Does anyone here like chef's fiddling with food before serving?

[klaatu]

While I agree that food served on lumps of wood (etc) is a crime, if you simply eat because you would otherwise expire, and feel cheated if your plate is not full to overflowing, that's fine, but please do try to accept that for some of us, when we eat in a restaurant, it is sometimes more than just an exercise in getting our bellies filled.

 

[bubble63]

"Fine dined" twice last week and pub lunched once,
Both fine dining experiences were fab, @Tootles ,we ate socially- so the wine, the food and the company were all important, didnt go to get full
We belong to the cambridge food and wine society, so its a hobby The food and wine are key , the people are diverse and interesting also, I sat with a barrister who's never practiced and an office bod
I'm with @Langtoftlad on this one

 

[Tootles]

but please do try to accept that for some of us, when we eat in a restaurant, it is sometimes more than just an exercise in getting our bellies filled.

I sincerely apologise, M'lud. I have, it seems, been for many years under the assumption that food was for sustenance only. Maybe 'some of us' would feel that way if dining out in say the Sudan, where the local populace don't seem have the pleasure of an al a carte menu.

 

[bubble63]

I sincerely apologise, M'lud. I have, it seems, been for many years under the assumption that food was for sustenance only. Maybe 'some of us' would feel that way if dining out in say the Sudan, where the local populace don't seem have the pleasure of an al a carte menu.

what's third world got to do with this?
do you live in a tent, drive a cart, wear head gear.......... nope, you live in a first world and enjoy the benifits of such, medicine, stable economy etc.........

 

[Langtoftlad]

Apparently some nice restaurants in Khartoum ...

https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurants-g293835-Khartoum_Khartoum_State.html

As an aside - amazing what one learns as a result of a thread about fiddled with food on a motorhome forum...
"Khartoum is for example 36.8% more expensive than Houston TX for groceries, 12% more expensive for household costs than Kuala Lumpur, and 16% more expensive for transport costs than Dubai."

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[Tootles]

what's third world got to do with this?

Well, I suppose the third world side is in response at being talked down to in a snobby way. You know.........................

you simply eat because you would otherwise expire, and feel cheated if your plate is not full to overflowing, that's fine, but please do try to accept that for some of us, when we eat in a restaurant, it is sometimes more than just an exercise in getting our bellies filled.

 

[sedge]

I couldn't criticise highly trained and qualified chefs using blow torches - not if I want my Crème Brulee at Christmas I couldn't, else our eldest would refuse to make it for me. And it's fab! Yeah I could make it myself had I any cocotte dishes and a blowtorch - it isn't that difficult to do actually - but absolutely ALL food is better when someone else prepares it and serves it up to you. (well - perhaps almost anyone else, LOL)

If the food is tasteless enough to need a boatload of gravy over it, well that's probably the best thing to do, isn't it? However, it shouldn't be - in which case any sauce including bog standard Bisto gravy - is only there to enhance it. Wouldn't want a ladle of French dressing on a salad, would you? But just the right amount is fantastic.

 

[pyro]

It’s not just pretentious cooking and serving that annoy me. The ridiculous descriptions that some of these “gourmet" or "gastro" pubs serve up really annoy me.

Example

“Pork Medallions” - are we talking testicles here?
“Hand cut chips” – odd sizes, nothing out of the ordinary
“Home cooked” – in a pub kitchen?
“Artisan” or “Rustic” – basic grub served on a scratched, bacteria ridden bit of planking
“Gourmet burger” - costs more than the equivalent steak, served with fries in a wire basket to pretend they’re freshly cooked and a flippin salad so you can watch the calories!
“Fresh vegetable” – you’d hardly expect stale vegetables


And ostentatious rubbish descriptions. e,g : "Free range home cooked organic brown wild duck, stuffed with polished Israeli pearl couscous, surrounded by a sprinkling of sun-dried Tuscany tomato, served on a bed of hand picked coulis on an artisan platter, crescendoed by organically grown kalamata olives and drizzled with extra special virgin oils, hand pressed in Florence". In a flippin' pub in Watford????

Food for me is mostly just for maintenance purposes (fuel) or as part of a social occasion., in which case it is a matter more of the company you are in that makes the event memorable.

My other half tells me I should learn to cook, then I would enjoy my food more. I tell her she should earn a living to pay for what she orders in restaurants , then she would start losing weight.

My doctor tells me that it should be safe to remove the neck brace sometime next week

 

[mitzimad]

some eat to live others live to eat

 

[pyro]

And others eat others. Well, cannibals do

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[WSandME]

Hmm, Snobbery can be of the inverted variety as well, you know?

 

[pyro]

Trust me, anyone who knows me would laugh at the suggestion I am an inverted snob.

My abhorrence of ostentation makes it easy for me to indulge simple tastes where it suits, not everyone thinks that the most expensive item on the most expensive menu is necessarily the best you can get. Wealth and taste are two different things

 

[JJ]

and three fluffy pancakes drizzled in sweet syrup"

I must say initially I was amazed and shocked by your information Mr Langtoftlad... until I realised it was not relevant to the burgers... only the pudding!

Who wants pancakes after a Double Whopper with extra cheese and bacon (no pickle), chips and Pepsi followed by a chocolate sundae?

Actually... now you have got me thinking...

JJ

 

[Mrsambulancekidd]

Fray Bentos pie Cadburies smash and tinned mushy peas.

John.

That's the other end of the scale.....lol.....

 

[Langtoftlad]

@JJ
Do you ever slum it at the Golden Arches?

This takes drizzling to a whole new level !

Broken Link Removed

McChoco Fries!

No need to thank me

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[Bobby22]

We belong to the cambridge food and wine society, so its a hobby The food and wine are key , the people are diverse and interesting also, I sat with a barrister who's never pra

Hey @bubble63 this reminds me of the eminent Scottish QC. He used to tell of dinner parties at his house where he would decant cheap wine into expensive looking labelled bottles and listen to all the shit his guests would spew.

Another story, Sir Cliff Richard, wine tasting with Gordon Ramsey. Cliff owns his own vineyards that produce their own wine. GR stuck some of his CR in the mix and Cliff suggested it was shit.

Sometimes you can fool some of the people some of the time.

 

[TheBig1]

well this says it all for many celebrity chefs and wanabees

 

[chaser]

Getting back to the op, no one has mentioned the practice of putting the food on the plates then wiping around the edge with a dirty old tea towel hanging from his belt, I have seen this many times and always puts me off.

 

[The Wino]

Having stayed unexpectedly (on a cheap deal) in a hotel that did present food like that (I mean nicely presented not the wipe with the grubby tea towel)this year it was great. Its like everything else if you don't like it don't do it if you do like it go for it be a sorry world if we all liked the same thing. One mans pretentious food is anothers delight one mans plate of good old fashioned hearty fare is anothers plate of stodge that resembles a dogs bowl !!!!

 

[Tootles]

B

Having stayed unexpectedly (on a cheap deal) in a hotel that did present food like that (I mean nicely presented not the wipe with the grubby tea towel)this year it was great. Its like everything else if you don't like it don't do it if you do like it go for it be a sorry world if we all liked the same thing. One mans pretentious food is anothers delight one mans plate of good old fashioned hearty fare is anothers plate of stodge that resembles a dogs bowl !!!!

BUT, you dont always know what your about to get for say a couple of weeks. We went on a cruise with Royal Caribbean for our 25th a few years ago, 14 nights Norway and above the Arctic circle.........First night, 'picture on a plate food', which it seems, was the norm. Now, as, (it seems), a food cretin and an inverted snob, I didnt realise that I was going to have to put up with this dump for the next two weeks when I booked. Fair doos, my last cruise had been to Malta from Benghazi on an LST, where the food suited my snobbery.
Anyway, I slipped the head table turkey a tenner, (in dollars of coarse), and got burgers chips steak, pies and all the other low life food instead. Day saved.

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[klaatu]

Well, I suppose the third world side is in response at being talked down to in a snobby way. You know.........................

Certainly wasn't my intention, sorry you interpreted it that way, and it wasn't directed at anyone in particular. You said yourself that you eat to live, and I said that was fine. I was simply defending an alternative attitude to food, which appears to be under attack in this thread.

 

[Deleted member 29692]

We eat out quite regularly, sometimes fine dining places sometimes not. Personally I like to see well presented plates and perfectly cooked food.

I'd rather not go out than have over cooked meat and tasteless frozen vegetables chucked on a plate and then drowned in a horrible packet sauce to try and hide how bad the food is.

We belong to the cambridge food and wine society,

Do you go to Midsummer House very often?

 

[pyro]

I can't speak for Tootles, but speaking for myself, I abhor all forms of ostentation. I am financially comfortable, although I do have a problem with people who like to constantly brag about the size/price of their motorhomes or need to be seen at the most expensive restaurants, clothes shops, etc. The sort who feel they have to tell everyone that they turn left when they board an aircraft. Somehow it seems rather vulgar to show a display of wealth in the presence of those more may be less financially secure than yourself.

In terms of restaurants, I tend to prefer those that cook the food I like in the way that I want, as opposed to making it look "pretty". They're not mutually exclusive properties.

In the UK it is becoming increasingly difficult to find a place that doesn't charge a massive premium for appearance, an example of this being our local village pub which is generally almost empty and charges £25 for a wine you can buy in Sainsbury's for less than a fiver, £3 for a cup of coffee, £5 a beer and charges for basic (but prettily presented) sandwiches start at £8. Little wonder it's usually empty

I have long established that just as you don't have to spend a fortune at highly expensive places to have an enjoyable meal, equally, spending a fortune on a meal doesn't guarantee it is going to be more enjoyable. Except perhaps for those unfortunate few for whom price equates to some sort of superiority.

 

[The Wino]

The thing that bugs me more than the prettily presented food is when you go to a pub carvery and there's a couple that take up 4 seats (because of their width) who have plates loaded to the point where stuff drops off the edge all mixed in together so they can't possibly taste much of it especially given the rate at which it goes in. But as I said each to their own.

 

[chaser]

While in Benidorm recently we tried the top four restaurants on TripAdvisor, and not one of them charged more than £35 for two, including all drinks and bottle of wine and they were all superb but none did the fancy stuff.
Funny enough three of them are side by side up a narrow street that you wouldn't go up if you didn't know they were there.

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[Tootles]

The thing that bugs me more than the prettily presented food is when you go to a pub carvery and there's a couple that take up 4 seats (because of their width) who have plates loaded to the point where stuff drops off the edge all mixed in together so they can't possibly taste much of it especially given the rate at which it goes in. But as I said each to their own.

Thats nothing to do with food or eating, but sheer greed! 'As much as you can eat for a fiver' type carvery. I have watched people fighting with staff to get their fivers worth.

Do you go to Midsummer House very often?

Who do you think he is, Inspector Morse??

I was simply defending an alternative attitude to food, which appears to be under attack in this thread.

It's not 'under attack', as such, but what you see here is just the social divide. Your hobby is eating out at fine restaurants, resplendent in exquisite wines and food presented in a certain way. Many on here had to fight for their food as kids, and so food means nothing but fuel to climb the next hill.

 

[Yorick]

We don't get any of that poncy stuff over here stuff over here.

 

[bubble63]

We eat out quite regularly, sometimes fine dining places sometimes not. Personally I like to see well presented plates and perfectly cooked food.

I'd rather not go out than have over cooked meat and tasteless frozen vegetables chucked on a plate and then drowned in a horrible packet sauce to try and hide how bad the food is.



Do you go to Midsummer House very often?

LOL
never been, walked past it a few times
It's in the very upper echelon
Went to 22 last week
It's the wife's bag really,
Have you?

 

[Deleted member 29692]

LOL
never been, walked past it a few times
It's in the very upper echelon
Went to 22 last week
It's the wife's bag really,
Have you?

Yes once, we went for my birthday last year. It's epic, every bit as fantastic as you expect it to be and then some.

 

[ambulancekidd]

Many on here had to fight for their food as kids, and so food means nothing but fuel to climb the next hill.

That pretty much sums me up, I had a mother who wouldn't feed or cloth me & life was extremely hard, so I had to fight for everything before the social services spotted what was going on & I was taken into care. Perhaps this explains my disgust at chef's fannying about with food oh & that I feel its done to get away with serving piddly little amounts to save money.
Let me put it another way, its like that king folk sing about, you know the one "The King Is In The Altogether" snobs or the pseudo snobs dont realise that they're being turned over. The odd thing is that I have some friends that are extremely rich, but you'd never know it as they're so grounded. The types that crave this tripe are the V neck sweater golfist types.

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