“Forget the House red or white, bring me the whisky!”
This kind of opening request to the sommelier would normally bring on fear and slight disgust, but not at the excellent Plateau restaurant in Canary Wharf….
The Plateau - Canary Wharf
Allan Picket, head chef, has joined forces with Johnnie Walker to create a unique three course tasting menu that highlights the key expressions in the single malts which combine to create Johnnie Walker Blue Label.
Blue Label is Johnnie Walker’s premium single malt. Only 1 in a 1000 barrels make the grade to Blue label. The quality shines through, backed with a smoothness and a strong depth of flavour. The price of Johnie Walker blue label is all too irrelevant once tasted.
Johnnie Walker Blue Label Whisky
This whisky orientated tasting menu starts from September. Upon arrival, guests will be guided through the specially crafted seasonal menu. Each course, such as a terrine of ham and parsley with pear chutney or Bitter Valrhona chocolate tart, is paired with a single malt or other expression of Johnnie Walker.
Guests will be introduced to each whisky as it arrives at the table and appreciate its versatility by trying each liquid straight, chilled, iced or with water to understand the complex flavours and varying strength before finally matching it to their own palate and enjoying the food.
To culminate, diners will be presented with a perfect serve of Johnnie Walker Blue Label and they will be able to draw on the knowledge acquired throughout the evening to appreciate the deep and varied flavours present in each sip.
An entertaining and educational evening. A dedicated whisky expert will guide you through each course. For whiskey tasting London can offer no better venue.
Allan Pickett, Head Chef at Plateau: “Few people think of whisky as a drink to accompany dinner, but it can be an incredible match with the right dishes. Our whisky expert will explain how and why I created this special menu, in what promises to be a fascinating evening.”
As I have said, the incredibly reasonable cost of Johnnie Walker blue label (http://www.johnniewalker.com) is irrelevant. The cost of this rather special evening is priceless, but just for you, details are below.
The Johnnie Walker Blue Label exclusive tasting experience will be available from 1 September 2010 in Plateau’s private dining spaces for £95 per head. Reservations must be made in advance (http://www.plateaurestaurant.co.uk)
From September, Gaggia, the number one choice of coffee machines in Italy, is launching Accademia, the ultimate machine for coffee lovers everywhere. Whatever your coffee preference, Accademia will impress you with its superior performance and style, bringing you the easiest way to professional coffee at home today.
Apart from looking far too good for home use with it’s stainless steel finish with a real nod to quality craftsmanship, This Gaggia Coffee maker performs at a professional level. No, It’s better than that, better than most coffee shop’s machines. The Accademia has been created with high end luxury in mind, using innovative materials and technology.
Now aesthetics are out the way, let’s talk performance. How much do you love coffee? Not enough, if you aren’t getting excited about this Gaggia review!
USP’s for the Accademia as follows;
* Memorises your favourite coffee and milk/froth preferences
* Adjustable telescopic coffee dispenser so you can enjoy your coffee in mugs and cups of all sizes
* Display panel features dynamic images for each step of the coffee process
* An advanced milk system lets you specify how much creamy froth you would like
* Patented automatic cleaning feature takes away the hassle of cleaning up afterwards
Yes! That’s right. This machine has a memory and an easy to navigate digital display. You can programme up to 7 beverage choices and, simply, 1 touch of a button gives you professional standard coffee every time.
It’s all sounding pretty impressive, yes? It gets better. The Accademia cleans itself afterwards.
Gaggia Coffee Makers have never been so good.
The Gaggia Accademia is available from September 2010 at selected department stores, online and leading independent cookshops. RRP £1,400.
When you think of Vodka, you may think principle ingredients would be grain or potatoes. You would, mostly, be right.
However, you may be lucky enough to come across Ciroc vodka, a luxury vodka made from grapes. The use of grapes is instantly obvious. The result is a fresh, crisp, aromatic vodka with a hint of citrus and a smooth after taste.
In Fact, If you are a vodka fan, You really need to get hold of this very special spirit, this grape vodka. 5 times distilled to give that extra smoothness.
The French grapes used benefit from long warm autumn days with cool nights providing an extended ripening season, enabling the development of complex aromatic flavours and the necessary level of acidity.
The grapes are left on the vine until they are overly ripe. After harvesting the grapes are sent to temperature-controlled cellars where they undergo a cold maceration, cold fermentation, and cold storage processes, until recently only practised by fine wine producers, which preserves the distinctive freshness and extracts a more flavourful fruit character.
You can track down this fantastic premium vodka at thewhiskyexchange.com. It retails for £39.95 for 1 litre.
To really go to town with Ciroc, you should consider a night out at Bond nightclub in Soho. Bond (formerly known as 24) is an uber chic club and private hire event space set in a stylish pocket of Soho.
The most technologically advanced and cutting edge club in Europe, 24 events at Bond in association with Cîroc vodka has installed new technology to give you an utterly unique clubbing and events experience.
2 interactive booths with touch screen messaging facilitys allow users the ultimate night out. Order a cocktail containing Ciroc, or a bottle of Ciroc and the whole club will know about it due to the animation show across the club’s wall to wall projection screens and 1,000 lighting colour combinations. This is, after all, a drink to be proud of!
The booths also feature a messaging application on the digital screen to send a virtual drink to another person in the club. You can also use the touch-screen drinks menu from which you can browse a selection of delicious Cîroc based cocktails to treat yourself and your friends.
For the chance to celebrate in ultimate in VIP style, book the exclusive Cîroc-booth to enjoy your night out in the comfort of seclusion and exclusivity. You’ll also have your own personal photographer who will take photos of your night out, which will appear on the screensavers of the clubs iBar units, giving you real celebrity status!
Puerh is a compressed, post-fermented green tea that is grown and processed only in the Mekong river area of Yunnan Province in China. Puerh leaves are processed into Raw or Green (Sheng) and Cooked or Black (Shou) puerh.
Puerh is worthy of the attention of the true Lussorian as aged examples are the most coveted of all tea types. This is one of the few teas that improves with age, and 40 or 50 year old examples can fetch enormous prices. Puerh collectors buy the tea as an investment and trade in it as a commodity. 2003-4 a ‘Puerh bubble’ pushed prices up to stratospheric levels and sparked widespread counterfeiting. Teas from this period are still regarded with suspicion. Despite the controversy, the market for fine puerh remains robust: in 2009 two kilos of aged puerh were sold at auction for $160,000.
The best quality aged Puerhs can be infused up to 60 times to produce an astonishing range of subtle and complex flavours, ranging from earthy and musty to sweet and fruity. For this reason, Puerh inspires widespread devotion among aficionados and has suffered from almost equally devoted counterfeiting by unscrupulous producers. However, today it is possible to enjoy authentic and reasonably-priced Puerh. The golden rule is to buy from a reliable source. One such is cantonteaco.com.
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Posted by Paul Handley on Mon 19th July 2010 at 08:08 AM, Filed in Luxury Drinks
Maybe you wouldn’t think that there is a place for beer in Lussorian’s pages, but I have to make an exception for a most remarkable brew. Kirin Ichiban is made by the unique “Ichiban Shibori Process”, which is the simple reason it stands out from the crowd in the beer world.
Ichiban Shibori, or ‘First Press’, is the unique, uncompromising process by which this legendary Japanese beer is made from a single first pressing of the finest ingredients giving you the purest beer every time.
Other beers, brewed by less exacting methods, are pressed and repressed. Kirin Ichiban is crisper, richer and purer - because it is pressed once using only the sweet liquid from a single pressing of the finest ingredients, which contains less bitter-tasting tannins.
If you consider the similarities with this process and that of Extra Virgin Olive Oil - compared to a standard Olive Oil, you may come close to understanding why this is such a superior lager.
With its mild, pure and well balanced taste, Kirin will always go down well with Japanese food like sushi, sashimi and tempura. It is also the perfect combination with all kinds of Oriental and European food, truly a cosmopolitan taste.
The secret is serving it cold, my preference would be in a ½ pint glass. I said serve cold, I meant it – really cold. What you get is the cleanest, freshest lager you have tasted. Because of it’s purity, it also seems to cleanse the palate. This is like a fabulous lager sorbet!
It is ridiculously (dangerously?!) easy to drink. The light, mild flavours make this a perfectly refreshing summer lager. It caused a sensational boom when launched in Japan in 1990 and is still one of the best selling Japanese beer brands.
Kirin Ichiban can be ordered from www.beersofeurope.co.uk with a welcome rrp of £1.39 per bottle or £32.36 for case of 24 bottles (330ml). Or Kirin Ichiban can be bought in your local Slug & Lettuce or Wagamama restaurants, plus lots of other high end bars nationwide.
Please always enjoy alcohol responsibly.
