What's the nicest thing you've ever eaten in a restaurant? And been searching for ever since?

[catinboots123]

Mine was battered zucchini flowers, in Rome about 20 years ago.

Also snow crab on a boat trip in Florida also about 20 years ago.

Never been able to find anything similar to either.

Horseradish marmalade as a side or a fillet steak, > 10 years ago on holiday in Wales
Utterly amazing
Have been to numerous farm shops & craft fairs
Googled it
Zilch 😢

Thai sticky rice with prawns. I tucked into a bowl on the Phi Phi islands about 10 year ago. Tried so many places here but nothing comes close

Lol at ‘NHS Toast’

Portugal - bowl lined with sliced cooked potatoes with a huge hunk of tender beef and sauce/stock in the middle. I think it was a specialty of the area. It was amazing!

The lobster mayonnaise from a hotel in Dunbar. They don't do it anymore.

A strawberry drink (it wasn't quite a smoothie but more silky) from a Turkish cafe in Colchester.

Try this recipe:

food52.com/recipes/10747-coconut-fried-shrimp-w-horseradish-marmalade-sauce

I'm going to give it a go myself. Unfortunately very few people seem to like horseradish, but I love it.

Also a burger in LAX of all places. It was a rare steak burger with port stewed onions, blue cheese and the most incredible ketchup in an Umami Burger in the food court during a 4 hour stop. The most delicious burger I have ever eaten and impossible to recreate.

I had an amazing dessert at a dim sum place in Hong Kong twenty years ago - it was just described as mango and rice paper, but it had this incredible creamy texture, little rolls, with coconut on the outside...it was incredible. Went back the next year and the restaurant had closed, I have tried so many mango desserts at excellent dim sum places over the years and had nothing even remotely similar.

Most of my most memorable dishes are abroad. Scallops in Venice. Bagel with lox and cream cheese in NYC. Piles of whole prawns covered with SO much garlic, at a streetside cafe in HK again. Street food in general in SE Asia.

Special shout out to NHS toast after giving birth for the second time, as mentioned by pp 😂

We also had swordfish in Malta about 30 years ago and it’s never tasted the same anywhere since, including going back to Malta a couple of years ago (not the same restaurant). It was more meaty than fishy as a remember it, a sort of a cross between pork chop and chicken.

In the early 2000's somewhere along the Great Ocean Road in Australia I had a Toblerone cheesecake in a random small town cafe which was the nicest thing ever. I have had Toblerone cheesecakes since but none have lived up to that one.

A garlic and onion soup with bread and cheese on top from a small town in Slovakia it was amazing but have never seen it again or been able to recreate.

Sweetcorn with blue cheese dressing in a lovely steak restaurant in Napa Valley. The steak was good but the corn was exceptional and I can’t recreate it.

Horseradish marmalade sounds epic, and very tempted to give that a go as DH would adore it.

French onion soup at a cafe in Paris - it was so delicious! We went back, a couple of years later, and found the same cafe, but the soup was a pale imitation of its previous self.

Curried chicken stuffed with plantain, fruity curry sauce, wild rice and crispy plantain chips.
Florida.

Sea bass with garlic prawns, crushed local new potatoes and samphire. Guernsey. Simple food but cooked in an amazing way. Can never replicate the taste.

@SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius noooooo! Oh what a shame! It was always so busy too! If I remember rightly the owner was from South America so a lot of the dishes were from that region, and so unusual.

In Brittany, a starter of Scallops in a simple cheese sauce, Assiette des Fruits de Mer, and Les Isles Flottante.

In a British pub, Eton Mess which was heavenly.

Beef ravioli with a regional cheese and roast sauce in Stresa, Italy, this summer 🥰

The most beautiful chocolate tart. It was heavenly. I have no idea how they made it so delicious. It really was on another level.

Amazing tempura prawns in a New York restaurant that I am not sure I’d find again, even if it stills exists. Also a fantastic strawberry cake in a small restaurant in Llangollen. There’s a chance that is still there actually so I’m off to check! 😀

Violets flavour ice cream, from Hitchcocks restaurant in Hull

Chicory ice cream ( dark and slightly bitter ) served with a glass of ginevra. The spirit was warm against the ice cream. It was an overnight stop in Wimerereux, I thought we had struck gold, but unfortunately the room was tiny , stuffy and had an oddly sticky carpet….

Lamb cooked in yoghurt in Albania. I've tried to find it and recreate it ever since. Rick Stein did a version in one of his cookbooks but it was not quite right.

The same cafe I ate that in also did a carrot soup. I ordered it as a starter. Then ordered it again instead of pudding it was that good!

Garlic Soup at an Italian restaurant in Key West. We were on our honeymoon and it was a week after Hurricane Georges had flattened half the island, so there were almost no tourists. The soup was incredible- soft, silky and with enough garlic in to fell a reasonably sized elephant. It was so delicious we went back every night until we had eaten it all! Once home I searched and searched for a recipe, but no luck. For our first wedding anniversary I cheekily emailed them and asked for the recipe- and they sent it! Had to do a bit of scaling down, but I make it all the time. It takes 40+ cloves of garlic!

Mmm this sounds wonderful.

Best chocolate brownie at the Rusty Pelican in Huntingdon Beach, LA.
Closer to home, nothing has ever bettered Banoffee Pie from Kites in York. Not sure if it still exists but it was absolutely perfect.

This goats cheese salad 3 days ago in St Elm in Majorca- far too nice to eat- totally delicious!!