Last weekend saw the return of the Taste of London festival in Regents Park.

When we think of London we think of pigeons, red buses and those mice you see on the underground - thankfully, despite the images, the taste of London is surprisingly brilliant - teeming with gourmet restaurants and a hitherto unseen variety of cuisines, confirming London as one of the most multi-cultural cities in the world.

So, take that cross-section of the upper echelons of fine dining in London, put it together with a park and here you have the world famous Taste Festival (in London). It certainly makes a change from the normal diners we see around London parks - pigeons and pasty office workers desperate for a glimpse of sun before retreating back to the darkness.

 More satisfied Taste diners

The number of restaurants peddling their wares in exchange for your hard earned crowns (the Monopoly-esque currency of choice) is huge and you can probably try almost any cuisine you can think of. We were big fans of Benares, Gaucho and Launceton Place (which offered an amazing suckling pig and summer truffle roll - definitely the best bang for your buck/calories for your crown), but there was alsways plenty of other comestibles to choose from.

The drinks and store cupboard are also well covered with numerous stalls doling out free samples of almost everything - we happily took the freebies in an attempt to fill our bellies for free.

Our top tip was to head into the Taste of Malaysia section which was woefully under-subscribed - we got to meet Rick Stein and sample many free delights at a leisurely pace because most had strayed to stalls of the more traditional London food gurus.

All in all, a good day out happily spent trawling for free samples and tasting snippets from some of London's (and the world's) best chefs...