"Give me the simple life" - well kind of when it comes to food................

In 1946, Harry Ruby and Rube Bloom wrote a lovely song entitled 'Give me the simple life" and last night that song filled my head after watching ( my wife watches it, I don't as a rule) another boorish, pompous cooking contest show  this one called 'Iron chef'
Whatever happened to straight forward, great tasting cuisine, devoid of scores of ingredients, platted towers of food, silly foams (foams should be left on the beach) and over all, just boorish cooking. 
I have been on a quest over the last several years, to find restaurants and chefs who have returned to the glory days of cooking, great 'heavy' sauces, simple country dishes, the comfort food of my youth ( and I am not talking about Mac and cheese here!, god forbid) I am talking about the great dishes of British and French cooking. One that I love and return to time and time again, especially in London, especially at Wiltons (in St James) is Sole meuniere. 

If you have never had that dish, prepared correctly, you have not eaten.
At Wiltons, they prepare the sole, so that its  been perfectly sauteed to a Platonic ideal of golden brown and the butter melted to the limpid yellow of young Sauternes.
So, when all the silliness of today's chefs is long gone, the Classic way of cooking will always remain ( I will admit - sometimes hard to find these days) and be found in spots in London and Paris and the French countryside.  
So when I sing out 'Give me the simple life" I mean such things as smoked salmon, Stilton Cheese, after dinner Savories, Sole Meuniere, rabbit with mustard, duck with olives ( an after dinner cigar) and so many other classics. Now that's eating and enjoying the simple life!