A challenge

This is not a blog for "the haters" and I hope that it'll mainly emanate positivity, but there are inevitably moments in a food blog when you're going to want to criticise rather than praise.

What I want to discuss here is the question of restaurants that put you off; places you walk past on a regular basis and think "I cannot see myself ever eating in there". My challenge to myself is first, to develop a list of such places over time and, second, to eat in them if there is ever even the smallest hint that my irrational or rational prejudice against them can be exploded or countered or even nuanced in any way.

First up, Rhum Jungle at the end of Exmouth Market. This is a restaurant I walk past about eight times a week, on my way to and from swimming, and each time I look in I start freaking out at the vista which confronts me: namely the bottles of Hildon still and sparkling water sitting there on every bloody table. It's a Caribbean place and actually somewhere I'd like to go, but not so long as those bottles are there because what they signal, in my mind, is a complete lack of hospitality, which is bad news for a restaurant. If people want bottled water fine, but don't guilt them into it, and what happens with the water on the tables? Is it served as it is, i.e. warm. If so, double aaaarrrgggghhh. One of the marks of classy restaurants, be they cheap or pricey, is if they serve tap water pleasantly and willingly.

Second, Giraffe. Now I know that I'm not their natural constituency, but how can any restaurant brand itself with the slogans "Global food", "World music". Jesus! Serve global food if you will, and play some Baba Maal in the background if that takes your fancy, but don't bloody brand your chain of restaurants around such a sappy, faux-liberal, cynical set of ideas...