Liam Collens

In the twilight of 2025, we returned to Osip, a farm to table restaurant in deepest Somerset that we last visited in 2023.

I keep a list of restaurants that I want to visit on Google Maps with notes. Osip sat at the top of my list. I subscribe to their newsletter and read about the renovations of this 16/17th century coaching in-turned-pub reborn with a lived in, English countryside chic.

On entering I instantly had some regrets that we did not book on of the four rooms above the restaurant; a regret amplified when it also dawned on me that we had not booked a return taxi to Frome because Osip is isolated. So much so that on the winding journey here I accepted that no one would ever find our bodies if it came to it.

The reception room is cozy. There is a short pile of newspapers in a basket; both the logs and decorative pillows are hand-chopped, the latter as if by protocol. It all looks thrown together in that deeply considered, designer way. An indoor fire exudes warmth and a flickering glow that softly whispers, “Stay a while, drink red wine and throw on some thick socks.”

Versus our last visit, Osip’s dishes are intense, studious and bold. Two years ago, the cooking felt displayed rather than harnessed — admired, rather than realised. Now, Merlin decants flavour by coaxing what’s delicious from places we know instinctively, then assembles disparate elements as if they were always meant to sit together. The kitchen plumbs flavour depths with a finesse that feels intuitive and honed.

Take the Orkney scallops, lacquered in sticky roasted-chicken jus beneath a ten-tog duvet of Jerusalem artichoke purée, those crispy tubers and a dusting of cep powder. It’s a modern surf-and-turf by which others should be judged.

Osip is now a local hero turned world class restaurant but for one caveat, and that’s the service. It’s fine. It’s professional and well-informed, but it is under powered. The food invites you to lean in while the hospitality keeps you at arms’ length.

Read more about Osip on EatGoSee or my Substack. Both links are in my profile.

📍 Osip, 25 Kingsettle Hill, Bruton, Somerset, BA10 0LN.

#itsliamcollens #osip #foodwriter

Would you go? Less

Last week I posted a review—an Uninvited Opinion—about Lolla, with its easy going spirit and capable, crowd-pleasing dishes that just delighted. It is a neighbourhood restaurant for which I had to travel almost 4000 miles.

Uninvited Opinion? A few weeks back I shared that I will segment reviews calling out more clearly those which are not invites, not because this changes the way I write, but it may change the way you interpret that writing. (NB I’ve always declared when I’m invited because it’s the right thing to do.).

Back to Lolla.

Singapore gives you many reasons to eat out, but few speak as clearly as the menu at Lolla. Tucked inside a conservation shophouse in Chinatown, Lolla is the sort of place where you sit at a bar counter upstairs watching two chefs quietly turn out chocolate-pistachio tarts and corn ribs with the kind of calm competence that makes you lean in. It’s casual, confident and completely uninterested in theatrics.

The dishes read simply but land with intention: burnt cabbage with crispy capers; toasted sourdough with kombu butter and koji-cured quail with an egg yolk. There’s pan-fried lemon sole, a cheese menu (dangerous), plus specials like brioche layered with herbs and anchovies, and *the* called crab, crab, crab.

Downstairs, ropes and warm lighting hang over a communal table that feels designed for groups, solo diners, and anyone who enjoys the low hum of a busy dining room. The service is friendly without fuss and knowledgeable without reading from a script. It’s the sort of team that simply gets on with it — much like the capable kitchen.

Lolla isn’t trying to be a scene. It’s trying to be delicious. And it succeeds. The kind of place you choose not because it’s the hot reservation in town, but because the food is grounded, thoughtful and quietly joyful. A restaurant you return to because the menu and team pull you back.

Thank you to @alanquah522 and @vickieeeee1109. Read more through the links in my profile. Would you go to Lolla?

#itsliamcollens #lollasingapore #singaporeeats #sgeats #eatgosee Less

Lunch at Al Muntaha in the Burj Al Arab: 16 months ago, dinner felt like someone threw every “luxury” stereotype at the wall and hoped for a second Michelin star to stick.

Fast-forward to late 2025 (where I am invited), and the transformation is a relief: sunlight now bounces off the pale interiors, the sea view is the moneyshot, and the food feels reassured and confident.

There’s still ceremony but in the right way that creates a sense of occasion and feels special. The menu is now sharper, slimmer, intuitive. The Jerusalem artichoke and white truffle “pre-dessert” and the boot-lace-thick spaghettoni with tuna crudo stand out on the new menu.

The vibe is elegant without being pompous; indulgent, yes, but without the froth now feels deliberate instead of desperate.

In short: come for lunch (yes, really) when the light shines kindly on an eyebrow raising decor and the sea is visible.

Read the full review at the link in bio.

#itsliamcollens #almuntaha #almuntaharestaurant #restaurantreview #burjalarab #michelinguidedubai #invited Less

New words up from me about Calicut Paragon, South Indian restaurant in Karama with a steady, loyal following.

“Where were you in 1939? When Calicut Paragon first opened its doors in Kozhikode, the UAE did not exist, Europe was limbering up for World War II and Gandhi was still telling the British where to stick their empire.

While the outside world convulsed in bombs, politics and bluster, Govindan Panhikeyil and his son established Calicut Paragon, a casual dining restaurant plating up Malabari dishes, the moreish by-product of its Portuguese influences and Kerala’s centuries-old maritime trade with the Middle East. His grandson owns the business today.”

There’s a lot to love about Calicut Paragon and it’s very clear that they serve a small country’s population every day, but there were moments when I sense it plays to the masses with mixed results.

“No matter what else you read, Calicut Paragon needs no endorsement beyond its constant churn of hundreds of Dubai’s South Indian diaspora every hour of every day. Yet, the braggadocious trumpet-blasting that it is one of the “Most Legendary Restaurants in the World” rings hollow as popularity is quite a different thing to greatness, and this lunch is a tale of two meals that speaks to a wider feeling that Calicut Paragon’s dishes play a straight bat and never swing for the boundaries.”

Read more via the link in my profile: https://open.substack.com/pub/liamcollens/p/calicut-paragon-dubai-restaurant?r=12rjc7&utm_medium=ios" target="_blank">https://open.substack.com/pub/liamcollens/p/calicut-paragon-dubai-restaurant?r=12rjc7&utm_medium=ios

#itsliamcollens #calicutparagon #karamadubai #southindianfood #restaurantreview #dubairestaurants

You can read more here via my Substack: https://open.substack.com/pub/liamcollens/p/calicut-paragon-dubai-restaurant?r=12rjc7&utm_medium=ios" target="_blank">https://open.substack.com/pub/liamcollens/p/calicut-paragon-dubai-restaurant?r=12rjc7&utm_medium=ios Less

La Bottglieria del Ruché was not my first choice. It was not even my third, but this quaint-from-the-outside enoteca set into a street corner sharper than a bird’s beak in bucolic Castagnole Monferrato caught our eye while driving passed almost daily.

La Bottiglieria’s decor feels homemade and knowingly haphazard, organic and crafty, busy and lived in. Their one bathroom also features a washing machine inside in case you need a quick wash and dry while working through their plate of salami and cheese (€12).
Some walls are mustard yellow; others, Ruché red. Murals overlay some surfaces, such as a door painted with cartoonish wine drinkers. La Bottiglieria’s bohemian pastiche draws a smile, but some will find its incongruence jarring.
A dark bookshelf stores libraries of Barbera, Nebbiolo and, of course, Ruché (so, mostly red wine) sourced nearby, whose bottles are etched with handwritten prices. A little sign confirms that the owners add a €5 markup to the winery’s sale price. Not bad.

You can read more via the link in my profile on EatGoSee or here on Substack: https://open.substack.com/pub/liamcollens/p/la-bottiglieria-del-ruche-restaurant?r=12rjc7&utm_medium=ios

#itsliamcollens #castagnolemonferrato #monferrato #restaurantreview #ruche Less

In 2021, we first went to Lido 84 on the shores of Lake Garda a few months after a collaboration with Trèsind Studio in Dubai. Mrs EatGoSee and I swore we would make the pilgrimage to Lido 84 when we were in Italy later that summer.

And went we did. We went a second time in 2023 for dinner.

I published a write up about that first glorious visit to Lido 84, which I’ve updated and re-published on my Substack account.

One of the standout courses that we enjoyed during lunch is their famous rigatoni cacio e pepe en vesse. I could describe this myself, but I thought it would be better to share the entire video with you of the team describing the process directly. The mask is a throwback to the requirements of the time. How things have changed!

Check out the write up via the Substack link in my profile and tell me would you try this rigatoni cacio e pepe dish?

#itsliamcollens #ristorantelido84 #cacioepepe #alchiodo #cookingpasta #lakegarda #envesse #rigatonipasta Less

Al Naqa Lao Kebab House opened in Neighbourhood Food Hall around June 2024. Tiffany and I went as she knew “AJ”, and I only ever heard of him. I trust Tiffany emphatically on matters of the stomach.

Al Naqa would not work in lesser hands. It teeters between worlds that are disparate and almost estranged from each other but with AJ as a thoughtful guide, he is able to stand back 35,000 ft to see the broader strokes that unite Laotian, Persian and wider Middle Eastern cuisine and then slide into the details that serve each other almost naturally, like they were always meant together, like fingers that find the grooves of a glove.

Al Naqa is a brave, but AJ has ability and humility is spades.

To be clear, this is street food. This is budget dining in a food hall I’ve once described as a gentrified abattoir. (It’s honesty great, go! I make it sound terrible but it’s easily one of my favourite places and I’m fortunate to live close to it.)

It is the kind of eating people want not only because it’s delicious, but it’s recognisable. It’s the kind of stuff I would cook myself if I had the time, and abilities.

It’s what Dubai’s Michelin Guide is missing—a publication so bent on fanning tourists towards Dubai’s next shiniest thing that it blithely overlooks what it needs.

We don’t need another mortgage-threatening opening. We need to celebrate the diaspora of those that make this city better than great; they make it delicious.

Al Naqa sits among them and, if Michelin won’t send you here, I will.

#itsliamcollens #alnaqalaokebabhouse #neighbourhoodfoodhall #michelinguidedubai #foodwriter #restaurantcritic #wheretoeatdubai @alnaqakebab @ajsavanh @itsliamcollens Less

Weekend 15 comes and goes. I spent much of it catching up on those things that eluded me during the week.

Work things, by far. Family things. Italy things. Personal things. These two days that buttress the week like a bookend are a scramble. These were the highlights.

Greek wine is largely unknown to me and versus other wine producing countries often stocked in Dubai, they present good value. So I’m on the hunt. @avantisestate produces this Malagousia, a grape otherwise unknown to me. Rounded, aromatic, expressive—with plenty of stone fruit.

We continue to explore things my son will eat. The latest: pomegranate seeds. He’s a fan.

@neighbourhoodfoodhalls is a Motor City favourite that I’ve neglected as of late.

@alnaqakebab by @ajsavanh has a special menu on right now, so I took my laptop down to eat a few things while breaking the back of my inbox.

The Tahini Caesar Salad is deliciously light, 38 dhs (the before and after featured here). The Special Hat Yai Dubai Fried Chicken quarter leg delights with its glassy, crispy skin, garlic chips, crispy onions and a pineapple habanero so good, I ordered a second portion of it. Run full pelt this month.

I’m sad to see @big.oli.pasta left NFH. @funkcoolio takes its place, and offers pizza by the slice (smart). The spicy duck pizza will be loved by most, but I’m never a fan of that dynamite shrimp type sauce. 65 dhs for 10 inches.

A moment of zen outside, even if it is pushing 40 C.

Good luck all for the week ahead.

#itsliamcollens #wknd #weekend #greekwine #wheretoeat #week15 Less

“The truth is I tried to dine at Sufret Maryam three times, but it was always fully booked until one fine Saturday lunchtime.

Busy is a good sign, but this is expected from a relatively new opening by Chef Salam Daqqaq; a woman exalted across multiple fronts.

Her worshipped Bait Maryam started a snowball effect that led to Michelin Guide gongs, MENA 50 Best list slots and a MENA’s Best Female Chef Award and, of course, the irresistible PR catnip of Somebody Feed Phil. The likes of Massimo Bottura and others flocked to Bait Maryam and, now, we congregate around Sufret Maryam which, if you did not know, means “Maryam’s Dining Table”. ”

These are the first paragraphs from a write up I wrote about @sufretmaryam by national treasure Salam Daqqaq, @bait.maryam.

You can read more about it via the link in my profile!

#sufretmaryam #itsliamcollens #substackwriter #dubairestaurants #levantinefood #wheretoeatdubai #wasl51 Less

I started slash registered EatGoSee almost six years ago now. I set this platform up for many reasons but one of them was to bring different voices into the writing space. It felt cliquey and, worse, the writing felt flaccid.

@sanjayvarman is a someone I’ve know a long time and, recently, he started a Substack called Supperman, which you should read. (Subscribe to him, then come back and subscribe to me.)

I like Sanjay’s storytelling, his wonderment and perspective that comes from a different place to mine. That’s good. It’ll fact, it’s better.

EatGoSee needs him. And Matt Broderick.

He and his wonderful partner (who I also know very well) ventured over to @smokedroom.dubai which, in his words:

“The Smoked Room experience thrives on contradictions. The décor shouts fire but the food leans into a gentle Japanese Omakase. The service is relaxed, understated, almost restrained, but here the food is vibrant, personal and intimate.”

They has a fabulous time and you deserve to read a considered piece about Smoked Room because—wait, what did he say…

“When you pay a bucketload of money for two people you don’t just want dinner, you want an experience.”

He’s right.

Check out Sanjay’s review via the link in my profile. Thank you Sanjay. Let’s grab some soy ice cream, Chantilly cream and a non-alcoholic sake jelly some time.

#sanjayvarman #eatgosee #smokedroom Less