The three-part profile of jazz great Duke Ellington written by Richard O.Boyer for The New Yorker in 1944 isn’t just one of the greatest musical portraits ever written for a magazine. “The Hot Back“ is a classic in food and travel writing, too, a tell-all from a then 45-year-old legend who liked to eat it all and was always worried about keeping his weight down.
Duke Ellington: King of Jazz & Gluttony
26 August 2011 By 2 Comments
Princess Burger Transformed Into Prince Meatloaf
Come mid-August I welcome a glass of pink wine or pink lemonade for cool refreshment. But oddly I’m no happy camper when my Provence rosé tastes like old-fashioned lemonade, or when my freshly squeezed lemonade is no sweeter or pulpier than a dry rosé. I’m funny that way.
Same with burgers and meatloaf sandwiches: At their best I love them both. But give me a burger patty with the mealy, mushy consistency of moulded meatloaf and I’m transformed from young&foodish to young&moodish. How fortunate that no one saw this side of me when I, seated solo with no one to the left or right, tried the squashy Aberdeen Angus beef shin burger with foie gras and white truffle mayonnaise (£10.95) at the handsome Princess of Shoreditch pub in London. [Read more...]
20 August 2011 By 2 Comments
Wimpy Mega Burger an Endangered Classic in Fast-Food Design
The genius of the Wimpy Mega Burger may not by immediately apparent to those of you grew up with and later grew weary of that national chain of fast-food hamburger bars.
But to an American introduced to the uncertain charms of Wimpy 57 years after its launch on Coventry Street in London and decades past its sell-by date this Mega achievement stands out like yellow mustard on a white shirt collar. Behold a monument in modernist fast-food design: The cheeseburger hot dog cohabitation. [Read more...]
10 August 2011 By 8 Comments
My Open Letter to Pierre Hermé
15 July 2011
Dear Pierre Hermé,
Imagine my delight when on the first of this month I received an invitation from your public relations representative in the UK to visit your Pierre Hermé Paris boutique in London (map), sample some of your incomparable macarons and share the experience with readers of youngandfoodish.com. [Read more...]
15 July 2011 By 9 Comments
The Lionel Lévy BurgerMonday Pop-Up Question
Lionel Lévy, the Michelin-starred chef at Une Table, au Sud in Marseille, loves to revisit the classics. The protégé of Gérard Garrigues and Alain Ducasse has made a name for himself with his bouillabaisse milkshake and other signature (re)inventions. He added another to his repertoire as guest chef at my BurgerMonday pop-up on the 23rd of May at Andrew’s Gray’s Inn greasy spoon in London. 
He merged two American standards, the burger and the BLT sandwich, replacing their customary condiments with the Provençal accessories he prepared at his restaurant, packed in sous-vide bags and stashed with ice packs inside his hand luggage for the flight from Marseille to London.
When just 15 minutes before service Lévy showed me the very first version ever of his stunning pop-up burger BLT I was startled. I wasn’t sure what to make of it, or how to eat it. As you can see in the video above many diners had the same initial reaction, if varied answers to the question: Which end is ‘wich?
13 July 2011 By 6 Comments
Osteria Francescana’s Massimo Bottura: “Our Ideas are in Service of the Most Beautiful Foods”
Chef Massimo Bottura of Osteria Francescana in Modena, Italy didn’t win the 2011 The San Pellegrino World’s 50 Best Restaurant Awards on votes but he was tops in decibels. Roars erupted from Monday night’s audience at London’s Guildhall when the chef at the fourth best restaurant in the world, up two places from 2010, was declared the winner of the Chef’s Choice award.
This was the second great honour bestowed upon Bottura in two weeks. On 4 April the local boy made good was awarded the Medaglia d’Oro – “gold medal” – from the commune of Modena (photos here). [Read more...]
20 April 2011 By 1 Comment
Diners, Like Liquids, Take Shape of their Container
According to the ground rules of the restaurant repertoire you’re not supposed to find a dish like this…
…in a place like this…
Yet when Hugue Dufour, the French-Canadian chef-proprietor of the M. Wells Diner in Queens, New York, asked me if I’d ordered his silky-smooth parsnip soup with the sautéed foie gras topper I was surprised anyone would regard this accessory as optional. [Read more...]
18 February 2011 By 9 Comments
Department of Coffee & Social Affairs Now Serving London
Yesterday I was trudging through the snow drifts along London’s Leather Lane on the quietest of Saturdays in this December of discontent when I came across this wondrous sign above the entrance of numbers 14-16: Department of Coffee and Social Affairs. [Read more...]
19 December 2010 By Leave a Comment
