The editor writers: Time to tuck into Leeds's table of delights

Eat Leeds starts today and runs all week. Over 110 of Leeds’s best restaurants are taking part, offering bespoke menus for £10 or £15.

Let’s just take a moment to digest that - one hundred and ten of our city’s best restaurants.

Of all the things Leeds has to offer the visitor, food has to be one of our number one attractions.

Of course not everybody can afford to eat out often, but nonetheless it is still a far more common thing to do than it was even a few decades ago.

Eating out was saved for some very rare occasions when I was growing up - birthdays and anniversaries were just about the only reason for dining out, and even then the choices were limited, depending on where you grew up.

I’m risking an “all our yesterdays” moment here but I would love to hear some of your memories of places you used to eat out at in Leeds in the 1960s or 1970s - when a Bernie Inn was the height of sophisticated dining. You could choose from steak, chicken or fish as I remember and yes, fruit juice was genuinely an option for a starter.

We’ve come a long way.

Eating out in Leeds is not just a gastronomic experience but a global one with tastes and flavours, fusions and firsts from around the world.

Narrow margins on food,the mimimum wage and increasing import costs are putting the squeeze on restaurants and they remain among the most likely businesses to fail in their early days.

So Eat Leeds week is the perfect time to show our appreciation of the treats set out for us in Leeds, thanks to the support and promotion of Leeds BID.

Bon appetit!