Posts by Tom Johnston
Asparagus and Gruyere Flan
Certainties in life? There are many. In central Prague, for example, they come in the form of young men dressed as Mozart selling tickets to Vivaldi concerts. (No, I don’t understand that either. Though come to think of it, maybe the ones flogging tickets for the Mozart gigs are in fact dressed as Vivaldi.) Anyway,…
Read MoreLisa & Pann’s Kitchen, Birmingham – Guest Reviewer Miranda Heggie
Lisa and Pann’s Kitchen at The Pig & Tail 12 – 13 Albion Street, Jewellery Quarter. Birmingham B1 3ED 07533 886988 www.lisapannskitchen.com The Bill 2 courses for two £29.10 The Score Cooking 7/10 | Service 4/5 | Flavour 4/5 | Value 5/5 TOTAL 20/25 Although the last year has had its challenges, one thing which…
Read MoreChef Watch – Brian Maule, Chardon d’Or, Glasgow
Chef Watch Featuring Brian Maule of Chardon d’Or, Glasgow How long have you been a chef? 36 years. Why did you become a chef? Went to a work experience in the Skean Dhu, Irvine (probably to give my teachers peace and quiet). Favourite ingredient Without a doubt, salt. Favourite or signature dish I don’t really…
Read MoreBraised Ox Cheek
From this… This is such a simple recipe that I thought hard about including it at all. But when you have a meat dish which can feed up to six people with the main ingredient costing less than a pound a head, it is irresistible. Equally so is the transformation from something so tough that…
Read MoreGolden Oldies – Strangers’ Dining Room, London
Strangers’ Dining Room, House of Commons, St Margaret’s Street, London SW1A 0AA See below for details of the bill Well that’s it! Democracy has gone mad! Is nothing sacred? For this, Scotland’s last week of restaurant free existence, for the final period of no eating out unless you succumb to the horrors of…
Read MoreRoss Marshall: In Praise of Roadkill
Now don’t go all squeamish on me. I’m not talking about that pancake flattened feral pigeon, barely identifiable, in the middle of Corstorphine Road on a wet April afternoon. Such are beyond redemption, frankly, alive or dead. Quality roadkill (RK) is mostly, though not always, the preserve of country roads and, though RK is available…
Read MoreSmoked Haddock Omelette
Many will have heard of Omelette Arnold Bennett; fewer, I suspect, will have eaten it; and fewer still will have made it. Invented at The Savoy Hotel in London for author Arnold Bennett, who resided there for a number of years, it features on the menu of The Savoy Grill to this day. Provided you…
Read MoreGolden Oldies – Restaurant Andrew Fairlie at Gleneagles Hotel
Restaurant Andrew Fairlie Gleneagles Hotel, Auchterarder, Perth & Kinross PH3 1NF 01764 694267 www.andrewfairlie.co.uk The Bill (2015 Prices) Dinner 3 courses £95.00 Dégustation Menu (7 courses) £125.00 The Score Cooking 10/10 | Service 4/5 | Flavour 5/5 | Value 5/5 TOTAL 24/25 The good news for all of us, not least for the beleaguered restaurant…
Read MoreH is for Harissa
Hands up all of you who know what harissa is. Well, that’s all of you, obviously. Keep your hands up if you’ve used it. Yep, most of you, as I suspected. And finally, keep the hands up if you know what the word means. Ha ha! And it’s such a simple word too – هرس…
Read MoreHalibut with Mussel and Leek Sauce
I didn’t follow a recipe for this anniversary routine masterpiece, but it worked quite well. You make it slightly backside foremost, as you have to cook the mussels first. The sauce for the fish is wine based (or in this case vermouth). Traditionally you would thicken this with a splash of cream, which I don’t…
Read MoreWhere You’re Going To Eat After Lockdown
After a little prompting your replies have come in thick and fast with where you’re going to go and eat once lockdown permits. Space doesn’t permit mention of all of them, and in some cases initials have been changed for reasons of modesty. You’ll see why. A lot of you have been pining for your…
Read MoreIntroducing Slow Food Scotland
Well this whole article came to life because of a quip about fish and the aftermath. And if you are a food writer of a certain age who is a fan of the Marx Brothers, it would be negligent not to include the greatest of all fish jokes, from the pen of genius of S…
Read MoreWee Deliveries – The Wee Restaurant At Home
The Wee Restaurant, 17 Main Street. North Queensferry. KY11 1JG If you still remember how, pick up a pen, pencil or other implement and sign your name. Put it to one side and read on. Oi, moosh! I hear you cry. Not only do you not do takeaways, you’ve written almost eloquently about why you…
Read MoreTrout Fillets En Papillote
I hope you didn’t miss Wednesday’s On The Side column featuring Galton Blackiston. The daft customer experience involving the guest whose filo pastry in her en papillote dish was tough is a classic. Confused? Read on. En papillote simply means cooked in a paper bag. (Incidentally, that ridiculous little paper frill you used to see…
Read MoreChef Watch – Galton Blackiston, Morston Hall, Norfolk
Chef Watch Featuring Galton Blackiston, Michelin Starred Chef of Morston Hall in Norfolk How long have you been a chef? I’ve been a Chef since 17 and I’m now 58. Do the maths it’s embarrassing. Why did you become a chef? Because I’m not academic and I liked cooking at home. I actually wanted to…
Read MoreScottish “Cassoulet”
I share at least one thing with Nigel Slater. Not, sadly, his cooking ability – how many know that he trained as a chef at London’s Savoy Hotel? I refer to his love of seizing on an ingredient or two, then building it into a dish off the top of his head. This one came…
Read MoreThe Greenhouse by Gary Rhodes, mid 1990s
The Greenhouse – Alas, no more What would Spiderman* do? If you are a prescient child who is foreseeing a problem, you might ask such a question. Having an issue with filling a restaurant review column, I posited a similar query. Next week it will be answered by all of you who responded to my…
Read MoreA Masterclass with Jay Rayner
Want to improve your food writing? Sign up, as I did, for an online class with the guv’nor himself, Jay Rayner. There is no such thing as food writing, he declares. Well, that’s me telt. He is, of course, quite correct. There is writing on the subject of food. The best proponents of the art…
Read MoreGinger: Spice Up Your Food, Spice Up Your Life
Ginger on Wednesday, Ginger on Friday No, not a couplet from a popular ditty. Just a mundane reminder that, as night follows day, so the Wednesday Alphabetical of Food in On The Side comes a couple of days before a couple of recipes featuring that month’s hero. There are so many choices. Ginger cheesecake and…
Read MoreParadise Lost, Paradise Regained
Unknown Never mind a COVID test. Today, Tom Eats! requires you to take a mood test to ascertain if you are a fit and proper person to be its reader. Are you in jabtastic mode, or are you Googling about blood clots? Are you viewing spring with a springy step, or are you an institutionalised…
Read MoreG is for Ginger
Neither of my grandmothers could have been described as exotic. So let’s think of some exotica which we do have today but didn’t have in our culinary lives 30 or 40 years ago. Turmeric root, galangal, cardamom. All of them closely related to today’s hero. Yet we don’t think of ginger as at all out…
Read MoreDinner at Sea – Guest Reviewer, Binkie Johnston
With current reviews impossible, It was fortuitous that I came on the diary of a long lost relative, Binkie Johnston. This is his account of a memorable dinner. North Atlantic, April Well, the Doc had been badgering me about the old vital organs. A bit of sea air, old chap, is what you need. So I…
Read MoreSome Dishes From Binkie Johnston’s Dinner
If you normally read both Tom Eats! and Tom Cooks! don’t read this column till you’ve digested the former. If you don’t read Eats!, I can tell you that these are recipes for a few dishes which featured there. Consommé Olga You may recall that Binkie’s steward, McTavish, attributed this dish to chef’s dalliance with…
Read MoreSome Wad Eat That Want It
Some hae meat and canna eat And some wad eat that want it But we hae meat and we can eat Sae let the Lord be thankit Let me ‘fess up immediately. Despite the Selkirk Grace above, the first part of today’s column has precious little to do with food. It is, however, a follow…
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