First visual impressions of Masterchef winner Mat Follas’s Beaminster dining room are of a tearoom that’s been subjected to a lick of paint and some design consultancy. Exposed brick, chunky wooden tables and a daily menu on the chalkboard give The Wild Garlic a studied “refined rustic” look. It’s not unpleasant, just a bit mannered. However, that’s the last so-so impression this place makes.

Follas’s love of foraging is evident right from the starter: both are delivered in hearty portions on wooden butcher’s blocks garnished with wild leaves and edible flowers. The brill ceviche is fresh and delicate with a whisper of zest, lacking only a grain or two of salt for my taste. A flash-fried and optimally cooked pigeon breast comes with a chunky compote of dark berries and beetroot. It’s delicious.

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Dalston, De Beauvoir, Shoreditch. Not the standard chapter headings from your London guidebook, to be sure. But if you haven’t visited my city for a few years, here’s the bit you missed: London is moving east.

The tarmac thread that links those three is the Kingsland Road, the Broadway of the East End. A trip along its arrow-straight two miles serves up a United Nations of food influences. Restaurants are generally chaotic, informal, and great value. In other words, a perfect cipher for the waves of immigration that have made this London’s most varied (and, suddenly, most fashionable) cultural quarter.

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Gordon Ramsay’s York and Albany, 127–129 Parkway, Camden, London NW1

Tel. 020 7388 3344

Set lunch menu: £18

Main courses: £14–18

There are many Saturdays when I can’t afford to lunch at a Gordon Ramsay restaurant, and last Saturday was yet another of those. Because, and let’s get this straight up-front, the York and Albany isn’t a Gordon Ramsay restaurant. Not really. The “Patron Chef” is Angela Hartnett, Ramsay’s talented right-hand-cook, but quite what an Executive/Patron Chef actually does isn’t always clear to me. I picture her getting a menu faxed through every now and then, scrawling “fine” on the bottom and faxing it back to Head Chef, Colin Buchan. But then I’m a cynic.

Chicken with foie gras and chicken liver parfait

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So, you’re heading to the eurozone with sterling at a historic low; to Italy, where inflation is at a 12-year high; and to the country’s priciest region. Are you in for a cashflow nightmare? Not necessarily.

Booking value summer accommodation for families can be tricky [Read more →]