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Welcome back to Insta Stories, a column examining the London restaurant scene through the often-problematic medium of Instagram. This week’s filter is corrected.
Inescapable seasonal cheer of the week
There’s a bit around the 3.05 mark of Slade’s festive classic ‘Merry Christmas Everybody’ where vocalist Noddy Holder discards all notions of subtlety, screaming “IT’S CHRIIIIIIISTMAAAAAAAAAAAAAS”. That’s Instagram this week, and it’s not even December.
Seasonal delicacy of the week
A necessarily short-lived new feature, highlighting that rare thing: Christmas-adjacent fare that actually looks enjoyable, or at least edible.
Anchor point in a fairly nomadic life of the week
On the menu at Westerns Laundry this week: lobster, with a side order of sacred deer.
Chef’s Table audition tape of the week
Netflix: get the chequebook! Or the lawyers!
Dinner of the week
A single bottle of the 2005 vintage from the unicorn-scarce Château Le Pin retails around a cool two-and-a-half GRAND, so this might have been a nice one to be invited to. As slogans go, “Yquem 88 goes with everything” may take some beating.
Potable pun of the week
Yep, nice.
Who wore it best of the week
A ranking of London’s most truffled dishes, in order of least to most truffled:
Who wore it best pre-deletion of the week
The account What Is Mana Copying This Week did a Ronseal job of highlighting some, ahem, similarities between courses turned out by the Manchester restaurant of the same name and dishes cooked at some of the temples of global gastronomy. There’s already been a Noma and Restaurant Sat Bains — but now the account has been deleted. An Instagram mystery is afoot.
Dish of the week
Shouldn’t that be the ‘eel à carte menu’?
Shot of the week
Stop the ride — it’s time to get off.