top resto eats of 2012 in no particular order:

fried chicken (roberta's)
many tiny puddings (guy savoy)
zander / cabbage (noma)
everything else (noma)
veal face / truffle (jean paul jeunet)
poulard de bresse / vin jaune (jean paul jeunet)
crab / olorosso (morito)
porcini salad (locanda locatelli)
ancient parmesan (la greppia)
tortellini in brodo (canetto d'oro)
bollito misto (sergei)
lobster quiche (40 maltby street)
white asparagus / morels / duck egg (40 maltby street)

(this makes me feel very old)

sorry about the lack of posts - i have been a bit busy.  went to richard and dan's last night and had good times and tasty lemon soup. before that, i went on a rather lengthy work trip - highlight was probably fried chicken for breakfast at roberta's in brooklyn with petey, laura and bobby.  anyway, among all this non-culinary activity i have been developing a new saturday pursuit - butter making.  here is a grainy, out of focus guide to the process.

step 1 - ferment.  i like cultured butter because of the tang, so start by mixing cream and yoghurt and letting it get lively for a few days on the worktop - it ends up like a slightly out of shape creme fraiche:

step 2 - agitate.  i am currently too unfit to do this by hand so am using an electric whisk thing.  in the end it sort of separates into lumps and whey.step 3 - washing.  squeeze the lumpy bits in cheese cloth until all the butter milk comes out.  then kneed it in fresh water a few times until the water stays clear.  add salt and press out all the liquid one last time.the finished butter is rather good - i think i am probably fermenting longer than most commercially available butter and this is much to my taste.