The Green Man and French Horn - Jan 2013

Now I have to admit to being slightly inebriated when I first visited The Green Man and French Horn. It was the glorious day that Bradford City triumphed over Arsenal in the Capital One Cup. Not a day seared into most people's memories, but enough to send me into paroxysms of clappy handed joy as I watched the giant killing unfold.

In fairness, all I really needed was something to soak up a number of pints. The output from this cracking little newcomer and youngest sibling of Terroirs, Brawn and Soif, was almost certainly beyond my faculty. So good though that, while not capable of sobering me up, it did cause me to drag a non football obsessed guest back to confirm what I'd witnessed.

We're in mixed small plate territory here. Lots of lovely little ideas, pulled together with a loose thread of the Loire Valley, intended as much as anything to show off an outrageously interesting cellar.

A thick slab of pork rillette was pushed eagerly into the contents of a hearty, fresh bread basket and consumed within minutes, hearty and flavoursome. My main plate was, as it had been on the previous visit, one of the simplest dishes I've had in a long time, three beautifully buttery fat mackerel, served with butter, garlic and a spritz of lemon. The quality was superb and the simplest of touches was all they needed.

Alongside, I opted for a grassy almost cidery fresh Cabernet Franc, refreshing and unexpected. A punch in the mouth of clean flavours that it through the thickness of the pork and the fish perfectly.

Poached pear was almost unexpectedly rich after the simple fare so far and a little too sweet for me, reclining like an early Rita Hayworth in a limpid caramel pool. I couldn't stop eating till it was gone, but in hindsight I'd have snuck in another small plate.

It was only after I'd been for the first time I realised the background to the restaurant and its owners, the terroir if you will. It was obviously going to be a winner. Until that point I got to experience the sheer joy that comes with making a real find, of discovering a new restaurant that will stay in your little black book for years. The fact it's a known quality doesn't change that fact.

Tapas Brindisa - Is the original still any good? Jan 2013

So how's the original outpost of growing tapas juggernaut of Brindisa doing since I last visited? Not as well as I'd hoped unfortunately...

Situated on the corner of Borough Market's southern corner, no bookings Brindesa was always a tough (and tiny) table to score, light wood interior filled with souls exiting the market laden with goodies, unable to wait until their home before sampling them. The unlucky masses would look on through the floor to ceiling windows and resolve to turn up earlier next week.

A recent midweek trip to the neighbourhood let me pop in for lunch on one of the less screwily busy days for the restaurant before the market next door grunts into life on a Friday.

The menu is still a organic shopper's wet dream, everything veggie sourced from the nearby stalls while meats and spices come from the Brindesa shop, hotfoot from the best suppliers in their Spanish homeland. The joy has always been that you don't want to wait until you get home from the market, mainly because what the kitchen can do with the same handful of ingredients is infinitely better than anything you could manage.

We've been spoilt by Jose, and the jamon croquetas he now serves up on Bermonsey Street. Those are light, fresh and heaven sent, these lumpen cigars of gluey mash under a too thick oily carapace just don't cut the mustard. Huevos Rotos - broken eggs over fried potatoes and Iberico pork sobrasada - is unevenly cooked. Soft slices of spud seemingly decanted into a lukewarm serving dish, the egg just the wrong side of soft and the sobrasada, a thickly spiced tomato based sauce, huddled in one corner under a slice of waxen potato. A great idea, and one I'm looking forward to borrowing for an inevitably hungover brunch, but there's nothing here any reasonably home chef couldn't improve on.

Sautéed chicken livers with an onion and caper dressing were fine, and well cooked. If I'd just taken a plate of that with a muscular minerally and obscenely dry sherry, I'd no doubt be hurrahing from the rooftops.

Compared to a recent revisit to gracefully ageing Barrafina, the team at Tapas Brindisa have got some way to go to regain their crown. If you're in the area, nip round to Bermondsey Street and see what their old boss Jose Pizzaro is up to at his brace of eponymous restaurants, either one of them easily has the measure of Brindisa I'm sad to say...