This weekend saw the Financial Times unveiling its newly expanded food and drink dream team, Appetites, consisting of Tim Hayward, Marina O'Loughlin and Jay Rayner alongside columnists Jancis Robinson, Ajesh Patalay, Laila Gohar and Alice Lascelles. Jay set out his stall for his new gig by reviewing Rules, and the magazine ran a special issue on The Rules of Modern Dining.
We have to admit to taking a particular interest in one piece on restaurant hype - a data driven piece which actually works best in the online version of the newspaper where writer Clara Murray talked to London restaurants Cloth, Goodbye Horses, Chishuru and Bistro Freddie to find out what makes certain new restaurants stand out from the crowd.
Having ploughed through the restaurants booking data they were able to pinpoint what had driven reservations to spike and, we'll admit to being gratified to learn that Hot Dinners plays a part. In talking to Dominic Hamdy, the owner of Shoreditch spot Bistro Freddie we learn that "There was a flurry of attention shortly after opening, with Hamdy citing a feature in Hot Dinners as particularly influential." Cloth's graph also shows an uplift following one of our articles. And while we weren't namechecked specifically, the Goodbye Horses drilldown references how important Reels and TikTok were and we'd like to think our own reel and TikTok on it which got north of 200k views played a role.
It's all very interesting if you're a restaurant geek so you might want to consider a subscription to get access. Digital is pretty punchy but there's an FT daily edit for under a fiver which Rayner says will always include his weekly review.
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