Short & Sweet: Westerns Laundry

Style: Modern European

Budget: Mid-range.

Venue and atmosphere: All the usual minimalist features (exposed brick, bulbs and concrete floor), softened by loads of natural light, beautiful flower arrangements and a stylish bar overlooking the open kitchen.

Service: Casual and friendly, but efficient. Good knowledge of the menu and wine list, which translates into great recommendations. (This is crucial with a menu like this, as you’ll want to order everything.)

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Short & Sweet: Brawn

Style: Modern European

Budget: Mid-range, though if, like me, you try every wine by the glass and almost every item on the menu, it soon adds up…

Venue and atmosphere: Cosy neighbourhood wine bar and restaurant.

Service: Casual, friendly and knowledgeable. Often Australian. It can sometimes be hard to get their attention when they are busy, but otherwise on point.

Food: Most of their produce is sourced from Natoora, which imports the most flavourful varieties of fruit and vegetables from Europe and the UK, along with some other top of the range products like charcuterie, cheese and Lolin anchovies.

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Short & Sweet: Ellory

Style: Modern European

Budget: Depends how greedy you are. Around £100/head if you want to do it properly, i.e. all the dishes you want, a nice bottle and some aperitifs and digestives. Good value for money at this level.

Venue and atmosphere: Michelin-starred restaurant without the ponce or hefty price tag. Converted warehouse space with minimalist design that somehow manages to feel warm and unpretentious. 

Service: Manages to strike that perfect balance between friendly and efficient, casual and knowledgeable. Ask questions – they are very willing to help and you will be expertly guided towards good decisions. 

Food: The dishes at Ellory appear deceptively simple, but there is clearly a lot of thought behind the combinations, which both surprise and delight.

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People's Palace Thai, Manila

It did not really come as a surprise, having travelled around the Philippines for 2 weeks, that the best meal I had there was (a) in the cosmopolitan capital of Manila and (b) not Filipino. I am willing to be proven wrong – I did end up in some rather provincial places – but overall I found Filipino food to be too sweet, greasy, bland or all of the above.

In some ways it is a shame that we didn’t do Manila first, when we were excited to try the local food, as I have read about some places that do modern Filipino food and get rave reviews, but after 2 weeks of eating greasy meat, sweet bread, margarine coated everything and a lot of junk food at bus stations, we just weren’t keen to give them a go.

This is how we ended up at a modern Thai restaurant for our final meal in the Philippines. People’s Palace Thai is similar in style to a David Thompson restaurant, except with less emphasis on the cultural style of eating and more on traditional recipes cooked and presented in a modern style with a focus on high quality ingredients.

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Short & Sweet: The Ledbury

Style: Modern European, fine dining

Budget: Very expensive (£600 for two, though we did drink a lot)

Venue and atmosphere: Inviting and elegant dining room with soft tones and plenty of natural light. White tablecloths and silver service but not too stuffy. 

Service: This is the kind of place where they read what kind of people you are and what service you want and behave accordingly. We were clearly there for a good time and they gave us one. Our waitress talked, joked and laughed with us. When my cousin wanted to swap one of the tasting menu options, they just brought it as an extra course. When it came to cheese, they saw we’d been having a few craft beers and suggested a beer matching instead of wine. Nice touch.

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