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The
Restaurant Hall of Fame (www.resthof.co.uk)
was launched at the beginning of November 2007 to celebrate over 200
years of ethnic restaurants in Britain. Joseph Moretti opened an
Italian eaterie of London's Leicester Square in 1803 and Dean Mahomed
from Bihar in India opened The Hindostanee Coffee House in London's
West End in 1809. There are currently around 500 profiles of past and
present restaurateurs and chefs in the website available free to visitors.
In the past
year nearly one hundred thousand people have visited the site. The
greatest number have been from United Kingdom but there have also
been thousands of visits from United States of America. Other major
visiting nations have been Canada, India, Australia, Belgium, South
Africa, Hong Kong, Finland, Denmark, France, Italy, Netherlands,
Germany, Norway, Brazil, Greece, Trinidad & Tobago, Russia,
Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Each month
the numbers of visits for each profile have been recorded and
allocated a 1-10 placing. After one year these placings have been
added together to give an overall placing out of a possible 120.
Winner by a long way with a total of over 90 points was Founder of
The British Curry Awards Enam Ali who also founded The Guild of
Bangladeshi Restaurateurs and runs Le Raj restaurant in Epsom,
Surrey. Mr Ali has been very active in lobbying the British
Government in connection with the staffing problems of Indian
restaurants in Britain. Close together in silver and bronze position
were well known restaurateur David Tang, knighted in the 2008 New
Year's Honours List for his charity work, and Chad Rahman,
aspirational chef of the classy Chez Mumtaj in St Albans.
"I
expect the number of available profiles to double over the coming year",
commented Restaurant Hall of Fame editor Peter Grove, "so it
will be interesting to see who is in the top slot this time next year."
RHF
Personality of the Year 2008
1/ Enam Ali -
Le Raj Epsom
2/ Sir David
Tang OBE - China Tang, Dorchester Hotel, London
3/ Chad
Rahman - Chez Mumtaj, St Albans
4/ Mohinder
Kohli -Shimla Pinks, Birmingham
5/ Cyrus
Todiwala MBE - Cafe Spice Namaste, London E1
6/ Moula Miah
- Rajnagar, Solihull
7/ Vivek
Singh - Cinnamon Club, London SW1
8/ Ana
Choudhury - House of Spice, Haddenham, Bucks
9/ Rajesh
Suri - Tamarind, London W1
10/ Claudio
Pulze - Via Condotti etc London
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