October 2008 Archives

As openings go, this was no T5....even though Westfield managers admitted to us at the end of the day they had been preparing for the worst, on the day it was packed to the rafters. But despite the crowds, there was a conspicuous lack of shopping bags with punters clearly chosing to browse rather than buy. The food outlets however, were definitely the winners of the day, being totally rammed from about 10am onwards.

Even a few problems with the gas at one point couldn't dampen spirits and despite queues of around 45mins at the lunch time peak, most customers said their dishes from the food court were worth the wait.

One little snag that will hopefully be quickly remedied..

In this post-smoking ban era, it's essential to have plenty of bins and ashtrays around for fag butts, but someone forgot to order them - so by the end of the day the outside was strewn with fag ends - lowering the tone somewhat..

Kitchen Rat spies down at the grand unveiling of the Westfield London Shopping centre today have reported that all is not well on the Western front.

The 17 restaurants along the Southern Terrace of the £1.6b retail development in White City, including BBC Masterchef winner Thomasina Miers's second Wahaca outlet, Tom Etridge's latest concept, Ito, and Swiss vegetarian group Tibits as well as chains Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Wagamama and The Real Greek  have been forced to close as the gas supply has been turned off...

Despite the massive media coverage and clamouring crowds there will be no food available on this floor of the shopping centre.

Shame. We'd hoped it would be cooking with gas, etc etc.

New concepts make their debut at Westfield>>

Joel Robuchon kept his three stars at the MGM Grand hotel, while Guy Savoy was awarded two stars for his outlet at Caesars Palace.

Meanwhile Robuchon received another, single, star for his version of L'Atelier, also at the MGM Grand and Daniel Boulud's Brasserie at Wynn gained a star too

The Las Vegas edition of the Michelin guide is in its second year, and already these new city guides to the USA are great news for the top French names.

Chefs such as Robuchon, Savoy and Gagnaire took the idea of being a global brand in the late 1990s and ran with it, to the extent of opening restaurants in North America, the Middle East and Asia. Now Michelin has belated chased them across the globe, still handing out awards for the same type of French food, wherever it's cooked. For ambitious chefs the game is no longer about owning a fine property in Paris with good food and service.

And for those who have always obsessed about winning two or three stars - or even being a double three-star winner as Ducasse once was - the bar is raised. Why not 15, 20, or even more? There are further Michelin city guides in the pipeline, with Hong Kong likely to be the next after inspectors were spotted there over the summer. More stars add up to good marketing as well as being great for the ego - the era of the celebrity chef is just starting.

It's funny how other countries see us. A writer for the New York Times today is amazed that restaurants apparently keep opening apace in London, while the economic downturn crunches on. The journalist points to the recent(ish) opening of L'Anima, and that of Le Bouchon Breton around the city's financial district as evidence that it's a "Bull Market for London Foodies", as the headline goes.

Well, true enough, the Cinnamon Club's Cinnamon Kitchen and the J Sheekey Oyster Bar are set to launch next month. Then there's a new restaurant from former Pont de la Tour head chef James Walker, called - and this is deliberately quirky - Bob Bob Ricard. It's a replacement, finally in ad land Upper St James St for the much-loved Circus, and takes the trend for British food so prevalent in gastropubs across the land into a more upmarket venue.

We also have a new venue from ex-Moro head chef Jacob Kenedy in November, and upmarket Italian called Bocca di Lupo, plus the Grosvenor's attempt to gain back what they once had with Nico Ladenis on Park Lane, via Richard Corrigan.

Some of these will be great new additions to the London scene, from some particularly fine chefs and operators. But when you think that on average three-to-four restaurants open in the city every week, and that this is traditionally a busy time for openings, it's no great shakes. Some of these are smaller spin-offs with lower costs than the main brand they derive from; others are long-planned, mid-market ventures. Backers are hardly going to pull out with a new £600,000 kitchen in place and most of the fittings sorted.

It will be more interesting to compare next year with this one, around March and April, when the effect of the credit crunch really does begin to kick in. Then the drawn-out period after Christmas could mean that rather than plenty of openings, unfortunately there could be a few restaurants closing down too.

Relationships between the UK and Russia may be frosty but it appears the long-running Cold War between superstar-chefs Marco Pierre White and Gordon Ramsay may
have thawed.

A Kitchen Rat spy was on hand at JFK airport in New York earlier this year to witness Gordon Ramsay striding to the car rental desk pursued by Marco Pierre White.

However, rather than remonstrate and threaten legal proceedings against Ramsay for the theft of the reservations book from Aubergine (again) with a smattering of his own F-Words, Marco instead gave Ramsay a warm embrace.

Alas, our spy wasn't near enough to tell if Marco's actions made Ramsay cry, or whether the Cook Along star chose to cry (or, in fact, actually cried at all). But eithier way, Posh Spice can cook, so there!

Gordon Ramsay Holdings revenue to hit £100m by 2010>>

Gordon Ramsay to open restaurant at London's Hippodrome>>

Marco Pierre White set to launch Frankie's in USA>>

Gone are the all-night eating sessions with partner and fellow restaurateur Mario Batali. Where once Joe Bastianich, owner of 18 New York, Los Angeles and Las Vegas restaurants with Batali, used to start at 2am and go on to 5 in the morning, chewing his way through 42 ounce steaks, now there are only healthy breakfasts and running.

The fearsome duo used to egg each other on in all-night eat-offs, after service at Luppo, Babbo, or Carnevino, just three of the popular diners owned by the pair, eating their way through huge mounds of meat.

But it took Bastianich to the brink, forcing him to sleep at night with a breathing mask after he was diagnosed with sleep apnea, brought on by his less than healthy lifestyle.

Now, however, he's rising at 7am, eating nuts, steamed chicken breasts and broccoli. And on Sunday, after much training and stamina work, he'll be running the New York marathon.

According to his wife Deanna, "I am still getting used to seeing Joe in the spandex running pants. "That is a sight I thought I would never see."

Men Behaving Badly and Waterloo Road star Neil Morrissey is in the Metro this morning extolling the virtues of beer.

Having run a couple of private clubs and a hotel in Wales over the last few years, he's just launched his own beer at his new pub in North Yorkshire. A brave move you might think, in these testing times for the pub industry but we reckon it's about time this classic British tipple got a makeover like cider's epiphany with ice last summer.

His journey is documented on Channel 4 at 10pm tonight entitled Risky Business.

There's something voyeuristic about TV chefs peddling fresh veg to burger-chomping council estates. It may start off as a worthy idea but it becomes condescending and didactic. And it makes awful viewing.

The solid formula is chef feeds nice-recipe veg to aesthetically-imperfect working-class family, family admits fresh food isn't a comparable evil to nuclear destruction or Sarah Palin as they once thought, family then thank said chef and once he's out the door likely bump up their veg quota by an iceberg a week.

While Tom Aikens's suppliers are busy tearing their hair out over the tens of thousands of pounds he owes them in unpaid bills, it seems all is still rosy in celebrity chef land.

According to a piece in yesterday's Sunday Times Aikens is carrying on as usual despite the mess surrounding his restaurant business.

The article talks about such serious matters as his "adorable aristocratic PR bunny" wife and the competition she faces on the ladies front, and goes on to say that apart from the little hiccup with Tom's Kitchen, "team Aikens is raring to go".

Yes, Tom Aikens fans worry not: His restaurant business may have collapsed into administration but there are loads of things you can look forward to. There's the new cookbook, which launches next week, the "hugely desirable" cookware he has just designed with "friend" David Linley and even the possibility of a TV show. Hoorah!

Let's hope that with such a busy schedule Aikens will find the time to pay his suppliers.

Alexis Gauthier, owner of Roussillon restaurant in west London, told three members of his kitchen staff they had to leave back in July - but now he's rehiring for those same posts. Expecting a massive fall in numbers eating at his restaurant due to the economic slowdown, Gauthier has in fact found that his brand of classic French cooking is drawing people away from the flashier, more experimental type of cooking found in central London. "We don't have warm jellies, or foamed surprises," says Gauthier. "We're roast pigeon, braised duck".

Gauthier is benefiting from what he sees as the new expense account world in London: a maximum of £100 per head. That's how his 40-seat diner is full in the evening, and lunch, where he offers a set deal at midday of £35 including a half bottle of wine, is nowhere near the disaster he was predicting. "September and October has been quieter than last year, but Monday to Thursday is still going great guns pm". 

His rent is reasonable compared to some of the more extreme charges in W1, and Gauthier has developed his local clientele over 10 years of Roussillon being open. However, Gauthier admits that he's worried about 2009. "January through to Valentine's Day is traditionally tough, but next year it's going to be really difficult. I am really worried about 2009, to tell you the truth."

 Us journalists aren't a precious bunch. Anyone who's seen Jay Rayner or Giles Coren selflessly chow down a foie gras and truffle dinner will know the score. A more humble, modest, self-effacing group you'd struggle to find outside of an Afghan Red Cross tent. And even they get battlefront immunity; cholesterol abides by no such rules.

So it was a little out of character when the anything-but-staunchly-defensive Fay Maschler got pernickety via email about our brief résumé of Charles Campion in October 16's Ask the Critics cover story, where we described him as "Restaurant critic of the Evening Standard":

My colleague and friend Charles Campion (Any Questions for the Critics) contributes articles on seasonal ingredients and a blog to the Evening Standard. He is not the Evening Standard restaurant critic. I am.

Fay Maschler.
Evening Standard

Other than a predilection for full-stops, you might notice an atypical note of stroppiness; Maschler defending her unique title with the voracity of an irksome Jack Russell guarding its dinner. Well, let's hope she's got a bag load more of full-stops, because a quick Google-search finds this introduction in the Evening Standard's website This is London:

"Evening Standard restaurant critic Charles Campion takes us through his top ten places to eat in London that won't cost a packet."

Maschler's one-in-one-out rule for Evening Standard restaurant critics doesn't seem  too indoctrinated among the sub-editors. But then again, it'd be too silly to care. Wouldn't it? 

The service in a restaurant is as important as the food and while poor food can ruin your experience of dining out a great meal is easily spoilt by bad service.

But what do you do as a customer when something's gone wrong in a restaurant? The Good Food Guide claims it has the answer and lays out five golden rules to complaining. 

1. Keep your voice low and calm, but be firm.

2. Avoid creating a scene in front of other customers, or your guests, which can put the restaurant on the defensive. Instead, approach it as part of a deal between you and the restaurant and its staff to jointly create a great eating experience.

3. Identify the manager, maître d'or person who appears to be in charge and take them aside quietly and state your case firmly.

4. Complain immediately if things go wrong. Don't brood - act. If the soup is cold or the meat not done to your specification, say so there and then.

5. Don't leave it until paying the bill to make a complaint - by then it may be too late for the restaurant to rectify the situation and you will walk away thinking it was all a horrible experience.

Alea Glasgow has teamed up with the city's Diamond Studio to create Scotland's most expensive cocktail.

Priced at a spectacular £7,175, the Alea Rock is made of Ultimat vodka, Junipero gin and the zest of one whole lemon and is garnished with an 18 carat white gold and diamond ring.

Perhaps some men will love the idea of proposing to their girlfriend with a ring floating in a cocktail but I'm not sure now's the best time to be launching such an extravagant offer.

Especially in Glasgow.

Fancy getting banged-up for the night? (And paying for the privilege?)

Well now you can. A multi-million pound hotel development in Covent Garden which offers visitors the chance to spend the night in a former police cell has been approved.

The former Bow Street Magistrates' Court will be transformed into a 76-bedroom hotel with a museum and 16 "sleepover" cells.

Irish development company Edward Holdings, which bought the building for about £25m in 2006, hopes it will take its place alongside other "criminal attractions" like the London Dungeon and the Tower of London.

A night's stay will put you in the company of previous jailbirds that include Casanova, Oscar Wilde, the Kray twins and Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst and also saw the delightfully pointless Pete Doherty in the dock.

They're not changing many of the original fixtures either, the basic lavatory will be there, but will apparently be covered by a glass box...(Does that makes it better or worse?)

For the less intrepid though, there will be "better" conveniences available elsewhere and breakfast will be provided by room service instead of a police officer (guffaw).

US presidential candidate Barack Obama proved that despite the gravity of the ecomonic crisis, food is still the way to American voters' hearts.

In a recent speech in West Philadelpia he mentioned pie not once, not twice, but 15 times to raucous cheers from the audience each time he uttered the word.

Sweet potato pie was the favourite with 13 mentions, followed by quickie nods to lemon meringue and coconut cream pie.

And we wonder why Americans have an obesity problem! Doh.

Contract caterer Artizian has been quietly adding high profile clients to its books in recent months.

Known in the marketplace for its commitment to good health through good food, Artizian has demonstrated that it's far from a one-trick pony by winning business at two prestigious London clients.

The company, set up in 1997 by Alison Frith, now counts law firm DLA Piper (staff restaurant) and investment bank Dresdner Kleinwort as clients.

Both contracts were previously run by Restaurant Associates, which is part of industry giant Compass Group.

Most recently Artizian has snapped up camera-to-printer-manufacturer Canon and is providing services at its UK headquarters in Surrey and at a training facility in Sussex.

The previous incumbent here was Sodexo, so another notable scalp for the independent, which is now just shy of the 20 contract mark.

Contract catering news page>>

Kitchen Rat can today reveal that administrators at BDO Stoy Hayward have instructed property agent Christie & Co to sell the Smollensky's flagship outlets in Canary Wharf and on the Strand.

The move comes as little surprise as the burger chain's owner Grill Group has made it known for some weeks that it was interested in offers in any of its outlets.

Sources close to Smollensky's expect a "very quick sale", based on the level of interest in the two sites in recent months.

Another one bites the dust...

That well-known consumer of food, Victoria Beckham, is to appear on Gordon Ramsay's new cookery show. Victoria is apparently appearing on Ramsay's Cookalong Live to show people how to cook, according to The Sun.

He told the paper: "Victoria can cook."

So there you go.

Chris Horridge, head chef at the Michelin-starred Bath Priory, is leaving to join von Essen's Cliveden, Kitchen Rat has learnt.

The Great British Menu contestant, who has garnered critical acclaim for his health-conscious approach to fine dining, will take over the reins at the property's Waldo's restaurant.

He will replace Robert Thompson, who left in June just eight months after joining Cliveden to set up his own restaurant on the Isle of Wight.

Von Essen recently took the unusual step of borrowing six chefs from its other hotels to cover some shifts at Cliveden. Or, as the rather breathless press release said, it "invited top chefs from the other hotels in the Von Essen collection to show off their culinary skills for the next two months".

That's until Chris joins then.

Von Essen's crafty loan deals

Healthy fine dining: An interview with Michelin-starred Chris Horridge

Desperate times call for desperate measures. And the current economic climate could definitely qualify as such.

According to one high-end property expert, the current credit crunch (are we using the 'R' word yet?) has led to an outbreak in what the industry calls "runners"- that is people who formerly worked in property looking to make a quick-buck by setting up a sale between two parties.

Rumours being circulated by such people at the moment include the sale of The Sheraton Park Tower, owned by Mahdi al-Jahir, and the Four Seasons in Canary Wharf-currently closed for refurbishment.

But one owner of luxury-end hotels was intrigued when one of these sharks approached him with a view to buying a four-star hotel in the capital.

Playing along, and undoubtedly wrestling with a smile that threatened to creep into the corners of his mouth, he resolved to obtain the particulars of the hotel in question.

The runner fluffed his way through some answers, but found he was no match for the hotel magnate's superior knowledge.

Hardly surprising, since the man in question was already the owner of the hotel...

Marmite moments - Zaha Hadid's new design for Home House will probably be the most polarising opening in London this year.  

The iconic female architect has created 'installations' for the bar and lounges in the classic Robert Adam designed building which feature her trademark sci-fi esque style.

You're gonna love it or hate it...

Of course, you're only gonna be able to see these creations in the flesh if you can afford the club's £1,500 joining fee and £1,500 annual membership fee on top..yah right.  

Tory leader David Cameron may have urged us to "hug a hoodie", but it seems that this touchy-feely approach could in fact be the missing piece in the school-dinner uptake puzzle.

While Jamie Oliver has been making headlines once again, slamming the Government for a lack of investment in the school meals system, and caterers themselves are still kicking up a fuss about the new nutrition-based standards, the bods at Surrey school meals may have a simpler, more cost-effective solution to the problem.

A recent pilot at ten schools in Surrey saw new starters at primary level offered free school meals for a week to entice more children to use the service.

But, put simply the uplift from this initative was disappointing.

However, before schools minister Ed Balls thinks he's found the perfect reason to dismiss the Food for Life Partnership's calls for free school meals for all, an insider at Surrey has a quite different take on why the caterers literally couldn't give the stuff away.

It's because the children are missing their mummies. Aaaahhhhhh!

"My own daughter was the same when she went to school, which was of course the first time she'd been away from home. She found it all so traumatic at first that she simply wouldn't eat very much at all for the first few weeks."

So, a hug as well as healthy grub to boost school dinner uptake. Bet Jamie Oliver never envisioned that one.

School meals round-up>>

It's become customary to give the government a rough ride on everything, so any representative, however tentatively connected with the main seat of power, is seen as fair game.

That's how Michael Nelson, head of research at the School Food Trust, found himself confronted by a group full of people if not exactly baying for his blood over new nutritional standards in secondary schools, then taking out all their frustrations on his person.

The LACA London & South East region autumn event yesterday was a chance for caterers and local authority members to engage with the Trust, and put their views across.

However, academic Verner Wheelock, formerly of Bradford University, poured petrol on the fire of many a simmering frustration with a lecture purporting to show that the whole basis for the nutritional standards was fundamentally flawed. Thanks Vernon, you could imagine Nelson saying through gritted teeth as he sat on the front row taking the blows.

The assembled caterers and local authorities took this as a sign to rip into Nelson, questioning how the Trust's funding was being used, its inability to listen and above all how the nutritional standards were badly thought-through, and impossible to implement.

Allyson Lloyd, the LACA vice chair, eventually managed to calm the room down, reminding that this was a forum for engaging constructively with government - rather than throwing out random insults.

Yet still the accusations came, that the School Food Trust had brought the regulations without any consultation of the industry, and that the new laws would causing inordinate amounts of stress.

Some of this may be true. However, at at the risk of seeming like a cheerleader for the current administration, haven't we been here before? Two years ago, the whole sector was up in arms about food standards being brought in primary schools - and now it's been taken on board with few problems. As nutritionalists working with schools have shown, some of who spoke yesterday, it is quite possible for food regulations to be implemented.

And shouldn't we just be getting on with it? One thing for sure is that there's no chance government is going to backtrack on the new regulations now.

Yes, secondary schools are a different proposition, with kids allowed outside school gates at lunchtime - and that in itself is another issue. However, the more nutritionally aware children from primary schools are coming through the system, and that should give people hope.

Local authorities do have a point over the government's approach to funding, which on a two-year round basis, leaves council accountants questioning whether any monies should be put towards long term planning.

But that aside it would be well to remember that there's a reason for the new nutritional standards - because school food had sunk to such a low level over the last 20 years. And second, unlike rules, guidelines tend be ignored or fudged.

Word reaches Caterer Towers, from more than one source, that chef campaigner and all round good egg Jamie Oliver is planning to launch a bi-monthly foodie mag, imaginatively entitled "Jamie" from next month.

Jamie's people refused to shed any light on the rumour ("little birdies should be shot and stuffed," we were told) but we're assured it's got legs.

More as we get it...

Contract caterer Charlton House has won the deal to feed staff at London law firm Mayer Brown.

Under a three-year deal the caterer will manage hospitality services, previously run by Elior's Avenance, at Mayer Brown's Pilgrim Street office until February 2009.

After this time the law firm is relocating to a new site in the Broadgate development in the City at 201 Bishopsgate.

Services at the new site will include a staff restaurant for the first time, as well as hospitality, fine-dining, vending and a coffee shop for the firm's 750 staff and partners.

Kitchen Rat hears Charlton House pipped rivals BaxterStorey, Lexington and Harbour & Jones to the gig.

Charlton House regains 'Ready Steady Cook' crown>>

Charlton House wins Allianz Insurance deal>>

FSA reports on healthier workplace meal drive>>

Crown Group's Kudos wins Honourable Artillery Company deal>>

Contract catering round-up>>

A particularly scaremongering piece in today's Evening Standard, predicting the closure of "hundreds" of London restaurants in the New Year as the economic downturn continues to bite.

While there is no doubt restaurateurs are concerned about the next few months, it seems a bit doom and gloom to ever-optimistic Kitchen Rat.

The piece brings us "news" such as the Smollensky's outlets on the Strand and in Canary Wharf being placed up for sale by owner Grill Group.

In reality, sources close to the company tell us, they have never been placed for sale as such but if an offer comes in it will be considered. As Caterersearch reported on 30 June in fact.

Ed's Easy Diner is also "up for sale", according to the Standard, but as readers of The Times on 5 October will be able to tell you, the chain's owner is considering its options, including outside investment.

Caterersearch brought you exclusive stories of the sale of the Smollensky's in Hammersmith and Charing Cross, on 3 October, and chef Malcolm John taking over the lease of the Smollensky's in south Croydon, on 7 October.

So if up-to-date, exclusive and accurate news is what you're after you know what to do. For everything else, there's Mastercard (oh, and other "news" sites).

Update: 15 Oct. The Standard has pulled the article from its website. One expects this is after the angry reaction from Ed's Diner

There are many random pastimes people like to indulge in but my favourite weird and wonderful sport has to be competitive porridge making.

This weekend saw the 15th annual Porridge Making World Championships, which took place in Carrbridge in Scotland. Amateur enthusiasts including housewives and hobby cooks were joined by professional chefs in battling it out for the coveted Golden Spurtle.

The winner was local porridge lover Ian Bishop, who took the title on his 15th attempt. Talk about perseverance.

Bishop put his success down to the local water. "My secret ingredient is the water, which comes from a bore hole in my garden," he said.

The winner of the Speciality Porridge award was Addy Daggert, a professional chef from Holland, who made his dish with a mixture of marzipan, home-made ice-cream and an 18-year-old Glenfiddich. Daggert didn't put his success down to the water but rather the booze. Nice.  

Today, another kids' food angst story in the paper, as one school in Cardiganshire in west Wales bans Marmite for children's breakfasts - slamming it as too salty.

We all know Marmite has salt in it, but you only put a tiny bit on a piece of toast and if the rest of your diet is balanced I'm convinced no harm will come of it. Surely the generations of Marmite babies who love the brown sticky stuff are testament to this?

Although the skills shortage is the much spoken about thorn in the hospitality industry's side it seems for event caterers a shortage of beautiful people can be just as crippling.

There's no point after all in putting together a fabulous party with the cutest canapes and most darling design aesthetic, if Doris the 20-year employee with the weird eye from the staff restaurant is the one offering up the grub on the night.

A recent meeting with an event caterer confirmed Kitchen Rat's suspicions that at most fancy events there are a disproportionate amount of good looking girls and boys waiting on clients than is entirely plausible. Random chance it is not.

Suede's "Oh, hear they come, the beautiful ones, the beautiful ones", could have been playing in the background as the caterer in question conceded sourcing fine looking young things from recruiters was almost as important as sourcing great grub.

Although hospitality's sector skills council is called People 1st, we're not certain this was the thinking behind the name, but it seems for some in the events market the face really does have to fit. 

What's the most aphrodisiac food? Oysters? Chocolate? Strawberries?
Well, according to one London restaurateur it's none of the above.

Simone Falco, managing director of Italian restaurant group Rossopomodoro, reckons the sexiest food of all is pizza. And as there's nothing more sensual than eating with your hands, he's decided to ban all cutlery from his pizzerias in Covent Garden, Chelsea and Notting Hill.

"Pizza is something you touch and share," Falco says. "You've got to treat a pizza like someone you want to make love to. The pleasure of eating it is just as much about how it feels as how it tastes."

Could it be then, that Falco is the secret inspiration behind the Fast Show's iconic Swiss Toni?

This week a chef told me that he had been added to a list of sexy chefs.

Not that I did not believe him, but I hadn't heard of such a list, and wanting to have a nose, I searched the internet.

And lo and behold, there he was on the Kitchen Crumpet awards website.

Currently, claiming the top spot is someone called Gizzi Erskine, domestic goddess Nigella Lawson is second and Gordon Ramsay is third.

Also on the list are somewhat stranger nominations, but who am I to judge?

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder after all...

Given that we're all bankers now thanks to the Government's bail out of UK lenders to the tune of £400b, an investment bank related catering story seemed timely.

Last week the Association of Catering Excellence held its annual Ready Steady Cook Team challenge, a popular and fiercely contested competition amongst the contract catering industry.

Ultimate honours went to Charlton House who beat fourteen of their peers to the coverted title.

I say fourteen teams but there were actually fifteen on the billing.

Alas at the eleventh hour industry heavy-weight Aramark called to say that they simply couldn't spare the required two-strong team of chefs as they were mobilising their £10m Goldman Sachs contract.

Well fair play Aramark. It's rare that you hear about such a literal 'all-hands-to-the-pumps' approach to launching a new contract, and rarer still at a caterer with an annual turnover of £400m and more than 12,000 employees in the UK.

I'm sure Goldman Sachs will be very happy and it's a case of credit where it's due rather than credit crunch for Aramark.

Lehman Brothers collapse bad news for Compass>>

Aramark wins BBC catering deal>>

Aramark to cater at all HBOS sites>>

Goldman Sachs says goodbye to catering manager during retender>>

Formula 1 driver Lewis Hamilton has reportedly paid out £20m on a luxury Caribbean hotel and beach resort.

Hamilton is now the proud owner of the Grand Beach in Grenada, and the lucky boy also received £10m worth of beach-front land from the government.

The driver, guest of honour at Grenada's Independence Day, was given the land to become the "face of the island" where his grandfather lives as part of a four-year tourism drive.

 
But things are not as squeaky clean as one would hope for, as the fresh-faced gazillionnaire is now the subject of an inquiry launched by Prime minister Tillman Thomas into the deal, struck before he took office, after allegations it deprived taxpayers of millions in land fees.

 The deal is reportedly part of a strategy Lewis's advisers devised for his expected earnings of £75m over the next five years...Credit crunch? What credit crunch?

The sale of the Grosvenor House Hotel in Park Lane to oil-rich buyers from the Gulf states is the latest rumour making the rounds in the hospitality world.

The landmark 500-bedroom hotel has just gone under a £100m facelift but its owners, the Royal Bank of Scotland, are reportedly negotiating a £720m sale to the ruling family of Bahrain, who already own the nearby 219-bedroom Four Seasons Hotel.

RBS bought the hotel in 2003 when previous owners, Le Meridien, went into receivership and it is now managed by Marriott.

An RBS spokesman  did not deny the rumour of the sale either, looks like the sale of the Paris Hotel could have kicked things off for the hotel market!
.

When organising a conference called Open To All by 2012 espousing the benefits of making your hotel fully accessible for the Olympics in London it's good to book a venue that's beyond reproach.

Alas, although the London Development Agency (LDA) organised event last week in the capital was inspiring and informative in equal measure, the venue, the Royal Society for Arts off the Strand, was to put it simply, a bit of a pig for the disabled delegates and speakers to navigate.

As the venue for a conference on disability this is about as appropriate as the decision by officials in Australia to dedicate a swimming pool to former Prime Minister Harold Holt who drowned in 1967.

On the day of the conference it prompted Sarah Ebanja, deputy chief executive of the LDA, to apologise unreservedly to attendees just after the morning coffee break for booking the venue in the first place, which is admirable in a way.

This did however throw Kitchen Rat off kilter as we'd been presuming the choice of venue was a deliberate ploy to highlight how far London still has to go to deliver the most accessible Games ever as envisioned by mayor Boris Johnson. Bugger.

Boris Johnson: hardworking mayor of London>>

London 2012>>

Last week's London Development Agency seminar Open to All aimed to dispel some common myths about customers with disabilities ahead of London staging the Olympics in 2012.

Two amusing, but pertinent, anecdotes from the seminar's speakers exposed the day-to-day preconceptions we all carry around with us.

Chris Holmes, a nine-times gold medal winning Paralympic swimmer and now a lawyer at a City firm, spoke of winning a record breaking sixth gold in the pool at the Barcelona Games in 1992.

Having won a breathless final in the outdoor pool at the games, beating the Spanish favourite in the process much to the horror of the partisan crowd, Holmes, who has been blind since the age of 14, was immediately set upon by an excited British media and interviewed for BBC radio.

Still trying to take in the enormity of his acheivment Holmes was put through live to the broadcaster in the UK while at poolside and asked:

"So Chris, how is it competing in a wheelchair?"

Holmes, who had only moments to think of a reply said: "As I can't see, bloody dangerous!"

The second tale is now part of London concierge folklore.

Oh dear. Could Gordon Ramsay have burnt his bridges with bosses at Claridge's?

In the fiery chef's latest media friendly outburst, he claimed in The Times that The Connaught management is "anally retentive"; is run by "little shits"; is "lord and lady' pompous"; and that its staff "walk around with their heads up their arse".

The Connaught - which recently replaced Ramsay protege Angela Hartnett with Helene Darroze - is, of course, run by the Maybourne Group, owner of Claridges.

Not the best way to ingratiate yourself.

Ramsay also bizarrely claimed that Hartnett's new restaurant with rooms, York & Albany in Camden, north London, would be "two fingers" up at the five-star hotel restaurant at the Connaught.

The Hardens, who have fallen out with Ramsay in recent times, were less than impressed with the chef's latest comments.

"The piece, it seemed to us, was a spectacular own goal on Ramsay's part, as his football-hooligan style of expression simply helped one understand why the Connaught would have been very pleased to be rid of him in the first place," they said. 

Finding love in London isn't easy at the best of times and with the credit crunch causing havoc on the world financial scene and inflation rearing its ugly head the whole wining and dining thing, much like love, is starting to hurt (wallets).

But fear not love starved readers for WineDater could be the solution to ready meals for one from the supermarket.

The dating service is based around wine tasting evenings with the night structured so that there's plenty of interaction with the other sex (and of course alcohol, that most excellent ice-breaker).

Travelodge to adopt spped interviews to find new staff>>