Call them pizzelle fritti, if you insist on using the correct term for this Neapolitan treat. But I took one bite of the golden dough fritter topped with spicy tomato sauce and grated Parmesan and instantly thought doughnut. Savoury doughnut. Pizza doughnut. [Read more...]
Pizza Doughnut Pops Up in City of London
30 March 2012 By Leave a Comment
Dutch Designer Marcel Wanders Out-Geeked by Blanch & Shock at Galleria Illy
Only a fool tries to upstage Marcel Wanders by out-smiling, out-dressing, out-tanning, out-hairing or out-flirting the tall, dark and handsome Dutch designer. But were you to tie your hair in a bun, as Josh Pollen did, or hide your intense gaze behind protective goggles, as Mike Knowlden did, you might find it relatively easy to out-geek Wanders. These ingeniously inventive – and skinny – young chefs managed just that at the London launch for Flos of the beautiful Wanders Can-Can Lamp at the Galleria Illy pop-up this October.
28 November 2011 By Leave a Comment
A Correlation Amongst the Quality of the Coffee, the Cookie & the Conversation
The reasonably safe premise behind my CoffeeSaturday pop-up series was that there would be a correlation between the quality of the coffee and that of the conversation. Nothing new there: For centuries coffee shops have cultivated an open exchange of ideas, knowledge and opinions both meaningful and meaningless. I nevertheless chose to sweeten the equation with a third element: the cookie. [Read more...]
5 September 2011 By Leave a Comment
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
Jaws Drop at Goodman BurgerMonday Pop-Up
photo by Paul Winch-Furness
Why did jaws drop throughout Andrew’s Gray’s Inn greasy spoon when London chef John Cadieux of Goodman steakhouses and butcher Darragh O’Shea of O’Shea’s of Knightsbridge revealed their BurgerMonday pop-up burger? Were diners expressing astonishment at the unreasonable height and drippiness of this bacon cheeseburger? Or was it more the reflexive action of carnivores stretching and shaping their mouths for the imminent entrance of that brioche bun and all the beef, special sauce and accoutrements John stacked beneath his homemade, egg-polished, sesame-seeded dome? [Read more...]
30 June 2011 By 3 Comments
SpagWednesday Poaches Spuntino Meatballs
slideshow photos by Paul Winch-Furness
Great fan though I am of Polpo, Polpetto and their new sibling sensation Spuntino, Wednesday the 13th of April was probably not the best night to be dining at any of these madly popular restaurants in London’s Soho. That’s because Spuntino head chef Rachel O’Sullivan and group chef Tom Oldroyd took that afternoon and night off to prepare 350+ meatballs for my SpagWednesday meatballs and spaghetti pop-up dinner (see photos above by food photographer Paul-Winch Furness) at the Gray’s Inn greasy spoon Andrew’s.
Rachel and Tom sent out heaping plates of spaghetti and meatballs with wedges of focaccia to 66 SpagWednesday twirling slurpers who did with it what SpagWednesday twirling slurpers do: They ate like kids and dined like princes.
Although some Italian purists insist you shouldn’t serve bread with pasta, piling starch upon starch, the Spuntino chefs concluded that the far greater crime would have been to leave a roomful of urbane Londoners with traces of homemade tomato sauce on their plates but no bread with which to mop it up. The only viable alternative would have been for diners to use their fingers, which, though hardly unheard of at young&foodish pop-ups, is perhaps not the preferred medium.
Don’t miss out on the fun at my next pop-up. Join the young&foodish community now and as a member you’ll receive email alerts about upcoming SpagWednesday and BurgerMonday pop-ups as well as advance booking privileges.
17 April 2011 By 1 Comment
SpagWednesday Vongole Pop-Up: The Movie
For my inaugural SpagWednesday pop-up on February 23rd I lured Francesco Mazzei out of his comfort zone in the state-of-the-art kitchen at L’Anima, his posh Italian restaurant in the City of London, to prepare spaghetti alle vongole (with clams) at Andrews, a 1950s greasy spoon. [Read more...]
15 March 2011 By Leave a Comment
Is Isaac McHale the next big thing?
Were a CV a sure indicator of a chef’s potential, as only gullible restaurateurs and food critics are led to believe, then Isaac McHale would already be counting his Michelin stars. 3 weeks shy of 30 and 3 months from running his own kitchen for the first time at autumn arrival Elliot’s Borough Market, the Glaswegian has already held positions at Tom Aikens and The Ledbury in London, Marque in Sydney, Momofuku Ssam Bar in New York and, most opportunely, Noma in Copenhagen, named World’s Best Restaurant in April. This month he began cooking preview Friday night dinners at Elliot’s in the Park, a pop-up at the Pavilion Cafe in East London’s Victoria Park: 5 courses, 5 wines, £50. [Read more...]
16 June 2010 By 1 Comment
