NHUBE

NH Hotel, Lyon St Exupéry airport

I recently spent a week touring the Luberon, and was frankly underwhelmed on many fronts, not least the food. Avoiding expensive and tourist-infested places was easy, however finding alternative places to eat was less so. On a couple of occasions I resorted to buying some bread, cheese and fruit from the local market and picnicking in a beauty spot. At Isle-sur-la-Sorgue I had a couple of fairly agreeable lunches but pleasant places to eat an evening meal in small Luberon towns - in Apt, at least, where I was staying - are thin on the ground. You would be forgiven for thinking the national dish of Provence is pizza.


I flew back to Brussels from Lyon, where I arrived with a few hours to spare before my flight. Lyon St Exupery airport, which caters mostly to the likes of Easyjet, doesn't boast much in the way of gourmet dining, but the NH Hotel at the airport had a nice-looking restaurant offering a 16-euro two-course lunch during the week. I calculated that I had two and a half hours to kill, so I went for the 22-euro formula, which throws in a third course and a glass of wine. It was quite delicious, well served by courteous and well-trained staff, although I apologise if I can't remember what I had. Some kind of fish as a main course, I think. Chef himself came out to greet each table individually and ask how we had enjoyed the lunch.

"I've just spent a week in Provence, and this is the best meal I've had all week!" I told him. He beamed.


Only on my return did I check out the restaurant on the internet and found it was part of the Nhube concept restaurants designed for the Spanish NH hotel chain by famed Catalan chef Ferran Adria. Well of course! I should have guessed. Nhube restaurants can be found in many NH hotels in Spain and elsewhere, many of them at airports.

Next time I won't bother going further than Lyon, aptly named "la capitale gourmande".

I may not ever make it to El Bulli but at least I've sampled a little of Ferran Adria's magic

SEVENTEEN

I recently jumped aboard the Thalys to visit Vi Hornblower who has just taken up residence in Paris not a million miles from the Champs-Elysées, having become the Paris correspondent of the Reading Chronicle. Vi's retired husband Desmond had still not awoken after a week in the sleep clinic last March, so she called up her old flame Reggie, who used to be Something Big in Bauxite, and was on one of his regular jaunts from darkest Africa where he has an important position as The Despot's Special Adviser, to join us for lunch.

We piled into the Bistro du 17eme, on avenue de Villiers near Pereire RER and metro, which offers a 38 euro menu including aperitif, three courses, half a bottle of wine per person and coffee. The Bistro is part of a chain of seven restaurants which all serve the same menu, and includes the Bistro Melrose, one of Harold's and my favourite troughs in the old days. Harold used to love the foie gras, although could not pronounce it to save his life, and ended up making it sound like some kind of sushi.



The Bistro du 17e is very classy, with proper linen tablecloths and napkins, and lots of plush and mirrors. We perused the menu over three kir royales, which gave me flashbacks to the Bloggers' Christmas party the year before last in Reading. Violet and I had foie gras de canard to start, in memory of Harold, and Reggie had a Gateau Landais, which was a very posh potato cake.




To follow I skillfully dissected a simple but perfectly cooked sole meunière au beurre, served with a little tub of flawless creamed potato. I do find it sad that restaurants don't have fish knives any more, even in Paris. Vi had perfect carré d'agneau, cooked à point, with gratin dauphinois. Reggie, being a fairly unadventurous type, had entrecote with pommes frites, or steak and chips to you. We washed this down with a bottle of Touraine blanc between Violet and me, and Reggie had a whole bottle of Premières Cotes de Blaye red at no extra charge. The service was elegant, efficient and the staff all spoke English, which was just as well as a number of our neighbours appeared to be from the better parts of Surrey.

How we managed to hold a conversation with our faces constantly in our plates is a mystery, but we hardly stopped nattering. I now know more about bauxite than I will ever need to, but Reggie was so charming that he kept us both enthralled. It is unusual for Vi to be enthralled by anything over 25, especially fully-dressed, but I guess Reggie and she had previous. It was sweet to see the two of them flirting competitively with the young waiter.

Vi and I were already stuffed but couldn't resist the dessert list. I was served something wonderful called a Magnifique, which was indeed magnifique, a sort of mousse with a caramelized topping, which I admired for several seconds while Vi demolished her Millefeuille with its salty caramel sauce. Reggie, ever circumspect, went for the cheese, having the dregs of his whole bottle of red to finish off.

Three coffees later we paid the bill and staggered back to Violet's luxurious penthouse on a roll, where we polished off two bottles of champers and Reggie, who is what is known as an Old Africa Hand in the office, regaled us with his tales of derring-do and adventures up the Zambezi. Vi dug out some old photos of her dancing the can-can in a dugout canoe going over Victoria Falls, and how we laughed when she told us that Desmond was known to the local lingo as "Little White Man With Huge Set of Bongos".


The Bistro Company comprises:

Le Bistro du 17e, 108 avenue de Villiers, Paris 17e
Le Bistro Melrose, place de Clichy, Paris 17e
Le Bistro St Ferdinand, 275 boulevard Pereire, Paris 17e
Le Bistro de Breteuil, 3 place de Breteuil, Paris 7e
Le Bistro des Deux Théatres, 18 rue Blanche, Paris 9e
Le Bistro Champetre,107 rue St Charles, Paris 15e
Le Bistro de la Muette, 10 chaussée de la Muette, Paris 16e

BRUSSELS GRILL

Yes, which part of me would you like?

I have been in Brussels five years now and every working day have walked past a Brussels Grill without feeling the remotest desire to eat there. The red-and-yellow steer horns sign, the menu with its big colour pictures, all had the appeal of a Berni Inn steakhouse circa 1980. Even when the terrace was heaving on a hot day, its location right on a very busy main road did not tempt me.

The other day I couldn't avoid going there for a group lunch. Most of us, being girlies, had salads. Which turned out to be amazing - copious, fresh, varied, and good value. I had the salade aux lardons, with comes with a generous helping of bacon bits and a barely boiled egg sitting on a dressed green salad. The salad dressing is delicious and the leaves are fresh and crunchy. Two colleagues had the goat's cheese salad and the seafood salad, which both pronounced to their satisfaction, confirmed by their empty plates at the end of the meal. A couple of other colleagues went for steaks, and demolished them. The meat is Argentinian and is, apparently, excellent.

It was one of those days when I had a craving for chips, which - together with being able to fill out my tax return unaided - makes me realize I am becoming quite Belgian. The large portion of frites - easily enough for two - came in a bowl and were excellent. Our waiter was a speedy wag with a constant line in chat in French and English, and managed to keep all 10 of us happy despite the terrace being absolutely chocker on the first really hot day of the summer. The terrace has canopies if the heat is too much. Sadly there's not much they can do about the location, right on the Avenue du Boulevard by one of the exits to Rogier metro station, but I'm told the basement dining room is very pleasant.

Brussels Grill is a franchise operation, and there are other branches at Porte de Namur and Place de Brouckère, handily placed for the UGC cinemas. The Boston Cafe at Porte de Namur and Raphael just off boulevard Anspach are also part of the same group.




Salads cost around 8.50 euros which is exceptional good value. Steaks a bit more expensive but not outrageous. With a soft drink I think my share came to about 17 euros.

I'd definitely go back again, and try the meat next time. I'd recommend the Brussels Grill for lunch on a work day, or a pre- or post-cinema dinner. It would even be suitable for dinner for a big group where you didn't want to waste too much time over choosing your dishes. Not really suitable for a romantic wedding anniversary dinner, it doesn't have the charm of Meet Meat, but if you're out shopping and get to the top of the Rue Neuve, it's just across the street, under the Sheraton Hotel.

BRUSSELS GRILL
avenue du Boulevard 21
1210 St Josse
(Metro: Rogier)

place de Brouckère 21
1000 Brussels
(Metro: Brouckère)

avenue du Toison d'Or 7
1050 Ixelles
(Metro: Porte de Namur)

Website: http://www.brussels-grill.be/EN/Restaurants.php

TEA AND EAT

TEA AND EAT is a funny name for a chain of restaurants. OK, EAT is TEA with the T at the beginning instead of the end .... I wonder if they're anything to do with MEET MEAT?

Anyhoo, I was down at Woluwe Shopping Mall and felt a tad peckish. As restaurants in shopping centres go, it's a bit more upmarket than Debenham's Style Cafe. It's hidden away down a corridor just after C&A, and looks like just a few tables behind a perspex screen. However, once inside you find a circular bar where you can park your man while you get some more retail therapy in, a spacious restaurant with high tables, low tables, and a wraparound terrace for the rare Brussels warm weekend. The decor is very 90's Islington - you know, lots of bamboo, a whiff of Zen ambience, a glass cylinder goldfish tank on the bar. The waiting staff are young, smiley and attractive, and the service is fairly smart.



There's a shop inside the restaurant where you can buy upmarket foodie things like fancy olive oil and poncey tea. You know, essentials. Generally sold in big clunky bottles with the name of the product in big black letters, e.g. SIROP. Merchandising is part of the Tea & Eat experience, and they have shops in various locations. As retailers they compete with Oliviers & Co. and Pain Quotidien for the yummy mummy demographic. The restaurant competes with the excellent Cook & Book (another inspired name!) across the road. For my money, I prefer Cook & Book for its proximity to, well, books, of which there are none in Woluwe Shopping Centre. But if you're an habitué of Habitat, Tea & Eat is exactly where you should go afterwards to peruse the catalogue. If they could only move across the way, they could become Habitat's in-store restaurant. (Habitat actually has an in-store restaurant, which is so badly situated that I found myself examining the tables looking for a price tag).




Tea & Eat is popular with the eurocrats, and can be found in the more affluent expat areas such as Woluwe and near Place Stephanie in Ixelles. If they were in London they would be based in Stoke Newington. The "Tea" in the title indicates that they specialise in, er, tea, and so they do - they are exclusive distributors of Betjeman and Barton teas in Belgium, but I didn't see much evidence of anyone consuming it. One table were having a bottle of champagne with their meal. I hope they'd finished their shopping. I demonstrated great self control and sipped a glass of house white wine with my smoked salmon and cream cheese bagel whilst observing my fellow shoppers.

The bagel was toasted, and served with lashings of good Scottish salmon, plenty of cream cheese and a very fresh salad. It wasn't cheap at 14.50 euros but if you want cheap, Quick is just across the way. The salad sauce came in a miniature Perrier type green bottle, and although delicious, let's just say I'm glad I wasn't wearing a navy blue dress to spill it on, if you follow me. Sadly it is not one of the products on sale in the outlet, but is made to the chef's closely guarded secret recipe.

With the wine and a tip, there was no change out of 20 euros. But you don't come out smelling of chips.

BREAKFAST IN AMERICA

Consistently good: Margaritas

A friend of mine once gave me his analysis on why Americans were all neurotic.

"You go to a restaurant, and they give you a great big laminated menu with colour photographs. Every item on it has a whole paragraph of descriptive along the lines of: try our succulent quarter-pounder, freshly made with a generous four ounces of prime ground beef from Angus cattle fed on the lush grasslands of North Dakota, seasoned with Tahitian rock salt and cracked black pepper from the slopes of Mount Popocatapetl, lovingly barbecued over a hickory-wood charcoal fire and laid on a bed of shredded iceberg lettuce and shavings of white salad onion fresh from our organic kitchen garden, layered with thin slices of juicy plum tomato flown in this morning from Italy, and lightly drizzled with homemade low-cholesterol mayonnaise made personally by our Chef , all of this encased in a warm sesame bun and served to you courteously by our staff."


"It takes you 20 minutes to read the menu, and another 20 minutes to decide what you want.


"And when you get your food, it's just a burger.


"That's why Americans are all in therapy - they're all suffering from chronic disappointment."

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I have spent most of last month travelling in America, and did my best to eat American wherever possible. This only involved a burger once, not counting the MuckDonalds I had one night because everything else was closed (in Vegas! 24/7 my eye).

Farmers Market in LA, early morning

I have always wanted to say the immortal words: "Pastrami on rye and hold the mayo!" I finally got my chance in Los Angeles, not at one of the famous Jewish delis down on West Pico but at Phil's Deli in the Farmers Market. The "small" size had "only" 400 grammes of beef - that's about a pound. I'd always thought pastrami was an Italian speciality but it is in fact Jewish, a prime side of beef seasoned in brine and then steamed until the meat is so tender it melts in your mouth. Also known as a salt beef sandwich, in Jewish delis it is often served with a large dill pickle. Mine was relatively unadorned, served in plain white rye bread and washed down with a Martinelli's apple juice in an apple-shaped bottle.

San Francisco was the only place where I chose to eat "foreign" - but Chinatown is a must, and the Chinese community have been there so long that San Francisco Chinese is probably a cuisine in its own right by now, rather like Scottish-Indian. I happened upon the Far East Cafe on Grant, which is a cavernous high-ceilinged room with the full-on look of old Shanghai - red paint, gilt, ornate heavy wooden furniture, and dragons. It has been in operation since 1920. Down one side of the room are cosy little booths with carved wooden swing doors, for a tete-a-tete or a discreet opium deal. The service is brisk and unsmiling, but at least they don't interrupt you three times while you're eating with "Everything OK with you guys?". I had won ton soup, followed by Peking baby ribs with fried rice, and a pot of green tea. I could eat in there every day.

Cioppino: Italian dish invented in San Francisco

Dungeness crab down on Fisherman's Wharf is another San Francisco classic. A local speciality is cioppino, a sort of fish stew but which involves molluscs so was off limits for my delicate stomach. I had a bad cold, so maybe that's why the crab cakes didn't taste of anything. I was in one of the Italian restaurants on Jefferson Street - it could have been Alioto's, or Tarantino's, or Scoma's, I don't know, they're all Italian and all serve crab. I ordered a glass of white Zinfandel to go with my meal. The waitress served me a glass of rosé. I pointed out that I had ordered a WHITE Zinfandel. That is a White Zinfandel, she said. But it's pink, I said. She went away and the manager came back to explain to me that a White Zinfandel is in fact a rosé wine. Whatever. In Starbuck's if you want a small latte, you have to ask for a TALL latte. Honestly, sometimes it's like being in a foreign country.


The third in my trio of San Francisco culinary classics is John's Grill. This is one of the settings in Dashiell Hammett's "The Maltese Falcon" and is, fittingly, the HQ of the San Francisco Dashiell Hammett Society. The interior is classic American grill room with photos of all the famous patrons on the walls. The food is fairly ordinary - not bad, but not exciting. I had seafood cannelloni which was slightly underwhelming and not cheap.

The patio of the La Fonda

Moving on to New Mexico, this was a risky place for a dame with a delicate palate. In Santa Fe I primed my lips with a margarita at the elegant La Fonda Inn. The origins of this hotel are fascinating, it was one of the original Harvey Inns which inspired the movie "The Harvey Girls" starring Judy Garland. I was invited to taste tamales with mole sauce at Café Pasqual's in Santa Fe. I didn't like either much. Tamales are made with maize flour, and maize, as anyone who has lived in Africa will tell you, is a very tasteless cereal. Mexican food seems to be either fiery hot or completely bland, with no subtlety of flavours in between. Although it is not true, as Billy Connolly contends, that all Mexican dishes are the same, only folded differently (see photos - although if you can tell a burrito from an enchilada you must be a local). At The Alley Inn in Taos I liked the fish and chicken tacos, but the chicken tostada at the Guadalajara Grill, also in Taos, was quite blah. Back in Santa Fe, Cowgirl is a fun place to eat, and I demolished a whole side of BBQ ribs to even my surprise.

Tacos (2)

Enchilada

Burrito

American breakfasts require a whole menu to themselves, and I tried to sample every type of breakfast from bagels to eggs Benedict, leaving out waffles as I live in Belgium and knew they wouldn't be up to scratch. Starbucks was just confusing - there's a whole system there and if you don't know it you look like a twit. The girl took my order and then asked me my name. "My name??" I repeated, baffled. "Yes, you pick up your order at the other counter down there, so we call out your name when it's ready," she explained patiently, as if talking to a child.

I tried pancakes, thinking they would be something like the pancakes here, which are shop bought but then cooked gently in butter. When they arrived, there was a stack of three bogstandard Scotch pancakes, barely warmed out of the packet, stuck together with confectioner's cream and covered in icing sugar, with blueberries and strawberries and a jug of maple syrup. The maple syrup proved necessary as they were so dry. It looked pretty but was a heart attack on a plate.

Comes with a complimentary defibbrilator

In San Francisco there is a chain of diners called Lori's which are replicas of the traditional 1950's diner, with red leather bar stools, booths, lots of chrome, and staff in perky little white hats. Well at least it's not called "Happy Days". I went to one to try the "famous Lori's French toast" which sounded delicious, but when it arrived was just a thick slice of industrial brioche soaked in egg and milk and shoved under the grill, served covered in icing sugar. The Americans seem to think food is something shameful to be hidden by sauces, syrups, sugar, anything to disguise the flavour, or lack of one.

In several places I ordered just a toasted bagel or simple eggs over easy and bacon, which they do very well. They also top your coffee up as many times as you like. I had to try Eggs Benedict once, and did so in a posh hotel in Las Vegas. The eggs were fine, but once I'd scraped off the heavy layer of chilli-spiced Hollandaise sauce I found they were sitting on a thick gammon steak which itself was sitting on a couple of English muffins. With freshly squeezed orange juice and coffee it turned out to be a $30 breakfast, but as I'd been too busy to treat myself to a decent dinner in Vegas, and had a long afternoon at LAX airport in view followed by an overnight flight, it kept me going till England, where I had the first decent cup of tea I'd had in three weeks.

Eggs Benedict

Vegas is full of swanky empty restaurants. Mon Ami Gabi at the Paris always seemed to be full, and I would guess requires advance booking. But you don't need to be a high roller to get a good meal in Vegas. The Hawaiian Market has a number of places to eat, including a very pleasant open-air Mexican cantina where you can eat breakfast, lunch or dinner, or just sit and sip a frozen margarita or a Corona. The Fashion Show shopping mall has a food court on the 1st floor (sorry, 2nd floor over there) which is not top quality but you can eat quick and cheap and choose from about 10 different dining options. The Chinese wasn't bad. House of Blues in the Mandalay Bay resort has a good Southern menu, and I can recomment the chicken gumbo as well as the music.

I can also recommend the margaritas.

PARIS IN THE SPRING - LE PHENICIA

Tango dancers by Botero

On my last night in Paris we all went out for a lovely Lebanese meal at Phénicia. It's posh Leb, with tablecloths, Fairouz warbling discreetly in the background and subdued lighting, none of your doner kebabs and belly dancers wobbling their navels in your face. Vi and I clinked kir royales and Desmond woke up long enough to order a pastis, before demolishing a selection of mezze, which if I remember correctly, consisted of kebbe (lemon shaped meatballs with a crunchy coating), stufffed vine leaves, spicy sausage, tabboulé and Lebanese flat bread. The Hornblowers have healthy appetites, and even the children attacked a main course. I had skewered lamb, which was tender and perfectly cooked - just pink inside. The wine was Lebanese Chateau Musar and surprisingly pleasant. Not cheap, mind you, but at least there were no burnt bits to set Hepzibah off.

Children get bored easily, so I lent Hepzibah my camera to keep her quiet. She took some rather good pictures of the food:

Kebbe by Hepzibah Hornblower

The children have been schooled early in art appreciation. Hermione, for example, is a fan of Kandinsky. Hepzibah, being a typical 9-year-old, found the Botero painting on the wall fascinating and took a photograph. It's a bit out of focus. Can you see which part of the painting it is, boys and girls?

We thought we were stuffed after all that, but still found room for a plate of baklava pastries shared between us, which we adults washed down with mint tea. Service was unobtrusive but attentive, and the best thing was we only had about 20 metres to waddle back to bed.

PARIS IN THE SPRING - LE PETIT VILLIERS

The weekend before Easter I tripped down to Paris to visit the Hornblowers. On arrival they whisked me off to Le Petit Villiers for dinner. An unexpectedly reasonable and down-home family restaurant in a posh part of town, it offers French country cooking in a traditional atmosphere, with red checkered tablecloths and a covered enclosed terrace for smokers. You get a fair choice for your 22 euros menu du jour, with a 9-euro fixed menu for kids (steak-frites, dessert) which was fine for the Hornblowers two granddaughters, Hermione and Hepzibah. Or so we thought. It was past Hepzibah's bedtime and she was going to make us pay. She didn't want the children's menu.

"But you always have steak-frites!" said Vi.

Hepzibah whinged, wittered, griped and grizzelled. When her steak-frites arrived she didn't like it. It was a bit burnt on the outside and she didn't like "the black bits". Children's menus are all very well but, like vegetarian menus, they shouldn't be a variation on the normal menu. Chefs should know how to cook for children. She ate her frites, and drank her Coke, which at least woke her up and made her forget about the burnt steak.

Our food was fine, although Vi did say she knew what Hepzibah meant about the black bits on the steak. My eyes lit up when I saw "rognons sauce moutarde", my favourite. They were served in a creamy mustardy sauce, but hadn't been separated, they were still "on the vine", so to speak, which made me wonder how they managed to get the piddle out of them. I was always taught to cut the sinew out of kidneys and salt and rinse them to remove the traces of animal urine, and it's true they do smell a bit pissy when they're cooking. However, they had obviously found some way of taking the pee, as they were delicious and very tender, although I would have preferred them to be pink inside, as ordered, rather than plain raw.

When it came to the dessert, Hepzibah of course didn't want the set pudding. The manager, who had remarked kindly "There is always one who is a star," told her she could have anything she wanted from the menu, which defused her. During all this time Hermione, her 11-year-old sister, had sat good as gold and eaten everything that was put in front of her. She didn't much fancy the set dessert either but to reward her grown-up behaviour, I had arranged to swap desserts if she preferred mine. In years to come, Hermione will be quietly and successfully negotiating in the background while Hepzibah is selling her story to the tabloids.

The service was friendly and brisk, although the manager had his hands full with all tables busy on a Thursday night. Apart from the slightly overcooked steak and the slightly undercooked kidneys, we had to agree that the 100 euro bill for 3 adults and 2 children was indeed, as the website says, "un rapport qualité-prix exceptionnel".


Le Petit Villiers

75 av. de Villiers

75017 Paris
(near metro Wagram)
Tél. : 01 48 88 96 59