4 minute read
Drink Bill Knott
posters and those red-and-whitecheck tablecloths.
Yet for me, the greatest shock was that this glamorous restaurant sold burgers, then the staple breakfast, lunch and dinner of lorry drivers. And I didn’t have to ask for ketchup. That bête noire of the refined classes was already on the table. I was living the dream.
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These burgers were huge. And they were actually made of minced beef. None of us ever questioned the content of a Wimpy burger, but it was widely, if silently, assumed, that the cow had barely a walk-on role.
So what sadness when I read the legend was closing – only to be replaced by elation at the news of its reopening in nearby Burleigh Street. Those Seventies theatre posters (and Elaine Paige) are still there. And those burgers, as we aficionados know, are still not on the menu. They are ex-directory and have to be asked for. Hurry back!
Beautiful towns like Bradford-onAvon deserve a great restaurant. And the Bunch of Grapes is just that. Set in a stunning Georgian building, it’s owned by people clever enough to appeal to all budgets and tastes, as if it were a pub. The ground floor has an elegant bar where you can as easily order a pint of Butcombe as a Negroni. You can even bring your dog, after a good walk along the Kennet and Avon canal.
The panelled first-floor dining room is pure elegance, with long tables down each side. And the menu matches it. It’s the perfect venue for roast beef (£18.50) on a Sunday. Needless to say, they too offer various burgers, not least one made of Cajun cauliflower and garlic mayo.
Save for the smoked cheddar, it would be worthy of V Honest Burgers in Garrick Street.
Joe Allen, 2 Burleigh Street, London WC2E 7PX; tel: 020 7836 0651; www.joeallen.co.uk
The Bunch of Grapes, 14 Silver Street, Bradford-on-Avon BA15 1JY; open Thurs-Sun; bookings at table@thebunchofgrapes.com; www.thebunchofgrapes.com
DRINK BILL KNOTT THE ART OF THE APERITIVO
The barman at the Pino Azzurro in Linguaglossa, a small town north-east of Mount Etna, looked at me uncomprehendingly. ‘Negroni?’ Frowning, he rolled the word around his mouth a few times, and then tapped it into his phone.
‘Ah!’ he exclaimed, reaching for bottles of gin, Campari and Martini Rosso, before combining equal measures of each in a small wine glass with no ice.
I should have stuck to beer. I thought the Negroni had conquered the world, but there is at least one corner of Sicily it has yet to penetrate.
The island’s reluctance to embrace the concept of the aperitivo – drinks and a few snacks before dinner, something of an art form in Turin and Milan – may simply be because Sicilians do not finish lunch until around five in the afternoon. Up north, however, it is practically a sacrament, from cicchetti and prosecco in Venice to the spritzes and stuzzicati of Bologna and beyond.
It has even spawned the apericena, bastard offspring of the aperitivo and dinner, much beloved of impecunious students who can nurse a solitary beer and load up with carbs for 15€ or so.
The genius of the Negroni, as we know, lies in its use of alcohol as a mixer, but those wishing to pace themselves more prudently might prefer to scan the bar shelf for an amaro, to be mixed with ice and a splash of soda. Or, might I suggest, to make a bicicletta.
Amari – ‘bitters’ – are generally intended to be consumed chilled and neat as digestivi, to settle the stomach after a good meal. The history of many of them involves monks, apothecaries, and a bewildering selection of mountain herbs, happily blurring the lines between religion, medicine and intoxication.
But they are also admirably suited to being judiciously mixed with white wine (it is the perfect way to use that dodgy bottle of Pinot Grigio that has been sitting in the fridge door for a month), lots of ice, enough soda to provide a prickle of bubbles and perhaps a slice of orange.
Campari – technically an amaro, but invariably taken before a meal – is the classic choice for a bicicletta, but you might substitute amari based on rhubarb (rabarbaro: try Nardini’s version), artichoke (Cynar is the classic brand), or more nebulous concoctions such as Averna or Fernet-Branca.
There is even, so I have discovered, an amaro from Etna, made with ‘more than 26 herbs and aromatic plants’: although, at the Pino Azzurro, the ice might still be a struggle.
This month’s Oldie wine offer, in conjunction with DBM Wines, is a 12-bottle case comprising four bottles each of three wines: an intriguing white made by an Englishman in Romania; a Spanish red with an almost
Burgundian complexity; and a great example of how well Cabernet Franc can perform in South Africa. Or you can buy cases of each individual wine.
Wine
Solevari Reserve Feteasca Regala, DOC, Viile Timisului, Romania 2018, offer price £9.99, case price £119.88
A mouthful of a name and a mouthful of a wine: terrific dry white with delicate stone-fruit flavours, made by Bristolian Phil Cox.
Vermell, Celler del Roure, DO Valencia, Spain 2019, offer price £13.50, case price £162.00
Made from Garnacha, Monastrell and the indigenous Mando grape, and aged in amphoras: a beautifully balanced, medium-weight red.
Cabernet Franc ‘Dolomite’, Raats, Stellenbosch, South Africa 2019, offer price £13.50, case price £162.00
Plush, silk-smooth, fruitforward Cabernet Franc made by Bruwer Raats. Splendid with roast lamb.
