1: Sushi Tetsu
With a three-month waiting list, this seven-seater bar in Clerkenwell, London, run by former Nobu chef Toru Takahashi and his wife Harumi, would be our favourite sushi place, if we could ever get back in. Tell them how much you want to spend, sit back and savour how it should be done. Recommended: everything, especially the razor clam maki with a minty hit of shiso. sushitetsu.co.uk
2: Picon biere
An orange-flavoured bitters to be added to blonde beer or lager. Served in the UK in discerning establishments such as Soho's Quo Vadis or Islington's The Charles Lamb pub but popular throughout northern and eastern France. A sophisticated beer-based cocktail or posh version of snakebite – you decide. thewhiskyexchange.com
3: The Bubbles at Bubbledogs
Skip the blogger-hyped hot dogs, it's the small-grower champagne at Bubbledogs in London that really excites, making the two-hour queues just about worth it. Our favourite: the stunning Françoise Bedel Entre Ciel et Terre brut. bubbledogs.co.uk
4: Soup noodle at Young Cheng, Chinatown
With free tea at lunchtime, good greens and excellent chilli oil, this basic Cantonese caff on the northern fringe of London's Chinatown does a fast trade in superior duck noodle or prawn wonton soup. Even better, combine them in the same bowl.
Young Cheng, 76 Shaftesbury Avenue, London W1
5: Jourdan Dunn's Well Dunn
A cookery show hosted by a fashion model might not be as ridiculous as it sounds. Jourdan Dunn defies expectation with her online show Well Dunn, hosted on rapper Jay-Z's website, Life & Times. Rough and ready but watchable, you'll believe a fashionista really does eat as she cooks Cantonese duck, jerk pork with rice and beans, and baked sea bass. See also fellow model Karlie Kloss's knockabout baking clip, made with Momofuku Milk Bar's Christina Tosi. lifeandtimes.com
6: Fern Verrow
Beloved of Nigel Slater and a small but devoted band of followers, this biodynamic smallholding in Herefordshire, run by Jane Scotter and Harry Astley, is OFM editor Allan Jenkins's choice for the best farmer's fruit and vegetable stall in the country. If you are in luck they may have home-grown chickens and their own bacon on sale, too. fernverrow.com
7: Marou chocolate bars
The elegant wrapper isn't the only eye-catching thing about this new brand, whose beautifully designed bars can be snapped up at retailers around the country, including Cocoa Cabana in Manchester, Defaba in Birmingham, Thinking Chocolate in Edinburgh and Fortnum & Mason. The country of origin also stands out: who knew Vietnam produced such fantastic cocoa? marouchocolate.com
8: Just Seaweed
Iain McKellar was taught to harvest seaweed on his native Bute by his mother, who first gathered it during during the second world war, when it was made into camouflage nets. Now he's selling to discerning chefs such as Edinburgh's Tom Kitchin and by mail order to customers keen to add depth and flavour to their kombu dashi. justseaweed.com
9: Whole grilled turbot at Elkano, Getaria, Spain
If you're joining the thousands who make a food pilgrimage to San Sebastián, travel an extra 24km west to the fishing village of Getaria and eat at one of the world's great seafood restaurants. The turbot at Elkano, caught in the bay, grilled outdoors and served whole, free of accompaniments or garnishes (it really doesn't need any) may be the best we've tasted. restauranteelkano.com
10: Fumbally Cafe, Dublin
Many cafes cultivate an artfully disarranged thrift-shop aesthetic but few pull it off as stylishly as the Fumbally, a new haven for Dublin flaneurs, hidden away in the roomy basement of a southside office development. The main attraction is the great coffee, supplied by top UK roaster Has Bean, and although more cafe than restaurant, the simple food shows care and attention, too – think porchetta and apple sauce on ciabatta, avocado and chilli on sourdough. thefumbally.ie
11: Hackney Wild pain de campagne from E5 Bakehouse
It's not cheap at around £3.50 a loaf, but the bread from East London's E5 Bakehouse is worth both the extra cost and the travel time to the bakery: a railway arch beneath London Fields station. For starters, take home a loaf of the bestselling Hackney Wild, a pain de campagne with a delicious dark crust that takes a total of four days to prepare. e5bakehouse.com
12: Whitebait and Spitting Feathers ale at The Brewery Tap, Chester
When you open a pub in a listed building, as the Spitting Feathers brewery did in a magnificent Jacobean great hall in Chester five years ago, you've got to work hard to do justice to your surroundings. However, an ale and a bowl of deep-fried whitebait at The Brewery Tap perfectly complements one of the most spectacular pubs in England.
the-tap.co.uk
13: Little Bread Pedlar Pain au Chocolat
Former Anchor & Hope and St John Bread & Wine alumna Nichola Gensler, based in Bermondsey, London, produces the sort of brilliant baking once only found in France. Her buttery, flaky croissant and pain au chocolat, served at Monmouth Coffee Company stores are, we think, the match of any pastry anywhere. The only bakery, too, with a cycle repair shop on the premises. lbpedlar.com
14: Lotus stem salad at Viet Grill, London E8
There's no shortage of choice on east London's Kingsland Road if you're in search of good Vietnamese food. Somehow, though, we always end up sitting at the bar at Viet Grill, ordering the lotus stem salad with Thai basil, peanuts and a lime dressing. It's fresh, tangy and insanely delicious, particularly accompanied by a plate of chilli salt-and-pepper squid. vietnamesekitchen.co.uk/vietgrill
15: Astrance: A Cook's Book
Prize for the year's most beautiful cookbook so far goes to Pascal Barbot's 25-seater, three-Michelin-starred L'Astrance in Paris. Warning: don't expect anything as simple as actual recipes, though there is a slim accompanying volume with a dozen or so step-by-steps. Proper food porn to drool over while you wait for the real thing. An English-language version is available later this year. editionsduchene.fr
16: Ivy House Farm dairy products
In the late 1990s, Geoff Bowles was told that a bypass was being built through his farm in Somerset. "I had three choices: get big, get niche or get out," he says. He decided – thankfully – on the second option, and replaced his Friesian cows with a small herd of Jerseys, fed on organic produce. Bowles now produces the most decadent milk, cream and butter. ivyhousefarmdairy.co.uk
17: The dim sum Trilogy at HKK
HKK is expensive: the eight-course lunch costs £48, the 15-course dinner a hefty £95. There are no other options. But as the high-end output of Hakkasan, it's also serving some of the best Chinese food in the capital. So it's worth saving up to taste the Dim Sum Trilogy of truffle har gau, pan-fried Szechuan dumpling and sour turnip puff. Each parcel is perfect. hkklondon.com
18: Wine Grapes
Until the end of last year, there were two reference books on every self-respecting wine geek's shelf: The World Atlas of Wine, and The Oxford Companion to Wine. Both are by peerless British wine writer Jancis Robinson. Now Robinson, along with her co-authors José Vouillamoz and Julia Harding, has written a third definitive work. Several years in the making, and just shy of 1,300 pages, Wine Grapes is the vinous equivalent of the human genome project, profiling the history, geography, genealogy and foibles of the 1,386 grape varieties used in wine production. Authoritative, without ever feeling dusty or dry. winegrapes.org
19: Gourmet Pizza
The gourmet fast-food trend has moved on to pizza. Pizza Pilgrims are capitalising on the success of their Neopolitan-style pizza van at London's Berwick Street market and becoming chef consultants at a Hackney pub; recently opened pizza-and-frozen-margaritas joint Voodoo Ray's in Dalston is packed; and pop-up dough-masters Homeslice have found a permanent home in Covent Garden's Neal's Yard. pizzapilgrims.co.uk; homeslicepizza.co.uk; dalstonsuperstore.com/features/voodoo-rays
20: Butter from the Butter Viking
Great restaurants pay close attention to the little things that can make a big difference to their food. Like butter. Some chefs, such as Stephen Harris at The Sportsman in Seasalter, Kent, are making it themselves. Others have fallen for the clean flavour of "virgin butter" – a fresh, pleasantly acidic variety made from cultured cream. It's the creation of Patrik Johansson, also known as The Butter Viking, who works in a Swedish castle producing butter for Noma and other select restaurants, including the John Salt and Texture, both in London. vallmobacken.se
21: Filter coffee at Prufrock, London
Of all the artisanal coffee joints that have been popping up around the UK in the past few years, Prufrock on Leather Lane in east London is the most delightfully geeky: it looks like a hip science lab. Dodge the queue and instead head for the brew bar, where a bespectacled perfectionist will labour to fix you the very best filter coffee. prufrockcoffee.com
22: Noma's insect wranglers
When the world's No 1 restaurant had its 10-day pop-up at Claridge's last summer, foraged ingredients included 16,000 live ants sourced by their very own insect supplier, Thomas Lausen. They're used in paste form, with a dark, lemongrassy pesto being particularly tasty. The ideas were developed in the Noma-affiliated Nordic Food Lab, which has since moved on to turning grasshoppers into a miso-like filling for sorrel leaves. The lab's mission is to "explore the building blocks of Nordic cuisine through traditional and modern gastronomies", which roughly equates to fermenting, pickling, distilling, burning, rotting, smoking and curing in the pursuit of deliciousness. These techniques can be applied to most things – even creepy crawlies. Catch Ben Reade, head of culinary research and development, leading an insect-tasting workshop at the Wellcome Trust's Who's the Pest event in London, 30 April-1 May.
nordicfoodlab.org
23: Sorbitium Ice's apricot milk with salep and orange blossom ice cream
Towards the end of 2012, Suzanna Austin and Pedro Confessore, the duo behind Sorbitium Ices, went to Turkey to learn the secret behind salep, which comes from the powdered bulbs of wild orchids and gives a wondrous, chewy elasticity to ice cream. Mixed with fresh and dried apricots, the result is light and refreshing, like no other flavour you will enjoy this spring. sorbitiumices.com
24: Ciya Sofrasi, Kadikoy, Istanbul
Those who watched Ottolenghi's Mediterranean Feast last autumn might remember the Turkey episode when he picked courgette flowers at dawn, stuffing them with lamb and rice while the buds were still open. He was joined by Musa Dagdeviren, the chef patron of Ciya Sofrasi – a small restaurant on Istanbul's Asian side that's long been hailed as one of the city's best. Go there for seasonal dishes such as milk thistle with yoghurt and saffron. ciya.com.tr
25: Everybody Love Love Jhalmuri Express
Jhalmuri is an east Indian street food dish sold from roadside stalls. There are many different versions and Angus Denoon sells his from a colourful cart that he pushes round London or the van that he drives around the festival circuit during the summer. A delicious handmade mix of hot puffed rice, peanuts, coriander, tomatoes, tamarind, lime juice and more. @jhalmuriexpress
26: Rachel Eats
"I am all the cliches: a middle-aged British woman seduced by the food of Rome," says Rachel Roddy, whose blog, Rachel Eats, charts her love affair with the Italian capital's cooking. A part-time drama teacher with a 17-month-old son, Roddy blogs about well presented recipes, such as pasta and chickpeas or ossobuco. Plus there's the added glamour of life in one of the world's great cities. Could well join another expat Rachel, Little Paris Kitchen's Rachel Khoo, as a blog-to-cookbook success.
racheleats.wordpress.com
27: Percebes at Barrafina
Percebes means "goose barnacles" in Spanish, although they're more delicious than their name suggests (their appearance – gnarled legs and prehistoric claws – doesn't do them any favours either). These crustaceans are a winter delicacy, found on the rocks along the Galician "Coast of Death". London's Barrafina serves them on Fridays, blanched with bay leaf and served with raw parsley salad. Head chef Nieves Barragán Mohacho says it best: "They taste like a sip of the sea." barrafina.co.uk
28: Justin Gellatly, pastry chef
St John's secret weapon, Justin Gellatly, the quiet man behind the bread, the wobbly custard tart and the legendary doughnut, has hung up his apron after 12 years. He's setting up on his own and writing a cookbook with his wife Louise. The couple have been known to take their sourdough starter home with them during holidays, to keep an eye on it. "It is like looking after a child," says Justin.
Click here for the St John Bakery doughnut recipe
29: One-stop shopping at souschef.co.uk
For anyone whose ambitions are greater than what's stocked in their local shops or supermarkets. Edible flowers and squid are on sale alongside a broad range of herbs and spices, plus there's a "modernist and molecular" department. Ideal for those in need of sous-vides or gas canisters for their "chef's blowtorch". souschef.co.uk
30: Food Curated
Food Curated wanders off the beaten track to find the stories behind interesting independent food producers, from Long Island salt makers to South African vegetables fertilised by rhino dung. Now with her own television show on NYC TV, Brooklyn-based creator Liza de Guia posts a couple of videos a month, shining a light on small producers who might otherwise go unnoticed. foodcurated.com
31: Turkish chilli flake
Salted, dried, rubbed with olive oil and roasted – once you've tried the sweet heat of Turkish chilli flake, you'll wonder how you managed without. The Dock Kitchen's Stevie Parle sprinkles it on to fish and roast meats. In Turkey and northern Syria they are known as Aleppo peppers and used to garnish soups, stews and salads, including Middle Eastern food guru Anissa Helou's white tabbouleh. thespicery.com
32: Bread as a course in its own right
Long gone are the days of being served a few slices of anaemic, pappy sliced baguette and rock-hard butter – some chefs are taking bread as seriously as any other course. Think exemplary sourdoughs made on site, such as the still-warm slices served in neat brown paper bags at Dabbous, or the bread served with smoked butter topped with chicken skin and Iberico ham at Viajante, in Bethnal Green. dabbous.co.uk; viajante.co.uk
33: Alain Ducasse's haute cuisine camel
A ground-breaking restaurant dish takes time, even if you are Alain Ducasse who spent two months refining the camel dish that forms part of his "contemporary Middle Eastern" menu at Idam in the stunning IM Pei-designed Museum of Islamic Art in Doha. Ducasse's team travelled extensively, from Morocco to Mumbai, in search of local flavours and textures to be married with French technique. The meat must be hung for four weeks and takes six days to cook, creating a hump-backed "Rossini" with the texture of falling-apart rib. But here the Islamic constraints kick in. Idam is a "dry" restaurant with no alcohol served or to be used in cooking. "No wine, no pork, no blood," shrugs Ducasse, talking of the removal of three key pillars of classic French cuisine. New techniques were developed, vegetable braises reduced. To finish it off, the camel is topped with failsafe foie gras and truffle. Asked whether Idam's Middle Eastern menu will influence his many other restaurants, Ducasse replies: "I am not sure about our guests in Paris or at Louis XV, but maybe in London or in St Tropez." And the future for alcohol-free fine dining? He smiles, then says: "In New York, they already drink only iced tea." idam.com
34: Crab shack, Teignmouth, Devon
Mitch Tonks, owner of OFM restaurant of the year, The Seahorse in Dartmouth, writes: "On the beach in Teignmouth sits Robbie and Amanda Simmons's Crab Shack. Robbie is a crab fisherman and his catch is served by his wife in their small restaurant. It's the best-cooked crab I've ever eaten. If you have time, grab a glass of wine and sit on the beach, watching the boats go by." crabshackonthebeach.co.uk
35: Covent Garden
No longer just a tourist trap, Covent Garden is the site of two of 2013's biggest launches, both from influential New York restaurateurs. Keith McNally opened the London branch of glamorous brasserie Balthazar last month. Not quite as plush, but generating almost as much excitement, is the first British outpost of Danny Meyer's Shake Shack burger chain, due in the summer. Polpo's Russell Norman has bought an old pub in the area, too. Add these to earlier arrivals – Mishkin's, Hawksmoor, Opera Tavern – and suddenly there's less need to head north to Soho.
36: New food magazines
There's been a sudden growth in magazines for food obsessives eager for more than just recipes. Lucky Peach, a collaboration between Momofuku chef David Chang and arty publishers McSweeney's, is perhaps the cleverest. A nerdy, witty high-end fanzine, it makes smart use of Chang's contacts book, with Anthony Bourdain, Harold McGee and Mario Batali among the contributors. Other favourites include the beautiful photography of Per-Anders Jorgensen's Fool and the absurdist humour of Wolf, from OFM contributor Eleanor Morgan. http://lky.ph; fool.se; wolf-magazine.co.uk
37: Danny Bowien, Mission Chinese Food, New York & San Francisco
Just look for a long queue winding around the sorry-looking ash tree. Mission Chinese Food, in the Lower East Side of New York, is tucked unpromisingly below a hair and nail salon; step inside and your eyes are drawn to a back-lit menu board, the kind you expect to find in the dirtiest, down-at-heel takeaway. But then you don't come to Mission Chinese for the ambience; you come – and you wait and you wait – to eat.
Bowien has been called "the world's least-likely celebrity chef". He's Korean, but he was raised by white, Midwestern parents in Oklahoma City. He did not apprentice with a great chef; in fact, he had never actually cooked Chinese food before he opened the original Mission Chinese in San Francisco. His style is, in his words, "weird Chinese": thrice-cooked bacon (that's poached, steamed and wok-fried) and kung pao pastrami with mouth-scorching "explosive chilli". "Mr Bowien does to Chinese food what Led Zeppelin did to the blues," wrote Pete Wells in the New York Times. If the US is too far to travel, he's rumoured to be opening in Paris. The queue starts here.
missionchinesefood.com
38: Stephen Hook, The Moo Man
Stephen Hook is on first name terms with Ida, Biddy and the rest of his 70 cows. He believes that this relationship improves the quality of their milk, which he sells raw, ie unpasteurised. Hook is also something of a movie star, his charisma and love for his herd making the documentary about him, Moo Man, a hit at this year's Sundance film festival.
Customer and film-maker Andy Heathcote spent a year filming Hook at work on his Sussex farm for Moo Man. It's a touching portrait of Hook's relationships with his cattle, but started out as a story about raw milk, which Hook says not only tastes better but helps with lactose intolerance, eczema and hayfever. Associated risks, including salmonella and E coli, mean it's banned in Scotland, and in the rest of the UK farmers need a licence to sell it directly to their customers. Hook has one and also briefly sold his milk through a vending machine in Selfridges in 2011, although the Food Standards Agency is charging them both with a breach of hygiene regulations (Hook and Selfridges insist they did nothing wrong). "People always smiled when they poured their milk," says Hook, "as though they were doing the milking themselves."the-mooman.co.uk; hookandson.co.uk
39: Salted caramel Rolo
This is the highlight of the dessert menu at the most luxurious incarnation of Hawksmoor, on Air Street, where Mayfair meets the West End. It has some competition in the form of the Hawksmoor Jaffa Cake: both are giant-sized, grown-up variations of childhood treats. The rolo's concentrated hit of salt, sugar and fat just edges it. As OFM's Jay Rayner declared: "The mayor's office should denote these a London landmark." thehawksmoor.com/airstreet
40: London Honey Man's bell heather honey
Steve Benbow specialises in fragrant urban honey from his own hives but it is the densely flavoured, bittersweet bell-heather honeycomb from the Dorset coast that Marcus Wareing snaps up for his cheeseboard at the Berkeley. Eat it, too, as runny honey with thick yoghurt and figs. thelondonhoneycompany.co.uk
41: Bone Daddies ramen
Britain still lags behind the rest of the world in its pursuit of perfect ramen (there's a museum in Japan and obsessives devoted to the ideal combination of broth and noodle across the US), but it's catching up fast. Three ramen restaurants opened in London in quick succession earlier this year – Shoryu on Piccadilly, and Tonkotsu and Bone Daddies in Soho – all of them instant hits. Everyone seems to have their favourite – ours is the artfully down at heel Bone Daddies, where the steaming bowls arrived accompanied by pipettes of extra fat. Delicious. bonedaddiesramen.com
42: Manchester
Although Manchester city centre awaits an elusive Michelin star, it has significantly upped its game recently. Nearly 25 years after New Order singer Bernard Sumner persuaded his record label, Factory, to open Dry 201, the Northern Quarter is home to one of the best collection of independent bars outside the Lower East Side, including Odd, Black Dog Ballroom and newer arrivals Bakerie, Port Street Beer House, Solita, and Almost Famous.
OFM favourite Robert Owen Brown continues to produce superlative retro British food at The Mark Addy, while Parlour in Chorlton was voted Best Sunday Lunch in the country at last year's OFM Awards.
Some of the most interesting developments are outside the city centre, including the rise of two neighbourhood restaurants in unlikely locations that are becoming destinations for food lovers across the north. Steve Pilling and Simon Stanley have picked up accolades for their Heaton Moor restaurant Damson and have just opened a second restaurant in MediaCity, much to the delight of BBC staff with expense accounts.
North of the city, a modest converted cottage in Prestwich is home to the similarly lauded Aumbry, which is owned by husband and wife chefs Laurence Tottingham and Mary-Ellen McTague (who represented Manchester on BBC2's Great British Menu) with Kate Mountain.
Salford, the birthplace of vegetarianism in the UK, is now home to The Biosphere Project, a farm/laboratory/research centre in a converted mill which aims to explore how to continue to put food on tables in an era of rising prices, growing populations and climate change.
Finally, Mancunians obsessing about an elusive award from Michelin might not have to wait much longer as Simon Rogan, who won two stars at L'Enclume in Cumbria, has just arrived at The French restaurant at The Midland hotel.
43: Music at Electric Diner
It's hard to get restaurant music right. It's either dreary muzak or a frustrated DJ trying way too hard with his iTunes library. But at the Electric Diner on Portobello Rd, west London, the soundtrack of modern American classics is as considered as the posh comfort food. The reason the honey-fried chicken came with a side order of Pavement and Flaming Lips? The music fans at sister restaurant Au Cheval in Chicago send over a fresh selection of tunes every week. electricdiner.com
44: Onion rings at 34
Eclipsed a little by its big-sister fish restaurant, Scott's, the latest addition to the Caprice stable, 34, in Mayfair, serves fine bone-in rib-eye steak but does the small things with equal care – especially onion rings. Crisp batter, sweet, yielding alliums that arrive stacked in a giant pile, like a 70s Slinky toy. 34-restaurant.co.uk
Try the onion rings recipe here
45: Cheesecake at Honey & Co
Run by husband and wife team Itamar Srulovich and Sarit Packer, Honey & Co is a tiny but faultless Middle Eastern cafe restaurant behind Warren Street tube station, with reasonable prices and room for about 20 people, tops. It doesn't try too hard and doesn't need to when the cooking is so excellent, in particular their take on cheesecake: sweet fronds of kataifi pastry topped with dense cream cheese, raspberries, almonds and honey from Regent's Park. honeyandco.co.uk
46: Yotam Ottolenghi's codcakes in tomato sauce
A standout recipe from Ottolenghi's most recent cookbook, Jerusalem, which celebrates the rich, many-textured cuisine of his home city, is this deeply satisfying Syrian-Jewish fish dish. Like many of his recipes it takes a while to prepare but the results justify the effort – and it's even tastier the day after. ottolenghi.co.uk
47: Food DIY
Yes, all cooking is DIY, but here we mean the rise of adventurous food lovers curing bacon, and smoking fish. OFM contributor Tim Hayward has written extensively on the subject, with a book Food DIY, due this summer.
48: The Clove Club
As part of the Young Turks collective, Isaac McHale made his name – and last year won an OFM award for best newcomer – by taking his own path to success as a chef. That means pop-ups and one-off appearances at food events around the world. His new restaurant, inside Shoreditch Town Hall in east London, continues the theme having found investors via funding website Crowdcube. It's a permanent site and there's clever cooking on the set menu, especially the warm fennel, walnut and seaweed. The bar options are just as considered with wood pigeon sausages an instant classic. thecloveclub.com
49: Off-beat whisky
Think whisky, and most of us think Scotland, the USA and Ireland, but the classic trio are now seeing competition from a number of unlikely sources. Some closer to home than you might imagine: Penderyn distillery has been making stylish whiskies in the Brecon Beacons since 2000, St George's has released a clutch of young whiskies from its distillery in Norfolk, and Suffolk brewer Adnams has just distilled its own Sassenach Dram. Canada, India, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, France, Holland and Sweden also have a handful of creditable distillers. But it's the Scotch-inspired scene in Japan that is leading the way, with fabulous bottlings from Yoichi, Yamazaki and Hakushu. royalmilewhiskies.com
50: Ametsa with Arzak Instruction
A taste of San Sebastián comes to London's Halkin Hotel with Elena and Juan M Arzak's Ametsa. Expect brilliant, playful food skillfully tailored to the Knightsbridge crowd. Our favourite dishes: "quick change squid" and a crunchy king prawn on a stick. Just ensure you save room for dessert. ametsa.co.uk
CONTRIBUTORS
Luke Bainbridge, Killian Fox, Gareth Grundy, Mina Holland, Allan Jenkins, Tom Kitchin, Tim Lewis, Eleanor Morgan, Mitch Tonks
