Ditalini pasta with lion’s mane mushrooms, Romanesco cauliflower and romesco sauce at The Alna Store. Photo by Jasper Ludwig Hypno-something: hypnagogic, hypnopompic – I never remember which is which. One describes the hazy, surreal transition that leads you into slumber, the other the groggy stumble that leads you out. I’ve had both words on my…

Gloriosa, 1321 Argyle Street, Glasgow G3 8TL; gloriosaglasgow.com. Small plates £6-£10; large plates £16-£25; desserts £5-£14; wines from £29 a bottle It is five years since last we saw each other, but it might as well have been yesterday. I am saying hello to an old friend and I am giving them a hug in…

In the year 2023, a person of a certain worldliness in the United States learns to be jaded about crème brûlée. There it is at the airport, a puck weeping in plastic, defeated. There it is, caught in aluminum foil on a tray hoisted by an exhausted cater-waiter at an event whose pleading eyes meet…

I’m sorry Craig and Charlie, but sunshine on Leith is overrated. I prefer a rainy cityscape, with the Firth of Forth draped in haar. Up on the industrial-chic eighth-floor bar of Scotland’s first vertical distillery, even the staff stop occasionally, and are transfixed by the watery vista. In the sixth floor shop, where they serve products from their trading…

Toka Cafe & Grill. Photo by Angelina Aragon Opened: May 2023 Banking exec turned restaurant owner Milot Bejta and his baker-wife Besa are turning out excellent Southeastern European cuisine at their tiny café, tucked away in a commercial neighborhood behind Scottsdale Quarter. Don’t be misled by the menu’s familiar breakfast and lunch selections, surely designed…

The fall season of Burger Friday has arrived, and it was a brisk 50 degrees when I dropped by EaDough Pastries & Provisions,  a bakery/coffeeshop in the (ahem) EaDo neighborhood.  The temperature mattered because EaDough operates as a walk-up business that offers a couple of cafe tables on a front porch, plus a line of…

Lisa Vanderpump is thinking pink. The restaurateur and reality TV star is opening Pinky’s by Vanderpump in summer 2024 at the Flamingo, the property announced Thursday. The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported first, in August, that Vanderpump would be opening a restaurant at the Flamingo, though its name was unknown at the time. Pinky’s, after Vanderpump’s…