Snoop's Reviews
Reviews are very important before making any purchase. Reviews protect us from buying things that we will soon regret. Snoop's Reviews hopes to aid you in making the best decisions on places where to eat and all of the newest cooking tools.
Tools
In the Tools section you will find a running list of the newest gadgets that Snoop's friends at BAS have concluded are absolutely not worth your money. Snoop does not like to waste his money, and neither should you. That is why the guys at BAS are looking to spare you the misery of these devices.
Restaurants
On The Restaurants page you will find a quick guide to great places to eat. This list will be updated on a regular basis along with the Snoop's thoughts on them.
Featured Reviews
Below you will find Cheff Dogg's featured reviews. These reviews are of restaurants and stood out because of their detail. Snoop felt that such reviews deserved a spotlight.
Can Cinnamon Kitchen get the spice right?
By Taylor Clark
My latest conspiracy theory is that modern Indian food in this country is actually a revenge on the Brits for the injustices and excesses of colonial rule. So, instead of subtly spiced feasts that show a deep-rooted understanding of traditional techniques and a strong sense of place, we get mousses, timbales, dribs and drabs.
I value and appreciate the efforts made to evolve Indian cuisine by the country's leading modern Indians — Amaya, Benares, Quilon, Rasoi Vineet Bhatia, Tamarind, Trishna, etc — but when they go too far up their Khyber Passes, they rarely leave me with the feeling that I have eaten an Indian meal. And now that they are getting rewarded with Michelin stars, I fear that "modern Indian" will get even more modern and less Indian.
So I come to the new Cinnamon Kitchen not as a convert, but, as Henry Kissinger said, "Neither anxious nor confident, but rather resigned to events". It is the louder, livelier City-side outpost of Westminster's clubby Cinnamon Club, also overseen by the rather dashing Vivek Singh, who learnt his craft with India's mighty Oberoi hotel group.
Located, ironically, in what was once the East India Company warehouse, it is a buzzy, high-ceilinged industrial space lined with polished wooden tables and topped with gleaming air-conditioning ducting. Hand-perforated globe lights cast exquisitely filigreed shadows against pearly silver-grey walls and a stool-lined open grill, while an adjoining bar, Anise, specializes in spiced-up mixology for the boom-and-bust generation.
The food promises to be lighter and simpler than at the Club, with more flexible options for snacking and sharing. A comp starter gets my interest immediately, with its moreish crisp shell of semolina encasing spiced potato, a play on the street snack gol guppas. Next, three cloth-wrapped flat breads ($8), and a variety of chutneys (sweet tomato, mustardy pea, chili and garlic, $4) bring color and warmth to the table, the breads fresher and chutneys more complex than the usual poppadum fodder.
A little, rich, electric-yellow sweetcorn soup ($8) is a creamy, light-hearted tease, the perfect foil for two lollipop-like masala corn kebabs that crunch with corny sweetness in a lovely combo of modern manners and traditional spicing. OK, you now have my full attention.
A stylish little tasting plate ($10) of lamb keeps up the pace, with a smooth-talking, paté-like lamb patty wrapped in betel leaf, textbook lamb seekh kebab and a little yoghurt cake sitting on diced apple. Another starter of "fat chili" stuffed with bland, dry, under-spiced paneer ($8) loses me momentarily, but I return for the lamb rack ($32), divided into two rose-pink double cutlets, with lovely rice and a well-balanced mint-onion sauce, the lamb all the better for being roasted rather than the more traditional braising.
Both the lamb and a main course of spiced-up sea bream with Malabar curry sauce ($25) look like refugees from a groovy gastropub, but again, there is an integrity to the spicing, a sensitivity to cooking time and an attention to textural contrast that raises them above their Western plating and passé rice timbales.
The left-field, Euro-plus wine list is also full of pleasant surprises, such as a smooth, juicy Pasqua Vigneti Casterno Valpolicella ($38) that seems to go well with everything.
Even dessert is a treat, with a creamy buffalo-milk kulfi ice-cream prettily presented on a tangle of crisp sevian noodle that is like eating deep-fried angel's hair.
The power and subtlety of traditional spicing gives Cinnamon Kitchen an anchor to the past that lets it incorporate some intelligent deconstruction and innovation without losing the plot. It means the food here is as Indian as it is modern, something I had never been convinced was possible.
Rating 16/20
The Luxe
Cafe-bar and restaurant in Old Spitalfields Market
By Linda Terse
Our brand new ‘Time Out Eating&Drinking’ guide had just been published when we first visited The Luxe. For the small editorial team who create it, the guide makes us reflect on the many changes we’ve seen and reported on over the last year.
In each new guide we also eagerly anticipate what’s going to be opening over the coming months. In September 2008 we boldly announced the imminent arrival of The Luxe, ‘a new café-bar from John Torode (of Smiths of Smithfield renown) on the site of the Spitz music bar in Old Spitalfields Market. The first-floor dining room will specialize in game and poultry.’
Our announcement proved a little premature, because for 12 months after it, we were walking past and peering through the screens, watching the building work proceed at the pace of termite mound construction. Then it quietly opened.
Was it worth the wait, though? It might not be Sydney Opera House, but it’s a good-looking place, large and light and airy. Only the ground-floor café and the basement bar were open on our first visit; the first-floor poultry and game restaurant followed a couple of weeks later — just after the publication of the Aussie TV chef’s new book, ‘Chicken and Other Birds’.
There’s currently only one chook dish on the menu — chicken paillard. This is chicken that looks as if it’s been run over by a steamroller, then flipped on to a barbie. It was a tasty free-range bird, juicy and simply served with buttered baby leeks.
Most of the menu is even simpler than this, but the dishes we tried were all good. A large bowl of battered deep-fried whitebait was spry, crisp and dry, served with rich mayonnaise, malty brown bread and half a lemon wrapped in muslin.
We ordered the day’s special of panzanella salad to see just how wrong they could get it. They didn’t. In Tuscany this dish is a way of using up stale bread by mixing it with ripe tomatoes, olive oil and garlic, adding wine vinegar for sour-sweet notes, plus capers for extra zip. This version was excellent, and would pass for Italian.
With an Aussie proprietor you’d expect a good pavlova, and here you get one. A proper pav should have a crisp meringue exterior, a chewy center, good fresh fruit and look good. This fresh passionfruit version scored better than Ricky Ponting.
Torode has very competently covered all bases with this venture: as well as the ground-floor bar-cafe and the first-floor restaurant, there's a basement club, a takeaway and even a flower stall.
Rating 12/20
23 Romilly Street
Bar and dining room in Soho
By Guy Diamond
This old Soho townhouse has a certain charm. It also has one of the cheapest makeovers and some of the dodgiest carpets you’re likely to find in the West End; a capricious door policy; and is frequented by the sort of Soho bohos who take being ‘up yourself’ is a compliment, but that’s also part of the charm. It’s quirky, and if you don’t like it, you can always go to Pizza Hut instead.
Walk straight through the ground-floor lounge bar to reach Dick’s Bar in the basement. It’s now home to the legendary Dick Bradsell, strutting his stuff behind a surprisingly makeshift bar. Most cocktails from the surprisingly short list cost a mere £7, and are predictably well-made.
You may, or may not, be able talk your way in past the door staff just for a drink. The website claims this is a “members’ bar”; yet it only appears to enforce this when it suits them. One way to be assured entry is by booking dinner.
The first-floor dining room is named Andy@23RomillyStreet, after chef Andy Campbell; the restaurant manager, Alessandra Risley, is his partner. The room’s small and conspiratorially low-lit; the menu’s a mish-mash of retro dinner party dishes and comfort food.
Sausage and mash comprised dense, meaty bangers flavored with garlic and fennel, with a caraway-flavored mustard. A slightly more challenging test for the kitchen was a tart of Gruyère cheese with caramelized onion, which had good, thin pastry. A pork chop was nicely cooked, served with clams and bacon; the accompanying cube of dauphinoise potatoes was nicely pert. Other dishes were a bit so-so; a salad of baby spinach, cherry tomato, and avocado is the sort of thing you could easily throw together at home, except that in this case, the pancetta had been home-cured by the chef. Puds include crème brûlée or a French cheeseboard. The wine list is limited.
Visit on a Wednesday night if you fancy a little cross-dressing, because that’s when trannies are encouraged for what they’ve dubbed the Green Fingernail club. (Do trannies actually need encouragement? The ones I know need none.) Be warned that the website isn’t up-to-date, so ring first for more reliable information on entry details and the various club nights.
Rating 8/20
Ssam Burger
Best Thing We Ate: Seoul Burger
By Christopher Hassiotis
Korean mash-ups may be the de rigueur flavor fusion of the day (even chains have Korean tacos these days), but we thought Ssam Burger might offer something a little more authentic. After all, the recently opened Westside restaurant was originally going to be a Korean sausage joint, but the owners didn't quite have the space to do what they wanted and decided on burgers instead. Lucky Atlanta!
The Seoul Burger sports an Angus beef patty glazed with Korean-barbecue spices and the house made "ssam sauce," a sweet but piquant glaze that tasted like a variant on the traditional chili-paste sauce used in Korean ssam wraps. Sesame oil can be a dangerous thing when wielded too liberally, but the arugula matched with a sesame-and-chili dressing that sat atop the burger struck the right notes. Thin and salty, the lotus chips side erased any thought of french fries - especially the over-flavored sesame-oil fries popular at many Korean fusion restaurants.
If we could've changed one thing? The beef patty was great, and cooked to a perfect medium rare, but more Korean seasonings within the meat itself would've taken an already excellent burger over the top. Located in a strip mall that's humble if we're being generous - depressingly industrial if we're being honest — Ssam Burger's worth a visit.Our burger and lotus chips came to $7.50 total (2072 Defoors Ferry Rd.; 404-609-5533).
Rating 15/20
Bacchanalia
by Kim Wilde
Holding fast as the "pinnacle of refined dining" (voted No. 1 for Food and Popularity in Atlanta), this near-"flawless" Westside New American "keeps it fresh year after year" with "absolutely outstanding" fare, served in a five-course, prix fixe menu that can be paired with an "impeccable" wine list for a "feast befitting its name"; the "well-trained" staff works with "panache", the setting is done up in "chic retro-industrial" style and there's a definite "sense of occasion" in the air, leaving the "extraordinary" cost as the only sticking point; P.S. à la carte ordering is available at the bar and allowed, if not encouraged, in the dining room.
Rating 18/20
Blanca
by Alex Lifeson
The "spectacular" fine-dining adjunct of Bushwick darling Roberta's, this "must-try" (if you can get in) New American in spare, "cool" loft digs delivers an "amazing experience" with its lavish tasting menu, offered at a single seating nightly to "only 12 lucky diners"; chef Carlo Mirarchi's "exquisite" "morsels" arrive artfully plated on high-end china, appropriate to the $195 prix fixe—only price tag — the few who've tried it say this is "as good as it gets."
Rating 17/20
The Green Table
By William Squire
"Simply delicious" "farm-to-table" fare is the draw at this "cozy", little American in Chelsea Market that emphasizes organic and locally sourced ingredients on its seasonal menus; "hit-or-miss" service and "pricey" tabs don't deter loyalists who deem it "a find."
Rating 15/20
Gonzalez Y Gonzalez
By Norma Jean
After a brief absence, this Village staple has reappeared in a smaller, sleeker space with a pared-down menu of Mexican street-food favorites; though the storefront’s signature neon sombrero is now hanging inside rather than out, fans will be relieved to discover that the moderately priced margaritas and nightly salsa dancing remain.
Rating 14/20