Kitchen Diners

' ve eaten in some rum place in my time .Curled foetus-like in a Congolese ditch lava-tory when sheer hunger (for which tead castanet-teeth-chattering fear)took priority over the pong ,files and bullets.In a London sewer at dead of night when a generous cleaner pressed half his sandwich on me. Upright in the driver's cabin of a subway train. Standing on the trapdoor of a Zambian prison execution shed sucking iced-lollies with a jovial one-eyed hangman who was showing me the, er, ropes of dispatching a fellow human.

Some nice places too. Lunch at London's Lambeth Palace with the then Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Michael Ramsey. In the bath while luxuriating in that city's most expensive hotel suite. A place called Fred's in Baghdad which served lamb cooked in heaven, and the back row of a Karachi cinema where a bowl of cold soup came with the proffered female companion.

All memorable. All grist to my journalistic mill and to which I can now delightedly add the kitchen of Beijing's Kempinsky Hotel.

Come again? Kitchen? Chefs strictly private holy-of-holies? True enough. If you want to eat somewhere far different to the norm, or treat your family, company officials or private guests with an out-of-this-world gourmet spread tailored to your every culinary whim, Kempinsky food and beverage director Patrick Ritter, executive chef Peter Schaumburg, pastry chef Regis Negrier and their fellow gas-range rovers will mastermind a unique Chefs Table for you. You can even watch them weave their magic spells as they cook it before you take your seats.

The squad will just as happily give you a tour of their below-stairs butcher's section, or even take you behind the scenes to their in-house bakery or equally famed Chocolate Room - this a paradise for the sweet-toothed with its collection of everything from exquisitely hand-made chocolates to (in the case of our dining party) Spring Festival specialties that included giant choco figures of goats and terracotta warriors. Our superbly designed menu for the evening embraced Napoleon of salmon with Beluga and avocado, Thai broth, pan-seared goose liver, rosemary flavored currant sherbet, venison medallions in a vanilla and mushroom sauce with asparagus spring rolls and cranberry pear, and a gargantuan all-chocolate creation called Valrhona Surprise.

As our picture shows, this offered enough chocolate for a ravenous bunch of school-kids, never mind a single diner. As would be expected with a menu of this high order, each course was accompanied by an appropriate top-class wine. A further nice surprise was that each of us was presented with a pukka chef's jacket embroidered with one's name, and an authentic chef's hat-just the job for showing off when entertaining guests at home.

Delightful though the Kempinsky experience, I can't resist making an observation. We dined at a beautifully dressed six-seat table that would have done credit to a royal celebration. I don't know why F&B boss Ritter went to all this trouble, even though, as he says, chefs love putting on a show. Truth is, the kitchen floor was so spotless that we would all happily have eaten direct from the tiles!

Seats for the Chefs Menu promotion are limited to 20 (for example a company celebration or birthday), but small parties of five or six can also be entertained. Reservations are recommended. Prices range from RMB595 per head to, as Ritter says,"anything goes" Obviously dishes such as caviar will push the price up.