ENDPAPERS
Good Food Scout
LESLIE ADRIAN IF the Chancellor of the Exchequer carries out his threat to put a squeeze on expense-account entertain- ing in the budget, the effect on the catering trade should be similar to that envisaged for the British economy if we were to A enter the Common Market.t present, the extrava- gant, indiscriminate, snob-
bish and greedy eater spending his firm's money has raised the prices and spoiled the quality of far too many eating places which should by now have become reasonable and worthy cater- ing establishments. As Raymond Postgate says in the introduction to the new Good Food Guide (Cassell, 18s.), the American wave of fried chicken and lemon meringue pie, which rolled over the land when food rationing went and the USAF came, has been succeeded by an ocean of scampi and prawn cocktails, tournedos Rossini (which the old Bolognese maestro would hardly acknowledge) and crepes Suzette.
If and when the fiscal crunch comes, some of the less deserving money-hungry restaurateurs will have to look to their laurels (or rather their bays). The honest, fair-dealing people will con- tinue to be supported by customers not afraid to spend their own cash on a good meal and a sound wine. (The Charles Greville carafe- measuring exercise in the Daily Mail is in the new tradition of Carmelite House consumer pro- tection. The GFG usually prices wines by the glass, which is safer.) How refreshing it would be to have friendly service instead of mock ser- vility, pleasant surroundings in place of preten- sion (or, worse still, pretence) and above all a good, indigenous menu expressed in sensible language.
As Postgate says, 'the more frenzied the foaming at the mouth, the more wretched the food on the plate.' Many of the obvious ex- amples are American, and it has been said before that they eat with their eyes. Listen to the Carlton Tower Rib Room: 'A veritable Beef- eater's Bonanza . . . a Giant slice of very, very tender and Succulent Roast Beef—Rib and All . . . Gourmet Adam Rib Cut.' As far as my in- formation goes. Adam's rib became a woman, which supports the tender image. My palate failed to respond to the words, and detected the faintest tinge of the roast beef of Old England in the flesh, despite the hot intro. 'Slip Away from Today . . . back to a Yesterday of Truly Gracious Dining.'
Yesterday can comfortably and more cheaply be found at Simpson's-in-the-Strand where the beef comes hot from the baron, and you cross the carver's palm with silver. The menu, with its eternal Bateman cartoon; simply says 'roast beef.' Simpson's devotees (even Australians) also sum- mon up the saddle of mutton trolley. Nowhere else' in London, except at the other Savoy eatery, Stone's Chop House off' Leicester Square, can such succulent mutton be had. Mutton is poor
man's meat, is therefore neglected by butchers and never properly hung. Cooked as a saddle in the Forsyte tradition, there is nothing better that ever wore wool, including ahbacchio and all the oversized 'baby' lambs this side of the Caucasus.
Again agreeing with Postgate (and what sen- sible and sensitive stomach would not), there is a great need for good English cooking in English catering. His list of London restaurants in this tradition is to be welcomed, but what a variety of quality and price it accommodates, from the simple approach of the Nag's Head near Covent Garden Opera House (but do they, too, have to put pineapple rings on grilled ham and serve fried chicken?) to that extravaganza in Lower Regent Street, the Hunting Lodge. From what I have seen of hotel schools where cooking, cater- ing and management are taught, the presence of too much 'international cuisine' with all its empty ritual and snobbery is largely their fault. But even they surely would not serve sardines pro- vencales in what looked like an ashtray, the sardines being canned Portuguese garnished with dying lettuce, a welter of mustard and cress and a ring of Spanish onion.
I mention this only because I have just been compelled to sample the culinary offerings of Dr. Brighton, and the only way that one can review a directory of these dimensions is by sample. In my experience the GFG turns up trumps ninety-nine times in a hundred. It im- proves. every time it appears and its effect on our meal-providers has been salutary.
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