DINE WITH DOS HERMANOS: HAWKSMOOR @ SEVEN DIALS

Four years ago, DH decided to celebrate one year of posting about our eating experiences in words and blurry pictures by holding a small supper at one of our favourite restaurants.  We posted about it on the blog and managed to rustle up a little over a dozen willing souls to join us for memorable meal at Hawksmoor in Shoreditch.

Move on to 2010 and DINE WITH DH has become, people tell me, one of the more popular dining events in the capital with  hundreds of people requesting a place for meals at such notable restaurants as Casa Brindisa, Bentley's Indian Zing, Forman & Field, Vinoteca and The Bull & Last.

It is hard to believe we have hosted a dozen of the things to date, but the combination of a fixed price and great venues seems increasingly popular.  So much so that our latest event on Monday 25th could easily have seen ten times the number of people attending as the thirty lucky few whose names I pulled out of a hat.
Mind you, while the numbers may well reflect the popularity of DWDH, they also reflect the fact that our chosen venue for the night was the new Covent Garden Location for Hawksmoor's new restaurant.

DH and Hawksmoor go back a long way.  HP was one of the first people to walk through the door of the Shoreditch branch in 2006 and it has become a regular haunt for us ever since.  Given that these events may be more spaced out in future with my relocation stateside, I wanted to do something a little bit special for my all too brief return to Blighty and was delighted when Will & Huw said they would be up for hosting a bunch of us during their soft opening.

Unsurprisingly, the new space on Langley Street is stunning.  Huw tells me it is a converted brewery and both the bar area (always a vital part of the whole Hawksmoor offering) and main dining area are built around the supporting columns in the cellar space.  In the kitchen too, they have done things properly with about ten times the space of the original restaurant and a Josper Grill very much in effect.

After a welcoming cocktail provided by the good people of Ketel One we made our way to a long table set up for us down the spine of the main dining room and left the rest up to restaurant manager, Tim, Will, Huw and the rest of the excellent staff who were using the opportunity to feel their way around their new working space.

There was, of course, plenty of food.  There always is at DWDH.  The one thing we insist on is that people come away feeling like they have had fantastic value for money.  No one has let us down yet and Hawksmoor kept us well on track to some serious meat sweats with a menu that far surpassed even the impressive one they had promised.

I don't have pictures of everything because, quite frankly, I was a little bit pissed and too busy enjoying myself to remember to snap everything with my little point and shoot.  Particular mention, however, should go to the Hawksmoor chipolatas made with beef, pork & mutton, the T-bone steak which is still hard to beat as the best steak in London and a collection of stunning sides. Alongside all of that, there were oysters, Tamworth pork ribs, smoked salmon and a couple of exemplary desserts.

As well as the pre-supper cocktail, there was also enough good red wine splashing around to have a bath in and, for those that like that sort of thing, an espresso Martini.  All enough to send people out into the chill night air of Central London four hours later pledging to return again and again.  Quite right too.

One sour note of the evening, given the number of people who clamoured for tickets, was an e-mail from one pair of diners an hour before the event to say that they were not coming because they were ill.  These bugs that hit you an hour before you have to shell out £50 are a bitch aren't they?  Perhaps they should, as I reach my sixth decade, but the ill manners of some people never cease to amaze me.

All I can say is Amy Lu and friend, you don't know what you missed.

I am likely to be away from the UK for the next few months as I ponder on matters immigration.  However, I am already working on some ideas for next year.  So keep 'em peeled. Dine with DH will be back before you know it.

DINE WITH DOS HERMANOS: HAWKSMOOR SEVEN DIALS - 25th OCTOBER 2010

Well folks, it has been a while since the last DINE WITH DOS HERMANOS, a splendid meal at H.Forman & Son's way back when at the end of May.  But, now we are back with a bang.

I am delighted to be able to announce that the next event will be

LOCATION: HAWKSMOOR SEVEN DIALS

DATE: MONDAY 25th OCTOBER 2010

DRINKS: 7:00pm

TO TABLE: 7.30pm

COST: £50 (All Inclusive of drinks + service - although as ever, we do take a extra collection for the waitstaff at the end of the meal)

I am particularly pleased to have this exciting new restaurant as the venue for the next in our series of popular dining events.  DH were, I believe, the first blog to write about Hawksmoor's original location back in June 2006 . At the time, although they were not even serving food, there was something about the place which made us keen to return, which we did again and again and again. Both HP and I have been staunch supporters of the restaurant which made steak hip again ever since and are thrilled to help support their new venture.

Will, Huw and all the team at the new location, are guaranteed to pull out all the stops to make this a truly memorable meat filled occasion and I am already counting the days before I stare down at an unfeasibly large slab of dead cow.

There are only 30 spaces for this extra special DINE WITH DH.  If you would like to attend, please email us via the website by FRIDAY OCTOBER 8th.  As we are limited for space, then please limit to + 1 requests only.  As before, I shall be pulling names out of a hat and will contact you shortly after that date if you are lucky enough to have a place. 

We look forward to seeing some of you on the 25th.  

GOOD LUCK

MORTON'S: MEAT & A MARTINI ON DATE NIGHT

I have a soft spot for Morton’s Steakhouses. I know they are a chain and, the good lord knows I have railed against chains often enough on the blog. But, having a steak at a Morton’s Steakhouse always feels like going to visit a favourite old relative, a relative who takes $200+ out of your wallet before letting you leave, but a relative never the less.

Morton’s in Chicago was one of the first steakhouses I ever visited on a business trip to the US. I immediately fell in love with the themes that are now so familiar to me at steakhouses across America. The waiters in their long, starched aprons displaying trays of raw beef while explaining the house cuts to bemused customers. The bathtub sized martinis that may not be very good but are so strong they get you drunk enough not to care. The wine lists as thick as a phone directory and the sides dishes that you really don’t need, but order anyway to later take home in doggy bags where they will sit in the fridge until you throw them away after a week.

I was going to be dining alone last Friday night and, with Sybil being no great fan of the cow, it struck me as the perfect time to snaffle a leather booth and indulge myself in a good steak and a large cocktail without the sight of her rolling her eyes at me across the table. My good chum, John Haskell, who is a long time regular at Morton’s in Beverly Hills, offered to make the reservation for me when I shared lunch with him at Langer’s and I spent the rest of the week planning which one of their signature steaks would have the pleasure of gracing my plate when Friday finally came around.

Then Sybil cancelled her planned trip and Friday went from being solo night to date night. When we arrived at Morton’s, there was no real thought involved for me and I just sipped on my first powerful martini of the night as our server waved various bits of raw cow flesh us at us and tried to persuade Sybil to take the waggling tail portion off a still live lobster.

I have said it many times before, but starters in steakhouses serve little other purpose than to fill the time between ordering and when your steak arrives. Those we chose at Morton’s, for the record Lump Crab meat Cocktail and Tuna Tartare, were decent enough and served their purpose of distraction until the main courses were presented.

If a place like this couldn’t get a steak right, then there really would have been a major Majumdar hissy fit. I am pleased to report that my “Chicago Style Bone in Rib-Eye” was a great piece of Nebraskan USDA Prime and cooked perfectly. They say you are never too old to learn and, in recent years, I have gone from demanding all my steaks rare, whatever the cut, to understanding that a rib-eye with its network of marbling, needs a longer cooking time to melt down the extra fat. I may now put up with people telling me how to have my steak cooked, but I still demand that it is given a decent char while it is on the grill. Mine had. It bloody well should have done of course. Morton’s have cooked thousands of the things over the years. But, when you eat as many steaks as I do, you know how often such a seemingly simple task can be botched.

If the steak was good, the lobster that had given up its tail for Sybil’s benefit had not done so in vain. Meaty and rich, barely needing the drawn butter that came with it. Sybil struggled to finish the huge portion of seafood despite my constant reminders that she was attending against my wishes and was as much an added financial burden as a welcome companion (it was the martini talking, I swear) Although we managed to polish off a few thick spears of asparagus, the other side dish of Mac & Cheese remained almost untouched and was decanted into a take away container, placed on the table as we shared a dessert of rich chocolate cake with a molten centre.

Added to a few glasses of wine and a well deserved service charge, this brought the total cost to.…. Well, I really don’t want to think about it, because the other thing I remembered, as the bill was deposited, was that another theme of all good steakhouses is that they are murderously expensive. When my credit card bill arrives, the wailing and gnashing of teeth will probably be heard in space.

Still, Sybil had a good time and seems to understand that next time we have a date night it will probably be at a place where the condiments are served in sachets and the staff wear hair nets.

BLOKES EAT BEEF: NO HEFFERS ALLOWED

One of the beauties of the Internet is how quickly a plan can come together.

A few weeks before Christmas, I was scrolling down a page of comments of Twitter and came across a tag which read #girlssteakclub. As the name suggests it was a steak-eating event at the splendid Hawksmoor restaurant, organised by women for women with a strict ban on those of us who carry a Y chromosome.

I thought it was a rather silly idea to have an event which set out to exclude half the possible audience and more in petulance than anything else, I created my own tag suggesting a competing event open only to those who could prove they have never talked about their feelings, watched Sisterhood of The travelling Pants (I or II) and think that a good scratch “down there” in the morning is one of the proofs of God’s existence. So, #blokeseatbeef was born and within twenty minutes of me creating the tag, nearly thirty people had contacted me asking for a place.

With Will & Huw of Hawksmoor throwing their lot in with the girlies and with London’s paucity of places for great steak there was one other option for the dinner and that, of course was Goodman. One call to their estimable GM David Strauss and the private room was booked giving us space for twenty-five serious meat eaters to explore their wildest dead cow fantasies.

Although I will of course take lots and lots of credit for the success of last night’s events. In truth every bit of the organisation bar getting people to turn up was down to David and his team. The Goodman guys went into action contacting their suppliers to send in the very best beef they had. There were two five rib joints of Irish beef from Darragh O’ Shea, huge slabs of Belted Galloway from the Lake District, Charolais/Limousin from Scotland and, of course Goodman’s USP, a whacking great piece of prime wet aged USDA from Nebraska.

On their own, this amount of beef (36kgs for the record) would have been enough for a feast, but David was determined to make it even more of a night to remember and had turned to his best suppliers to bring us three courses that will stay in the memory as long as the beef does in our colons.

Glasses of Chapel Down Sparkling Rose might not have seemed the most butch of drinks to begin with, but cleared the palate wonderfully as we all gathered in the private room and watched members of staff carry in trays of raw beef so chef, John Cadieux could take us through the merits of the different cuts. Again, for the record, there was an equal amount of beef to that shown in the picture left down in the kitchen ready to be thrown on their Josper grills

Yes, in case you are not believing your own eyes, we did all gather around to take photographs of the meat as if we were The Sun's finest and it were Amy Winehouse on one of her regular late night tumbles to the gutter. We (and by we, I mean I) may even have given one of the more oxidised joints a stroke as it went passed.

First however, a little starter courtesy of Frank Hederman who, with his wife, had personally flown over three sides of smoked salmon for us to begin our meal. For anyone who hasn’t tried it, it is well worth seeking out. It was a glorious colour, meaty and with a light scent of smoke, a perfect way to begin and complimented by a separate preparation with a mix of cucumber and crème fraiche.

The main course, the beef of course, involved a bit of a test as plate after plate of perfectly cooked meat was brought to the table with only numbers to identify them. The three tables jumped on the plates as soon as they were placed in front of us and we soon began heated debates as to which was our favourite. Opinions differed widely as to which was the best and why. #2, my own choice turned out to be the USDA prime, but there was a strong show of hands for all the other plates at the end of the meal when David asked our opinions.

With steaks, of course come sides, this time in the shape of chips (fat, damn them) creamed spinach and excellent tobacco onions all from vegetables supplied by the excellent MASH Purveyors of New Covent Garden. Also, there is nothing to compliment well prepared meat than an excellent glass of wine and again, thanks to the generosity of Goodman’s suppliers our glasses were constantly topped up during the evening with delicious Malbec and Chardonnay from Argentinean award winner Catena.

I find it hard to imagine that I or anyone else could possibly have made room for more food, but the cheese course, courtesy of La Fromagerie offered up a particularly ripe and pungent slice of Stinking Bishop and I could not resist having a nibble before finally giving in and slumping back on my seat exuding meat juices through some most unusual places.

Meat sweats were very much in evidence amongst the others too as the trays of bones were carried away, but not before most of the party had requested doggy bags to fill with the remains so they could relive the evening at a later date.

In case you are wondering why there is a picture of the food correspondent from The One Show gurning over a plate of bones, Mr Rayner popped in to steal some leftover beef on his way home from reviewing another restaurant.

All that for the bargain amount of £50, which again owes more to the generosity of David, Goodman Steakhouse and their terrific suppliers than it does to my own powers of persuasion. #girlssteakclub is tonight. I am sure it will be a great event, how could it not be at Hawksmoor? But, it is going to have to go some to beat the first of what I hope will be many #blokeseatbeef events.

And, of course, you have to wonder what the hell they are going to do if someone finds a spider in the sink.

TO LIVE & DIE IN LA: LIZ & JOHN. A CUT ABOVE THE REST

I may well have mentioned in passing, during the last few posts, my being less than whelmed by LA’s mid and fine level dining scene. There is however one place where I can always be guaranteed to have a memorable night filled with amazing food, great wines and, best of all, exceptional company.

Unfortunately, it is not a place I can recommend to you all as a must visit, because my favourite place to eat in L.A. is not in a restaurant but in the dining room of my dear friends, Liz and John Haskell. Over the last year and a half as I have been visiting the city on a more regular basis, Liz and John have taken Sybil and I under their wing and treated us to any number of great evenings. But, no invitation is more welcome that when Liz tells us she fancies cooking and John tells us he is going to open up a few bottles of “interesting” wine.

Last night’s supper came about after we had suggested to them that they might care to join us at CUT, Wolfgang Puck’s high end steakhouse. Instead, John offered to light up the grill at their house and Liz offered to cook a few things to go alongside a decent steak.

We knew from previous experience that when Liz offered to cook a few things that usually involved days in the kitchen preparing a multi course menu. Liz is a dining maven (for the record, she has eaten at The French Laundry over 100 times) and brings to bear all her many years of eating experience to what is prepared in her kitchen.

The meal began with starters served at the coffee table. The first course comprised two pates served with hot buttery brioche and glasses of two different styles of West Coast sparkling wine from Domaine Chandon in the Napa Valley. A perfect match and just as enjoyable with the next two courses, one of blini cups filled with crème fraiche and topped with caviar, the other using the same high end ingredient but this time served with eggs, slowly scrambled with butter for twenty five minutes and then returned to their shells for presentation.

After John had fired up the grill for the preparation of the main event, we moved to the dining table be presented with a bowl each of rich, velvety chestnut soup, laced with a shot of brandy just before serving. John poured us all a glass of Malmsey, which proved to be a terrific in combination with the gloriously luxurious soup. Luxurious would be the perfect word to describe a lot of Liz’s cooking. That does not mean that she always uses high-end ingredients. In fact, caviar apart, the ingredients used in the night’s meal were quite simple, but it is the attention Liz gives to their preparation transforms them into memorable dishes.

The main course of steak, potatoes and spinach was a perfect example, although admittedly the steak they prepared for us was no ordinary slab of meat from the supermarket. John had ordered a 40oz porterhouse from a company called Bryan’s Fine Foods. I had not heard of the company, but when John proudly showed off the raw porterhouse with its fine network of marbling, I immediately scribbled down the name to find out more about them.

Alongside the porterhouse was an equally impressive New York Strip from the same supplier. Both cuts of meat had been dry aged for forty days and gave off waves of meaty steam the moment John slapped them on to the grill. After they had been cooked and as soon as they had been rested, John carved them into big meaty slices making sure that each plate had plenty of each cut, while Liz added her own contribution, potato gratin and creamed spinach. So often in steakhouses, side dishes are no more than a diversion. Liz Haskell’s versions are, however, amongst the very best I have tasted, both again taking hours of preparation to get the desired result.

We staggered to the coffee table for the last two courses, cheeses from Andrew’s Cheese Shop in Santa Monica and a slab of persimmon pudding, which we doused in booze laden whipped cream and washed down with the last drops of a very fine 2001 Ridge Montebello Cabernet .

By the time we all looked at our watches and realised that nearly five hours had passed while we enjoyed our meal, wine and conversation, Liz had already begun to pack a goodie bag for us containing more of the persimmon pudding and some homemade chocolate chip cookies, in the unlikely event we got hungry on the way home.

It was the perfect end to another great meal at my favourite place to eat in Los Angeles. If any of you are fortunate enough to get to know Liz and John Haskell, you might just be lucky enough to experience it too.