Gin has become rather fashionable, as they say, on the continent – particularly in Spain, where ‘gin tonics’ are served in over-sized wine glasses as a digestif. In the UK, though, it has long been considered the poor cousin – in terms of sales – to vodka, which outsells it by about three to one. But those who appreciate gin know it is a far finer, flavoursome drink than its oafish rival. In recent years, new artisan distilleries have opened in London, including Sipsmith and The Sacred Gin, and the Hoxton Gin was launched before Christmas by bar-owner Gerry Calabrese. Now the InterContinental’s stylish new Arch Bar has devoted itself to the spirit, with an apothecary of fresh ingredients, nostalgic cocktails such as Mother’s Ruin and Tuppence Duty, and two Italian mixologists, Fabio and Stefano, who are passionate about their craft.

It is the botanicals that hold the secret of gin.

As Fabio pours, the anecdotes, dates and names spill out. We start with malty Bols Genever from Holland, ‘the grandfather of modern gin’, swigged on the battlefields of 17th-century Europe to inspire ‘Dutch courage’. Fortified with slices of marinated lamb and hummus, we sail back to England with the East India Company to drop anchor in Hogarth’s sozzled Gin Lane, and a shot of Jensen’s Old Tom Gin. Then onwards, through the 19th century to the Jazz Age and the present day, the bottles marching across the bar in their handsome liveries – the crisp blue of 6 O’Clock, the colonial chic of Whitley Neill, fragranced by the African baobab. For it is the botanicals that hold the secret of gin.

Fabio instructs us to ‘eat water’ between mouthfuls to clean our palate, and sniff each new glass first with one nostril, then with the other. We balance a ‘soupcon’ of gin on our tongue and count to five – a good gin will take six seconds to burn, then the different botanicals will be revealed. Juniper, of course, but also rose, coriander and liquorice, ginger and orange peel, the exact infusions remaining closely guarded secrets. Fabio proudly holds up the bottle of Whitley Neill he infused with cinnamon and vanilla for London Cocktail Week, and we shake our heads at the French Citadelle gin – ‘with nineteen botanicals. It is too much.’ After all that tasting, we need a drink. Fabio mixes a Lady of Libation cocktail and a Dutch Courage. We make a resolution to make 2012 the year of gin. RJ

FABIO AND STEFANO’S TOP 3 GINS
Tanqueray No. 10. ‘A smooth and fresh-tasting gin that makes a great Martini, this is handcrafted in small batches using fresh citrus fruits, grapefruit orange and limes. A fantastic product.’

Martin Millers Westbourne Strength. ‘Blended with Icelandic water, this has lovely strong citrus on the nose with juniper notes.’

Oxely Gin. ‘Using a unique and unusual distillation process, this is a clean gin with a nice blend of botanicals. The finish is very dry and just a little bit spicy.’

The Arch Bar, InterContinental London Park Lane ( ichotelsgroup.com; 020 7409 3131). Gin tastings £28 per person including canapés (for groups of 10 or fewer). The Arch Bar hosts regular ‘Gin & Jazz’ sessions: the next one is on 16 Feb

50ml  Tanquery gin
40ml orange juice
20ml Martini Rosso
20ml Martini Dry
Add to boston shaker, sake and double strain into Martini glass

You can use whatever bacon you have in the fridge for this dish. If it is smoked so much the better, because it will enhance the smokiness of the fish, but if it’s unsmoked don’t worry. I think bacon is a very personal thing, so use whichever you prefer. What I would say, though, is try to find a good, traditional, dry-cured bacon. Mass-produced bacon is often pumped up with injections of water or brine, sometimes containing preservatives, in order to increase its weight, and when you fry it the liquid leaches out again into milky-white puddles.

Note: you can make the chowder a day in advance if you like. Keep it in the fridge and then reheat it gently. Serve in big hearty bowls, or in mugs as a starter.

Ingredients for 4-6
2 medium onions
250g streaky bacon or pancetta, smoked or unsmoked
1 punnet (about 250g) button mushrooms
4 large potatoes
1 large (300g) fillet of smoked haddock, skinned – preferably, traditionally smoked, undyed fish
½ bunch of curly parsley
Large knob butter
About 2 tablespoons olive oil
1 litre fish stock (or vegetable stock, or even water if you have no stock)
250 ml double cream
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Preparation
Finely chop the onions
Using pair of scissors, snip the bacon into strips about the width of your little finger
Clean and then halve or quarter the mushrooms
Peel the potatoes and then cut them through into rough 1 cm dice
Cut the fish into big chunks, roughly 2-3 cm in size
Roughly chop the parsley

Method
1. Melt the butter with the olive oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pan. Add the onions and bacon and cook gently over a medium heat for about 4-5 minutes. The bacon will start to brown a little, but the onions should just be translucent. Add the potatoes and stir well, then add the mushrooms.

2. Stir well to coat all the ingredients in the oil and butter, and then add enough stock barely to cover. Stir and bring to a gently simmer for 8 minutes.

3. Add the cubed fish and cook very gently for a further 5 minutes, just long enough to poach the fish without overcooking it. Don’t let the soup boil, otherwise the fish will disintegrate and the soup will look mushy and unappetising. Add the cream and stir gently to heat through. taste the soup at this point. The bacon and fish are quite salty anyway, so you may not need to add any more salt. Season with pepper, if you like, then put in the parsley and serve.

Taken from COOK in a class of your own, published by Kyle Cathie with photography by Jean Cazals. Richard Bertinet’s new book Pastry, published by Ebury, is out 3rd May

Homeslice Pizza – Netil Market – homeslicelondon.com
The best pizza in London. Full stop. It’s run by some New Zealand guys who have got this mobile wood-fired oven, and they drag it into the car park come rain or shine. They do really simple pizzas – try the Margarita with a bit of chilli oil on – but they are just fantastic. They are in Netil Market every weekend.

Lucky Chip – Netil Market – luckychipuk.com
This is right next door to Homeslice Pizza. They moved up here from Kensal Rise and it’s done with the same passion as Meatwagon: looks like a cheap burger van, but produces a really fine burger. It’s all done properly. It’s all about the burger.

Androuet Cheese – Commercial Street – androuet.co.uk
Originally from Paris, Androuet Cheese has been established since 1908 – and now they are open in Spitalfields. When I met Alex, who runs it, I had never encountered anyone more passionate and knowledgeable about cheese. As a cheese shop it is excellent – you get well looked after – but they are also a restaurant. Go in and have a glass of wine and a classic French cheese dish.

Off Broadway – Broadway Market – offbroadway.org.uk
I am not a big drinker of cocktails, but if I was, I would go here. It’s owned by a guy from New York. They do serious cocktails, but in a relaxed and easy environment – so it’s a proper bar, in the same spirit as the bar at Hawksmoor, for example.

La Rochelle Canteen – Arnold Circus – arnoldandhenderson.com
This is run by Margot Henderson, who is Fergus Henderson’s wife. It’s in an old school (literally) building and the restaurant is in the old bike shed. Margot cooks predominantly for all the businesses that are now in the school, but go in there and check it out. It is basically like St John, but not widely known. Open for lunch only.

Brawn – Columbia Road – brawn.co
The culmination of all the things I know and love about Hackney. The site that Brawn is in is just wonderful. It was a bar before we took it over, and every time I went there I thought it was great. This is my ultimate neighbourhood restaurant. People can come and hang out, eat, drink and make friends. It’s a good regular base for the customer.

Ed Wilson and Oli Barker – after the success of Terroirs and Brawn – have now opened a third restaurant, Soif (in Battersea). Go to terroirswinebar.com for details

Serves 4 people

Ingredients:
For the risotto:
500g  (1lb)pearl barley
2l (3.5pts) good quality vegetable stock
100g (4oz) shallots
2 cloves garlic
Rapeseed oil (or olive oil)
Seasonal vegetables

10g Cornish butter
4 x fillets of black bream
1kg (2lbs) washed cockles
125ml (4 fl oz) white wine
Large handful of curly parsley
Salt and pepper

For the pearl barley risotto:
Heat oil in the bottom of a large pan.  Add chopped shallots and garlic.
Stir through until shallots are translucent.
Add the pearl barley and stir for 2 mins until the oil is absorbed
Add the stock a little at a time.  Allow each spoonful to be absorbed by pearl barley before adding the next.
Season to taste

Prepare your favourite seasonal vegetables separately and add to finished risotto
For example, we love to roast heritage carrots and sauté some leeks this month.  Kale and marrow are also bang in season right now.

For the fish and cockles:
We use black bream but a fillet of similar white fish (such as seabass) would be just as delicious.
Melt 10g butter in a frying pan and, if you like, add a touch of semolina to add some extra crispiness.
Pan fry the fish skin side down for 3-4 minutes until almost entirely cooked through.
Flip over and finish frying the flesh side for 1 minute.
Season with salt and pepper.

In a separate pan, steam the cockles in olive oil, splash of white wine, salt and pepper until all the shells are opened.  Discard any that don’t open.

Plate up the risotto in a deep bowl and gently lay the fish across the top.  Add the cockles around the edge of the plate.

Finish with a handful of chopped curly parsley.

www.bumpkinuk.com

Sam Clark knew early on that her fascination for food was possibly verging on obsessive: ‘I have memories of eating a banana in different ways – if you split it lengthways how would it be? Why does the end bit of the banana taste more lemony than the top bit? And I used to think of all the different ways of eating a Jaffa cake – I thought about everything in quite a lot of detail. My mother was a good cook, and my grandmother lived in France for 40 years, so we would go and spend every summer there. I grew up with sardines and lovely tomato salads.’

Home cooking started with making the perfect Victoria Sponge – ‘I used to beat the butter and the sugar together for a very long time.’ Then it was pasta, which she experimented with at just ten years of age, after her mother bought a pasta machine, ‘I have clear memories of draping home-made tagliatelle on the back of chairs in the kitchen’.

Cooking was obviously central to her life, but Sam was never aware that it was what she wanted to do professionally. After a fortuitous fill-in stint at the Eagle pub (‘London’s first gastro pub, very cutting-edge’) she met her namesake Sam Clark. Two years at River Cafe later (he had already done five years there) the idea of Moro was born. ‘We went for three months in a camper van around Spain and Morocco before we opened Moro. There were things we wanted to learn about that you couldn’t get from a cookbook. We wanted to soak up the atmosphere, try to understand the whole ethos behind these countries. We had to make our restaurant as authentic as we possibly could.’ It worked – Moro is coming up to its 15th hugely successful year.

We have loved doing Morito, but we want to keep fresh creatively. To do Moro food, but for a different audience

‘I was rung up by one of the organisers [of The Long Table – which also includes food by the likes of Nuno Mendes, Hawksmoor and Big Apple Hotdogs – the Dalston brainchild of the Bootstrap company]. They asked if we were up for it. We absolutely were. Moro is 15 years old, and we have loved doing Morito, but we want to keep fresh creatively. To do Moro food, but for a different audience. The space is an unused walled carpark and I am really looking forward to their long table – people will buy their food and then everyone sits at it. There will be bars and music and a lovely festive, twinkly feel. I imagine there will be some kind of live fire.’

‘I am going to serve a chestnut and chorizo soup and slow-cooked lamb with preserved lemon and chard and coriander and paprika, and flat bread with spiced lamb – with cinnamon and sweet honey – and chopped salad and humus, as well as veggie options. All the lovely Moro flavours will still be there.’

‘I love this whole wave of things going on at the moment using interesting spaces and doing something exciting with them. I really enjoy the whole pop up restaurant scene. One of our chefs - Ellen Parr – did a wonderful night at the Artillery Arms just off Old Street. She did a WWII menu – it was inventive and inspired, with Spam and devilled mackerel and stuff – and the whole room was dressed with WWII props.’

‘Last week we went to the Young Turks at the Ten Bells – their pop up in Spitalfields. It was in a lovely room upstairs in a pub with a set menu that changes every week. I love the way they use spaces, it’s really fantastic. Certainly if I was younger I would be doing things like that – if I was starting up now. London – Britain, even – is going in a very exciting direction’. Jo Ascherl

The Long Table, every Friday, until 23rd December, 6pm-1am, Abbot Street, Dalston, London E8. thelongtable.net

TASTING INDIA
Tipping the scales at more than 6lb and almost a square foot in size, Tasting India would make a great chopping board or a spice pestle. But it should mainly be used for bringing one of the world’s great cuisines to your kitchen. Christine Manfield, an acclaimed Australian chef with her own Sydney restaurant, Universal, has been travelling around India for the past two decades, and this highly personal book reflects her love affair with the country. From Kolkata to Mumbai, Kerala to the Himalayas, she builds an evocative portrait through travel writing and recipes donated by restaurant chefs, domestic households and friends – from simple relishes and pickles to Jamshyd’s Chicken Dhan Sakh, which has 66 ingredients to its name, and the fragrantly named ‘One hundred almond curry’. The stunning photography by Anson Smart captures India’s luscious colours. This will inspire not just your next meal, but your next holiday, too.
Conran Octopus, £40

THE HIVE BEACH CAFE COOKBOOK
Loved by the likes of AA Gill, Jasper Conran and Rick Stein – not to mention its loyal, local clientele – The Hive Beach Café in Burton Bradstock, West Dorset, has been at the forefront of Britain’s burgeoning beach café scene for several years now. Seasonal seafood is served in a relaxed setting, just yards from the sea, making it one of Dorset’s coolest foodie destinations. This tome features more than 100 fish and seafood recipes divided into four seasons and reflects The Hive’s chefs’ passion for sustainability and protecting our dwindling fish stocks – you’re just as likely to discover recipes for coley, cuttlefish, garfish, gurnard and huss as you are to come across innovative new ways to cook lobster, scallops and squid. Edited by former Mr & Mrs Smith editor Rufus Purdy.
Bristlebird Books, £16.99. Go to www.hivecookbook.co.uk to pre-order a copy.

THE SILVER SPOON: THE NEW EDITION
This Italian cookery bible was first published in 1950 and remains one of Italy’s most well-thumbed cooking tomes. Experts were commissioned to collect hundreds of traditional recipes from throughout the country, including every possible regional speciality. This new editon features 400 new photographs, new introductory material and tips on how to set an Italian table and the different food traditions of different Italian regions.
Phaidon, out now.

EVERYTHING BUT THE OINK
Just how many spices are there in allspice and which ones are in Chinese Five Spice? What do you find inside an Eccles Cake? And what exactly is a duxelles when it’s at home? Just a few questions for starters from the 500 or so inside Everything But The Oink, compiled by The Guardian’s Graham Tarrant. Arranged into 50 handy sections, from Mixed Veg and A La Carte to Simply Italian and Say Cheese, it’s the ideal gift for the know-it-all foodie in your life. I bet they don’t know which TV chef had Richard Burton as a godfather.
Absolute Press, £6.99

THE FAMILY MEAL: HOME COOKING WITH FERRAN ADRIA
A step-by-step guide with over 90 recipes, by the hugely influential ex El Bulli head chef. The Family Meal is a reference to the 6pm El Bulli staff gathering where everyone would stop what they were doing and sit down for a three course meal together. All the recipes have been carefully constructed for nutritional value and so that they are entirely affordable for every day households – whether you are feeding two people or 75.
Phaidon, Hardback £19.95

A visit to the #MEATEASY www.themeatwagon.co.uk rewrote the rule-book on how good a burger could be. Talk as much as you like about the behavioural economics attached to the initiative – the wait, the faux secrecy, the twitter-fuelled exclusivity – but there is no detracting from how damn good the burger is. Its comparative fame and digital publicity in food circles seemed to signal a new dawn for the ‘gourmet’ burger. Chefs were scarpering for longer-hung cuts and riper cheeses; better brioche buns and sweeter gherkins. Ginger Pig meat. What? In a burger? Ogleshield cheese melted? Creativity extended the ingredient invitation to kim-chi at Hawksmoor and developed a frenzy among food bloggers.

The #MEATEASY had created a very delicious and very dirty burger. We are talking Kraft cheese here. Enough said.

Then came the claim on twitter by the almost-always-right Marina O’Loughlin, that there was a burger better than the one coming out of the Meatwagon. Lucky Chip was the name www.luckychipuk.com. On ordering their ‘classic’, I put it to the co-owner Ben, that the magnitude of praise had brought me to the van at Netil Market. He responded, with humility, ‘that’s very sweet [of Marina] but we like to say that we’re different, not better’. As it turned out, he was on the money. It was as good, certainly; it was no better but it was a burger with class. The #MEATEASY had created a very delicious and very dirty burger. We’re talking Kraft cheese here. Enough said.

Thus we were drawn two camps. Into the first (the classy burger) also fall the burgers by Hawksmoor www.thehawksmoor.co.uk. However, a brilliant and far less guilty pleasure is popping up all over the city. Red Dog Saloon in Hoxton www.reddogsaloon.co.uk have brought us a burger based on the squishy, sweet model of the burger chains – the kind you would expect to find in any American Diner. An upgraded version of the MacDonald’s hamburger.

Byron www.byronhamburgers.com, recent winners of the London Restaurant Festival’s High Street Hero award, must be credited with the proliferation across London’s streets of their self-styled ‘proper’ hamburgers. The entry level has been upgraded which is good news for the consumer. The blog http://www.burgerac.com/ has become something of a go-to compendium for burger lovers and would-be aficionados. An out of 5 index has been used to measure some of the best (and worst) burgers in town. The Rivington Grill www.rivingtongrill.co.uk – deemed so good – has been given an unprecedented 6 out of 5!
Adam Coghlan

The new Hawksmoor in Guildhall (pictured above) is now open. 10/12 Basinghall St, London, EC2V 5BQ. 020 7397 8120, www.guildhall@thehawksmoor.com. One of the draws of the new restaurant is the 7am opening and a ‘definitive’ breakfast menu. Other highlights include the six course beef tasting menu, available for tables of 8-10.

The founders of the Meatwagon and pop-up dive bar #Meateasy have opened the doors of their first permanent meat joint. Go to www.meatliquor.com for details.

Royal China, Baker Street, www2.royalchinagroup.biz
A very popular dim sum house (pictured above) – expect to queue for around an hour at the weekend. The pork buns and BBQ pork puffs are especially good. They also do a fantastic veal hoisin. It is an institution – it has an old school Chinese atmosphere so you really do feel like you have been transported back in time to China. It’s brilliant.

Cocorino on Chiltern Street, www.cocorino.co.uk
This does an excellent breakfast and an excellent coffee – as well as great Italian anti pasti and cheeses, pastas, sauces and gelato. My favourite start to the day is the scrambled eggs and a spicy Italian sausage in a croissant. They have one large communal table at the back of the room and it is always packed out.

Gunmakers Pub, 33 Aybrook Street, London, W1U 4AP
This was Churchill’s favourite drinking hole so it definitely has a nod to him. Great for sport – and they also do very good fish and chips, as well as a fine burger. Try their sausage rolls – from the Ginger Pig butcher – which are enormous, and beat any sausage roll you will ever have. There is a nice vibe to this place and all the old boys of Marylebone can be spotted in here.

Colbeh in Connaught village, www.colbeh.co.uk
The best Persian restaurant in London. Really. The kabab koobideh, the fresh sesame naans and various dips (roasted aubergine and walnut with garlic and yoghurt) are a must. It’s a small family run hole in the wall place, just off Edgware road. Breads, kebabs, dips – all as fresh as you can get anywhere in London. There is a queue outside the door every day, but it’s very quick. The food is brilliant and the waiters are rude – but that adds to the whole experience. Note: Bring your own bottle policy.

London Farmers Market, Marylebone. www.lfm.org.uk
This showcases the best seasonal vegetables, cheeses, meats and seafood in town, every Sunday. It’s the finest way to spend a Sunday morning, followed by brunch at Cafe Luc on Marylebone High Street. All the farmers come down every week from their farms. It’s full of butchers and their game, people cooking food, a big variety of cheeses, mushrooms and fruits and juices. It was one of the first markets in London where you could get asparagus.

Karam Sethi, Trishna, 15-17 Blandford Street, Marylebone Village, London W1U 3DG. www.trishnalondon.com

Bravery – Mikael Jonsson at Hedone. The former Swedish lawyer is passionate and obsessed about obtaining the best ingredients.

One Person’s Passion – Petra Barran of eat.st – her own mobile van Choc Star revealed to her the animating effect of food sold on the streets. She runs the site with Giles Smith and Gareth Davies

Warmth and Welcome – Xavier Rousset – the ideal knowledgeable and approachable guide on a voyage of vinous discovery. You eat very well but you leave better informed and determined to break your old wine choosing habits.

Understanding of Ceremony – The right kind of ritual around a meal can enhance enjoyment in a very particular way. Winners: Christopher Corbin and Jeremy King and manager Robert Holland

Discovery – Brixton Village. Recently described by Jay Rayner as ‘the most exciting radical venture on the British restaurant scene right now’.

Fun – Where there is fun, there is always customers. WInner: Russell Norman for Spuntino.

EROS award for the Spirit of London – Eric Narioom Ed Wilson and Oli Barker of Brawn in Columbia Road

High Street Hero – Tom Byng of Byron

American Express Award for Inspiration – Roganic

The Laurent Perrier Pioneer Award – Dinner by Heston Blumenthal

Best performing Voucher – The Blind Tiger

Best £25 Menu – Kopapa

Best £20 Menu – Cinnamon Club

Best £15 Menu – Tentazioni

Best £10 Menu – Ping Pong