Debbie does Dining

Ackee and avo: Mango Room, Camden

The girls and I had got to 'W' in alphabet dining. And 'W' stands for West Indian, of course …

Mango Room is a well-established restaurant tucked away behind Camden tube. The menu is modern Caribbean, which is to say skimpier servings and more artful presentation than such good-honest-tuck joints as nearby Cottons, whose portion sizes and enthusiasm with carbohydrates can cause hospitalisation if not sloshed down with too much rum.

Merchant Gourmet puy lentils with porcini and thyme

Somebody threw away my lunch. Or maybe the office mice got into the fridge. Either way, somebody's in my bad books … But in the meantime, I was down one lunch. Luckily, I remembered that I had a packet of microwaveable lentils in my drawer. Problem solved?

Weird candy: AMERICA

America is the land of the free and the home of the disposable income - where advertising is an art form and product design is a religion, where treating yourself is a human right and tomorrow's invention is already yesterday's news. It's weird candy paradise.

Read on for coconut M&Ms, chocolate nerds with popping candy, tongue tattoos and fruit which tells your fortune …

Perfect pairs: Rum & coke

If you ever go down Trinidad | They make you feel so very glad | Calypso sing and make up rhyme | Guarantee you one real good fine time | Drinkin' rum and Coca-Cola

This dated little ditty about Caribbean ladies (‘both mother and daughter’, apparently) entertaining American servicemen embodies an important truth. Rum and coca-cola does pretty well guarantee you one real good fine time. Oh is that stuff ever delicious.

It says tropical, it says holiday, it says kickin’ back and not giving a damn. It’s strong enough to be drunk by a rugged sailor, but sweet enough to taste good, and a fine enough mix to slip down nicely all night long. It’s a little naughty – and a little dirrrrty. Mmmm …

Perfect pairs: Peach and almond

Peaches and almonds are a perfect pair because they are the same. Oh but they are. No honestly, they are.

Examine if you will, gentlemen, a peach. Examine now an almond still in its fruit. Now if you’ll come with me to the next table, behold here a peach stone. And here an unshelled almond. And now, over at the cracking station, a peach kernel – and an almond. What do we see? Yes indeed - they are as like as thou are to thyself (with apologies to Messrs Horatio and Shakespeare who scholars agree were probably not talking about stone fruits at this juncture in the play …)

The brunch files: La Fromagerie, Marylebone

La Fromagerie of Marylebone specialises in yesobviouslycheese, and vegetables and some fresh pastas and salume as well as the usual mimsy gift items (12 types of honey, anyone?). You can get lardo di colonata, so they know what they're about. The piece de resistance and real point of the place is a sizeable cheese room stuffed to bursting with 300 or so perfectly kept cheeses and a smattering of properly trained staff – a facility of which anyone can be justly proud.

Snack! Gamer Grub

Gamer Grub is a concept snack designed for people to eat while they're playing computer games, presumably to avoid the considerable trauma of standing up and going to the kitchen, or overtaxing the opposable thumb by grasping food.

The resealable packs are intended to be poured into the mouth without getting hands greasy or averting eyes from World of Little Planet Kart or whatever these gamers do with their lives. It’s also nutritionally enriched with vitamins and 'neurotransmitters', which sounds like a load of old bollocks to me.

Le Whif: Breathable chocolate and coffee

Lobster Festival 2010: How to eat a lobster

Belgo is a Belgian restaurant chain in London, comprising 2 or 3 main venues and a couple more Bierodrome bars. The emphasis is on a large range of proper Belgian beers, and mussels. There's other stuff on the menu, but I'd nearly always just go for these two. Except in June, when it's Belgo Lobster Festival!

Marks & Spencer ‘Simply fuller longer’: Meatball minestrone

What is going ON with Marks & Spencer? Have they got a new chef in town? Somehow, under the guise of trying to make ‘healthy’ foods, they have tapped some really decent cooking. Shhh … they might realise and take it off the shelves.