Pierre Koffmann and Richard Vines have joined forces to launch Koffmann & Vines, a website and weekly restaurant review column, kicking off in November 2021.
Chef Pierre Koffmann and journalist Richard Vines have almost a century of culinary and media experience between them, which has also included hundreds of meals taken together in the UK and abroad.
The weekly reviews on the Koffmann & Vines website will start with a relative newcomer – Trattoria Brutto – and will follow weekly with a mix of new and established restaurants.
Every Thursday, a new review will be added, with Koffmann pronouncing on the details of the cooking, while both he and Vines will comment on the service, ambience and general background of the restaurant. Vines composes the prose, but it will always be a joint voice in the completed copy.
The two friends realised that their views on restaurants might be of interest to industry colleagues and the more general public, so the project took shape over an extended lunch conversation. A sponsor was sourced to cover the cost of the meals, and the two hungry men, often accompanied by Pierre’s wife, Claire, sketched a plan.
Born in Tarbes, France, Pierre Koffmann is renowned for his refined but gutsy French cooking, having held three Michelin stars at La Tante Claire in London.
Koffmann’s cooking instincts emerged with his maternal grandparents.
His career in the UK began with the Roux brothers, first at Le Gavroche, then at The Waterside Inn, Bray.
He moved La Tante Claire to The Berkeley, then took a break, followed by a wildly successful pop-up at Selfridge’s.
This led to a return to Knightsbridge with Koffmann’s at The Berkeley (closed at the end of 2016). Koffmann has also written three cookbooks: Memories of Gascony, La Tante Claire, and Classic Koffmann.
Richard Vines is a journalist with more than 40 years’ experience, including 25 years at Bloomberg, where he was Chief Food Critic.
He began writing dance reviews while at the LSE and Cardiff University, trained at the Morning Telegraph in Sheffield and went on to work for the Daily Mirror in Manchester and The Times in London.
He spent a year in Beijing as Thomson Foundation editorial advisor to China Daily, shifting to Hong Kong for six years as an editor on The Asian Wall Street Journal, and six more as foreign editor at the South China Morning Post.
Vines joined Bloomberg in 1995, and was appointed restaurant critic in 2004. He won the Fortnum & Mason award for Online Restaurant Writer of the Year in 2016, then retired in 2021.
Koffmann & Vines – Email: info@koffmannandvines.com
Pierre Koffmann: Instagram @pierrekoffmann
Richard Vines: Instagram/Twitter @richardvines
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Hospitality & Catering News: Koffmann and Vines. – 7 November 2021 – Koffmann and Vines.
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