly could not be maintained hot. Monte is still in the grip of a construction bonanza, and so the favoured place for breakfast, overlooking the Mediterranean, was spoiled by building works on the adjacent site

For one evening, the hotel put on a eastern/middle eastern buffet with freshly cooked dishes and I have to say that this was probably the best meal for me and also the hottest as you could grab stuff straight out of the pan/grill.

This shows mixed noodles, scallops, spring role and brochette of chicken and beef. This was tasty hot and delicious and was probably the best meal I had in Monte. 

Whilst there may have been issues with the hotness of buffet food, if you wanted cold food, no problem. Lunch buffets were highly attractive with sample of addictive tasters where one could have gone a bit crazy.

The food at all times was attractive and high quality, simply let down by the problem of catering for 100 people in the open. I will get over it. I make my generalisation in title because the same things applied wherever we went in the town: excellent food but only adequately warm. It must be a Mediterranean thing.

Latino's Diner Gibraltar: Walk on by.....

20th May
Gibraltar is a popular cruise stop because the prices for alcohol and tobacco cannot be be beaten. Scotch was unbelievably cheap. We decided to stay on shore rather than go back for lunch, and made a random choice based on gut instinct. Latinos Diner is strategically placed in Main Street and seemed like a good spot based on the fact that it was raining and the number of people eating there. I wish, in retrospect that we had walked on by and made another choice, but a choice is a choice.

There is a somewhat unhelpful web site on http://www.latinosrestaurants.com/diner/

It did not look very American inside, and the Spanish speaking staff did not pass for Mexicans.It looked like a holiday resort cafe. Let me make clear at this stage that I loved Gibraltar and would go back there at the drop of a hat, so I am not criticising the place.

For lunch, I had a cheeseburger, which is one of my litmus tests for places wanting to call themselves diners. After a significant wait this is what arrived

I think the picture tells the story. It was a somewhat limpid burger, adequately cooked bland tasting but somewhat off-heat by the time I received it (CHOF of 7.4). The texture was fine granular, but as there are no cattle of note on Gibraltar, it is difficult to guess the provenance of the beef. It was simply a sad affair which I regretted and was only bolstered by the fact that I knew I was eating in the good restaurant (The View) on the Saga Ruby.

If you are in Gib, I would give this one, or certainly the burgers a miss. It was also quite expensive, and this sad affair was priced at about £9 (they use English Money).

Algeria: a new emerging destination: lunch in Tipasa at restaurant Romana

17th May 2013
Although I have met people who know people who have worked in Algeria, I don't know anyone who has been there on holiday or part of a holiday. So it was a big big attraction when it came up on the agenda of the Saga Ruby cruise. A possibly once in a lifetime experience for me and I even changed my passport to make sure prior visas did not cause any problem. There had been some political trouble in the previous year, but nothing to see when we arrived. In the event, the port officials were whisked off to a private reception on the boat out of the way of the passengers, and we we told that it was typical to bribe them with cigarettes and whisky in exchange for a grief-free stop over. We will never know the truth, but suffice it to say that a good time in Algiers and Tipasa was the outcome, and there are no signs on my new passport that I ever went there.
Tipasa is a world class Roman Ruin, and as part of the outing for the day we were taken for lunch at what appears to be the only local restaurant. I think the food was of local quality for local people, because during the day, which was a Friday, small groups of smarter looking locals came and eat.
There was a set menu which started with Borek which is a stuffed deep fried pastry, which the lesser traveled among us called spring roll For some reason it arrived at about the same time as flatbread.

This was actually quite hot scoring a 9, and was delicious, truly tasting of the middle east, although we were in north Africa.

The next dish turned out to be a bit challenging for others, and in fact some progressed no further than the spring rolls:

This was a lamb soup with chunks of fairly fatty lamb, grains, which may have been couscous and spices. This again was pretty hot and was quite hard work to get the fat off. Nevertheless it was truly unlike soups I have had before, 

The next stage was a bit disappointing being a variety of brochettes, but the sausage was quite spicy. This was cold by the time it came to us, scoring not more than a 5 on the CHOF scale. By this time, the local Feral cats had arrive, and knowing no better, the animal loving British did not shoo them away and might even have fed them. Bad idea, as there is rabies in Algeria.

Desert was some unidentified local fruit, which I am still unsure of. We were told it was the national fruit of Algeria, but no one else in the country seems to think so.

If anyone know what this is, let me know. It tasted somewhere between a pear and an apricot. Coffee never came, and they had clearly lost interest in us. I have no idea how much was charged for this interesting lunch.

Tourism in Algeria clearly has a little way to go, but I think this may be the next big thing as it it relatively unspoiled and has lots of historic sites that can be seen at close quarters.

Hotel Majliss Rabat: Moroccan lunch for Tourists.

14th May.
The cruise on the Saga Ruby took us to North Africa, and a day trip to Rabat and Casablanca involved a local lunch at a good hotel, so they said. The hotel is next to the main railway station, and after some squeezing between parked cars, we were taken to a private dining area. Many of our elderly companions had not been to Morocco before, let alone eaten the food, and the suspicion level was high. The hotel has its own web site on http://www.majlisshotel.ma/accueil.htm and a big plus was good free wifi access.
I am used to coach tour lunches being chicken and chips, so it was a pleasant surprise to receive something a bit local. This is what we had:

a cold starter of mixed mainly cucumber salad, with garlicky dressing and egg that has lost its yolk, with local flat bread. I know we are warned off buffet salads like this for health reasons, but I think all survived this. Pretty good, and better than it looks.

A typical 'tagine' style chicken with olives served with couscous and hot sauce if you wanted it. Probably a 7.5 on the CHOF scale, but it was never going to be any better. Treated with great suspicion by my travelling companions, meaning all the more for me. Although I might have preferred to go a bit more native, that was never going to happen, and so for a tourist lunch it was actually pretty local and good. Reports on the hotel on Tripadvisor are mixed, and most people suggest eating somewhere else. The dangers of organised travel.

Saga Ruby: venerable old lady of cruising with matching clientele.

10th to 24th May.
Cruising is the new package holiday. This is where the the people with grown up children go. This is where you go when you want to travel, but don't want the hassle of destinations or the concern of where you are going to stay or going to eat. The Saga cruises are a little bit of Britain that travel the world. It is not all tea as mother makes it, because most of the time, our mothers could not match this.
Saga says it is targeting the over-50's, but on the Saga Ruby, that is aiming low, and it has been remarked in the UK press that the average age is much higher than that. These are the people with the indexed linked gold plated final salary occupational pensions. Where their customers will come from in 20 year's time is anyone's guess. The Ruby is being scrapped at the end of they year, possibly because it is old-fashioned and keeps breaking down. There is a high loyal factor among  some cruisers, and many of the passengers on this trip to North Africa had been on the ship multiple times, and seemingly some did not even bother getting off at ports of call. This was a first (and last for obvious reasons) for us. We had been on Saga Pearl a couple of years ago, and noted that the client based even then seemed younger to us.
One of the biggest deals of the Saga experience is the food. Potentially five meals a day of high quality grub, in huge quantities. Whilst each dish is not large, there are so many of them. There was an outbreak of Norovirus during our trip, and for this reason, coupled with the age of the passengers, buffet style food was served by gloved staff. Probably for the best. Three of the meals each day could be taken by silver service sittings.
One of the biggest pluses of the food on the Ruby is the existence of the specialty upmarket evening restaurant called 'View' (over the stern) and passengers were limited to one go there at no extra cost. The staff were kind to us, and permitted an out of scope second visit.
Over a two week period, there was too much for me to discuss in detail here, so I will let the pictures do the talking.

Typical dainty starter of smoked salmon and caviar: much attention paid to appearance of food which was served plated up.

Bit of a mistake: pan fried fish which was regularly available but was a bit of a miserable portion. Did not do this style of fish again.

Typical cooked breakfast: suffered from ubiquitous problem of overcooked scrambled egg which was not adequately hot, getting only a 6.8 on the CHOF scale.

A sumptuous tea is offered each day with savoury and sweet items. Not what you need before a big dinner, but there were no shortage of takers. Not quite up to Reeds or Claridges, but difficult to fault.

An exciting Spanish style lunch in the buffet restaurant did not get as many takers.

By and large, by virtue of numbers and buffet style food, there was always an element of hit and miss with the hotness of food. Most came in at an 8 or below for hotness,but I did not have to send anything back. In the View restaurant, where food was cooked to diners' orders, the hotness was an 8+ to 9.

In the View restaurant, where the best dining experience was to be had, the appearance was clearly important.

The desert above is a 'deconstructed trifle.

I can only speak highly of the View and it was the high-spot for eating.

There were too many other meals to go into detail, but the key issues are high quality of food with adequate choices. The temperature of most, especially buffet food deserved to be hotter, but there was nothing much the staff or kitchens could have done, given the magnitude of serving the passengers. However, I have little reservation in recommending the food on board Saga cruising for quality and quantity.