Eric Chavot swears on Saturday Kitchen – I get traffic!

The Capital Hotel’s Eric Chavot played a blinder on last weekend’s Saturday Kitchen. He was amusing, watchable and enigmatic, and the dish he created looked fab. Shame he let slip the f-word towards the end of the show and thus gave the Daily Mail free rein to vilify him …

My terribly clever WordPress dashboard registered a healthy dollop of traffic around Eric’s name after the programme, which spurred me to explore the chefs and cookery writers delivering the best footfall for me on this blog. So, pop pickers, here is my top ten of Lewis blog foodies. Dah Dah, da-da Dah, der der der, der der der, Dah Dah, da-da Dah … etc.

• 10th: Fergus Henderson
• 9th: Alain Ducasse
• 8th: Allegra McEvedy
• 7th: Delia Smith
• 6th: Elizabeth David
• 5th: Eric Chavot
• 4th: Nigel Slater
• 3rd: Madhur Jaffrey
• 2nd: Jun Tanaka
• 1st: Marcella Hazan

But what does this tell me about the relative pulling power of food stars, and the nature of chefdom, apart from the fact that I should clearly cook a dish from Marcella’s classical Italian repertoire every night if I want to grow my audience?

First, isn’t it interesting that two of the darlings of the food scene, Fergus and Alain, are way off the pace? Both are great chefs, and Alain occupies a place in the stratosphere of chef legends; but clearly their entrails and extravagance haven’t struck a chord with my visitors. Could it be that few domestic fridges harbour foie gras or trotters?

Second, how revealing that the top three should be booktastic, all, Madhur and Marcella having forged long and glittering literary careers from producing standard texts, Jun having only weeks ago brought out a popular new tome, Simple to Sensattional?

The message is that producing books of recipes that are attainable, tasty and rooted in a specific regional cuisine ensures a loyal following. In years to come, Jun (a really nice fellow) might have built up such a canon or work. Meanwhile, I would expect his name to be searched on less and less in the coming weeks, as more of his peers bring out new books. Ah, but “Fame is a fickle food upon a shifting plate”.

[The post was brought to you by Emily Dickinson and WordPress]

Chef Eric Chavot sends me bananas at the Capital

Two nice men from the AA Guide took me for lunch at the Capital Hotel in Knightsbridge yesterday. The chef there is a Frenchman called Eric Chavot. Eric is what’s known as a chef’s chef: not for him the fripperies of TV chefdom; he quietly plies his trade in London and is quoted as one of their favourite chefs by many of his peers. In an interview with me a couple of years ago, Marco Pierre White called Eric “the best chef in London without a doubt“.

The meal was superb. Scallops and bacon to start, rabbit fricasse with sublime wild mushroom pearl barley risotto, and – my favourite course – a fantastic banana tart tatin. I love bananas and I adore tarte tartin, so the dessert had my name all over it.This weekend I’m going to hit the cookery books and try to make one myself. Unless anyone out there has a good recipe for me to try?