New friends at Casa De Carli

Its gratifying that when Night Rider gives a bad review to a restaurant or other establishment, it usually means that they will close their doors soon after. The LS Club was the first "casualty"; they in fact banned Night Rider from darkening their doors. It seems criticism was too much for the owners to tolerate and I gather the main chap has now moved onto a dodgy website marketing cut price offers from other establishments around Prague that are finding it hard to drum up custom. Its called Gin & Tonic or something similar. The next to go was the overpriced Italian Restaurant, Ameci Mei. A trap for the naive tourists wandering by, I guess. Having heard it was no more, but now another Italian "Casa De Carli" it was with some trepidation that we gave the valuable Saturday lunchtime slot. Turns out that the Owner Chef is Matteo De Carli and his partner ( in both senses ) Lenka Hermanova runs the front of house. I had no idea who she was when I walked in unannounced and tried to decided whether to eat inside, or outside, on one of their pavement tables. In the end, went for an outside table. My experience with most restaurants with outside tables is that service immediately suffers, but this was not the case with Lenka doing a great job from start to finish, well backed up by her competent staff. The menu is pretty simple, but none the worse for that and best described as country Italian with a few twists added by the Chef. Both my fish dishes were perfectly presented and my only regret was that having my car with me I could not sample the wine list. But I shall return soon and put that right.

The Bungalow, NYE in Cape Town

Bit of a dodgy name I thought when invited to the opening party of "The Bungalow", just before Xmas 2011. Bungalow to me still has the resonance of retired persons final dwellings in say places like Bognor Regis or Folkestone - shabby genteel at best. Perhaps I am prejudiced as during most of my school days, my parents lived in one !

However, Cape Town's leading restaurant entreprenuer ( or should I say, moghul ) Paul Kovensky ( standing reluctantly with me above ) seemed to have no such misgivings in naming his new creation. Perhaps because along the next few beaches at Clifton, only the richest can afford the famous "bungalows" which dot their landscape.

Recruiting a good Chef with international experience was a good move by Paul and its cuisine far surpasses the only other beach club type place on the front, wrongly named "The Grand". The Grand ( in name only ), manages to get just about everything wrong that The Bungalow gets right. Food terrible, service poor and a security manager that seems to delight in fighting with would-be guests.

But having been to the Bungalow's opening party, I had little hesitation in booking it for the NYE celebration to welcome in 2012.

It lived up to expectation and despite having only been open for a total of 10 days or so, food, service and overall ambience far exceeded expectations. My only advice to Paul for next NYE's party - double your prices and let your chef deliver a more memorable feast.

A true master chef : Heinz Winkler

Near the Bavarian Sea, lake Chiemgau, nestles the fairytale village of Aschau, in which Residenz Heinz Winkler is located.

This is a true signature restaurant, a member of both Les Grandes Tables Du Monde and Relais & Chateaux. The restaurant and the dining experience is the raison d'etre of this fine establishment. That it has plush rooms to stay in and, a La Prairie spa is almost incidental. The food and service was so sublime, it almost seems churlish to criticise either.

I arrived there almost too late for lunch last weekend. Lunch, the Residenz "bible" in our suite, told me is served between 12 noon and 2pm. It was already 2.20 pm and the stand-in blonde was busy with her "stuff" in the bathroom. Requests to hurry were rebuffed with explicit advice. So I took off alone to the dining terrace.

I asked a young steward if he could find me a table to two for 2.30pm. He said he could and I duly arrived back with the blonde at this alloted time. However, my way was blocked by an imposing Maitre D'. "Sir, we only serve lunch up until 2pm" but my riposte was prepared, "Your colleague has already prepared my table" and walked straight past him. "Then you will just be having a snack then" he managed to impart. A mean spirited and worthless remark, as we were shortly presented with the full menu and proceeded to order a full three course lunch, which kept us mesmerised until about 4pm when we retired to our suite once more. Needless to say, the food was sublime, the service excellent and even the great Heinz Winkler made an appearance and did his round of the tables.

Herr Winkler is a discrete and likeable host. He kindly consented to have his picture taken with your scribe, standing by his establishment's front door above. Despite the skirmish with the Maitre D', all his staff are impeccable in their turn out and their approach. I could not fault them; but they not only did things in a very efficient German way, they did it with a smile, a warmth and dedication that hard to match anywhere in the world. So Herr Winkler is not only a celebrity Chef of the highest order, he is also one of the best team builders in the business. Reminds me of San Lorenzo, Knightsbridge, in its hey day.

In Vino Veritas - Loisium Hotel and Spa

Don't be put off by the neo-brutalist minimalist architecture, that looks as if was covered with industrial packing plastic wrap.

As we arrived, there was a sharp intake of breath from the blonde as she took in full ghastly impact of the facades. She muttered something like "you must be joking", before I could encourage her to descend from the Bentley and reconnoitre the interior.

Inside, brutalism is toned down considerably and, the warm welcome from the reception staff turned out to be just a taste of the excellent service we had throughout our stay. Staff attitude and training is the hardest thing to get right these days; I see this across Europe, from the top hotels in London to the fanciest restaurants in the South of France. The hospitality industry has much to answer for; little of no training, poor pay and conditions and no interest in fostering career development. But in the Loisium, try as I might, I had trouble to fault any member of staff and with Night Rider being one of the most demanding and difficult clients they will encounter, that's amazing.

Now I should point out that the whole experience revolves around wine; the hotel and spa are in the middle of the vineyards of Langenlois ( Austria ), the Aveda spa has many wine related treatments and a couple of hundred metres away is a kind of "World of Wine" building where wine tastings and sales are happening all the time, along with educational displays and wine paraphanalia. In short, a great place for wine-lovers.

Probably, like me, you might have thought that the Austrians only produce good white wines; I was wrong. They have started to produce some really excellent reds; but they are pricey. Expect to pay around 35 Euros for a good bottle of red, or more, in the Loisium restaurant and about 60% of that price, from their "Wine World" cellar priced establishment.

The spa experience is pretty average, and although branded by Aveda there is little evidence that they play much of an ongoing role. The treatments are expensive and pretty much what one would expect from similar small hotel spas around Europe. But it seemed that all the guests were at least pretending that they were using the spa, as the garden and pool areas, were a sea of contended burgers, enjoying the sun and all dressed in their white spa robes. It almost felt like being part of some new religious cult, where the wearing of this uniform like attire was obligatory. I guess the Austrians like this sort of thing.

Rating:
5 Star - Died and gone to heaven
4 Star - Rhapsody in white
3 Star - Wine lovers convention
2 Star - Cheap and cheerful
1 Star - Blott on the landscape

No prizes for guessing: its 3 Stars, if I am being kind

Bearing all just outside of Prague

This august establishment, in Klokocna, a village about 30 minutes drive south east of Prague has quite a reputation. But be warned, its a firm favourite with the locals and they travel for miles ( I should say kilometres ) to try the tasty fare of the Sapikova family, so booking is essential.

I have to say that the immediate countryside around Prague suffers from a dearth of restaurants worth driving to. I am usually so disappointed with what is put on their tables, they don't even get review space; yet alone any praise. The Sapikova establishment interested me for two reasons; firstly the head of the family has apparently cooked at Prague Castle for some of the great and the good and secondly, for a week or so in February, bear was on the menu. Yes, that's right bear.

Now in England, I suspect that even if you could get the bear past the Health and Safety gestapo squad, you would end up being picketed and having your windows smashed by some animal rights campaigners. Which is why I cannot remember AA Gill or Michael Winner writing about bear enhanced menus. Well guys, this was my big chance to pull off a review "coup" and write about the eating the brutes.

A couple of my colleagues went for bear soup, which looked pretty boring, but they pronounced themselves satisfied.

I went for the full monty of Bear a la Russe; bear Russian style, which seemed to be accompanied by some pretty Czech looking dumplings. As you can imagine, old bruin is a pretty tough beast to render into a state in which the human can chew and digest it. Sapikova's solution is the pretty obvious one of slow cooking and then, smothering it with a rich sauce to, how shall I put this correctly, take the bearishness away.

Well they pulled it off - just. I could have been eating the poorest cut of beef, horse, aged venison or possibly even ostrich. It had a gamey tang, but the rich brown sauce and my hunger, made it edible. Would I recommend to the ladies - definitely not and one certainly needs to be a lover of well hung game to derive any pleasure at all from the dish ( leaving aside the ethical considerations, which others are far better equipped than I, to comment on. )

A robust looking chef, whom I assume was the leading light of the Sapikova family, rolled into the main dining room as we were halfway through our meal. I assumed he would work the room and at least, enquire how bruin was going down. Not a bit of it; he sat own at a table with some of his mates in the corner and apart from a couple of shifty looks around the room, I assume to check that none of the great and the good had strayed from Prague Castle to visit him, was completely anti-social.

So no picture of Night Rider being embraced by a fat chef; perhaps just as well as after the rather rich bruin, a bear hug might have had undesired results.

Worth a visit again ? The jury is still out.

Dinner with Paul Day.........Sansho to take off shortly

Not able to try Dinner with Heston Blumenthal in London this week, I was still feeling miserable from Valentine's Dinner at Amici Miei, that only memorable for their outrageous bill, as commented below. However, a saviour was at hand. A call out of the blue from Paul Day, to invite me to sample the fare at his new lair in Prague, shortly to officially open its doors.

With blonde in tow, I duly turned up on Saturday evening to be warmly greeted by our host and his small collection of charming young staff. I left the food to Paul to select and he duly obliged with a degustation of numerous small courses. Outstanding were the pork ribs, cooked slowly and derived from some ancient breed that melted in the mouth; the surf and turf of stone fish and some very spicy thai style beef.

The house wines were worthy of a more distinguished title; a Cremant sparkling white that could have been mistaken for Champagne and very smooth red from the Languedoc Cote D'Or region. Restaurants in Prague so rarely get their house wines right, perhaps to encourage diners to go for the more expensive options. Not in this case, where I would have been happy to serve these two, at a private dinner party at home ( unless it included wine snobs ! ).

I look forward to the doors opening officially and revisiting some amazing dishes.

Amici Miei - no friends of mine !

I am one of those people who make social arrangements at the last minute, so this Valentine's Day found all my favourite haunts in Prague booked out. Had often walked past the Amici Miei restaurant in Prague's old town and close to the much frequented Lamborghini Cafe in Vezenska Street. Looked at its website and it was generally impressed, but hard pressed to find any of my friends who had actually eaten there. That should have been warning enough, but with little time left to make a reservation for the evening I put doubts aside and risked it. Laziness is rarely rewarded and sure enough, I got what I guess was fully deserved.

Prague is a beautiful City and as well as the mass tourists who wander its old streets through all the seasons, it has a fair number of well heeled visitors from east and west. Pariska Street ( Prague's Bond Street ) can be seen bustling with wealthy Russians, rubbing shoulders with the local rich and affluent Westerners. But for all its sophistication, rip offs await the unwary. Taxi drivers who charge treble or more, currency exchanges that take more in commission than you can imagine and there are always new ways being dreamt up of parting people from large amounts of cash. The inappropriately named Amici Miei restaurant decided Valentine's Day was a good moment to boost their bottom line and hit me with a bill, that I might have expected at the new Heston Blumenthal's new place at the Mandarin Oriental in London.

To start with they dreamt up a special menu for the day, which the maitre d later admitted was priced up considerably higher than normal daily dishes. I started with a mediocre seafood salad, poorly presented and lacking in any real excitement. Followed that by a Dover Sole; it was fresh enough and only slightly over-cooked but the roast potatoes with it were soggy and clearly had sat under a warmer for some time before making their way to our table. The desert, described as warm chocolate cake turned out to be a very small and again unmemorable souffle - not too bad but worth 15 Euro ? No way.

But the serious rip off came with the drinks, with over 20 Euros a glass being charged for a very standard house champagne and a very small glass ( 0.2 dl ) of house red wine, barely drinkable 12 Euros a glass.

The end result was a bill of well over 300 Euros; at least double what it should have been for a meal and drinks of this quality.

No friends of mine and not suprisingly, less than half full. The other denizens of Prague have been caught before ?