I'm on holiday right now in San Sebastian, picking my way through pintxos. So it feels like a good time to share everything I ate through my last holiday, on the comparatively blustery north Norfolk coast

In search of seafood on the north Norfolk coast

I didn't have to look very hard

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There's a certain sort of British restaurant — often a gastropub these days — with an all-too familiar menu of meat and veg. The Grain Store, in north Norfolk, fits that to a tee, but by leaning into excellent local produce it still just about stands out

The Grain Store, Weybourne

Made in Norfolk

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Very kind of @marinaoloughlin.bsky.social to write this just a few days before I head to the Basque country, staying in French Hendaye just across the water from Hondarribia. This should sort at least one pintxos crawl!

Skip San Sebastián — its Basque neighbour is an under-the-radar treat for foodies

[FREE TO READ] The pintxos are just as good in low-key, laid-back Hondarribia

ft.com

I always thought cutting business rates made more sense than reducing hospitality VAT, but why does this cover pubs and not restaurants?

Business rates to be cut by 20% for pubs, clubs and music venues in England

Burnham says relief for vape shops and other ‘non-positive’ businesses to be reviewed as part of £100m plan to fund cut

theguardian.com

Go to Sentosa, eat the Singaporean chilli crab, and don’t wear white. Just trust me.

Sentosa, SE1

Carcinisation

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Good read on the absolute mess of ownership behind most American cookware brands, and the almost inevitable drop in quality that follows sale after sale after sale

Your Cookware Got Worse On Purpose

One buyout firm quietly collected Pyrex, Corelle, Instant Pot, and Oneida. Farberware is a name on a 200-year lease. And the pans still worth buying.

worseonpurpose.com

My latest cookbook review is La Trattoria, a collection of Italian creature comforts from Tiella chef Dara Klein

La Trattoria, by Dara Klein

Comfortable cooking

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After all the hype I really wanted to love Impala, a restaurant which it turns out is simply Quite Good. Bemused why everyone decided it was doing something London had never seen before.

Impala, W1

Lower your expectations

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2210 by NattyCanCook’s plating is picture-perfect and Michelin-ready. The food itself sometimes meets the same bar — the pimento duck breast is glorious — but too often it feels like form triumphs over function

2210 by NattyCanCook, SE24

Caribbean food, but make it Michelin

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I’ve made no secret of loving a great many of my local restaurants, bars, and bakeries in Islington, so for this weekend’s newsletter for paid subscribers I finally listed my favourites

My favourite places to eat and drink in Islington in 2026

North London forever

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Last week I reviewed the Sourdough Sidekick, a starter maintenance gadget I sort of understand the thinking behind, though I think the target audience is someone who bakes rather more than me

The Sourdough Sidekick automates the boring bit of baking

But I’d only recommend it if you bake at least a loaf a week, and ideally more.

theverge.com

Back at Lucky Yu for the first time in far too long. Obviously started with my staple fuyu swirl, but my favourite today was actually the red bean custard bun, which I absolutely devoured — too fast to even remember to take a photo of its innards

For today’s @ftweekend.com, marking the US 250th, I’m at Appalachia, a new counter restaurant in London’s Shoreditch which is less mountain country restaurant than Brooklyn hipster outfit, in a good way. (The forth pic is a magnificent crab and ginger omelette) www.ft.com/content/a2de...

Angel Dabang is a place to go when what you really need from the world is something that's been deep-fried. It's a need it meets with aplomb.

Angel Dabang, N1

A banging dabang

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They're really making a feature-length ad for the worst chocolate you've had in your life

HERSHEY | Official Trailer | In Theaters Nov 25 | Alexandra Daddario, Finn Wittrock | Angel

YouTube video by Angel

youtube.com

It's been a breakfast sandwich sort of morning

Finally tried the sandwiches from Logma. Both good, but I don't get the hype. Good bread, and the aubergine has a lovely tangy quality. But the kofte are a bit eh. Two good sandwiches, but (inevitably) neither worth excessive queuing

Cornelius is one of the weirder restaurants / wedding venues I’ve eaten in for some time, but don’t hold that against it

Cornelius, N8

My big fat Romanian wedding venue

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According to Google's new search statistics, this is the summer of spam hot dogs, froyo, and figuring out how to make a Hugo spritz at home trends.withgoogle.com/trends/summe...

I know less about wine than I’d probably like, as someone who writes about restaurants on the regular — here’s why I think that might be just fine, and why food critics need not be wine experts

I'm a food critic, but a wine philistine

I like chicken wine, and I think that's fine

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A pretty pint at The Pocket, which it's taken me an embarrassingly long time to get to. Clearly an excellent pub for a pint and a book.

Two ways with stale bread and tomatoes: panzanella and pappa al pomodoro. Soggy bread and tomato salad, soggy bread and tomato soup. God bless the Italians.

London doesn’t have a whole lot of Appalachian food, but the best move new Shoreditch opening Appalachia pulls is resting the urge to aim for pure authenticity

Appalachia, N1

Country cooking with city style

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On opening night, Jackson Boxer’s new restaurant Vesper showed great promise with a few rough edges, then stopped me in my tracks with the best dessert I’ve eaten all year

Vesper, EC1

A strong start

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The Americans are going mad for British food right now, just as the Brits are slowly beginning to see another side of American cuisine. Why have we fallen for each other’s food all of a sudden?

The special relationship

Cooking with a transatlantic accent

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Good escalope sandwich from Franco's Take Away in Shoreditch, one of that dying breed of British-Italian cafes with a menu that sprawls from fry-ups to lasagne, and somehow covers every sandwich under the sun along the way

Just read a review describing Brutto as Italian-American, so I'm going to go and stare at a wall and scream for a little while

I liked Tiella when it was at The Compton Arms, I absolutely love it now it’s got its own home. One of my favourite meals in a while.

Tiella, E2

Early summers and second chances

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This week I reviewed Café Deco, a restaurant that’s obviously not new, but is new to me, despite having spent the best part of six years meaning to visit. It did not disappoint.

Café Deco, WC1

The ascetic aesthetic

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It turns out Max knows sausages just as well as sandwiches; Cooking with Sausages is a wonderful romp round a world’s greatest hits of sausage-based recipes, including a few deranged creations of Max’s own

Cooking with Sausages, by Max Halley

Wall-to-wall bangers

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