Declan Lyons

We are, according to Marks & Spencer, in ‘picky bits’ season. I cannot bear the tweeness of it all. M&S is surely mere days away from launching a ‘Paddington Bear picky bits picnic range’. In search for an antidote to such horrors, I go on my annual pilgrimage to Bouchon Racine, which starts on Westbourne Park Road at midday, sipping Beamish Irish stout in The Cow. It is reputed to be David Beckham’s favourite London pub and is one of an increasing number of English pubs piggybacking on the phenomenal appetite for Guinness by serving alternatives to the Black Stuff. Beamish and Murphy’s are popping up on taps across the capital and we are the better for it.

My late grandmother used to say that seeing Pope John Paul II descend by helicopter into Dublin’s Phoenix Park in 1979 felt like seeing God come down to Earth. I daresay I experienced something similar recently when I looked up from my tuna tartare to see Arrigo Cipriani smiling at me. For he sits at the head of what is now a global powerhouse of food and drink, with some two dozen venues worldwide, including London, New York and Hong Kong. But we are back where it all began. In Harry’s Bar, Venice, which Giuseppe Cipriani – Arrigo’s father – established in 1931 with a loan from a wealthy American called Harry Pickering.

Many years ago, when entertaining my then girlfriend (now wife) for our first Valentine’s Day, I spent a considerable amount of time and effort preparing an authentic beef bourguignon. With more than one bottle poured in during the slow-cooking process, it did not offer the lightness one might desire on such an occasion. After pushing it around the plate for an hour, she was less than delighted to then be presented with pudding – a sherry trifle. In the years since, not unreasonably, she has insisted on planning the menu. I have been left in charge of drink. For an excellent white wine, I would suggest Bodega del Abad’s San Salvador Godello 2021.

There are two great American bars in London. One is perfect to escape the winter chill, the other to embrace summer sun. In winter, the American Bar at the Savoy – London’s oldest surviving cocktail bar – is ideal. There is a reason why this warm and welcoming spot has courted popularity for so long and is considered the spiritual home of modern mixology, at least in this country. In the summer months, head for the American Bar at the Stafford. There you can enjoy the large terrace just a stone’s throw from St James’s Street, where similarly skilled bar staff are able to mix up pretty much anything one desires. You know you’re in a great American bar when the bartenders are able to sling together on-menu or off-menu mixes while maintaining good conversation.

There are different ways to approach the tyranny of Dry January. One is to drink in secret. Another is to indulge only on feast days. Personally I have always refused to make January a miserable and puritan month, which means finding excellent red wine to transition from Christmas exuberance to the long, drawn-out evenings of the new year. And so the quest to find the perfect January red begins. It should not be too expensive, but nor should it be a false economy. After the excesses of December, value is key. Readers are forgiven for pursuing a bargain in the January sales – we have all done it. But the truth is many discounted offerings represent exactly the kind of wines one should not be drinking. They are the rejects, the failures, the lesser vintages.

Perhaps because of the Flanders and Swann song in which a louche older gentleman tries to lure a younger lady to bed with Madeira wine, the drink has unfairly acquired a fusty image. While port and sherry have experienced a resurgence, Madeira remains underappreciated despite the fact it stands as a proud monument to the grand old Anglo-Portuguese alliance. One man, Jamie Allsopp, is intent on fighting a noble battle to promote the virtues of Madeira. And so to the Blue Stoops, Allsopp Brewery’s newish pub on Kensington Church Street, for their second annual Game and Madeira Dinner, named after the site in Burton-on-Trent where Jamie’s ancestors first brewed Allsopp’s Ale in 1730.