jamie goode's wine blog: L'Autre Pied: great food for the weight conscious!

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

L'Autre Pied: great food for the weight conscious!

Had lunch with Wine Australia's UK head Lisa McGovern yesterday at L'Autre Pied in Marylebone. Head chef Marcus Eaves is a genius: the food was brilliantly executed, with really good ingredients prepared creatively, but not too fussily (you won't find smears of different coloured gloops on your plate here). The wine list was also pretty creative, with lots of interest, but typically gougey London prices (how I wish restaurants would move to a cash margin for the smarter bottles, rather than just a straight GP).

My only slight gripe is the portion sizes. They're tiny. When the starters were brought out I thought they were an amuse bouche. I know this sounds greedy - and I could probably do with eating less - but there's a psychological impact that comes from looking at the food on your plate and thinking that the portion is probably about half what you'd have served yourself!

To drink? Australia isn't the strong point on the list, but that was where we were morally obliged to venture (Wine Australia were paying), and so we chose the excellent Mac Forbes rs09 Riesling 2008, at £40. It's a deliciously pure Aussie Riesling with just a touch of residual sugar, and it made a surprisingly versatile food match considering that we'd ordered all over the place in terms of flavour. Service was excellent, and wine advice which we tried out proved to be unstuffy and reliable.

Labels:

6 Comments:

At 4:00 PM, Blogger Douglas Blyde said...

I didn't get on well with L'Autre Pied and agree with you re. the portion sizes. Thinking of your companion, did they have much Australian wine in there?

 
At 4:14 PM, Blogger b.smith said...

Jamie, a typically honest and straight up (and therefore refreshing) account of your meal - and abs agree re cash margin.

Ben

 
At 11:13 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Who ate all the pie(d)s?

 
At 7:37 PM, Anonymous James said...

You should try The Hawksmoor (Commercial Street, London) on a Monday night. BYO wine with £5 corkage. Excellent quality meat as well.

 
At 9:23 AM, Blogger david said...

I'm dining there today and will be quaffing your suggested tipple.

Cheers.

 
At 9:26 AM, Blogger david said...

I'm dining there today and will be quaffing your suggested tipple.

Cheers.

 

Post a Comment

Links to this post:

Create a Link

<< Home