In an attempt to be better about taking advantage of London and not missing the boat on cool stuff (like the Leonardo da Vinci exhibit that scalpers are selling tickets for for over £100), I went to see the newly opened The Madness of George III in the west end. David Haig put on an amazing performance as George III and even it isn’t huge, I’m still glad I went to see it.
His and hers Guinness at the pub after a posh meal
I was getting excited about my posh dinner tonight at the 2 Michelin starred restaurant The Ledbury (thanks for the Christmas present Fergie!), so I went to go back and read about my last posh meal, which was at Heston Blumenthal’s Dinner. And then I saw that I never posted it. Oops. It was such a great meal, I feel like I’d be doing you a disservice not posting it.
Dinner is Heston’s newish restaurant in the Mandarin Oriental in Knightsbridge. It doesn’t have the same whimsy as The Fat Duck (from what I’ve read. I WILL make it there before I leave), but the reviews were still incredibly positive.
The theme of the restaurant is that it’s Heston’s take on classic British recipes and the menu guided you throughout the meal. There was even a “Sources of Origin” in the back telling you which cookbooks these recipes came from so you knew that Heston wasn’t just making it up, or so said one of our servers.
For example, my meat fruit starter is a recipe from c. 1500. Inside what looks like an orange is a smooth chicken liver parfait, which paired perfectly with the orangey jelly on the outside. The powdered duck (c. 1670) was perfectly cooked and the tipsy cake (c.1810 - man, they liked to soak their cake in booze back in 1810) with spit roasted pineapple (genius idea) were equally impressive.
If you don’t feel like shelling out £180 per person for a meal, or can’t get reservations to The Fat Duck, Dinner makes an excellent alternative.
After the market, Nate and I headed over to the Shoreditch area to check out a London Street Art tour.
Here are a few of our favorites for the day: Stik, Swoon, El Mac, James Cochran and 2 by Roa.
If you’re even slightly interested in street art, I would highly recommend this tour. In fact, I’ll probably take it again in the future. Street art is so ephemeral, you never know what you’ll see.
So why do I keep going back to Maltby Street Market, even though they have a lot fewer vendors than Borough Market who are spread out over quite a few blocks in not the nicest part of town? The answer has 2 parts and is quite simple-they allow dogs and those doughnuts. The St. John custard doughnuts are simply amazing, and even better paired with a Monmouth coffee. The smoked salmon from Hansen and Lyderson tasted like butter. The cheese from Kappacasein is going to make the most amazing grilled cheese. And so, we keep going back to Bermondsey.
Did you guys know that Nate is really into the London Street Art scene? Here he is in front of an original Banksy and at the Pure Evil Gallery.
I haven’t babysat in years, so I’m completely amazed by the new technology. It’s hard to tell, but that’s a video monitor and I’ve been listening to Jack sing about garbage trucks while kicking his little feet in the air for a while now.
First, the NYT told me about The Chocolate Trail, and that elderly experts said I should travel when I’m young. Then I noticed that Eurostar was having a sale. So, I booked a day trip to Brussels in March. Now I just have to figure out how I’m going to eat all the things (waffles! chocolate! beer! frites!) in 8 hours.
I made a New Year’s resolution to get out of London at least once a month, and so far, so good. We took the train up to Windsor and did The Long Walk between Windsor Castle and The Copper Horse statue, which is about 5-6 miles round trip. It was a bit chillier today, but sunny weekend days are rare here, so I couldn’t waste it.
Not only did I check off my get out of London for January, but I got another Jaclyn & Nate picture for the collection
Nate’s pseudo birthday
Nate’s 7th birthday was actually yesterday, but we had dinner plans with another couple, so we decided to celebrate today. (Shhh! Don’t tell him). We started the day at a dog shop up near Portobello Market to pick some toys and bones and then made our way down Portobello Road to Hyde Park. All the while, Nate was sporting his extremely stylish Union Jack sweater my brother got him as a Christmas gift, which was a hit. I came out of a shop to find Fergie on his iPhone and 4 DSLRs focused on Nate.
After a long walk through Hyde Park, we went down to Buckingham Palace to snag another picture for the Jaclyn & Nate in the UK collection and headed to what used to be my Aunt & Uncle’s local pub when they lived in London. Nate enjoyed a beverage, as did we.
We just happened to walk past Pierre Herme on our way back to Hyde Park, so I grabbed a few macarons (olive oil & mandarin, hazelnut praline, blackcurrant and creme brulee) for the walk home…and by walk home, I mean about a block past Pierre Herme.
