EUROPE - which country has the best cuisine?

question to brits: when was the last time you ate chicken tikka masala anyway?

can't remember

Probably about a year ago - was a place near my old work that had a good lunchtime deal and their ctm was pretty respectable.

I eat out a heck of a lot but hardly ever go for continental European of any kind. Maybe that can be my new year's resolution.

does new yorkers eat more tikka masala than londoners? or does blueski mean people eat different "curries"?

gabbneb i mean for all the talk of CTM being 'the nation's favourite dish LOL' i never think to have it and hardly ever hear it mentioned by someone else.

now i want to go to tayyabs again for the chargrilled lamb chops dammit

i thought about trying to eat at a restaurant for every country in the world or as close as i could get to that, in London, over this year and maybe the one after.

Where's the best Argentine restaurant in London then?

Stick to Gaucho or is there better off the beaten track?

Buen Ayre on Broadway Market seemed good

I ate Chicken Tikka Masala in December. In New York.

was it nice?

Not bad actually. But I was starving. It was a take out from Whole Foods. I ate it on a wall in Union Square.

Also Georgia deserves an honourable mention for wine, and interesting and varied uses of walnuts, pommegranite, spinnach and sharp cheese - but I've only ever eaten one Georgian meal in my life, so it's not much to go on.

buen ayre is incredible but a word of advice: have somehting besides meat if you plan on drinking heavily later on

anna there's a georgian restaurant just south of broadway market, i can't remember what it's called but it is thee awesome

it used to be on broadway market proper but their landlord raised the rent and now the former location is a terrible french restaurant called "la vie en rose"

orig restaurant reviewed by Freaky Trigger!

http://freakytrigger.co.uk/ft/pumpkin/2004/02/little-georgia-broadway-market-london-e8/

I think 'La Vie en Rose' translates to 'terrible french restaurant'.

i will try that - only tried one Georgian place so far (Tblisi) xp

Holland--worst cuisine in Europe?

depends on yr policy towards hash brownies

i would probably say yes altho you can get excellent steak there (not just in the south american places) and hey giant pancakes! xp

Yeah pancakes are about all I remember fondly.

Tblisi on Holloway Road was the setting for my one Georgian meal - it was lovely, so will probably try this place.

The Dutch have... edam...

Bless.

Zuurkoolstamppot, sauerkraut mashed with potatoes. Served with fried bacon or a sausage. Sometimes curry powder, raisins or slices of pineapple are used to give a stamppot an exotic touch.

Where's the best Argentine restaurant in London then?

I dunno about the best but there's a cracking one right on the heath in Blackheath. Also the proprietor is a weird ex-paparazzi bloke who looks like Tugay and began his career taking homoerotic shots of Che Guevara lying on a bed with his shirt off.

Chicken tikka masala etc count not because they are an example of England doing Indian food really well (it doesn't, by and large) but because they're dishes invented in England to cater to local tastes.

it doesn't, by and large

how come? i take it you're including Indian restauranteurs here

What is aforesaid cracking Argentine place called? There are a couple of South American-looking places there.

Not bad actually. But I was starving. It was a take out from Whole Foods. I ate it on a wall in Union Square.

that's a salad bar, not a restaurant, but it's pretty great (if expensive) for a salad bar

I dunno about the best but there's a cracking one right on the heath in Blackheath. Also the proprietor is a weird ex-paparazzi bloke who looks like Tugay and began his career taking homoerotic shots of Che Guevara lying on a bed with his shirt off.

-- Matt DC, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 15:54 (14 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Think this may be Buena Ayre mentioned upthread: http://www.buenayre.co.uk/chemenu.htm

Also Georgia deserves an honourable mention

I ate in a Georgian resturant in Krakow, and it was fantastic, a very refreshing change from the Polish red meat n stodge.

Yeah I presume they're owned by the same dude. The one in Blackheath is called Buenos Aires Cafe I think, served one of the best steaks I've ever eaten. I'm tipping Argentina to win the CONCACAF poll.

Ah, excellent. A good 30 seconds' jog away from the infamous Zero Degrees, too!

Any other good Blackheath eating-holes, just name 'em here. I've not been to that many.

It'll never win, but I voted for Romania, especially for its Transylvanian cuisine. But it should be said that Romanian cuisine has its own great oddball Latin sensibility and takes from the best of Hungarian and German cookinh, not to mention specialities derived from Turkish, Russian, Jewish and Greek styles. And some other places too, I'm sure. And it's dirt cheap. And the Romanians are lovely.

how come? i take it you're including Indian restauranteurs here

There actually aren't that many, the majority of so-called 'Indian' restaurants in the UK are run by Bangladeshis and what you get is heavily Anglicised. Generally speaking there are a lot of okayish bog-standard curry houses around but there's so much demand out there that there's not that much incentive for them to be much more than adequate.

Additionally there's a greater proportion of fuck-awful 'spice it to death or leave it largely tasteless' Indian restaurants in this country than there are for pretty much any other cuisine, although Chinese and Mexican may run it close. In my experience the best curry places (in London at least) tend to be either Pakistani, Sri Lankan or focussed on one region of India.

No Svalbard, no credibility!!

Where abouts are you Louis? Because there's a lovely gastro-pub type place on Royal Hill in Greenwich. It's called The Hill - love them for their lamb shank and not their uninspired name.

I'm Lee Green, myself, that well-renowned hubbub of fine dining. Royal Hill, eh...is that near Coombs Hill? Thanks for the reccy, anyway; I may give it a go! The best pub food I've had in an absolute age, incidentally, is the traditional-yet-sublime fare at The Mill in Cambridge. Their bangers and mash was streets ahead of any other I've tried.

There's actually a full-blown Greek taverna in Lee Green, but for some unfathomable reason we've only been there once. Reasons for this are unknown, but I think it may be because the restaurant is a) Greek rather than Greek Cypriot or b) not up to our relatives' home cooking standard.

Or c) we don't really eat at restaurants very often on account of cash/reluctance to organise, unless it's a special occasion in which case we'll treat ourselves to Zero D.

there's so much demand out there that there's not that much incentive for them to be much more than adequate.

depressing but applies to so many other aspects of life here i guess

italy or france are really the only two choices here.

having said that i've never eaten at/ordered from an 'indian' res and found it less than adequate but then the more you know the harder you are to satisfy xp

an 'indian' res

haha

can you stop doing this bullshit quoting thing? say what you mean or stfu

hugz

long year ahead...

sorry, i is just entertaining the north americans

an indian res (or, more often, rez) does not refer to a restaurant over here. not making fun.

what does it mean? *feels sheepish now*

1. rez

Native American slang for "reservation," as in "on the Indian reservation."

Ayy, there's always a party Saturday night on the rez, man.

serious lols @ anyone voting for anything from UK

Whoever voted for Norway is crazy. Now... Wait. Nobody did. Oh well, right then.

Whoever voted for Norway is crazy. Now... Wait. Nobody did. Oh well, right then.

― Tied Up In Geir (Geir Hongro), Tuesday, 18 August 2009 00:02 (4 years ago

lol