Liam Collens

I am very grateful for my first Op-Ed for . It is about the debacle of this year's Michelin Guide Dubai.

Why is the Guide awarding stars and recommending restaurants that are closed, have been closed for months and have no clear expectation to ever reopen?

What do you think?

Why is Michelin recommending restaurants you can’t eat in?

Noren doesn't aspire to be the best Japanese restaurant in Dubai. It aspires to be the one that makes you think twice about hauling yourself all the way out to DIFC, from a team who were part of the crew that made Zuma what it is today.

This comes three weeks after my visit, when the restaurant had been open only two. It was never going to be a typical review. There are two wolves that live inside me. The first says that if you're taking bookings, seating people and charging them for food, you should be judged accordingly. The second has come to accept that nothing runs like a well-oiled machine from day one. There were signs of a kitchen and a floor still finding their feet, but nothing that got in the way of a good dinner, and this is a place plainly built for good times.

The ex-Zuma line is the one everyone keeps repeating. And there's very little on the menu that's new under the sun. But the sun doesn't shine on JLT the way it does elsewhere, and perhaps JLT deserves a little more sunshine.

It's Japanese, but not high concept. It's admirably well priced, the w**e and sparkling lists especially, with bottles from AED 120, and plenty of food under AED 100. That makes it easy for solo diners, couples, date nights and big groups alike. The dishes that punch at AED 200, 300, even 400 aren't really mains, and aren't called that on the menu either; they're built to be passed around the table and shared.

Noren will be popular, and should be. It isn't the same pedigree as Zuma, but it's the same breed. Convivial, a little boisterous, pitched at a thirty-something crowd who like a good time from the comfort of a chair, though who knows, there may be dancing on the bar before the year is out.

I hear through the grapevine that the business lunch is now up and running.

Disclosure: the meal was comped. Noren invited Courtney Brandt (), who brought me to her table; the invitation was hers, not mine.

Full review at the link in my profile.

Noren doesn’t aspire to be the best Japanese restaurant in Dubai. It aspires to be the one that makes you think twice about hauling yourself all the way out to DIFC, from a team who were part of the crew that made Zuma what it is today. This comes three weeks after my visit, when the restaurant had been open only two. It was never going to be a typical review. There are two wolves that live inside me. The first says that if you’re taking bookings, seating people and charging them for food, you should be judged accordingly. The second has come to accept that nothing runs like a well-oiled machine from day one. There were signs of a kitchen and a floor still finding their feet, but nothing that got in the way of a good dinner, and this is a place plainly built for good times. The ex-Zuma line is the one everyone keeps repeating. And there’s very little on the menu that’s new under the sun. But the sun doesn’t shine on JLT the way it does elsewhere, and perhaps JLT deserves a little more sunshine. It’s Japanese, but not high concept. It’s well priced, the w**e and sparkling lists especially, with bottles from AED 120, and plenty of food under AED 100. That makes it easy for solo diners, couples, date nights and big groups alike. The dishes that punch at AED 200, 300, even 400 aren’t really mains, and aren’t called that on the menu either; they’re built to be passed around the table and shared. Noren will be popular, and should be. It isn’t the same pedigree as Zuma, but it’s the same breed. Convivial, a little boisterous, maybe performative, but pitched at a thirty-something crowd who like a good time from the comfort of a chair, though who knows, there may be dancing on the bar before the year is out. I hear through the grapevine that the business lunch is now up and running. Disclosure: the meal was comped. Noren invited Courtney Brandt (@_courtneybrandt_), who brought me to her table; the invitation was hers, not mine. Full review at the link in my profile.

This month’s AB judges those who charge $48 for butter, celebrates pizza ovens in hospitals and runs down some of the best (and worst) eats this month.

Amused Bouche 10: Butter Should Be Free Bite-sized if not biting commentary. In this issue: hand wash as luxury, sartorial returns, overwrought shakshuka and do more hospitals need pizza ovens?

Amused Bouche 09 is the monthly newsletter that looks back on the last 30 days. This issue talks about people dancing on bars during industry nights, the accolades ghosting the restaurants that crave them and where I’ve eaten in August.

Amused Bouche 09: Reward Those Who Turn Up When Times Are Hard Bite-sized if not biting commentary. In this issue: dancing on bars, awards in absentia and restaurant w**e at retail.

There is chicken pie, and then there is this. Oof. 140 dhs and there’s a suggested w**e pairing.
📍 VNTG

Dubai should celebrate longevity like it does splashy new openings. Eric's Restaurant is a little Goan treasure that gets on with the business of feeding people tasty, affordable vindaloo, recheado and more. I was utterly charmed. It isn’t perfect, but that’s not the point.

Eric's, Dubai: ‘A capsule of Goa that belongs entirely to Karama’ – restaurant review Eric's restaurant: twenty years of Goan cooking in Al Karama, and what survives when a cuisine travels.

ONE YEAR LATER. A community-created guide to the best cafes, restaurants, street corners and sandwiches in Cairo, a city remarkably underestimated for its food scene.

Eat Like a Local in Cairo: The Best Street Food, Cafes and Restaurants As Recommended by Locals Forget the guides, this is where locals in Cairo really go to eat. Discover Cairo’s best street food and more, from shawerma buns to koshary, with locals revealing their favourite places to eat.

July - there’s no room for the middle, eating and saying goodbye to our one-eyed girl

Amused Bouche 08 Bite-sized if not biting commentary. In this issue: nobody wants a mixed verdict, eating through a 49C Dubai summer and saying goodbye to a one-eyed cat.

The Rise of Indian Food is NOW is now available in the restaurant if you want to stop by and pick up a signed copy. Or you can always buy an unsigned copy online. Trèsind Studio

The story of Trèsind Studio continues beyond the table. Published by @phaidonpress, The Rise of Indian Food: Recipes Reimagined by Trèsind Studio is now available to purchase directly from the restaurant. Co-authored by @chefhimanshusaini and @itsliamcollens, the cookbook features more than 60 recipes, beverages, and techniques, with photography by @shresth_maloo 🇮🇳 Purchase your signed copy, available exclusively at Trèsind Studio.

Three years ago, I sat in a room that wasn’t even open yet, eating a tasting menu with Jason Atherton and Dan Birk watching. I wrote 1,300 words that landed somewhere between admiration and a warning: a genuinely good restaurant, hiding inside one doing far too much. I didn’t go back for three years. Partly pride, partly principle. When I finally did, I wanted to go with people who’d never been. ROW stands for Refinement of Work. So the only real question worth asking is whether it had. Sixteen courses are now twelve; the pricing is trimmed; the music still modern but less intrusive. There are other softer edges sanded down “refined, through the steady, unglamorous graft of moving one hundred things one inch forward.” There’s enough Japanese produce to make one question whether this is still credibly a British restaurant, but then you lob in a kari buto cheese and onion “crisp” and a 540-day old jacket potato with what I’ll uncharitably call tuna mayo, meat and two veg with Saroma Wagyu A4, a meltingly pleasing blue cheese and — if it only matters to me — bread that once justified its own course now sits quietly as a side. “The dining rooms remain admirably eclectic and unmistakably British, like a lounge in Saltburn estate, minus all that transgressive eroticism.” Two people can eat here for less than one seat costs at FZN, Dubai’s three-Michelin-starred Frantzén outpost. That says more about FZN’s pricing than it does about ROW. Full review, ROW on 45, Dubai, revisited — link in my bio. If you were at ROW in its first year, I am curious to know what stands out for you now.