Vinoteca

Last night I visited one of my favourite haunts. Unfortunately, it seems to be everyone else's too - that's why we waited 50 minutes before being assigned a table.

Vinoteca - at the Smithfield end of on St John Street - has become one of the area's best-loved destinations: bar, wine shop and restaurant. Modelled on the vinotecas and enotecas of Spain and Italy, it has an impressive stock of wines - and, even better, a passionate, knowledgeable staff to tell you about them.

It also runs an impressive kitchen serving up a limited but excellent selection of food. There's a Mediterranean influence but you're as likely to find traditionally English ingredients in there, with ham hock, pigeon, beetroot, horse radish and Gressingham duck breast alongside Serrano ham and olives. Tapas or racion sized portions are the future as far as I'm concerned, and I rarely opt for the main courses, preferring one or two of the smaller plates - less chance of getting bored - and of course it leaves room for something sweet afterwards (very important).

Vinoteca also runs a series of winemaker dinners, presided over by wine growers and makers, plus their bi-annual wine tastings - heady afternoons in which over 50 wines from their portfolio are available to taste between the hours of midday and 4pm. The next one is the Winter Portfolio Tasting.

As you can tell, Clerkenwell Dweller likes Vinoteca - a lot. So much so that she even features on the website.