Over the last 17 years the name Mark Hix has grown to be synonymous with first of all Le Caprice, then the Ivy and latterly with J. Sheekey and Scott's. He may not have been the man slaving over a hot stove when you last ate at one of these chic restos but he was certainly the man with the ideas behind the menu. Hix is also passionate about British food recently picking up awards for his rather good book - Regional British Food, and a large helping of notoriety for a winning performance on the BBC's Television extravaganza The Great British Menu.

If this all sounds a bit like an obituary it shouldn't - Hix has resigned as chef director of Caprice Holdings to pursue his own ventures. With such an exalted job he will be working out a lengthy period of notice but there are persistent rumours linking him to the Riverside Restaurant in West Bay, Dorset. This "new leaf" would be wholly in character as Hix was born and bred in Dorset and spending more time a little nearer to the sea would fit in with another of his passions - fishing.

Charles Campion

Hoorah!  At last the guide book has "gone to bed", now it's just a matter of waiting for publication (6th September) and noting how many or how few restaurants have inconveniently gone bust, changed hands or relocated in the weeks between signing off the proofs and seeing a copy. There is a certain amount of relief in knowing that it is now too late for even the most last minute changes! 

The whole process has been made more scary this year by a spate of filming, nobody seems to know when "Eating with the Enemy" will burst onto your screens but over the last few weeks we have been shooting 20 programmes for the BBC in the glamour of a railway arch in Bermondsey. Various members of the public cook for a panel of food critics - myself, Toby Young, Jay Rayner and Kate Spicer, in a competition to find the best home cook and there's a welcome emphasis on regional ingredients. Thankfully the gastronomic highs just about out-numbered the lows but there was a good deal of uninspiring eating involved.

Meanwhile over at the Rivington the focus was on crayfish when a large party tucked into a "Crayfish Feast" - this is a traditional summer pastime in Sweden. In the U.K. the only freshwater crayfish available in any numbers is the large Signal Crayfish. This American interloper has just about finished off the Native Crayfish and perhaps the best way to get revenge is to eat them. For the feast the crayfish came from the Oxford area and after a crayfish bisque we tried them boiled in beer with wild fennel, and finally served as a salad with rabbit. Each course was paired with a different beer so we had Grolsch wheat beer with the boiled crays, the magnificent White Shield with the salad, and Innis and Gunn with the pud. It's a very good strategy - the best way to rid our countryside of vermin is to eat them! Let's turn our attention to pigeons.

Charles Campion

The Rivington, 28–30 Rivington Street, EC2 (020 7729 7053)

It's that time of year….however organised I try to be, the few weeks running up to deadline for my Guide to London Restaurants are invariably something of a scamper. There are so many new restaurants to be looked over and possibly squeezed into the 2008 edition - due to be published on September 5th - and any moment now my pleas to add "just one more restaurant" will be refused by the patient folk labouring over the artwork and indexes. This edition will include over 400 restaurants making it the biggest ever and the decisions doesn't get any easier.

The "new places" imperative means that I don't get as many leisurely and comfortable dinners as I would wish, but recently there was one honourable exception when we went to Fung Shing on Lisle Street, a long-term favourite of mine.

I first went to the Fung Shing in the mid-1970's when it was a small, scruffy place that specialised in late opening (4am!) and fish cookery. Today it is an altogether bigger, bolder, brassier and more prosperous establishment. In the early days there was a management buyout by the front of house team but over the years those guys have retired and handed things over to the second generation who dish out the same warm welcome.

As with all venerable restaurants there are sometimes rumours that standards are slipping but I can report that all is well. On the evidence of a very good meal - the salt and pepper spare-ribs were large and meaty; the mixed meat in lettuce leaves very savoury; the double cooked pork with yam in hotpot was gloopily rich; sizzling prawns large and crunchy; stir fried beef with lime leaves from the "specials" delivered plenty of flavour; and the Singapore noodle was magnificent, (satisfactorily chilli hot rather than being spiked with cheap curry powder as is the trend although the portion may have got a bit smaller) - standards are as high as ever. And if you discount an implausibly large amount of Tsing Tao beer from the final bill it was pretty good value. Sometimes it is a pleasure to get off the treadmill of new openings and re-visit an old-friend.

Charles Campion

Fung Shing, 15 Lisle Street, WC2 (020 7437 1539)

It's happened again, we dined in a solitary splendour reminiscent of the trip to Hara (22nd April 2007). As we sat down in Stanza the only other table (a two) were just leaving. Full marks for the acting talents of the receptionist on street-level who made a show of pondering the reservations book before conceding that there might be a table available even though we had not booked. At least Stanza has the excuse of being brand-spanking new to account for the deathly quiet.

This is the site that was formerly known as Teatro, but hang on, Teatro lives, just the restaurant and bar have been re-done as Stanza. You have to suspect that the bar is the engine driving this place, but then the restaurant is large, elegant and modern. It's all a bit of a puzzle.

The menu comes as a shock, it is aggressively, uncompromisingly, gloriously, British.  Potage of summer broad beans; a Cumbrian charcuterie block; a pressed terrine of Goosnargh chicken, treacle bacon and foie gras; a Morecambe bay brown shrimp cocktail. The mains continue the theme rump of Herdwick lamb; crackled organic pork belly with dripping roast potatoes; salmon fishcakes with samphire. The kitchen knows its stuff, the pressed terrine is very good; the fishcake is large, simple, well-made and well-seasoned. The pork has real cracking and is teamed with horseradish - novel but strangely successful. The dishes that need skill are well done - perfectly roast scallops impress.

And as unlikely as it may sound the prices are not too grasping - starters run from £5 to £10 and mains from £8.50 to £16.50. There's lengthy wine list and it too has accessible prices. What's a restaurant like this doing in such a place? Will it succeed? We'll have to wait and see.

Charles Campion

Stanza restaurant & bar, 93-107 Shaftesbury Avenue, W1 (020 7494 3020)