From the hottest new home entertainment systems to the coolest pocket-sized gadgets, we look at what’s hip and hot.
Everyone loves a gadget or two. To keep your life and home up-to-date this season, get your hands on some of these top audio gadgets and systems.
There are plenty of corporate hospitality arenas across the UK, but where do the top business giants take their clients for a day of corporate wooing and what makes these places stand out from the crowd? We find out which venues have the greatest wow factor and what they offer to make a day out of the office something really special.
Cheltenham RacecourseCheltenham racecourse is best known for the National Hunt festival, a four-day event that is held in March each year. It includes races such as the Cheltenham Gold Cup and Champion Hurdle. The picturesque setting, a natural amphitheatre in the Cotswolds, helps to create an incredible atmosphere, and make it a special day out for both hosts and guests.
Cheltenham’s entertainment facilities are extensive and wide-ranging – choose from an array of restaurants, boxes and chalets to entertain up to 200 people according to taste, budget and party size.
The Panoramic restaurant is the place to be as the views are second to none and guests can enjoy top nosh, table service and totepool betting while watching important races. Other eateries include the Horseshoe Pavilion, Moscow Flyer, Istabraq and Champion’s Drive restaurants as well as the fabulous Final Fence restaurant, with a great view of horses jumping the last fence.
Private boxes, for groups of ten, 14 or 18 people, are available, as well as the grand glass-fronted boxes which give excellent views of the action, plus access to the paddock and betting ring. These boxes accommodate 40 people for luncheon or 50 for a buffet.
Celebrities to look out for: Royal rider Zara Philips and potential future royal, Kate Middleton.
Cost: Expect to pay around £399 plus VAT per person for a glass-fronted box. A hospitality marquee in the Tented Village will cost from £299 plus VAT per person.
Contact: 01242 537653 or vist the website at www.cheltenham.co.uk
WimbledonWhen it comes to international tennis, our very own Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Championships are regarded as the most prestigious in the world. So it’s only natural that if you aim to impress, you will want to take your most esteemed clients to SW19.
A typical Wimbledon hospitality package will include official tickets to the prized Centre Court or No.1 Court matches and access to plush temperature-controlled marquees which feature both dining and lounge areas. You can also look forward to musical entertainment throughout the day, a champagne, Pimm’s, bucks fizz and canapés reception, a fully complimentary bar, including champagne and a four-course à la carte luncheon served with wines and liqueurs. And, of course,Wimbledon wouldn’t be Wimbledon without strawberries and cream.
There were 36 marquees and suites in 2007, but less than 8% of all Centre and No.1 Court seats during the fortnight are used for hospitality, making them even more exclusive.
If you intend to entertain a large group, private chalets are available for parties of 30 plus.
Celebrities to look out for: Former 007, Pierce Brosnan (whose presence allegedly inspired French underdog Marion Bartoli to spectacularly turn around a semi-final she was losing against Justine Henin); Hollywood superstar, Jack Nicholson and, of course, the irrepressible Sir Cliff Richard…
Cost: For a highly prized Centre Court ticket for day one of the Championships, expect to pay around £900 plus VAT per person. For the luxury of a seat at the men’s singles final, you’re looking at a cool £2,450 plus VAT per person.
Contact: 020 8944 1066 or visit the website at www.wimbledon.org
Royal AscotClosed down in 2004 for a staggering £185m refurbishment, Ascot Racecourse was reopened by Queen Elizabeth in June 2006. The four-day event known as Royal Ascot which takes place at the racecourse is the biggest in the racing calendar, and a place where horses rub shoulders with British royalty, rich sheiks, business tycoons and, of course, A-list celebs.
As you would expect from such a world-famous name, when it comes to hospitality packages, you will be spoilt for choice.
You can opt to entertain in one of the fine dining restaurants, which include the Pavilion restaurant, Windsor Forest restaurant and the Old Paddock restaurant. As a guide, dining packages invariably include tea, coffee and biscuits on arrival, a champagne reception, four-course luncheon, fine wines, full afternoon tea, a complimentary bar throughout the day, and totepool betting facility and racecard.
Alternatively, you could really push the boat out and plump for one of the 263 luxury private boxes all with stunning views across the racecourse. Some are positioned close to the track past the winning post with a ‘head-on’ view, while others are situated before the winning post so that the horses race past you to the finish. Each box has a private dining room with large flat-screen television, a balcony overlooking the track, a bar and a private kitchen shared with the adjoining box. Dedicated serving staff are on hand all day.
Cost: Varies enormously according to what level of hospitality you want. Be prepared to fork out £4,500 for a single box on level 2, for Royal Ascot on 21 June 2008. A double box on level 5 for the same day would set you back a cool £18,000. Restaurant packages cost around £180 per person.
Celebrities to look out for: The Royal Family are always out in force, and keep your eyes peeled for the likes of rocker Rod Stewart and his model wife Penny Lancaster, and British footballer-turned-actor Vinnie Jones.
Contact: 0870 727 4321 or visit the website at www.ascot.co.uk
Chelsea Football Club
Cowes Week
HATS OFF TO YOURACING WITH STYLE
Although the dress code for racing events today is not as strict as it was in Queen Anne’s era, there are still a few rules worth remembering
1 Cape Town South Africa
Why?
It’s got miles of beaches and awesome surf. Plus, there’s only a two-hour time difference from the UK so you won’t have jet lag after the 12-hour flight.
How do I get there?
Fly with British Airways, South African Airways, Virgin Atlantic, Lufthansa or KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.
What’s unmissable?
Take a half-hour boat journey to Robben Island museum, where Nelson Mandela spent 18 years in prison (www.robben-island.org.za).
What else?
Let a cable car whisk you 1,000m up to the top of Table Mountain for panoramic views of Devil’s Peak and Lion’s head. Or venture out of Cape Town for whale-spotting and wine-tasting.
Where should I stay?
There’s accommodation to suit all tastes, whether you’re after a hip boutique hotel in the thick of things or a secluded mansion house in the outskirts.
Where’s good to eat?
Blues Restaurant is a must for seafood fans, and has jaw-dropping views of Camps Bay at sunset, (www.blues.co.za).
2 Marrakech Morocco
Why?
The hippy haven of the late 60s still has the power to draw the in-crowd. Medina, Marrakech’s old city, is a true sense-stirrer – noisy, colourful and deliciously dusty.
How do I get there?
Fly with British Airways, Royal Air Maroc and Air France.
What’s unmissable?
Shopping, shopping and more shopping. The many souks, or traditional markets, are famously diverse. Bag yourself a carpet, local pottery, a beautiful lantern or some Moroccan slippers – all that’s needed is some haggling skills.
What else?
Crowd into Jemaa el-Fna, the main clearing in the city. Gawp at snake-charmers, pick up a herbal cure for an ailment or even have a tooth removed!
Where should I stay?
It’s vital to have a cool, calm escape from the hustle and bustle. The city boasts at least 500 riads – grand houses with interior gardens – and many have now been transformed into chic boutique hotels.
Where’s good to eat?
In the mood for a blowout? Le Tobsil offers countless courses of succulent meats, vegetables and salads, and a dazzling setting in a riad courtyard, (22 Derb Moulay Abdellah Ben Hessaien, Bab Ksour, 00 212 44 44 4052).
3 Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Why?
It’s the fastest growing city in the world, and also the playground of the Middle East. Lose yourself in its glitzy shopping malls, catch some rays on the beaches or marvel at the incredible buildings. Some say Dubai is soulless, but you can’t help falling in love with the glamour.
How do I get there?
Fly with Emirates or British Airways.
What’s unmissable?
As a break from retail therapy, fasten your seatbelt for some ‘dune bashing’ in an organized four-wheel-drive sand safari, (www.alphatoursdubai.com).
What else?
Dubai is home to the largest indoor ski slope in the world. Environmentalists might not be happy, but there’s no denying it’s impressive – the manufactured snow is housed in a building 25 floors high, (www.skidubai.com).
Where should I stay?
Kissing the clouds at an impressive 321m in height, the sail-shaped Burj Al Arab is the world’s tallest hotel. If you’re not a guest, you can still take afternoon tea in the Skyview bar, suspended over the sea, or gawp at its underwater restaurant, (www.burj-al-arab.com).
Where’s good to eat?
Bateau Dubai, a luxury cruise liner, lays on fine food and live music, (www.bateauxdubai.com).
4 Bali, Indonesia
Why?
Terrorist bombings in 2002 and 2005 dented Bali’s appeal for a while, but holidaymakers are returning. It’s a true island paradise, but its abundant Hindu temples and shrines also lend it a deeply spiritual side.
How do I get there?
Fly with Singapore Airlines or Qantas.
What’s unmissable?
Head south of Bali’s capital, Denpasar, for the best beaches. Another ten minutes from there is Sanur, where you can watch the sun rise. And don’t miss the stunning temple, just a short distance from the water’s edge.
What else?
Bali’s interior is a volcanic area lush in vegetation and dazzling floral displays. Creative types should make a trip to Ubud, packed with art galleries, craft shops and little cafes.
Where should I stay?
There’s a large concentration of five-star resorts around Denpasar. Luckily, building laws decree that buildings can’t be higher than a coconut tree, so tourism hasn’t left such a damaging mark on this beautiful island as on many others.
Where’s good to eat?
For something a little different, try one of the warungs, outdoor restaurants, found all over the island. In Jimbaran, see your white snapper, tuna, crab, lobster or prawns cooked over coconut shells in oil drums and eat it by the sea while the waves lap your feet.
5 Maldives, Indian Ocean
Why?
The Maldives consists of 26 atolls, or low coral islands. From the air they look like a string of pearls flung into the ocean. The area was hit hard by the 2004 tsunami, but has bounced back quickly. Could that have anything to do with the gleaming white beaches, turquoise lagoons and palm trees?
How do I get there?
Fly with Emirates, Sri Lankan Airlines or Qatar Airways to Male airport, then catch a seaplane to your island.
What’s unmissable?
The Maldives boasts such stunning marine life and coral reefs, scuba-diving is like swimming in a giant aquarium. Most islands have their own diving centres. But if you’re not a water baby, you can still get some of the effect – just stand ankle-high in the water and scores of tiny, colourful fish will flock to kiss your feet.
What else?
Once you land on your own Maldivian island, you probably won’t want to move. Many islands have their own luxury beach-side spas where you can be massaged to the sound of waves lapping the beach. Mostly though, it’s all about doing nothing.
Where should I stay?
Reethi Rah, with its children’s club, is perfect for families. But prizes for the best beach go to the honeymooning paradise of Soneva Fushi – where there’s a no-shoe policy – for a complete switch off.
Where’s good to eat?
Most holiday-makers come to the Maldives on an all-inclusive package, which means that you can eat (and maybe drink) as much as you like in the resorts’ restaurants. The only foods native to the Maldives are tuna and coconut, so everything else has to be imported. But expect lots of seafood.
6 Prague, Czech Republic
Why?
Picture narrow cobbled streets and gothic spires – a heady fairytale skyline – and you’ve got the bohemian city of Prague. Since the communist government was overthrown during the 1989 Velvet Revolution, the city has opened itself up to the world.
How do I get there?
Fly to Prague with British Airways, Lufthansa, Czech Airlines and Easyjet.
What’s unmissable?
Charles Bridge, which crosses the Vltava river and links the old town with Mala Strana, is a sight to behold – and probably the city’s most familiar view. It’s decorated with 30 baroque statues, and was built around 1700. During the day, street artists and stall-holders base themselves here, but at night it’s the place to go for a picture postcard view of spotlit Prague in all its glory.
What else?
For a time check with a difference, visit the Astromonical Clock in the Old Town Square. On the hour from 8am to 8pm it delivers an intricate display of gold medieval
saints and zodiac signs in statuette form.
Where should I stay?
There’s been a lot of building work since 1989, and now Prague boasts luxury 5-star hotels, country houses and castles as well as budget accommodation. Aim
to stay in the Old Town to be closest to all the attractions.
Where’s good to eat?
Prague couldn’t be called a diet haven, as pork, dumplings and sauerkraut are Czech staples. At one of Prague’s most traditional pubs, U Medvidku, order the dish with half-litres of Pilsner or flavoured vodka. The best bit? It’s popular with locals so it must be good, (Na Perstyne 7, Praha 1, www.umedvidku.cz).
8 Majorca Balearic Islands
Why?
Majorca (also known as Mallorca) may have had a chic makeover in recent years – Catherine Zeta-Jones, Claudia Schiffer and Boris Becker are all said to own homes there – but its main draw is still its dazzling sandy beaches and magnificent mountains.
How do I get there?
Fly with British Airways, Easyjet, Ryanair and Iberia.
What’s unmissable?
Take the white-knuckle drive from Port de Pollenca to Majorca’s north east tip, Cap de Formentor, for some dramatic scenery. Opened in 1929, Hotel Formentor is the island’s original deluxe hotel, and these days its beach is open to all.
What else?
History buffs will love the walled city of Alcudia, a restored Roman settlement, where you can visit the remains of Roman houses and even a tiny amphitheatre. If you’re
here on Sunday and Tuesday mornings, enjoy haggling for fresh produce and local goods at
the bustling street market.
Where should I stay?
On the north east side of the island, lies the old fishing village Port de Pollenca, full of pensions (family-owned guesthouses), villas and hotels. Evenings see people taking a stroll or ‘paseo’ up and down the tree-lined walkway on the edge of the beach. As it’s
a sheltered horseshoe-shaped bay, it’s ideal for families.
Where’s good to eat?
For something a little special try Mallorquin dishes at Refectori, the restaurant of the hotel Convent De La Missio in Palma, (www.conventdelamissio.com).
9 Cuba Caribbean
Why?
The Caribbean island of Cuba is famous for its cigars, music and the faded colonial architecture of its capital, Havana. Now’s a good time to visit before its unique character is destroyed. It’s been stuck in a time warp since Fidel Castro became Prime Minister in 1959, but will soon be changing.
How do I get there?
Captivating Cuba holidays offer some of the best beaches in the Caribbean, the enduring Salsa pulse and of course the most sought-after cigars in the world, (www.captivatingcuba.com or call 0870 887 0123).
What’s unmissable?
Without a doubt, Havana. Like stepping back in time, it’s a fine example of Spanish Colonial architecture. Explore the churches of Old Havana and marvel
at the mansions of Catedral, Vieja and Armas. You’ll hear music everywhere, too – especially the rumba.
What else?
Santiago de Cuba in Eastern Cuba is the second most important city after Havana. Don’t miss the Santa Basílica Metropolitana Iglesia Catedral, said to be the most important architectural monument of the area. It’s flanked by statues of Christopher Columbus and its interior is richly decorated.
Where should I stay?
If you’re after a relaxing beach holiday, Cuba has numerous all-inclusive resorts. But these might leave you feeling in a bit of a ‘bubble’ as you don’t get to mix with locals. Others might prefer more authentic accommodation.
Where’s good to eat?
Before 1995, all restaurants in Cuba were owned by the state. Now though, paladares have sprung up – private houses with a license to serve food. Paladares tend to be quite transient – word of mouth is always the best way to find a good one.
10 Vancouver Canada
They’re the gold standard of travel – often described as the world’s top resorts and hotels. Their unparalleled mix of prestige and opulence attracts world leaders and A-list celebrities alike, and guarantee to make you feel like a million dollars – which is the sort of money you’ll need when splashing out on one of these five-star experiences.
1 BellagioLavish in décor and mammoth in scale, pure Vegas meets real luxury here. And with its own botanical gardens, fine art collection and musical fountain show on offer, the Bellagio has all bases covered. The many attractions of Las Vegas are on the doorstep, and the hotel is also only 10 minutes from the airport.
The 3,000-plus classically styled rooms boast up-to-the-minute facilities, while rustic artefacts and candle-packed bathrooms designed for soaking add a sense of true romance. Take a minute or more to marvel at the gob-smacking backdrops of the Vegas Strip, as well as the surrounding mountains and sparkling Lake Bellagio.
Musical theatre, six citrus-fringed pools, a European patisserie, themed gardens, a spa, salon and fitness centre, plus seven fine dining restaurants and the uber-cool Light nightclub make for a jam-packed stay.
Prices start at around £80 per night for a deluxe double room.
Visit www.bellagio.com
2 Burj Al Arab For a time the Burj Al Arab was marketed as ‘the world’s first seven-star hotel’. At a staggering 321m, it is the tallest building used exclusively as a hotel. The hotel stands on an artificial island 280m from the well-known and popular Jumeirah beach, and is connected to the mainland by a private bridge. A truly iconic structure, it has come to symbolise Dubai’s urban transformation.
A major feature of the Burj Al Arab is its atrium lobby – the tallest in the world, of course – which dominates the interior of the hotel, taking up over one-third of the available floor-space. While the exterior of the Burj Al Arab uses sleek, ultra-modern sculptural design, the interior combines the lavish and luxurious architectural styles of both the east and the west. The hotel boasts an incredible 8,000 square metres of 22-carat gold leaf, as well as 24,000 square metres of 30 different types of marble.
Despite its colossal size, the Burj Al Arab has only 28 double-storey floors, which together accommodate 202 bedroom suites. It is one of the most expensive hotels in the world. Suites can easily cost over £7,000 depending on the room’s level of opulence; the Royal Suite is the most expensive, at a whopping £13,325 per night.
One of the hotel’s many incredible restaurants – accessible only by panoramic elevator – is located 200m above the Persian Gulf, offering unbeatable views across Dubai. Another restaurant, the Al Mahara, is accessed via a simulated submarine voyage and is home to a large seawater aquarium. The tank is even made of acrylic glass in order to reduce the magnification effect. It really has to be seen to be believed!
Prices start from around £972 per night for a deluxe king suite.
Visit www.burj-al-arab.com
3 Mandarin OrientalSoon after opening its doors in September 1963, the Mandarin Oriental in Hong Kong became known as one of the most prestigious hotels in the world.
The hotel’s Mandarin Oriental spa offers traditional Chinese medicinal treatments and has spectacular 24th-floor views of the city and harbour. In the gym, instructors are on hand to show you how to use the state-of-the-art Kinesis equipment – a new way to increase strength, stamina and suppleness using a floating pulley system. There is also a cool spiral staircase leading up to a unique herb-infused steam room, and a beautifully calming water-pebble walk of enlightenment.
The hotel has several excellent restaurants, whose army of talented chefs conjure up superbly crafted fusion food. The 25th-floor restaurant, Pierre, boasts a dining experience that is as breathtaking as its views. And the Mandarin Cake Shop has been delighting customers since it opened over 25 years ago. As well as delicious homemade chocolate items, it sells a range of savoury foods such as quiche, sandwiches and salads, as well as French pastries, cakes and bread. It remains a popular shopping location at all times of the day. Signature items include Mandarin Oriental's cheesecake, chocolate truffle cake, homemade XO sauce (spicy seafood sauce) and rose petal jam – an internationally revered recipe. The Mandarin Oriental has 502 rooms and suites, each of which has a marble bathroom with handy anti-mist mirrors. Almost all rooms have their own private balconies, complete with a pair of binoculars, to allow guests access to the spectacular views across Victoria Harbour and the breathtaking Hong Kong cityscape.
Prices start from £429 per night for a deluxe suite with harbour views.
Visit www.mandarinoriental.com
A collection of luxury safari lodges spread across two game reserves famed for their wealth of natural wildlife, the incredibly stylish and utterly distinctive Singita properties
are beacons of sophisticated design in the African wilderness.
The beautifully appointed Boulders Lodge is set in the Sabi Sands, while Lembobo and Sweni Lodges look out over the Kruger National Park. Both reserves boast private airstrips and many onsite activities – from spa and gym facilities to swimming pools and a library.
The legendary morning and evening game drives and guided bush walks give a unique opportunity for guests to see local wildlife up close and in the flesh.
Stunning Boulders Lodge uses natural materials such as thatch, stone and leather to create a calming atmosphere, while Lembobo Lodge’s cliffside lofts marry glass, water, steel and timber with unrivalled panoramic views. Meanwhile, diminutive Sweni offers dark wood, flashes of colour and deep tranquillity.
Prices start from £550 per person per night, all-inclusive.
Visit www.singita.com
5 Chedi MuscatLocated in the heart of Oman and flanked by azure ocean waters, the Chedi Muscat pampers its guests with a selection of modern rooms and private villas offering access to two turquoise pools, a water-garden, lush poolside cabanas and a private stretch of beach.
Designed in the style of traditional Omani architecture and offering breathtaking views of the gulf of Oman and the mountain ranges of Muscat, the Chedi provides all the services you’d expect from a top quality hotel.
The Serai superior rooms are housed in the 4-story Serai wing. Rooms are designed to make maximum use of natural light and all have either a view of the Indian Ocean or the majestic mountain of Muscat. Sixty deluxe rooms are scattered amongst the one- and two-storey Chedi Wing, designed to create a feeling of elegant sophistication. Sitting furthest away from the lobby are the 36 Chedi Club Suites. Each one consists of a sitting room area, bedroom and bathroom with either a balcony or patio where you can sit and enjoy views over the Indian Ocean or the mountains of Muscat.
Prices start from £924 per person for a double room on a bed and breakfast basis for seven nights (including flights)
Visit www.onlyexclusivetravel.com
6 Santa CaterinaItaly’s shoreline reaches its chic peak around Amalfi, a stretch that combines history, glamour and natural beauty like nowhere else in Europe. The queen of the coast is the Santa Caterina, the hotel where Brad and Angelina were first spotted canoodling during the filming of Mr and Mrs Smith.
The location is spectacular – perched high above the Gulf of Salerno, with lifts down to the beach and a gorgeous saltwater pool.
The grand 70-room pile, which has been owned and run by the same family since it was built in the 1880s, is the epitome of simple good taste – hand-painted floor tiles, swathes of beautiful bougainvillea, spacious and elegant rooms, impeccable service and indisputably top-notch food.
Prices start at around £160 per night for a standard double room with sea views.
Visit www.hotelsantacaterina.it
7 Banyan TreeBanyan Tree Bangkok is an all-suite hotel in the heart of Bangkok. There are 216 exquisitely furnished suites, each with a spectacular view of the city or the historical Chao Phraya River. When it comes to dining, guests can choose from several different restaurants including the Vertigo Grill and Moon Bar, situated on the rooftop of the hotel, and offering a panoramic and breathtaking view of the city. Indulge in barbecued seafood, champagne and a wide selection of cocktails and wines. The Moon Bar is an al fresco bar offering a stunning venue for any occasion while Japanese restaurant Taihei features chic mini stations for sushi, yakitori and teppanyaki preparation. Lacquered finishes and atmospheric mood lighting make dining in this bistro an elegant event. Bangkok’s largest garden spa is serenely located on the 19th and 20th levels. Live entertainment in the evenings makes the Lobby Lounge a favourite nightspot. All 16 indoor spa rooms offer everything from traditional massages to pampering hair treatments.
Prices start at £260 per night including all taxes.
Visit www.banyantree.com
8 Killarney Park HotelThe five-star Killarney Park Hotel is wonderfully situated in the picturesque town of Killarney, Co Kerry. Situated beneath leafy trees on its own private grounds, the hotel consists of 68 spacious bedrooms. The ultimate in luxury accommodation, its classically designed suites feature a private entrance hall, lounge area, large marbled bathroom, a workstation and spacious bedroom, and provide an exceptional space for business, entertaining and relaxing. The Killarney Park Hotel has a wide range of dining options, from classic afternoon tea in the elegant Residents Lounge to a daytime menu in the casual garden Bar. The garden Bar menu offers snacks, lunch and supper options all day, and has the latest cocktails and a wide range of wines on offer. The award-winning Park Restaurant is one of Kerry’s most notable restaurants, specialising in traditional cuisine with a contemporary twist. The Ross Suite is the perfect venue for receptions, meetings or even private dining because it can seat up to 40 people. The Spa at the Killarney Park Hotel includes eight private treatment suites, a specially designed relaxation room, hydrotherapy suite and a caldarium, and features Eve Lom and Elemis treatments. It is Ireland’s only member of The Leading Spas of the World. The hotel is also in a premier location for golf lovers – they can access the finest golf clubs, links and championship courses in the South-West of Ireland.
Prices start from around £192 per night for a deluxe room.
Visit www.killarneyparkhotel.ie
Udaipur is arguably the most attractive city in India, and certainly the most romantic. Every other lane or alleyway turns up another fine palace or haveli (ornate merchant’s house) in creamy white marble, reflecting the still waters of lovely Lake Pichola. At the centre of it all is the Taj Lake Palace hotel, a 250-year-old confection that seems to float miraculously in the middle of the water – postcard-perfect, especially by moonlight. The hotel has 83 air-conditioned rooms including 17 suites. All rooms overlook the lily pond or the terrace and offer all manner of modern facilities.
As for dining, Jharokha is an informal 24-hour restaurant and coffee shop facing the lake and the city palace. You’ll also find guests at the Amrit Sagar, a bar that has been decorated with intricate glass mosaic work on the walls and ceiling and also has an enviable selection of vintage wines, spirits and cigars.
Prices start at around £242 per night for a luxury room with a garden view.
Visit www.tajhotels.com
What makes a restaurant great? Some of us can forgive ordinary food if the atmosphere is exceptional enough, while others of us will happily put up with surly service if every mouthful is palate-perfect. And what about shifting trends – with crazes like regionalism, new expectations such as local sourcing and buzzwords like ‘fusion’ floating around, can a restaurant that hasn’t changed its menu in 20 years be truthfully described as great? Not forgetting personal taste – no matter how gushing the reviews, or how long the waiting list for a table, the world’s finest Indian restaurant will never appeal to someone who starts to sweat at the mention of curry, and the hip new seafood joint that everyone’s raving about will only inspire dread in those who can’t stomach fish.
And therein lies the answer. Perhaps universal gastronomical greatness cannot exist – it’s a matter of taste. With this in mind we’ve compiled a list of restaurants that excel in service, ambience and their particular cuisine, many of which feature in San Pellegrino’s World’s 50 Best Restaurants. And we guarantee that no matter how unique your palate or how specific your restaurant requirements, you’ll find one here that you’ll genuinely believe is great.
3 of the best celebrity chef's restaurants
1 THE FAT DUCK
Heston Blumenthal
Heston Blumenthal’s restaurant came second in The San Pellegrino World’s 50 Best Restaurants 2007 survey. There is something about the combination of ingredients – calculated to turn every guest into one big erogenous zone.
Blumenthal’s food (his roast scallop with chocolate, his best end of lamb with sweetbread and oyster, his smoky bacon ice cream whipped up in a bowl of liquid nitrogen), is so creative and entertaining that eating here evokes emotions in us that we never knew we had.
High Street, Bray, Berkshire, SL6 2AQ, England 01628 580333; www.fatduck.co.uk
‘This is food of extreme flavours, textures and temperatures. Nothing you put in your mouth is what you think it is going to be. The combinations are not the attention-seeking, phoney sophistication of international fine dining, but intensely thought-out, lonely-hearts ingredients’ AA Gill
2 FIFTEEN
Jamie Oliver
The West Country is host to Jamie Oliver’s charitable restaurant foundation with a spectacularly beautiful setting overlooking Watergate Bay near Newquay. It’s the perfect place to be when the weather’s rubbish, with a glass of ruby red and a plate of delicious antipast as the waves lash the beach into total submission.
On The Beach, Watergate Bay, Cornwall; 01637 861000; www.fifteencornwall.co.uk
3 RESTAURANT GORDON RAMSAY
Gordon Ramsay
Never one to rest on his laurels, Gordon Ramsay closed his flagship restaurant for an extensive refurbishment in summer 2006 and it has emerged with a contemporary feel. The food – and the prices – have moved on, too. Ramsay is rarely at the stove these days, but head chef is clearly producing dishes that push the boundaries of classical cooking.
Feast on roasted scallops served on discs of octopus carpaccio. Long-term fans who insist the ‘stunning food’ traditionally served here has ‘never been bettered’ will no doubt be pleased to find that many favourites, including the much-loved ravioli of lobster, langoustine and salmon, are still on the menu. A great wine list adds to your dining experience.
68-69 Royal Hospital Road, SW3 4HP; 020 7352 4441; www.gordonramsay.com/royalhospitalroad
1 CAFE MAITREYA
Winner of the UK’s top vegetarian restaurant 2007 in the Observer Food Awards, Café Maitreya is famed for its edgy approach to vegetarian cooking. Dishes are rich in contrasts and vibrant in flavour – think wild mushroom, hazelnut and butternut brioche with wild mushroom stroganoff and sloe jelly – all served in a relaxed and unshowy setting. Maitreya pride themselves on using only local ethical suppliers and organic, seasonal ingredients.
89 St Mark’s Road, Easton, Bristol; 0117 951 0100; www.cafemaitreya.co.uk
2 THE RIVERSIDE VEGETARIA
Established in 1989 The Riverside Vegetaria’s been a favourite among London’s vegetarians for years. Serving a specialised selection of vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free and wheat-free dishes, the menu still manages to be exciting and the food itself exquisite – try the Caribbean Casserole or Tofu Teriyaki. Overlooking the Thames in Kingston, the setting is idyllic and in fine weather the glass doors are thrown open for al fresco dining on the banks of the river.
64 High street, Kingston, KT1 1HN; 020 8546 7992; www.rsveg.plus.com
3 222 VEGGIE VEGAN RESTAURANTS
Only opened in 2004, 222 has already established itself as one of the capital’s top veggie restaurants. Situated in West Kensington, the simple décor and excellent service make for a relaxed atmosphere. And the food, crafted by Ghanaian-born head chef Ben Asamani, is top-notch. The restaurant’s signature dish, 222 Gardens, combines Afro-Caribbean style plantain and okra with Middle Eastern falafel, oriental-style soy-marinated aubergines and Mediterranean-style tomato sauce – delicious.
222 North End Road, W14 9NU; 020 7381 2322; www.222veggievegan.com
1 CHUTNEY MARY
Established in 1990, Chutney Mary has long been regarded as one of the finest and most fashionable Indian restaurants in the UK, with a slew of awards and accolades to prove it. The restaurant was among the first ventures of the Panjabi sisters, who also run Amaya and Masala Zone, and the kitchen now specialises in modern Indian cuisine. There’s an emphasis on seafood such as Chutney Mary’s own take on the crab dishes that are all the rage in Bombay restaurants. Located in the heart of Chelsea, the atmosphere’s perfect for parties and quiet dinners alike. Service is impeccable, and the wine list is fabulous too.
535 Kings Road, Chelsea, SW10 0SZ; 0871 223 8071; www.realindianfood.com
2 THE RED FORT
Famed for its décor as much as its menu, the Red Fort is a glorious mix of traditional and modern design – a haven of sandstone walls, mosaic floors and antique artifacts. The food itself is superb – expect dishes such as exquisite regional biryianis, packed full of flavour with delicate perfume and vibrant colours – the legacy of The Red Fort’s former head chef Mohammed Rais, the direct inheritor of a 300-year-old culinary tradition of Mughal court cooking.
77 Dean St, Soho, W1D3SH; 020 7437 2525; www.redfort.co.uk
3 AKBAR’S
Opened in summer 2006, the Manchester site of this much-hyped, award-winning group of curry houses has lived up to expectations. The food is high quality, the atmosphere vibrant and the service superb. Akbar’s specialises in sizzling pan-cooked baltis from Baltistan, an extreme mountainous region North of Pakistan – and it’s the exciting menu that gives the chain its reputation as one of the best Indian restaurants in the North of England.
73-83 Liverpool Road, Manchester; 0161 834 8444; www.akbars.co.uk
1 THE IVY
The reputation of The Ivy as a gastronomic incarnation of OK magazine, fuelled by its opaque, stained-glass windows and infamously impossible-to-book tables, often overshadows what’s really great about it – the food. Dishes that span continents and cultures are prepared with seasonal ingredients and stunningly presented. Whether you fancy shepherd’s pie or sashimi, the execution is faultless and the service outstanding. And yes, the chances are you probably will spot an A-lister or two.
1-5 West Street, WC2H 9NQ; 020 7836 4751; www.the-ivy.co.uk
2 NOBU
Uber-stylish modern Japanese restaurant, Nobu, is located on the first floor of the Metropolitan Hotel, Park Lane, and tends to attract swathes of home-grown and visiting Hollywood celebrities. The décor is fashionably minimalist and the atmosphere chic but welcoming. The predominantly Japanese cuisine draws on Latin American influences to produce some incredibly unique and exciting fusion dishes – think yellowtail sashimi with jalapeno – each one an intense combination of flavours, colours and textures.
19 Old Park Lane, W1K !LB; 020 7447 4747; www.noburestaurants.com
3 LEMONIA
Uber-stylish modern Japanese restaurant, Nobu, is located on the first floor of the Metropolitan Hotel, Park Lane, and tends to attract swathes of home-grown and visiting Hollywood celebrities. Décor is fashionably minimalist and the atmosphere chic but welcoming. The predominantly Japanese cuisine draws on Latin American influences to produce some unique and exciting fusion dishes – think yellowtail sashimi with jalapeno – each one an intense combination of flavours, colours and textures.
19 Old Park Lane, W1K 1LB; 020 7447 4747; www.noburestaurants.com
1 NOMA
Set in a restored harbourside warehouse, Noma’s whitewashed walls, exposed beams, pale wood floor and leather chairs draped in animal hides is the height of Nordic cool. So, too, is the cooking from rising gastronomic force René Redzepi, who applies modern techniques to seasonal Nordic produce in dishes such as musk ox, grilled leek ashes and milk-skin which you slice with a reindeer-handled Saami blade.
Strandgade 93, Copenhagen K, Denmark; +45 3296 3297; www.noma.dk
2 LES AMBASSADEURS
This is a sexy place to eat or stay, and Jean-Francois Piège’s food is a real treat, particularly his crazy reconstructions of dishes such as spaghetti carbonara or rice pudding – nothing like you might expect but delicious none the less. The dining room is all gold candelabras and marble walls but is nowhere near as hushed as it initially appears. For those lucky enough to stay over, Sunday brunch is a truly decadent affair.
10 Place de la Concorde, Paris; 33(0)1 44 711616; www.lesambassadeurs.com
3 EL BULLI
Voted San Pellegrino’s best restaurant in the world an unprecedented three times, El Bulli is rarely out of the press. Head chef Fernando Adria Acosta, recognised by chefs all over the world as a true culinary genius, has been described as ‘an eccentric scientist with an artistic bent’, the result of his experiments as ‘21st-century tapas’. Idylically situated in Roses, on the Costa Brava, two hours north of Barcelona, El Bulli is only open from April to September. For the rest of the year, its chefs are holed up in their laboratory in Barcelona devising new recipes. Exotic, eclectic and exciting – new dishes this year include pan-fried brioche shanghai and pita of Iberian ham fat and veal bone marrow.
Aparado 30, 17480 Roses en Cala Montjol, Spain; +34 97215 045; www.elbulli.com
4 L’ATELIER
The Parisian outpost of what has since become a global brand, with branches now in London, Las Vegas, New York and Tokyo, is where the legendary Joël Robuchon’s comeback started to gather momentum. It’s hard not to be seduced by its small-plate menu, low-lit red-black bento-box-like interior and chic clientele.
5-7 rue de Montalembert, Paris, +33 (0)1 42 22 56 56; www.robuchon.com
5 WAKIYA
This is the restaurant Alan Yau should have opened for famed hotelier, Ian Schrager. Yet with the project all but finished, Yau pulled out leaving behind this opulent dining room and bar in the Gramercy Park Hotel. Now it’s managed by the team from Nobu with Japanese chef Yuji Wakiya’s take on regional Chinese cooking.
Lexington Avenue, New York; 001 212 920 3300; www.gramercyparkhotel.com
6 LE QUARTIER FRANCAIS
Located in the heart of the Cape Winelands, amidst the Franschhoek Mountains, the setting of Le Quartier Francais is nothing short of spectacular. And the food, created by executive chef Margot Janse, is more than a match for the surroundings. Fresh and exciting combinations of quality local ingredients are lightly prepared and accompanied by a fine, all-South African wine list. Wild game from warthog to wildebeest is always on the menu.
16 Hugenot road, Franschoek, Western Cape, South Africa; +27 21 876 2151; www.lequartier.co.za
7 LOUIS XV
Raymond Blanc, chef patron of the Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons, says, ‘This is one of the most amazing places I’ve ever visited! It’s so over the top, but absolutely beautiful and it has the most amazing ambience. Staff all dress in black tie, yet the welcome is warm and personal. Dishes reflect local flavours and the menu reflects the seasons with themes including the vegetable garden and the sea.’
Place du Casino, Monaco, +377 98 06 88 64; www.alain-ducasse.com
8 SARASTRO
The Mediterranean cuisine with a Turkish slant is top-drawer but it’s the unique ambience for which Sarastro is famed. Often referred to as the show-after-the-show, you might be lucky enough to catch a turn from stars of the nearby Royal Opera house. Individually styled opera boxes line the restaurant, and velvet drapes abound, all adding to the ‘backstage-at-the-Opera-House atmosphere.
126 Drury Lane, WC2B 5QG; 020 7836 0101; www.sarastro-restaurant.com
9 TETSUYA’S
The best restaurant in Australia is guarded behind swish embassy-style gates, has a dining room that opens onto a serene Japanese garden of bonsai and water features and a menu from chef Tetsuya Wakuda that’s a 14-course seafood-rich journey.
529 Kent Street, Sydney NSW 2000, Australia; +61 2 9267 2900; www.tetsuyas.com
10 LE CALANDRE
Head chef Massimiliano Alajmo has created a truly world-class restaurant, with experimental cuisine that draws heavily on its regional roots. Dishes include squid ink cappuccino and suckling pig with mustard and coffee powder, and the wine list is superb.
Le Calandre, Via Liguria 1, 35030 Padua, Italy; +39 04 96 30303; www.calandre.com
Mad in Japan Tokyo
On the face of it, the Japanese are very like us. We are both island nations, about the same size, both mongrel populations with constitutional monarchies; it rains a lot, they drink tea, we drink tea. We’re both obscurely addicted to odd sports (cricket, sumo), both had empires, are bellicose, mistrustful of foreigners, and are passionate gardeners. Neither of us are particularly good-looking, we are both repressed, both suffer a class system, drive on the left, and only in Britain or Japan is having a stiff upper lip explicable as a compliment. But that’s just on the face of it. Underneath, we’re chalk and tofu.
You don’t have to go to Japan to have an inkling that the Japanese are not as the rest of us are. In fact, they’re decidedly weird. If you take the conventional gamut of human possibility as running, say, from Canadians to Brazilians, after ten minutes in the land of the rising sun, you realise the Japs are off the map, out of the game, on another planet. It’s not that they’re aliens, but they are the people that aliens might be if they’d learnt Human by correspondence course and wanted to slip in unnoticed. It’s the little things, like the food. They make the most elegant, delicate food in the world and then make it in plastic for every restaurant window. Only a Japanese person could see a plate of propylene curry and say: ‘Yum, I’ll have that.’
And the loos. Heated loo seats are slightly worrying the first time you encounter them, but after that they’re a comfy idea; and there are buttons for jets of variable power, warm water, one for back bottom, one for front, with pictures to tell you which is which and hot air to help you drip-dry. All of which is strangely addictive and makes you question your sexual orientation, or at least wish for diarrhoea.
But it’s not that which gets the canary of weird coughing, it’s the lavatory paper: it’s like rice paper. They have 21st-century bogs and 13th-century bog roll. Your bum’s clean enough to eat sushi off, but you need to scrub your fingernails with a boot scraper. This is a country where the men pee in the street but it’s the height of bad manners to blow your nose, and they wear woolly gloves on their feet.
Kyoto has the most famous rock garden in the world: the ultimate Zen experience, 15 stones set in raked white gravel. You’re supposed to sit and ponder. Nobody knows who made it or why, but it’s deeply aesthetic, and fundamentally risible. Look, I’m sorry, but this is the emperor’s new garden, an impractical joke. It’s medieval builders’ rubbish. Oh, but then, silly me, of course I don’t understand. I’m constantly being patronised for my coarse sensibilities and told that naturally I couldn’t comprehend the subtlety, the aesthetic bat-squeak of Japanese culture.
No country hides itself behind the paper screen of cultural elitism like Japan, which, considering they’ve bought their entire civilisation from other people’s hand-me-downs, is a bit of a liberty. When it comes to Japanese civilisation, it’s mostly eyewash. Kabuki theatre is only just preferable to amateur root-canal work. The three-stringed guitar is a sad waste of a cat. Japanese flower-arranging is just arranging flowers. Their architecture is Chinese, as are their clothes, chopsticks, writing etc. The samurai were thugs in frocks with stupid haircuts, and haiku poems are limericks that don’t make you laugh. Indeed, they are so aesthetically difficult, one haiku master managed to compose only 23,000 in 24 hours, including gems like: ‘The ancient pond, A pond leaps, The sound of the water.’ Marvellous.
And then there are the geishas. In Kyoto’s wooden old town hundreds of Japanese tourists loiter, cameras at the ready. Nothing happens in Japan unless it happens at 400 ASA. Kyoto has seven million tourists a year, 90 per cent of them indigenous. It’s a pleasure to see that even at home they travel in gawky, bovine groups. They’re waiting for a glimpse of a geisha slipping into a teahouse. There used to be 200,000 geishas in Kyoto; now there are fewer than 200. They hobble out of their limousines, bowing in all their pristine extravagant absurdity. Geishas are trained to devote their lives to rich, drunk men.
Only the very, very rich can afford geishas. The salarymen dream of them. The trainee geishas, the backs of whose heads are dressed to represent vaginas, clip-clop down the road, their smiling white faces making their teeth look like little cherry stones. A geisha’s raison d’etre is to pour drinks, giggle behind her hand, tell men they are handsome, strong and amusing, listen to boastful lies, and never show any emotion except bliss. Occasionally, for a great deal of cash, some will allow men to copulate with them. We, of course, have geishas back in Blighty: we call them barmaids.
Haven’t you always wondered about the brown signs on motorways, wondered and been a little curious? They plague me, fill the small, sleepless hours with visions, they niggle. What are they? Who decides on them? What lies beyond them?
The green, blue and white signs are all written with a direct, Anglo-emphatic common sense. Travellers’ health warnings and timely topographic explanations. But the brown signs are oblique, runic, frankly weird. What, for instance, is Owl and Otter World? Or the American Adventure, in Derbyshire, or Butterfly World, or the mysterious Billings Aquadrome? They’re like the goblins’ and sprites’ incantations in fairy stories, tempting you to turn from the familiar mortal straight lines into some windy, wooded enchantment. They seem totally at odds with the know-it-all instructions of the modern mall, black-and-white tarmac world, like the guesses and rumours on medieval maps that explain the gaps: ‘Here be dragons’, ‘a land of blue men with two heads’, ‘monsters and giants’, ‘fountains of eternal youth’. They flash past as we humdrum up the road to some pedestrian destination, and we think: ‘Better not, not this time.’
I’ve always yearned to visit every brown sign on the M1. One day I’d do it, and then one day I did. In search of the brown signs of Middle England, I needed a car fit for an adventure. Just standing still, the AC Cobra fair takes your breath away. It’s every boy’s image of the perfect sports car. But it has one glaring design fault, one terrible oversight, or rather way too much oversight: there’s no roof. Not even anywhere to put a roof.
Having got the car, I needed a driver, and the promise of being able to belt on the Cobra brought Jeremy Clarkson panting.
The M1 ought to start with a triumphal arch. In practice, it sort of sidles out of Brent Cross shopping centre. I’ve always considered that its real beginning is the Scratchwood service station, now Blairishly renamed London Gateway. It’s here that you feel you’re leaving behind the safety of the city, all that is comforting, familiar and, well, just civilised. Ahead of you stretches Oop North in progressive shades of ee-by-gum intensity. Jeremy took off with a squeal and a great roar of exhaust. Then we got into the car, which, being red with two white stripes, in a fit of Arthur Ransome whimsy I’d named the Rasher. Under a blissfully sunny sky, with the wind playing croquet with our sinuses, we motored up the lads’ land of the M1.
The first brown sign wasn’t far off: Whipsnade. Not much of a surprise there.
I suppose I must have been to Whipsnade before during some desperate half-term, but I have no memory of the place. It returned with a torpor of amnesiac familiarity. Whipsnade was the first of the ‘I can’t believe it isn’t a zoo’ zoos. It’s meant to be a new habitat, somewhere between the interesting high security of a real zoo and the tagged freedom of the Serengeti. The great endangered stand in miserable huddles in the middle of off-season rugby pitches. Rarity is not necessarily concomitantly interesting. Relieved of the need to avoid predators, little bands of animals have not another single thing in their heads, and stand imbecilely chewing gum, staring at postponed extinction. A drab gene museum, their only purpose and excitement is the annual 30-second legover. Sancho Clarkson is as bored as a desert oryx.
The Rasher sped on. Gulliver’s Land was the next sign. I asked the lady in the kiosk for two adult tickets and she said: ‘Where are your children?’ Choosing to believe this was Midlands warmth rather than insufferable nosiness, I told her: ‘In the south of France, actually.’ ‘Don’t you have any children with you?’ ‘No, do I need some?’ ‘Everybody else does.’ ‘Well, can I rent any?’ ‘You want to come in without a child?’ Preferably, yes, I’ve already got him. Her eyes wandered over to Jeremy, then to her lap, where I expect there was a cut-out-and-keep News of the World I-spy monsters page. ‘I expect it’s okay, but there’s nothing in there for you.’
And there wasn’t. Gulliver’s Land is the sort of place I’d imagined disappeared with teddy boys and the Pathé News. The sort of can’t-complain, jolly decrepit Portakabin and cupboard funfair with rides that anywhere else in the post-moonwalk world would have been mechanised. There was a misshapen sculpture in the middle of the kingdom just before you got to the MDF fantasy castle.
I think it was meant to be Gulliver. Michelangelo’s David it wasn’t. Billings Aquadrome. I had no idea places like this existed. Actually, there can’t be another place like this, a trailer park set around some flooded gravel pits. There are pubs, shops, roads, a couple of funfairs. It’s a holiday park perched on the edge of the motorway. Traffic hisses just the other side of the trees. But here in the meadows is a perfect working-class getaway.
I don’t mean that snidely. But Billings is, unselfconsciously, tabloid fun. Aesthetically nude. Unencumbered by improving good taste or Tate Modernish, Domish sensibilities. It’s a little spot of England where Channel 4, The Guardian, Alessi orange squeezers, ciabatta and the Booker short list don’t exist. Its denizens, who have paid up to £20,000 for a hut, are all from the north. This is as far south as most of them want to get. It’s Catherine Cookson without the cobbles and smoke and abortions. Here all the doors are open and it’s safe for the kiddies. Men stand and chat on the communal lawns, handing out beer cans, watching their crop-haired sons juggle footballs. Men and boys are dressed identically in bright polyester football shirts and tracksuit bottoms. The only things that distinguish the generations are the beer guts and tattoos of the mature adult.
It was with great reluctance that I left Billings. I was truly envious of this comfy, ugly Elysian field. As we scraped over the kiddie-friendly traffic humps, past the pedalo swans, it struck me in a sadly typically smart-arsed, brittley intellectual, cosmopolitan way that this was far more like one of Swift’s kingdoms than anything I’d seen. And I would dearly love to be unshackled from my bookish heritage and have the culture, freedom and nerve to join in.
THE BUTCHER & GRILL **
39-41 Parkgate Road, Battersea, SW11; 020 7924 3999
Lunch, Mon-Sat, 12-3pm, Sun, 12-4pm; dinner, Mon-Sat, 6pm-11pm
‘I have become an economic refugee in the land of anecdotage. A place of steepled fingers, clip-on microphones and decanters of dusty water sipped as a self-regarding libation to allow the audience a moment to titter politely at some over-sucked Werther’s Unoriginal apercu. Have you noticed that the unshaggable wonks on University Challenge always self-toast after they get a question right? Performers on podiums do the same thing.
‘This has been my week of literary festivals. I had no idea so many places had hardback aspirations. Even Wimbledon has a literary festival, for Dickens’ sake. I wouldn’t have had Wimbledon down for owning a Waterstone’s. Book festivals are a strange Lewis Carroll-ish idea. Why would you want to hear a writer talk? It’s like paying seven quid to hear a footballer sing. And the good thing about books is that they are self-explanatory. If it needs extra instruction, then it’s not a very good book. I have a theory: reality is the new virtual, live the smart download, everyone’s going back on the road. Led Zeppelin, the Dalai Lama and me. Doing it face-to-face.
‘Somewhere along the way, I asked an audience how many of them were actually reading a book at the moment. Less than a quarter raised a hand. Festivals aren’t for people who are interested in reading; they’re for people who are interested in writers. So, as I progress around the small stages and Eames chairs of trite observations and limp giggles, I come across the same names carved into the furniture of green rooms. I seem to find myself following Simon Sebag Montefiore, who, so flirtatious, squirming ladies tell me, goes down a treat.
‘There’s obviously an intolerant interest in Stalinism among the dormitory suburbs. Then there’s Roy Hattersley, Ian Hislop and Howard Jacobson, who seem to appear with prune-like regularity. We are pop-up book raconteurs, perhaps not the premier cru of authors, the fictive equivalents of easy listening in the park.
‘Personally, I like to think of myself as the spoken Peter Sarstedt, peddling a medley of my infuriatingly unforgettable hits. We are reinventing the roving troubadour. The books are incidental; we’re better as live acts. It has an ancient heritage: Homer was the Bob Dylan of his day; Dickens was as famous for his performances as his part-works.
‘In Guildford, I was interviewed by a nice chap who was a latenight live phone-in DJ on LBC, whose demeanour spoke of unrequited Samaritanism. He had a stalker who waited outside to pass on a suspicious plastic bag. “She phones up a lot,” he said, as he emptied the contents: a triangle of gorgonzola, cheese biscuits and a family pack of chocolate KitKats.
‘He rolled his eyes in an, “Oh, the things we have to endure” celebrity sort of way, carefully repacked the bag and 4put it under his chair. This is why literary festivals are never going to be the new rock’n’roll. The stalkers don’t want to have your love child, or carve a pentagram into your chest because if they read your last page backwards it would be an incantation to the devil. They just want to do your shopping. And then there’s the signing. Books are bought not to be read, but to be given.
‘“Would you make it out to Tony? He’s my son-in-law.” There is the bat-squeak inference that Tony is an uneducated oik, who spends too much time down the pub and could do with a book to keep him at home.
‘Students get them, too, though why someone who already has a reading list longer than the Yellow Pages would want a collection of Sabbath journalism is beyond me. I suppose worried parents can’t give undergraduates the same things that everyone else gives them: crabs, chlamydia, cold sores and skunk-induced psychosis. People ask for odd things to be inscribed; surprising numbers ask for something rude, so I sign “Kate Moss”. The strangest was a large and sensually explicit woman, who demanded I write: “You were fantastic last night.” What an intimate gift, I thought, and wrote: “You were fantastic last night.” Signed: AA Gill.
Her friend looked over her shoulder and muttered, “You always get them to write that.” “Yeah,” she replied enigmatically. And I imagined the bookcase at home, groaning with handwritten jiggy quotes from Sebag Montefiore, Hattersley and Jacobson, the trophies of a grand fictional groupie. I wanted to write a review from the literary festival at Woodstock, so quietly exclusive that even the people of Woodstock don’t know it’s happening.
‘Woodstock is another slum of filthy Cotswold aspiration, a huddle of genteelly doffing genuflection at the gates of Blenheim, itself the most depressing aristo loony bin in Britain. There are two places to eat in Woodstock: The Bear and The Feathers.
‘The supremely unhelpful waitress at The Bear stood in the pristinely empty dining room at 1.15pm and said they couldn’t possibly serve two of us for at least half an hour, probably longer.
‘The Feathers wasn’t allowing anybody into its dining room either, but it offered us the Bistro, an inglenook that smelt like a Turkish farting contest with apparently, but understandably, nobody working in it at all. So I bought a pork pie at a butcher’s which was excellent, though waiting to be served by the staff, who outnumbered the customers, took longer than turning your own vitals into chipolatas. ‘So instead, I’m back in London, reviewing the Butcher & Grill, a butcher’s in Battersea that also grills. It’s a good idea.
At the butcher’s, you can pick your meat and they will cook it, and you can eat it in a warehouse of a room with uncomfortable furniture while you look at paintings of meat. Why paintings of meat? Who can tell?
‘Probably for the same impulse that yacht-owners always have pictures of boats on the walls of their yachts. ‘I’ve been told this is the place with the best burger in London.
‘Hamburgers, like pizza, bloody marys and fellatio, are things that incite fierce argument about technique, authenticity and heresy. In fact, they’re all just simple constructions. The trick with burgers is not to make them posh, expensive or large. They are supposed to be cheap, hand-held mince sandwiches. The further they get from their motorway origins, the worse they are. The Blonde said her 8oz, £10.50 bacon-and-cheese burger was perfect. A perfectly perfect bacon cheeseburger. I thought mine needed a touch more fat, and that the nozzle of the mincer was too fine, but essentially, it’s a good burger, a burger worth a detour, if you’re the sort of person who makes detours for burgers.
‘And that would all be fine, and The Butcher & Grill would get a head-patting review, if the waiter who gave me the bill with the 12.5% service charge hadn’t also told me that it was used to make up the staff wages. Of all the things I talk about at literary rock concerts, the only riff that always gets a round of applause is my rant about the mean-spirited, inhospitable and underhand practice of using tips to augment lousy wages.
‘And I’m not going to give up writing about it. So, by all means, get a burger, but leave cash for the staff.’
For most people, the enjoyment is enough; pleasure doesn’t need explaining. If you ask why they liked the play, the soup, the view, they’ll probably use all-encompassing, evocative words of emotion or volume – it was ‘great’, ‘terrific’, ‘amazing’, ‘good’, ‘very good’. Press them, and more than likely they’ll describe what they’ve seen, done, eaten.
‘There was this sensational ballet/novel/lap dancer – it was fantastic’. Analysing why something was moving or entertaining or funny, or wasn’t, doesn’t improve it. In fact, dissecting things might actually break the spell, tarnish the experience.
There is something odd, something obsessive, something a touch neurotic about wanting to be a critic, wanting to pull the legs off delicate bits of fun. It certainly isn’t part of cultured life. I don’t think critics feel things more intensely or on another level.
Their knowledge and experience, if they have any, doesn’t necessarily make them more sensitive to the all-round enjoyment of a sausage than anyone else is. Indeed, many of us critics look like we enjoy life only occasionally and then grudgingly. But being able to organise, distil, articulate and parse a sausage in the context of aesthetics, taste, morality, history, anthropology and fashion, whilst remembering it is still just a sausage, does give me a separate, academic, rather drily smug satisfaction.
Never have thought like that
Criticism doesn’t improve your experience of culture – but good assertive, stringent criticism does prevent creativity and craft sinking to their levels of least public resistance and to sycophantic pleasantries.
And the review itself may be entertaining and provoking. Criticism at its best elicits a response of ‘that’s what I think, but I’d never have thought it like that’. The strongest parts of the culture are those that hate their critics the most. Critics criticise so that everybody else can get on with enjoying themselves. We are civilisation’s traffic wardens.
Over the decade and a bit that I’ve been doing it, the Table Talk column in The Sunday Times has evolved into being more or less about restaurants and food. It’s also more or less about whatever has settled on my retina that week.
Questions answered
Here are answers to some of the questions that I’ve been asked over the years.
I always book under a false name, but I never wear a disguise. Getting into a wig or costume and talking in a funny voice to eat dinner is weird and way too self-obsessed. It’s the sort of thing they do in America. Yes, sometimes I am recognised and the first thing that happens is that everything gets worse. Particularly the service.
I always pay – always. There is no such thing as having a free lunch. I never eat with restaurant PRs, or go to restaurants on the advice or recommendation of press releases. The choice is capricious and random.
Sometimes I choose, sometimes my editor – mostly the Blonde chooses. I don’t have a favourite restaurant, and I don’t have secret restaurants that I don’t write about.
And no, not anyone could do it. Reviewing isn’t sophisticated or complicated or particularly onerous, but most people who think they can review find that they can’t. Expertise isn’t necessarily a help; it can make you talk down to your readers and distances you from their experience.
But over the years you do acquire it – I now know a lot about food. Except cheese, which like grammar, I simply cannot retain a single piece of useful information about. I’ve also worked in kitchens as a cook, a dishwasher, a waiter and a maitre d’. And I can cook. The problem and the skill is not actually in the food or in having an eye for décor, an ear for the staff or a nose for the wine list (which I rarely mention, because I don’t drink). It’s in the language.
English, which is so gloriously verbose about so much of life’s gay tapestry, is summarily tongue-tied when it comes to describing food and eating. The reasons are partially cultural. It has never been considered polite to talk about food, partly out of necessity, as there hasn’t ever been much food that you could be polite about. Food and talking about food was something the French did. It’s often pointed out that while the words for farm animals are Anglo-Saxon, their names when they’re cooked are Norman – pork for swine, beef for cattle, mutton for sheep – distinguishing who actually did the herding and who did the eating.
But then, many of the words that we do have are swaggered in a Pooterish bourgeois snobbery. I can’t write ‘moist’ or ‘succulent’ or ‘luxuriant’ without shivering. Writing about food and the sensation of eating can be as nauseating to read as watching someone eat with their mouth open. So you have to pick your way through the verbiage with care and imagination. You do need to be pretty omnivorous – I’ve always said that I’d eat anything anyone else ate, as long as it didn’t involve a bet, a dare or an initiation ceremony. I’m often asked what the most disgusting thing I’ve ever eaten is. Buried shark in Iceland, jewel beetles in the Kalahari, fertilised duck eggs in Vietnam, seal blubber with the Eskimos in Greenland and warm blood with the Masai in Tanzania all pale into wholesome yumminess compared with the fast food available on every high street after 11 o’clock at night, or the chilled, dehydrated and microwaved amuse-bouches lurking in petrol stations.
Why and how we eat
My particular interest in dinner really only begins with the food. I’m constantly fascinated by why and how we eat. The movement of ingredients, the history, anthropology, mythology, manners and rituals of food. Dinner is a defining human occasion. We are the only species that ever existed that offers hospitality.
Is my opinion worth any more than anyone else’s on the bus? With a modest blush, I must say yes. It’s also worth more than that of most chefs and restauranteurs – I’m a professional, this is what I do; they’re big men, but they’re out of condition. Do I ever get bored, blasé, bilious? No, hand on heart, I’m always excited about dinner. I still get that frisson with a new menu. Do I ever eat or order badly on purpose, look for awful food to make good copy? Of course not; despite what most of you think, it’s actually no easier to write a bad review than a good one; it’s just that you prefer reading the bad ones.
Finally, people often say, ‘Seeing as you know so much, why don’t you open a restaurant?’ And I always think of Brendan Behan’s famous quote about us. ‘Critics are like eunuchs in a harem – they know how it’s done, they’ve seen it done every day, but they’re unable to do it themselves.’ Like so much of Behan’s work, that’s smart but not quite right. Critics may well be like eunuchs in a harem who know how it’s done, having seen it done every day, they just don’t fancy having it done to them.
STARBUCKS
Have you ever been to a Starbucks? (God, I’m beginning to sound like those judges who say: ‘Pray, what is a Rolling Stone? And could you enlighten the court on the exact nature of a T-shirt?’) Of course you’ve been to Starbucks. Starbucks is your second living room. The question I should have asked is: Why?
I’m not a habitué of these West Coast coffee shops. Not for any snobbish reason – just because I like coffee. An American café sounds like the punch line to one of those jokes in which the Germans end up the lovers, the Italians the soldiers, the French the marriage counsellors and the Greeks the cooks, architects or hairdressers – in fact, anything at all. I can’t think of a single thing I’d trust a Greek to do professionally, except make Turkish coffee. (That should get the postman’s hernia pulsating.) Asking Americans to make coffee is like asking them to draw a map of the world.
‘Okay, so this is your house, that’s Disneyland, and what’s this squiggle over here? Right, that’s everywhere else.’
American coffee is only coffee because they say it is. It’s actually a pale, scalding infusion of junior-school jam-jar brush water. Americans who drink one a week imagine they’re in the grip of a vicious caffeine frenzy that prohibits them from signing legal documents, operating heavy machinery and adopting children, but, oddly, helps if they want to plea bargain a murder – or bomb developing countries. It’s not a drink for grown-ups.
Anyway, I did go to a Starbucks recently. And I’m still reeling. I can’t remember the last time I was served something as foul as its version of a cappuccino. I say ‘version’, but that’s a bit like saying Dot Cotton’s a version of Audrey Hepburn.
To begin with, it took longer to make than a soufflé. I was the only customer, and asked the girl for a cappuccino. There followed an interrogation that would have impressed an SS Scientologist. What size did I want? Did I need anything in it? Was I hungry? By the time she’d finished, I felt like sobbing. ‘You’ve found Tom, and Dick’s under the stove in D Hut, but I’ll never give away Harry – he’s got Dickie Attenborough up him.’
Suspiciously, she passed the order, written in Serbian, to another girl standing all of three inches away, who, in turn, slowly morphed into Marie Curie and did something very dangerous and complicated behind a counter, with a lot of sighing and brow-furrowing. An hour and a half later, I was presented with a mug. A mug. One of those American mugs where the lip is so thick, you have to be an American or able to disengage your jaw like a python to fit it in your mouth. It contained a semi-permeable white mousse – the sort of stuff they use to drown teenagers in Ibiza, or pump into cavity walls. I dumped in two spoonfuls of sugar. It rejected them. Having beaten the malevolent epidermis with the collection of plastic and wooden things provided, I managed to make it sink. Then, using both hands, I took a sip. Then a gulp. Then chewed.
I had the momentary sense of drowning in a snowman’s poo, then, after a long moment, a tepid sludge rose from the deep. This was reminiscent of gravy browning and three-year-old Easter eggs.
How can anyone sell this stuff? How can anyone buy this twice? And this was only a small one – just a baby. The adult version must be like sucking the outlet of a nuclear power station.
I slumped into a seat. There was a pamphlet about fair trade, and how Starbucks paid some Nicaraguan Sancho a reasonable amount for his coffee so that he now had a mule to go with his thirteen children, leaky roof and fifteen coffee bushes. It made not screwing the little no-hope wetback into penury sound like the most astonishing act of charitable benevolence. And they just had to print a pamphlet about it, so we all know the sort of selfless, munificent, group-hug people we’re dealing with.
I’ve just looked up the origin of cappuccino. I always imagined it was nineteenth-century Italian. Actually, it appears first in 1683, just after the relief of Vienna from the Ottomans.
The retreating Turks left behind sacks of coffee, and an enterprising double agent, Franz Georg Kolschitzky, opened the first European coffee shop (disputed with Caffe Florian, in Venice). It was not a success until he added milk, honey and cinnamon. The cappuccino was born.
He needed something to go with it, so he got his neighbour, the baker Peter Wendler, to turn his excellent butter buns into Turkish symbols. Ta-ra! The croissant.
All that history, all Sancho’s effort, and it ends up as Starbucks. Oh, the pity and the shame. The name, by the way, comes from Capuchin monks, who had white habits. Interestingly, they also donated their name to a monkey, simply by adding a syllable.
What attracted you to journalism and what still excites you about it?
I couldn’t do anything else! My father (the BBC television producer Michael Gill) started his career as a print journalist on The Scotsman and he always said he wanted me to become a journalist. But I came to it very late. I see work experience people now who don’t need to shave yet, but I was nearly 40 when I started.
Before that, I spent a long time working as an artist but I wasn’t very good at it. I started to write by default when I was asked to interview an artist for an arts magazine. I told them I was dyslexic and I’d never written anything for publication before, but they said it didn’t matter because no-one read the magazine anyway. I wrote 600 words and was told I could write for them again.
What doesn’t excite me about journalism? I have eight or nine newspapers spread out on my table now – I read them every day. I have always read the papers. I used to buy The Guardian when I was in my early 20s, and I remember reading Jilly Cooper’s weekly column in The Sunday Times at around that time, too. Even then, though, I thought that being a columnist was what I’d like to do.
How did you become a food critic?
Before I started writing for the arts magazine, when I was unemployed and poor, I taught myself how to cook. I was married and we’d just had my baby daughter Flora (now 17). My wife was a banker and was bringing in the income, so I stayed at home and looked after the baby.
One evening, a friend came round to eat with her fiancé, and she was fuming. Her future mother-in-law had told her she was going to send her on a cordon bleu cookery course in Paris, so she would be able to cook for her son in the way he was accustomed to. I told them to take the money, go to Paris and blow the whole lot. And then never invite his mother to lunch. But my wife suggested that I taught our friend to cook.
So I ran a 10-week course from my home, and it grew from there. Friends, mainly men, kept asking if they could come along. But I would always have one woman on the course among five or six men, because otherwise there would be competitive flicking of egg yolk. With a woman present, they all behaved very well. I loved it.
It just so happened that one of the men I taught worked for Tatler and he asked me to write an article. On the strength of that piece, the editor called me in and offered me a job interviewing celebrities for the magazine. It was a big job, but at the time I didn’t want to ask celebrities what they had in their knicker drawer, so I turned it down. I suggested to the editor that I could write a recipe column instead, as the magazine didn’t have one. She was completely taken aback that I had turned down her job offer, but said I could write six columns and see how it went.
From that point, I also started writing for other publications. But it was Jo, my editor at Tatler, who gave me the best piece of advice of my career and did more than anyone to make me a journalist. She told me there were hundreds of writers who were cleverer and more knowledgeable than me, but very few people who could write funny; and that nothing is better remembered than something that makes you laugh. That, she told me, was my niche.
I don’t have much of a sense of humour and I hate being told jokes, but writing funny copy is a trick and is about as honest. I know how it works – it’s a series of pulling levers and pushing buttons.
Who are you writing for when you write your columns?
I try not to think about who I am writing for. Imagining a mass of people turning up every week to read what you have written is very centurion, very Mussolini-like. I write for my editor, or the person who is going to read it first. I have a very close relationship with all the people who edit my copy – good editing is vital for a journalist.
What qualities make a restaurant stand out above all others?
There is only one quality that matters, and it should be tattooed on the forehead of every restaurant owner – hospitality. If you go to a restaurant you want to be made to feel welcome. It’s the first thing that comes up if you ask anyone what they want from a restaurant, and often the last thing that is considered by the owners. Making people feel welcome is what keeps a restaurant in business.
Do you think your critical opinion can be biased by what sort of mood you’re in, for example if you have an argument with someone before you sit down to eat?
I rarely have arguments because I hate confrontation. People think I’m an argumentative person because of my column, but I’m neither funny nor argumentative.
But I get the full range of emotions like everyone else and they always affect what I do, I wouldn’t be human otherwise.
What might happen when I’m reviewing is how much notice I take of what’s going on – some days it might be more than others. It’s usually the waiters you take notice of, and there are moments when you are more forgiving. But I’m careful what I write about waiters. Early on in my career, I wrote that a waiter had terrible body odour, which is an unforgivable sin (as much as wearing strong perfume). The owner wrote to me saying he was terribly sorry and that he’d fired the waiter. I was properly upset. The owner just hadn’t got the point: that he was obviously not paying the waiter enough and was making him work too many hours so he didn’t have time to have a shower and put on a clean shirt.
Another time I wrote a bad review of a restaurant run by a very well known chef, who I won’t name. He phoned me, which was a very big thing for him to do, and said he was angry about the review. But he’d been through every point I’d made and agreed I was absolutely right. So he’d fired the whole kitchen!
I do have a bugbear about the treatment of waiters. Most restaurants in this country use the service charge to make up waiters’ wages, so they can pay them less than the minimum wage. It’s immoral. This only happens in the catering industry.
I really mind that. Eating in a restaurant is so expensive. And in some restaurants people are serving you a main course which costs more than they earn all day. It is seriously distasteful that waiters cannot afford to eat the food they are serving.
You said in an interview that the rhythm of sentences is the key to great writing.
Yes, I do think it’s the secret of good writing is the rhythm. Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Rudyard Kipling all wrote with terrific rhythm. And in a much more subtle way PG Wodehouse, whose writing is marvellous, like jazz free-form. And I have no idea how he does it. It is brilliant. Writing has no backstage, there is nothing up your sleeve or CHI. It’s just a page of black dots.
Do you think having to dictate your work to copytakers, rather than writing it down, helps you achieve your ‘voice’, because you can hear spoken word?
Yes, because I have time to edit. I write slowly and then I phone it through to copytakers, so I can then hear if the sentence is working or if it sounds clunky. The copytakers are based in Leeds and they’re used to taking sports reports rather than long pieces like mine. I ask them if they understand what I have just said and they say: ‘No dear, I rarely know what you’re talking about,’ and then I’ll cut it out. Writing needs a strong voice.
Printed words are like Knorr dried soup – add brain and it rehydrates, so you have to give it a voice. That’s what good writing is. I do overwrite though and I’m too showy – I read pieces back and I ask, what was I was doing, that was an adjective too far!
How do you go about writing your columns?
I tend to talk my columns through before I write them. When I write travel pieces I talk about them a lot and make people listen to my anecdotes. I can judge instantly when I’m losing my audience and I realise that it’s too long or isn’t working. I always talk it out because writing is telling stories and I see writing as an extension of talking.
If you could live your life again what would you do differently?
I would not have been an alcoholic. I would not want to go through that again, as I only got out of it by the skin of my teeth.
A number of people I know did not make it into their 30s and 40s. I sat with a friend recently and we went through people we knew and there were a terrific number who had died through drink and drugs, or related incidents.
My addiction started in my school days and progressed very quickly. But unquestionably, going on that journey led me to what I do today. I get well paid to watch television and eat in restaurants and hopefully without sounding smug, give forth my opinions. I have a lot of words that are mine and no-one tells me what to write. In a free, pluralistic society, that is the greatest privilege.
I would prefer not to have dyslexia, as I was miserable at school and felt inadequate.
My boy (Alisdair, who is 14), is dyslexic in the same way as I am. And the way his school is treating him is not unlike how I was treated at my school. I ask him how they are helping and he tells me they are giving him extra writing. That’s like giving someone with a broken leg extra high jumping. Schools put such high opinion and value on grammar and spelling, and it’s the last place in the world that cares unless you are a sonographer or solicitor perhaps. Because of my dyslexia I spoke more at school and the basis of writing is about sound and speech.
Have you any career regrets?
I am sorry that my career in art did not work out. I loved drawing more than anything. From the moment I could pick up a pencil it was all I wanted to do. I had just enough skill to keep me going at a time when, maybe, I should have stopped.
The year I was teaching my friends to cook, I was drawing and writing and it was the writing that was economically more profitable. There were many more people who were willing to pay for writers at the time. I don’t draw any more, apart from doodling. Once you have done it professionally, you can’t do it as an amateur just for fun.
I used to teach drawing so I might do that again.
What do you think of the Harry Potter phenomenon – do you think it’s good as it has got children loving reading again?
If you like reading, then that’s a good thing, but it is not vitamins for the head – if you don’t read you are not going to get mental rickets. I read Swallows And 4 Amazons when I was a child and it was the first book I had read that didn’t have pictures. Since then, there has never been a moment in my life when I’m not reading a book.
But if my kids never read I don’t mind, it’s up to them. Novels used to be thought of like television is now – that it rots the brain and is the stuff for maids.
The idea that books are everything is a very Victorian hangover. My kids loved Harry Potter and I am pleased for them. Reading all the Harry Potter books was actually one of the high points of my daughter Flora’s life, so in that way it is a good thing.
You said that your favourite journalism assignments are when you were sent abroad covering serious stories. Why don’t you do that more often?
I do it as often as I can, but because I write a weekly column it’s difficult to juggle the time off. The column is my bread and butter, but I write about the surface and it’s important for me to step back from that.
In style journalism, it’s easy to think that all our lives are led behind red ropes surrounded by PRs with clipboards. And you start having a weird view of what the world is about.
Travelling means you’re getting a perspective on whole life. The real purpose of travel is to see where you have come from, not where you are going to.
What is your proudest career moment?
When I was first offered a contract by The Sunday Times.
I liked the managing editor there a lot – he was very protective of me. He was an old-fashioned Fleet Street journo, and he had kids like me. He said I would fit in at the paper and he liked my writing.
Then he wrote a figure on a piece of paper and said it was what they were offering as my salary. I knew I was supposed to negotiate, but my immediate reaction was to say, fine.
However, I said it wasn’t enough. So, he asked me how much I wanted. I told him that I wanted to earn more than my dad. He held his hand to his heart and said: ‘Sons, they can be so cruel.’ He asked me how much my dad earned and offered me £10,000 more.
Then he pushed the phone over to me and said tell your Dad now. My Dad answered, and I told him that I had been offered a contract with The Sunday Times and that I was going to be paid more than him.
I could tell he was pleased and proud. But without drawing breath he said: ‘Absolutely. I was earning more than my father at your age!’
What have you seen at the theatre recently that you thought was exceptional?
Shadowlands, [the true love story of the writer CS Lewis with Charles Dance in the lead role, and currently on-stage at Wyndham’s Theatre, in London’s West End]. I thought it would be an old play that should be doing the provincial rep round. But there’s a lot of stuff going around about God and discussions about religion at the moment, so the subject matter was right on the money.
The performances were simply unfaultable and compelling, with the whole thing working together to make one great performance.
What is your favourite European city?
If I couldn’t choose London one place (with much terrible gnashing of teeth) would have to be Rome. It’s the perfect place to visit.
I remember walking through the streets on a spring day and there was this amazing light which made it look heavenly, and I said to my friend, ‘Who is a Roman, why doesn’t everyone live here?’ He replied that it took him six months to get a telephone connected and not even the Pope could get broadband installed within a week. Nothing works in Rome.
What is the biggest social faux pas for a man to make?
There are a number of things that men do that they think are deeply attractive or masculine, but are just relentlessly hideous.
Wife-beater T-shirts is one.
But the worst is boorishness – masculine, loud bullying that does not stop and only being interested in humiliating someone else.
Boors dominate at a table and talk over everyone. No amount of telling them that what they are doing is social halitosis will work, because they will say I was right. It is very common.
Which holiday destination is the most overrated?
The Maldives. There are 2000 slung islands of which only 200 are inhabited. It is a Muslim country but no-one thinks of it as anything other than a holiday resort, so all things you should be careful and polite about a Muslim country, like covering yourself up, are ignored. People don’t care and I find that unpleasant.
Everything you eat is flown in so it’s rootless, frozen food. There is nothing to do except get towed by boats and have sex.
And it’s full of honeymoon couples who are unbelievably gloomy because they’ve spent 18 months being the centre of attention, and their whole relationship has been based on getting the wedding organised. There’s been an enormous build-up and they’ve spent all their money and their parents’ money. Then they’ve spent 12 hours in airports and 15 hours in aeroplanes, then dumped on an island. The depression is titanic.
Where do you have your suits made?
They’re tailor-made by a woman from Savile Row.
What do you think is the greatest invention?
My bicycle – I use it all the time. I simply adore it. I first discovered cycling at school and bought a bike for my son. Then when he went to boarding school I started to ride it. And then I had to get a better one!
What do you think of reality television?
Reality television is a big title and it can hold a lot in it. Jamie’s School Dinners was the best use of television for years and was brilliant.
And there have lots of ways the format has been used that have been inventive. Seven Up!, [a documentary following a group of seven year olds] which started in the 60s, is reality television, too. Telling reality is the thing that television can do so well and film finds difficult. You see documentaries at the cinema and the medium is too big – it just looks like big cinema life.
But programmes like ‘I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here’ and Big Brother (England is one the last places to still be showing this) are ghastly. They are exploitative, cruel and sycophantic to a certain sliver of the audience at the expense of the rest. They suck up to kids aged between 13 and 20 in a brain-dead, lame and exploitative way. Television gets an idea and flogs it to death and goes on flogging it until it falls to bits and smells. One format will lead to imitations, which expend the magic and then they move onto the next thing.
The grandaddy of these programmes was That’s Life, presented by Esther Rantzen. It was part consumer affairs and the big sell was the ‘ahhh’ factor. There were nice things like children running marathons wearing callipers and it had a family feel. But people got fed up with doing that so turned it around and reality television became about being horrid and seeking out weird, dysfunctional people to exploit. When Big Brother started it was about finding a couple who would have sex on camera, but then the producers realised they couldn’t show that anyway so they found people who couldn’t have sex because they had someone else’s penis sown on!
But saying that, there’s never been so much great television as now, and it’s mainly coming from the US. It used to be that only bad television came from there, but now they have produced some fantastically good programmes like Friends, The Sopranos, Six Feet Under and Grey’s Anatomy, which are all brilliant.
Britain does produce good drama, but I have a loathing of costume drama. I think it’s lazy using heritage to put a story on television because it’s written by Jane Austen for example, even though it’s not a very good story. And using some National Theatre totty with heaving tits.
Television is a very young medium. It’s only a generation old so far and technology changes so fast that inspiration is always chasing it, which is not necessarily a good place for a cultural form to be.
Which celebrities do you think are the most influential at the moment?
Whatever Kate Moss wears will sell out across the world, and whatever Nigella Lawson cooks will walk off the shelf in Sainsbury’s. In that way they are commercially influential.
I am dubious of the benefits of celebrities, but I think it’s the people who manipulate them who are more powerful. It’s another tool for selling stuff. Most celebrities do not make an enormous amount of difference and do not have a sense of purpose or commitment. They are young kids who have to make a lot of decisions very quickly and it’s the people who manipulate them like broadcasters, agents and fashion houses who have the influence.
I’ve noticed that celebrities have less and less to do with politics and perhaps that’s a good thing because you don’t have actors telling you how to vote and pop singers singing protest songs.
I look at what’s on my children’s walls and it’s very different to stuff I had, which was all ban the bomb and equal rights. We were very politicised as a generation, going on marches and even though I wasn’t particularly political at the time, that’s what you did. It has changed and now my kids are concerned about the environment. Politics has moved from being old hard-line issues like women’s rights, to planetary issues. People are the bad guys now.
How many restaurants have you reviewed and do you ever get fed up with eating out night after night it?
I’ve been writing restaurant reviews for 13 years. And I write one a week, 40 weeks of the year. I eat out six nights a week – I never get fed up with it.
I was an art critic at one point and that cured me of going to see art, but it’s not the same with restaurants. You can’t say: ‘Now I’m retired I won’t eat any more.’ We all eat three times a day and you cannot stop being critical. I still get a frisson inside every time I go somewhere new in anticipation of being given food I haven’t seen for a long time or have never tried. It’s the combination of ingredients that is exciting. But you still get terrible restaurants that take on that particular year’s fashion. One year, hundreds of restaurants were serving sticky toffee pudding, this year it seems to be this pustule chocolate pudding that bursts when you put your spoon in.
What is exciting is seeing an interesting ingredient or trying really new combinations that work. I went to Roget Verge’s restaurant in Cannes, Le Moulin de Mougins, and had lobster with vanilla. I had read about this dish, which is why I ordered it. When I tasted it I was speechless with admiration. It was so clever and absolutely right – it showed a deep understanding of taste and ingredients.
If you’re a book or theatre critic you can fall out of love with the medium and I know a lot of people who do. But you never lose hunger. I still won’t review a restaurant unless I am hungry and that’s what I take to the table.
Good taste is one of those virtues that most of us think we have, but very few of us actually do. What is good taste after all?
'
They say travel broadens the mind; but you must have the mind,' wrote GK Chesterton in 1921. The following year saw him pressing his point in What I Saw In America: 'I have never managed to lose my old conviction that travel narrows the mind,' he noted.
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