New Review Blog

ClassicDisaster

Just started a restaurant review blog. I only have two reviews up right now but I am in the process of wrighting ones for Wagamama, Kashturi, and Patrick Guilbaud. I plan to review Mint, l'gooleton, Pearl Braserie and a lots more.

input would be realy welcome.

http://onerestaurant.blogspot.com/

truecrippler

Nice man. This should come in handy. Will be looking forward to some updates. .

The Sweeper

ClassicDisaster, I'm going to go to town on this a bit, but please don't take it personally. I'm trying to be constructive, I'm not trying to trample you.

Went to Chapter One recently, and wow! I really got the Michelin service. We got in ten minutes late for lunch, not a problem. We were greeted by really great staff at the front desk, our table was ready for us but we were advised that if we had a drink at the bar we would get a much better table within ten minutes, naturally we accepted this offer.

This bit is fine really. Good indication of how helpful the staff are.

The bar was pretty nice, and there was a great selection of bottled beer and spirits, along with the fantastic wine list. Sure enough, within ten minutes we were seated in the main dining area in front of the beautiful Georgian windows.

'Pretty nice' should never appear in a review. Having never been to Chapter One, this wouldn't make me want to go. What would make me want to go is some detail - you need to pay more attention to your surroundings. For instance, 'Attached to the side of the restaurant, the bar at Restaurant X has a trendy, upmarket feel to it. With enough room to hold up to 30 waiting diners the atmosphere is up-beat. Dark wooden floors create a plush contrast to tall glass tables with bar stools - there is no low seating, this isn't a bar for sitting in all night. Playing a selection of [whatever] tunes, it's a fine place to wait for your table. Even finer is the selection in the beer fridges - all the usuals are on tap or bottled, along with a good range of import lagers including the Japanese and Indian staples, Asahi, Sapporo, Tiger and Cobra.'

That's just a for instance. What's a fantastic wine list? A big thick one? One that isn't hopelessly overpriced? How much do you know about wine to make a judgement on whether the list is appropriate for the food?

Straight off the bat we were served a pre-starter off the menu; Chestnut and chanterelle mushroom soup with chicken mousse. Which to be honest, separately both quite average, but when eaten together they weren’t far short of spectacular. There was also a great selection of breads.

Again - average, spectacular, great - these are all subjective terms. I want detail. The chestnut and chantarelle mushroom soup - how did it smell? How did it taste? 'The chestnut and chantarelle mushroom soup was served at the perfect temperature for gobbling straight away. A creamy texture with meaty chunks of mushroom, the chestnut flavour was a pleasant backdrop to the tanginess of chantarelles' - or whatever. I can't say, I didn't have it, but from what you wrote I don't know what it's like either.

Chicken mousse - sounds bloody awful. Persuade me otherwise. 'The chicken mouse was a light, fluffy slice of richness, bringing the roundness of a pate when smeared over a slice of crunchy-crust wholegrain bread.' Was it sweet? Salty? Peppery?

Also the great selection of breads - how many slices did you get, did your waitress wave a basket under your nose that was then whipped away, what WERE the ranges?

For my starter I went for ox tongue, the cousin had white pudding with poi lentils, a poached egg and hollandaise sauce. My starter was good, his was better.

Meaningless. How was the ox tongue? How was it served? Potted? Sliced? With what else? 'The ox tongue was sliced paper thin and piled in rolls on spoon of tangy onion marmalade.' Or however they served it. How was the white pudding? Peppery? Any barley in it? 'Two slices of a smooth, light, pate-like white pudding with a delicious spicy aftertaste were topped with a perfect poached egg - the white firm, the yolk runny, the egg hadn't even started to cool or congeal when it reached the table' - because whenever I get a poached egg in a restaurant you'd swear it was rocket science the number of times they get it wrong.

Also it's usually puy lentils - the spelling can be pui or poi, though I'm open to argument on this one if Chapter One were doing something to their lentils to make them poi and not puy.

The bar really had been set high for the mains and dessert. Luckily neither disappointed. I chose to finish the cows head off and went for slow cooked, spiced, daub of beef with parsnip puree, this came with a side of croquet potatoes. He got shoulder of suckling pig with carrots and an orange sauce, with a side of mash (which was amazing). The mains ate brilliantly, my plate was wiped clean and his was pretty similar.

Again, no information other than what was on the menu. First, explain what a daub of beef is - it's normally a stew made with all sorts of cuts of stewing beef - from your description of finishing off the cow's head, I might think that a daub of beef was cow's cheek or some such. Describe it. Was it melt in the mouth tender? Were there vegetables served that were stewed with the beef, or was it just meat and the parsnip puree? Also, how did they serve it? Were there slow cooked chunks of spiced beef piled onto a puddle of parsnip puree, with croquet potatoes on the side? And how were those croquets, were they a bit 'hello we've been ovened up from a frozen packet', or do you think they were made on site? Were they salty? (They can be very salty.)

How about the shoulder of pig, was it tender? Any crackling? Served in slices? Did it melt away in long strips or was it to be sawn through like roast pork in a pub? And what was so amazing about the mashed potato? Was it creamy? Light? Rich? Garlicky?

You describe portion size, which is good, but you do it after the fact - best describe it as you're being served.

I had poached meringue with amaretto anglaise, which was fantastic and almost cloud like. He got chocolate mousse, with coffee cream, campari jelly and vanilla ice cream which was also excellent.

Desserts - poached meringue sounds interesting, how did that work out? Meringue is often a dish done in the oven, so you have a crispy outside and a gooey centre - poaching it would produce, one would think, a different result, so explain what that result is like. Amaretto anglaise - 'anglaise' is the French for 'English', so I'm not sure what English Amaretto is like. A Creme anglaise is a light custard often flavoured with vanilla - so was this a creme anglaise with amaretto?

Campari jelly also sounds good - I would assume that's a bitter-ish, tangy jelly - grown up jelly, not for kids. That about right?

You do list the price, which is useful, but you don't tell us WHAT you had to drink. Two main courses, E38 each, so your drinks and a generous tip were E24. I want to know what you had to drink, what it cost, how it was (house wine? any good?).

Finally, watch your spelling. 'Defiantly' means marked by bold resistance. 'Definitely' means certainly, and is the spelling you're looking for. (I'm not being a bitch, you've used 'defiantly' for 'definitely' more than once.)

Look, I hope you're not reading this going 'Jesus what a bint'. Food is my passion, writing has been one my jobs for a long time. When I lived in London I used to read the food critics all the time. If you want to write in this genre, you need to read what everyone else is writing. You need to learn how food 'should be' so you can spot if something is bad in a restaurant - and I'm not just talking burnt or raw. I mean if someone serves you a classic dish with something that isn’t supposed to be there, you need to be able to spot it and then deliver a judgement on it.

For instance, in your second review you mention bruchetta. The commonly used spelling is bruschetta, and historically bruschetta is a piece of toasted bread, rubbed with garlic and drizzled with oil. The additions we see these days – tomatoes, cheese, basil – are variations on that theme, so criticising a bruschetta for not having much tomato isn’t really a goer. You need to make the point that they serve their bruschetta with tomato, and then they’re stingy with that tomato. Describe the un-Italian bread – what was it, a Pat the Baker white slice?

Also, it's not unusual for deep fried brie to be cooked with its rind on. They cut the cheese into wedges, rind intact, bread the wedges and fry them. So by saying ‘the brie was still encased in its skin’ - a lot of peopel would expect it to be. Pointing it out undermines the criticisms in your review, because it sounds like you don’t know what you’re on about. (‘When I asked for steak tartare they gave me raw mince!’)

Interestingly I noticed your second review, because you were unhappy, you put more effort into detailing what made you unhappy. Put that same effort in what’s making you happy when you go to a restaurant – pay close attention to your surroundings and all of your senses, sound, taste, smell, feel – and put all of that into your reviews.

Okay okay, I’m done.

The Sweeper

Okay okay so I'm not quite done yet.

I used to love reading this girl when I was in London - Marina O'Loughlin is her name, and she knows her stuff and writes with a wit and an edge that really makes you want to try the places she eats. Here's a link to who she is:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2006/feb/27/pressandpublishing.food

And here are a few links to her reviews so you can see what I'm on about.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/restaurants/restaurant-225946-details/Haozhan/restaurantReview.do?reviewId=23425722

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/restaurants/restaurant-226364-details/All+Star+Lanes/restaurantReview.do?reviewId=23414890

http://www.metro.co.uk/metrolife/food/article.html?in_article_id=138594&in_page_id=26

Faith

Wow, Majd, I'm in awe! Great post! That will be incredibly useful for the OP.

Radharc na Sleibhte

.....and that is how you review a restaurant, ok.

ClassicDisaster

Wow that comment was really what I needed, great advice. I will try to take it on board. Will review those two reviews and try to use some of your advice.

Minesajackdaniels wrote: »

from your description of finishing off the cow's head, I might think that a daub of beef was cow's cheek or some such.

Daub of beef is actually cows cheek

The Sweeper

Is it cow's cheek though? I always thought it was just a stew made with any long-cooking fatty cut of beef...

Minder

From what I know of Daube of Beef, it is made from large pieces of stewing beef. Cooked in the oven for a long period of time, it was customary to lay a cows or pigs cheek across the top of the filling while it cooked. The cheek would cook down helping to keep the moisture in whilst adding an unctuousness to the finished dish.

ClassicDisaster

From Larousse: Daub method of braising meat (beef, mutton, turkey, goose, pheasant, rabbit, pork, chicken), certain vegetables (boletus mushrooms, palm hearts), and some fresh fish (tuna). meat cooked en daube is braisedin red wine stock well seasoned with herbs; the name is thought to come from the Spanish dobar(to braise). The word daube alone generally means a joint of beef braised in wine: popular served cold in several southern provinces of France.

However, the daube I got was the cheek which had been rolled, spiced and cooked in red wine. But I should have checked the definition. My food ignorance got the best of me. Going to be doing full time training as a chef next year so hopefully my knowledge will go way up.

The Sweeper

Chef training sounds good - come back and share all your tips with us while you're doing it.

ClassicDisaster

Well, ive edited the chapter one post. i think its much better now.

catho_monster

MADJ
Your talk makes me hungry...

Minder

ClassicDisaster wrote: »

Well, ive edited the chapter one post. i think its much better now.

Feedback on your edited Chapter One entry. Watch your grammer and word use - spell check is useless here, the spelling is correct, but the usage is incorrect.

Use capitals for brands - so para 1, tiger should start Tiger
Paragraph 1, second last line : Seamed should read seemed

Paragraph 2 : Without the light, fluffy mousse it would have probably been too strong.

Paragraph 3 : Ii didn’t try the pudding but the lentils were great.

Paragraph 4 : The daube was a slow cooked cow’s cheek cooked slowly in spiced red wine

Paragraph 5 : not too salty homemade croquet potatoes came with our mains.

Paragraph 6 : The huge portion sizes (plus that pre-starter) meant a bit of a debate over dessert

Paragraph 7 : I defiantly had one of the best meals of my life there and couldn’t recommend it more. Should read I definitely.........

Last Paragraph : This “sixteen year, overnight success” defiantly deserves its star, possibly even a second. Again should read definitely.....

ClassicDisaster

yea...my grammer is terrible please forgive me.

The Sweeper

Hey that's all right. I thought I had good English skillz when I started working in the writing business, but getting a head to toe battering from a bunch of editors on a near-daily basis certainly kicks your perception of your abilities into shape.

Write into MS Word before you post into your blog, and use the grammar check tool - it won't catch all of it, but it'll catch some of it.

Still, it's a good thing that on your revised Chapter One review the second round of feedback is about things like grammar and spelling, and not things like 'This review tells me nothing'.

Minder

OP - Well done on the blog, it's a very brave step to ask for opinion on a broad forum like boards - all crticism is constructive and should not be taken personally.

One small point on the content - I notice in other restaurant reviews that the reviewer will often describe a selection of meals from the menu before describing in detail their own choice - not an exhaustive regurgitation of the entire menu, just a sample of what was on offer.

Keep at it:D

ClassicDisaster

Ok.. good advice. im going to write a review or patrick guillbaud, irelands only two star when i get home from england on monday... although my time is eaten up a fair bit by the leaving cert:(