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Ito Eats: Hix at Selfridges

http://itoeats.blogspot.com/2010/03/hix-at-selfridges.html

Sunday, 28 March 2010. Hix' and 'Selfridges'. Not names I'd expect to see together. Ramsay, Peyton, Stein, Yau, Conran, Galvin, Nobu. perhaps. Many chefs seem more than willing to get into bed with big business and hotel chains, and be lured into launching franchises. But Mark Hix struck me more the Fergus Henderson (of St John. I'd booked well ahead for Sunday lunch at Hix's Restaurant and Champagne Bar. The Conran-designed mezzanine dining area floats above the posh handbags, providing ample eye candy ...

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Ito Eats: Bar Shu

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Friday, 12 March 2010. For some, spicy food is considered an endurance test, but for many it's an awakening, a base pleasure to be sought in as many forms as possible, be it a simple extra grind of pepper over weeknight cheese on toast, a chilli-infested broth, or a fiery Saturday night curry. I adore heat. A grind of pepper is as important as a pinch of salt, and chilli flakes are always close to hand. About time, then, that I try out a Sichuanese restaurant. The laminated menu was luridly eye-catching,...

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Ito Eats: The Giaconda Dining Room

http://itoeats.blogspot.com/2009/08/giaconda-dining-room.html

Saturday, 15 August 2009. The Giaconda Dining Room. Denmark Street is all too familiar to me. The wonderful Helter Skelter bookshop (RIP), and gigs at the 12 Bar Club spring to mind, as does its role as a handy shortcut to Charing X Rd, but food - I'd never have thought it. The Giaconda Dining Room. Sits modestly among the guitarists' porn mag that is a street dedicated to rock 'n roll. Oddly placed, perhaps. Petite, most definitely. My companion's Tiramisu took soft, pillowy pudding decadence to a new l...

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Ito Eats: Railroad

http://itoeats.blogspot.com/2012/03/railroad.html

Monday, 19 March 2012. I've been meaning to check out Railroad. For months. Stevie Parle, who runs the critically acclaimed Dock Kitchen. In Ladbroke Grove, writes the Daily Telegraph's food column and has written a rather wonderful cookbook. Mentioned his sister Lizzie's East London cafe last autumn on Twitter. It sounded like a little jewel, a food- and coffee-lover's sanctuary in the dirt end of Hackney. And if her culinary inquisitiveness was anything like her brother's, I was in for a treat. First t...

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Ito Eats: The Ivy

http://itoeats.blogspot.com/2009/04/ivy.html

Sunday, 5 April 2009. Gone downhill in the last 12 months? I hear murmurs on the foodvine that things aren't quite what they used to be, particularly on the 1st floor (used for large groups/corporate get-togethers). What a shame, or perhaps it's just not as fashionable as it was, so A-listers can move on and leave it for the rest of us to enjoy. With its sense of occasion, The Ivy is an ideal spot for celebrations and impressing out of town-ers. Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom). Follow me on Twitter.

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Ito Eats: Hibiscus

http://itoeats.blogspot.com/2011/07/hibiscus.html

Saturday, 16 July 2011. Wish lists are for fools. To-do lists, on the other hand, urge participation. For too long, the back of my little moleskin diary has been home to a scrawled 'wish' list of restaurants I seem destined never to visit. Now it reads 'to-do', I am finally getting on with it. Jon chose Claude Bosi's Michelin-starred Hibiscus. From the list, the occasion being my birthday and our first 'date' since baby Charlie made his grand entrance. An excuse for fine dining, if ever there was one.

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Ito Eats: J. Sheekey Oyster Bar

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Wednesday, 16 September 2009. J Sheekey Oyster Bar. Occasion: our 5 th. Wedding anniversary. Where better to celebrate than an oyster bar. They may have been as plentiful and cheap as Big Macs in the 18 th. Centuries, but present times have placed oysters firmly at the top end of gustatory pursuits. Sitting alongside the 100-year-old Sheekey. Restaurant on a winding backstreet in the heart of Theatreland. Being cracked in the background, they were the best oysters we've eaten in London. The bar menu stic...

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Ito Eats: Canteen

http://itoeats.blogspot.com/2009/04/canteen.html

Tuesday, 21 April 2009. It's been a while since I've eaten at Canteen. What was once a refreshing change to London's restaurant scene, a trailblazer in the form of affordable back-to-basics British food, well cooked, has now become a fast-growing chain that seems to be losing its va va voom. It was too late to try puddings, but at a fiver each I wish we'd given at least one a go. Next time. Anyone else had similar experiences? Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom). Follow me on Twitter. J Sheekey Oyster Bar.

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Ito Eats: Hazuki

http://itoeats.blogspot.com/2009/05/hazuki.html

Thursday, 28 May 2009. It was a Bank Holiday Monday, and we found ourselves in Covent Garden with friends at 10pm, following a sunny day strolling and pub-crawling along the Thames, needing sustenance of a restoring and sobering kind. In Harden's, and passed it dozens of times, so this was as good a time as any to try it out. Hazuki does not offer high-style dining, but does deliver delicious no-fuss Japanese cuisine. I'll be returning soon to try their sushi for lunch, so watch this space. Ramsgate: Age...