Alimentari Cocorino, Marylebone

Chiltern Street is quaint little street near Marylebone High Street where people go for extra large sized shoes, bridal boutiques or whiskey specialists. So don't ask my why I stumbled across Ailmentari Cocorino.

Cocorino is cute and stylish in a Marylebone/Notting Hill kind of way. Its white walls are well stocked with high end Italian biscotti, sauces, salamis, hams and fresh pastas sourced from artisan suppliers in Italy. It's a "boutique Italian delicatessan and espresso room" - the coffee is good, and you can have them make you up a fresh foccaccia or nibble on some of the gorgeous little cannoli and Italian cakes or biscuits.

It's owned by Linda Yau, sister of Alan Yau (restauranteur behind Princi, Hakkasan etc). Apparently there's also a Cocorino Focaccia and Gelato bar around the corner. Very sweet. One to try if you're in the neighbourhood.

Cocorino, 18 Chiltern Street, Marylebone, London W1U 7QA (Tel: 020 7935 0860)

Vinoteca, Marylebone

Whole roasted partridge with lentils & green sauce

I love the original, and now I love the new one. Vinoteca has opened a new branch in Marylebone.

It's just off Edgeware Road near where, incidentally, I recently discovered the gastronomic joy that is shopping at Lebanese grocer, Green Valley. Everything you could ever need to work your way through the Ottolenghi cookbook is right there or, like me, you could buy lots of things you don't need (like a large jar of preserved lemons for just over £1) just because they look pretty. There's also a busy bakery for sweet pastries and cakes. Anyhoo...

The concept at Vinoteca Marylebone is the same as at Farringdon. Part wine bar, part restaurant, there's a great selection of wines at reasonable prices, and - if you have to wait for a table - you can browse the floor to ceiling shelves laden with temptation to drink in or take home.

The food is rustic and simple, but with a hearty oomph. Each course is matched to one of the 25 wines available by the glass, or you can choose from one of over 280 bottles. We stopped by for a bottle of wine and a one course meal, so we bypassed the tempting sounding starters (like smoked eel with celeriac and apple remoulade and wheaten toast (£8)) and got stuck into a big spicy South African (the Cape Chamonix Rouge for £19.75), while soaking up the buzz.

My whole roasted partridge with a wintry lentil stew was meaty and heartwarming, although I found the generous splodge of garlicky, herby green sauce just a little too overpowering (other minds might differ on this).

Bavette steak

TPG almost went for the lamb pie - a billowing pastry case packed full with finely minced lamb and vegetables. However, in the end he wavered in favour of the bavette steak, pink and juicy at medium rare, with thick cut, crispy chips and salad - a favourite from our visits to the Farringdon branch. The accompanying bread sauce was also excellent.

Vinoteca Marylebone is already busy. We had a short wait (about 10 minutes) for a table, but the friendly waiting staff (who still seem excited to be there) looked after us well. We simply sat by the window (or you can sit at the bar) and made a head start on the wine.

Main courses generally cost between £11 - £15 and our meal for 2 including wine and service was good value at £56.

The menu changes daily, so you're likely to see something new every time you go. Oh, yes - you will go again.

Vinoteca, 15 Seymour Place, Marylebone, London W1H 5BD, Tel: 020 7724 7288



PS. I know it seems weird that we didn't have dessert, but we stopped by at Princi in Soho on the way home where they now have these gorgeous little "Italian kisses" - they're satisfyingly crisp on the outside, but lovely and chewy within. As usual for Princi's sweet stuff, they're a rip off at £1.20 for 3, but they're so good that we keep going back for them despite our principles.

Cafe Luc, Marylebone

I may have mentioned before that The Peanut Gallery has a baby which has nothing to do with me. His bike. It's custom made and now has brand new wheels. It appears he is preparing for the Tour de France.  If I had, long ago, instituted a rule that every dollar spent on the bike is to be matched by expenditure on shoes for me, I'd be a very happy woman.

The trouble with having a such a bike is that you can never take it anywhere - or leave it anywhere at least. Many times, we have cycled around town looking for a nice coffee spot where TPG can not only secure his bike nearby, but eyeball it while he is eating, and be within a clear path to a doorway or open window to enable him to leap through the air and pounce in the event that anyone looks sideways at it. Sometimes it's easier just to go home....

So the bike valet service at Cafe Luc is something of a welcome addition to the London cafe scene for our household. After a cycle around the leafy streets of Primrose Hill and Regent's Park, customers can drop off their bikes with the bike valet and eat with the assurance that their pride and joy is safely locked up inside the building.

Apparently, they also offer a shopping valet service if find yourself unable to resist the temptations of the cafe's chic Marylebone High Street location.

Cafe Luc is run by Julie van Oostende and her father, Belgian restaurateur, Luc van Oostende. Despite their Belgian heritage, the menu at Cafe Luc is more broadly Modern European - although there is a Belgian week menu coming up from 20 - 27 September 2010. (Unfortunately there will not be waffles - the first thing TPG checked - although there will be speculoos, vanilla and salted caramel ice-cream which will appease him).

The interior was designed by Stiff and Trevillion (who were behind Le Cafe Anglais' decor) and is something like that of a larger Galvin Bistrot de Luxe, although slightly more corporate. It's a schlick looking brasserie, with muted walls, black wooden tables, chocolate banquettes and lots of mirror action. Eye catching light fittings include amber hand blown glass bulbs from Murano bubbling over the copper bar, and clusters of small black lampshades spaced along the walls. Even the loos are rather dashing.

Open all day from 7am, with a breakfast menu available until noon and a brunch menu available until 6pm, the hearty Full English breakfast (£12) was just what I needed last Sunday afternoon. The yolks of my 2 perfectly poached eggs oozed gloriously onto toasted brown bread, a delicious sausage (unfortunately no-one could tell me where it came from), black pudding, roasted cherry tomatoes, tasty bacon, sauteed mushrooms and baked beans. The baked beans were the only slight let down here - they were fine, but a home made batch would improve things.

Two upright eggs with soldiers (£5.50) were also perfectly cooked, although the smallish serving of toast may not be enough to satisfy you on it's own. I would suggest accompanying this with fruit salad, or the TPG went for pancakes - a dainty stack with maple syrup and berries were excellent (£7.50).

There are healthy options like Greek yoghurt with berries and honey and, while the menu is mostly quite conventional, more offbeat numbers like apple spring rolls with green apple coulis are available.

Juices are freshly squeezed (I had orange, but carrot, apple, pear and grapefruit are also offered) and I enjoyed a spicy, well made Bloody Mary to accompany my Full English. The coffee was fine, although not one to go out of the way for.

Service appeared to be helpful and attentive across the room. There were occasional gaps in product knowledge, but not too much to begrudge them - it's all very casual and friendly.

Cafe Luc is a good option for breakfast with cocktails in style - or one to remember if you're out free wheeling with an obsessive compulsive bike owner.


Cafe Luc, 50 Marylebone High Street, London, W1U 5HN (Tel: 020 7258 9878)

Greedy Diva was a guest of Cafe Luc.

La Cucina Caldesi: Italian Cooking School (Marylebone, London)

I have serious kitchen envy. I want the Caldesi kitchen.

My kitchen at home is only just big enough for TPG and I to work, crab like, as co joined twins. Our bin blocks the passage between stove and sink. We have enough storage to stock up on a whole 2 days worth of ingredients - so long as we're eating cheese on toast on day 2 (sometimes minus the toast). Our freezer is the size of a small box of matches. Handy.

Also, as my crunchy "caramel chicken" debacle pointedly illustrated (you don't want to know), my cooking skills could do with some serious polishing.

So the invitation to join Katie and Giancarlo Caldesi for an Italian cooking class at La Cucina Caldesi was gratefully accepted. Finally a chance to spread my cooking wings. To unleash my inner chef. To shine like the sun and soar like an eagle... Ahem. I was a bit excited.

La Cucina Caldesi is a family business, positioned next to the Caffe Caldesi where I have happily dined on Tuscan fare and celebrated with friends in nights out gone by. La Cucina runs a variety of cooking courses of different durations focusing on foods from various Italian regions, and with a range of chefs or foodie experts leading the charge.

On this occassion, the dynamic Caldesi duo would be showing me, and a bunch of other food bloggers, the ropes.

We started the evening with some prosecco and nibbles, before the cooking business began. We were each allocated a small chicken, before Giancarlo guided us through the deboning process - a first for me. They were stuffed with garlic, chilli, and rosemary then roasted and served with pancetta, roasted potatoes and onions - pollo al mattone (chicken under a brick). Gorgeous aromas of roasty bits filled the room. Yes, it was better than my caramel chicken.

Meanwhile, Katie showed us how to mould neat little parcels of gnocchi gnudi (a mix of spinach and ricotta, no pasta), later tossed with melted butter and sage and served as our starter.

We watched the Caldesis in action as they prepared a hot and very chocolatey chocolate and brandy dessert, served drinkable from a tea cup (although it solidifies to a mousse if left overnight). Cosy and warm, this was simply divine, and something I will eagerly replicate at home, perhaps even with a hint of chilli as suggested by Katie. The family had discovered this little gem on earlier travels - their son had the pluck to ask for the recipe from the original chef.

I enjoyed getting my apron dirty, however after cooking comes the feasting - where my talents really come to the fore. Everything was lovely. The Caldesis, as generous hosts, also supplied wines, and sparkling entertainment.

The Caldesi classes generally range from £25 - £170, although I sampled this one on the house. There are 7 week courses with Stefano Borella for £525. Obviously, like me, you won't be transformed overnight into a Michelin class chef by a 3 hour class, but my brief foray was enough to indicate that these classes will provide inspiration, at least as much as skills, for your Italian cooking inclinations.

Katie Caldesi has recently published an Italian cook book, The Italian Cookery Course, filled with recipes she has collected and adapted from over 3 years of research all over Italy and its varied gastronomic regions (Yes, I note jealously, this is called "research" in the world of K Caldesi). This thing is one comprehensive collection - over 400 recipes and 40 master classes are caught between its covers. It's thick and choc-a-block with a large variety of recipes and gorgeous pictures to have any Italianophile drooling. I did not have the opportunity to browse through it in great detail, but I loved the photos and the obvious breadth and depth captured - I'll be seeking it out for closer inspection.

I really liked Katie's style, and her non fussy approach to cooking good, hearty Italian food. And I want her kitchen.

La Cucina Caldesi, 118 Marylebone Lane, Marylebone, London W1U 2QF.

The Duke of Wellington - Marylebone, London

It's been a while since I've dined at the Duke. My lasting memory from my previous visit is of a fellow guest, a usually sane and extremely law abiding citizen, telling a Seinfeld-esque tale of skulduggery and grand larceny involving him, a dry cleaner and at least 1 pair of lost trousers. I can't for the life of me remember what I ate - but I remember it was good.

This time, I'm on the ball. Our group of six settled into the upstairs dining room, which is a lovely enough space with the semblance of a proper, grown up sitting room - intimate setting, white walls, dark floorboards, big breezy windows. So perhaps it's down to my juvenile and unsophisticated nature that I'm always slightly reluctant to leave the cheery downstairs pub behind - it's also a lovely place to eat.

The menu offers simple-but-posh pub nosh. There's crab on toast, crab bisque, jerusalem artichoke soup with truffle oil and steak supplied by the Ginger Pig.

I was, for once, avoiding the meatier dishes in preparation for the Christmas feast awaiting me later that evening. So, I settled on the mussels in a light, soupy Thai green curry with a side of pilaf. Alright, alright, I hear the gasps. I never order Thai curry in a pub, nor even mussels for that matter. However, this version was enjoyable - and would have been even more so had I been given a spoon to get at the lovely soup. Instead, I resorted to the scoop by shell method. Classy.

The grilled haloumi was a popular choice with the ladies - a salad with toasted almonds, rocket, hummus and grilled bread. As much as I adore haloumi, it has to be cooked well and eaten in a timely fashion to avoid the rubber tyre effect. It seemed to pass the tyre test with flying colours and gained the full approval of the girls who nodded and devoured and attacked it wholeheartedly.

The Peanut Gallery opted for the rather plain looking scrambled eggs - perhaps one too many fandangled protein shakes that morn, TPG? But he was happy enough with his choice.

Our sides of spinach and long, knobbly new potatoes were all cooked well, and as satisfactory as such sides could be. I certainly hopped in for my 3rd side of carbs (rice, bread and potato - mmm...). The bread was hot and fresh from the oven - always earning a big tick on the Greedy Diva checklist.

Desserts were fab. I had my heart set on the apple crumble but it was, to my dismay, sold out by the time we got around to ordering. However, the sticky toffee pud with banana ice cream was a solid wingman, ready to step up to the plate. The sauce was delectable, the pud rich and moist, and it was happily generous in size. The ice-cream was disappointingly icy but, all round, it earned a big thumbs up from me and Mands (we had one each, of course).

The Peanut Gallery's rice pudding with raspberry compote was lovely and creamy, and I liked the bitter sweet tang of the fruit - although he, of course, thought it superfluous. Don't put expendables between TPG and his pudding.

The Duke of Wellington is a lovely place to eat fine pub fare. What it does, it does well, as recognised by its Time Out Award in 2008 for the Best New Gastropub. Go lofty upstairs for a reliably good meal with friends, or nestle in downstairs for a relaxed and lazy afternoon pint, watching the rain fall over the quiet streets of Marylebone.

94a Crawford Street, Marylebone, London, W1J 2HQ

Galvin Bistrot De Luxe, London

Apparently, French women don't get fat. According to Mireille Guiliano, by sticking to time tested principles of French gastronomy, French women can indulge in bread, wine, cheese and frequent 3 course meals without fear of gradually expanding through the seams of their French pantalon. Food must be savoured, not rushed. Eating is all about joyful pleasure. At this point of the theory, the Greedy Diva is high-fiving Mireille all the way to the patisserie.

Similarly, the French Paradox is the observation that the French population suffers lower rates of coronary heart disease despite thriving on a diet lavish in saturated fats. Many attribute this phenomenom to the health benefits of plentiful red wine consumption. Fabulous - where do I sign? Eating high quality food is also a likely key. My thoughts exactly. Other probable contributing factors are the low incidence of snacking in between meals and smaller portion sizes. Hmm.....

This is where the Greedy Diva's subscription to living the French principles of eating comes to a screeching halt. Because the better something tastes, the more one must eat of it, non?

Fortunately, the Galvin brothers seem to concur. The portion sizes at Galvin Bistrot De Luxe, their fabulous French bistrot in the nether regions of Baker Street, are ample and hearty, while maintaining the high quality and classic style for which the chefs are reputed.

The Peanut Gallery and I opted for the lunch menu prix fixe: 3 courses for £15.50 (also available for dinner at £17.50). This would have to be one of the best value lunches in town, particularly when compared to the cost of a Eurostar ticket - sip your red wine, soak up the buzz, and one is instantly transported to Paris...voila!

We commenced proceedings with the chicken and root vegetable terrine. Colourful, if slightly Picassoesque, this was a delectable and satisfying starter. The Autumnal vegetables (mainly carrots and greens) blended beautifully with the luscious, rich chicken. The serving size was also generous, and certainly took more than the edge off the next course.

The Peanut Gallery wisely chose the short rib of beef for his main, accompanied by pumpkin puree, baby onions, carrots, greens and a rich sauce (pictured top). This would normally be the dish for me, but to broaden our explorations of the menu, I opted for the salmon and haddock fish cake with poached egg and herbs.

Fish cakes are not something I normally choose, but this was probably as good as a fish cake can get and the poached egg on top was a lovely touch. However, drenched in a bechamel type sauce, it was not only enormous but insanely rich. In the spirit of principled French eating (and a rare show of meal defeat), the Greedy Diva had to abandon a portion on the plate.

But then her lack of French blood inevitably revealed itself. The Peanut Gallery had also declared himself defeated by the beef. This was surely a crime for a dish so completely and utterly delicious. So tender, rich and lush. The Greedy Diva treated herself to a morsel. Then another. Until, mid sentence, The Peanut Gallery looked down at his plate and gasped in horreur. Somehow, in a matter of seconds, The Greedy Diva had managed to scrape the (once) well covered bone clean and was now licking her lips bashfully. It was then that I knew I would never master the effortlessly elegant ways of a French woman.

Finally, after some breathing space, the potted cheesecake arrived. The caramelised fig topping was too strongly spiced, but the cheesecake and biscuit base were divine. We also noted some robust blackberry souffles flaunting around the room, which would definitely warrant a repeat visit.

Galvin Bistrot De Luxe won London's Best French Restaurant of the Year Award in 2008 and it's easy to see why. It would have to be one of my new favourite lunch spots, and the reasonable prices are a bonus. If you were settling in for the evening, the extensive wine list has a great selection to keep you entertained.

While slightly stiff and formal looking on first glance, with its wood panelling, white linen and well-to-do older crowd, Galvin Bistrot has a charming and chattering buzz. It's easy to imagine you have just stepped out of your chic Parisian apartment to grab a meal and a glass of wine before taking a tiptoe through the Tuileries. What more could you want?

Galvin Bistrot De Luxe, 66 Baker Street, London, W1U 7DJ