Oh what a year that was

Everywhere you look there seems to be some sort of review of the year, and not to miss out on the opportunity to award a few accolades and a rotten tomato or two I have decided on a couple of my own Silver Forks to award to the worthy (or not so worthy) few.

My chosen categories are:
Most memorable meal
Most delicious dessert
Best use of mash potatoes
Most extravagant table setting
Real fast food
Favourite cookery book
Best exponent of food on the box
Favourite chef
Top gadget/kitchen adornment
Best new discovery
Most overrated restaurant
Rottenest tomato

Most memorable meal
There’s so many to choose from this year, I think the short list has to be Le Cipriani in Venice for sheer indulgence and a very flash journey, the extravagant lobster fuelled brunch on the Orient Express on the way back from Venice, Juniper in Altringham for being so innovative and eclectic (and possibly with the worse plastic flowers outside of France) Tom Aikens in all his magnificence or Union Square Café with DD on my birthday in New York.
It’s very tough but I think Union Square Café tips it for just being such a perfect day. Clearly buoyed by the general excitement of it being my birthday and the fabulous surprise of sharing it with KK, my most dearest DD and I shared some really delicious food, perfect mash, yummy Kir(a) Imperial cocktails and of course, those nuts! It was just the perfect place to linger, to enjoy our last moments in New York and wonder how late we could leave it to get the train out of there.

Most delicious dessert
Gary Rhodes' Jaffa Cake Pudding will always hold a special place in my heart but I've enjoyed it several times over several years so this year's dessert award has to go straight to the ‘egg’ dessert at Le Bernardin on the eve of my birthday. It was just so unusual, so tasty and so egg-shaped! This is always a pleasing shape! (And I got to wear my tiara and clearly that would enhance any dessert!)

Best use of mash potatoes
Hmmm, the contenders. Gary Rhodes at Rhodes24 for his just stunning pomme puree (and I enjoyed it twice this year), the City Lobster’s lobster mash for its sheer decadence and lobster-iness and a late addition to the list is the various fabulous mashes I have enjoyed at D’s – with the pinnacle possibly being the potato soufflé we consumed on New Year's eve at our gothic meal.
And the winner has to be Gary, it just fills me joy and is truly the benchmark that other mash shall be compared to. Well at least until I finally taste Joël Robuchon’s legendary thrice sieved pomme puree. Maybe this year, I finally will!

Most extravagant table setting
There has been a few fantastic over the top table decorations where I have been left to run riot with a particular theme. The finalists are the duck-tacular complete with the duck table confetti (a triumph, even though they gave me blisters!), the Easter egg-travaganza with egg paraphernalia and yellow chick table confetti but the top spot has to be the Queen’s 80th birthday black tie and diamonds meal for the sheer exuberance and sparkliness of everything.

Real fast food
I am very fond of Bagel Already’s bagels and Square Pie’s pies but the Gourmet Burger Kitchen just do such fantastic burgers and are quick and excellent value. I haven’t visited since I started the blog but that’s an excellent excuse to partake of one of their fine burgers and redress that.

Favourite cookery book
Ah now this one is so tricky and I have an abundance to select from this year. The gastro porn contenders are Anna del Conte – Amaretto, Apple cakes and Artichokes, Simon Hopkinson's Second Helpings of Roast Chicken for being the sort of book you're going to keep running back to for many years and will no doubt become another classic, Tom Aikens for total slickness, Giorgio Locatelli for an stunning Italian tome that will probably take me all of 2007 to read, Jamie Oliver’s Cook for some really good recipes, Sophie Conran’s Pies for such a wonderful subject, Gordon Ramsay’s Sunday Dinners for being Gordon and of course having some top recipes and countless more. It is a very close run thing but I think Giorgio’s epic tome has to be the book of 2006, it will really make you salivate!

Best exponent of food on the box
I think Saturday Kitchen with the young whipper-snapper James Martin at the helm in favour of AWT has been improved. I did try and watch the Saturday Cooks which I think is the name of AWT's new vehicle but I found the constant adverts and extolling the virtues of some obviously sponsored expensive competition prize very tedious. I really enjoyed watching Masterchef Goes Large even if it’s just to constantly criticise the judges for their inconsistencies! I believe another series is being filmed at the moment so I guess I’ll be able to shout and the screen again soon.
I was also pretty glued to the Great British Menu, though they did spin it out rather. They recap so often I can only think that programme makers genuinely believe that we all have memories of goldfishes and need a constant reminders what we’ve just seen. But I did enjoy recreating the winning menu even though it was really hard work. Possible why the plan to recreate some or all of the Great British Christmas menu was met with the most enthusiastic response! But I think my winner this year is going to be Gordon Ramsay’s F Word, I am not particularly keen on him ritually humiliating the amateur cooks each week but I love the rest of the show. And that beef dish was stunning!

Favourite chef
My award for chef of the year goes to Marcus Wareing. I thought we had a stunning meal at Petrus and that Marcus himself was especially accommodating to H and bump. Also Marcus' dessert was a triumph at the Queen's 80th birthday and the crowning glory to our black tie and diamond event. And he was very nice when I chatted to him at the Taste of London event just after he'd cooked for the Queen.

Top gadget/kitchen adornment
I added some little beauties this year to my batterie de cuisine. I upgraded my Bamix to a shinier silver model. And they even make them in pink now. I also finally got a large SKK frying pan. I'd been having some difficulties with my favourite Woll pan and despite Woll assuring me that I could post it back to them for examination, they aren't aware of my post office phobic ways. And they rather laughingly added that said postage would only 'be a few pounds'. I'm not entirely sure what Royal Mail service they are using but with the new restrictions with size and shape etcetera, I can’t see that sending a large cast iron pan costing nothing short of a small fortune.

Despite it clearly not be a kitchen gadget per se, I feel my beloved black Leica c-lux should get a special mention for being my constant companion in the act of updating or more appropriately visualising this blog with various edible goodies.

And I haven't included any fabulous new crockery as I don't really want to tally this year's additions; I can safely say that I have an unnatural love of plates and cookbooks. If I don't become the founder member of cookbooks anonymous; it could well be crockery anonymous!

The winner has to be the latest adornment to my kitchen and that’s Nigella’s Liquorice piglets that D got me for Christmas. They will feature in their own post soon in all their delicious blackness but I need to get a ‘second’ salt to complete them and show them in their true glory!

Best new discovery
This will have to be the Zip’n’Steam bags that have revolutionised my lunch time meals in the office. I am positive that they have also successfully raised my geek status as well!

Most fabulous restaurant critic
Well thiscan only go Giles Coren for his often laugh out loud missives in the Times. He awards points for the most esotoic reasons and his prose just drips with brilliance. Though enough of the girlfriend Rachel, we know she's training to be a barrister and her oven isn't big enough to bake a pimped Jaffa cake and so many other things!

Most overrated restaurant
Ha, this is so easy! It has to be the inappropriately Michelin starred, rude staffed and extremely indifferent and reluctantly served food of Masa in New York. I still stick by my feeling that the Michelin star inspectors had their sake spiked with hallucinogens. Unbelievably average! The nearest I ever intend to be to them again is when I sail past their door on my way to an awe-inspiring meal at Per Se. If I ever manage to get a table of course!

Rottenest tomato
As an all too recent memory, I think that dreadful not so finest ravioli is a contender for the rottenest spot but it may be pipped to the post to the award by the plain nasty meal of raw duck and crucified garlic potatoes I had the misfortune to experience at the Sante Fe Grill. Possibly the only time they'll be mentioned in the same sentence as the word 'award'!