Great wine-dining near St Paul’s November 1, 2010 Bar Battu 48 Gresham Street, W1U 5QU, EC2V 7AY tel: 020 7036 6100 FOOD SERVICE ATMOSPHERE Cost per person without wine: £25 POOR Bar Battu. A brilliant little restaurant opens with delightful staff, genuine enthusiasm for the good things in life, surprising wine – at times truly special – and delicious food, and all people [...]
TASTING NOTES: THE IVY TURNS 20 November 1, 2010 IT may not be a surprise to spot actors at luvviedom’s favourite restaurant, The Ivy, but you don’t generally expect them to be performing. However, anyone having dinner at there next week will witness exactly that, in what I suppose you could call the year’s most exclusive show. Actors will be seen gliding between tables, [...]
FOOD & BOOZE NEWS November 1, 2010 PAN ASIAN PUB OPENS IN NOTTING HILL Pi Pa duck and flower buns, and black cod with pickled kyurizuke – served with a pint in a pub? You bet, thanks to the opening this week of the Chesterfield in Westbourne Park. Plush upholstery and a long mahogany bar make it perfect for a wintry drink, [...]
Two hot new hotels signal a new wave of cool for Miami October 31, 2010 HURRICANE SEASON”. It’s a phrase I’d blithely brushed aside clicking “add to basket” on my Miami flight, and continued to ignore while enthusiastically selecting “convertible” as a rental car. Now, trapped on the bridge to Miami beach, windscreen wipers going like the clappers and palm trees bent straining under the gale force winds, it’s one [...]
TRAVEL NOTES October 31, 2010 Amsterdam goes chic The Dutch capital is one of Europe’s great cities, but it’s not the best for cutting-edge hotels – until now. Canal House, the third hotel from Curious Hotels (the group behind Gloucestershire’s luxurious Cowley Manor) brings sexy interiors and cosy urban cool to three ancient converted canal-side houses. It opens in a [...]
It’s the jokes that are dead and buried October 28, 2010 Film BURKE AND HARE Cert: 15 SIMON Pegg and Andy Serkis play the titular Irish murderers living in 1820s Edinburgh in this disappointing send-up of one of that century’s great social scandals. Out-of-work immigrants who spot a niche in the market supplying bodies to Edinburgh’s world-renowned physicians, they move into the murder business with Tom [...]
Bewitching homes for beautiful living October 28, 2010 WHILE few sane people would relish the idea of cohabiting with a ghost or other supernatural presence, Britain is an old country and has its fair share — perhaps more than its fair share — of spooky residences. We have more graveyards than you can shake a stick at, and plenty of people have died [...]
OUT THIS WEEKEND | PREVIEWS October 28, 2010 FILM SAW (3D) Yet another depressingly horrid instalment of the world’s worst torture porn franchise. THE HUNTER Beautiful, courageous and highly unsettling Iranian drama. IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT Showing at the BFI, Capra’s classic screwball comedy. DVD IRON MAN 2 Robert Downey Jr’s inventor/superhero returns to fight Mickey Rourke. BACK TO THE FUTURE 25th anniversary [...]
INTERIORS October 28, 2010 HEAD DESIGNER, APD INTERIORS Q.Dear Andrew, we have family visiting for Christmas and need to buy a sofa. Do we still have time and what should we consider? A.If you want to take delivery for Christmas you need to start looking now because your choice will already be limited by long lead-times for some furniture. [...]
Find yourself the perfect snowy bolthole October 28, 2010 AFTER reports this week that the UK economy has sharply bounced back from recession, confidence has returned to the second home market and those with a penchant for skiing can’t help but turn their attention Alps-ward – especially as the first snowfall of the season came two days ago. “We’ve seen an increase in demand [...]