Pleasures and Disappointments

Last Saturday Debrah and I had lunch at the two Michelin star restaurant Hibiscus in the West End of London. This was the second part of my 50th birthday present and we both agreed it was one of the best restaurant experiences we have had for years.

Hibiscus opened in Ludlow originally but transferred to London a year or so ago. The room was very calm and welcoming, the ambience just right, the staff knowledgeable and friendly and the service excellent - and the food and wine was outstanding.

We chose the six course tasting menu and left it to the chef to excite, surprise and delight us. We also left it to the sommellier to choose the right wines to go with each course. Both succeeded wonderfully. The polenta with truffle was a particular highlight but each course was in itself a glorious tribute to the chef's talent.

While the chef is French and the food very much based in the best traditions of his homeland, it made a welcome change to have wines that were not, well not all of them anyway. I adore French wine but one of the pleasures of eating in London is being able to drink wines from all over the world - in the Michelin starred restaurants I have visited in France the choice is usually local French wine or French wine.

The choice of wine is not the only culinary pleasure of being back in London - in the last few days I have also had two excellent curries, from opposite ends of the price scale.

On Friday I met my good friend Kieron, who wanted to pick my brain about a new business idea, which he did whilst entertaining me to a five star Indian lunch at Moti Mahal - a modern Indian restaurant based in Covent Garden.

Then on Saturday evening, we treated Christian to a takeaway curry at home. At first I wasn't sure I could eat any more after our lunch but once it was here we all tucked in with gusto - especially Christian who was back home for the first time since he went off to Uni at Falmouth - back home to be fed and washed, poor boy.

I am also very lucky that Debrah works near to Borough Market. It's a lot more commercial (and expensive) than Carcassonne market but it does give me my market fix. Last Friday I caught a butchery and cookery demonstration about game and watched fascinated whilst a deer was skinned and then cut up into it's constituent parts ready for cooking.

I also had a fix of Languedoc wines last Thursday when I was able to attend, courtesy of Louise Hurren, a tasting of organic wines from the region which was held at the Maison du Region de Languedoc-Roussillon in Cavendish Square - just behind John Lewis on Oxford Street, so a great central location for this regional outpost that does so much to promote the products of my part of the South of France.

It hasn't all been good though. I met some former work colleagues at a converted pub restaurant called the Bountiful Cow in Holborn and was completely underwhelmed by a fairly ordinary steak and chips that wasn't at all cheap.

On the same day I searched for ages for an internet zone - for some reason I thought that in a big international city, a worldwide business hub even, there would be many more free or pay as you go locations where anyone could turn up and just log on - alas that isn't the case. I ended up in the coffee shop of the Aveda salon and No, I don't want any face cream thank you.

And of course it has been lashing down with rain on a daily basis with massive windy squalls that make umbrellas useless - it doesn't help that I know it has been abnormally warm and dry back in Carcassonne - isn't the weather weird?

Here is the full lunch line up from Hibiscus

Oeuf en Cocotte, Ras al Hanout, Palm Heart Velouté

Cornish Red Mullet, sprout leaves & onion salad, bone marrow & onion toast
2007 Chablis 1er Cru, Côte de Léchet, Laurent Tribut

Creamy Polenta, Fresh Hazelnut, Umbrian White Truffle
2007 Riesling Qba, Scharzhof Egon Muller, Germany

Roast Mortimer Forest Venison, Pear confit in red wine, Savoy Cabbage purée
2006 Capoposto, Negroamaro, Alberto Longo, Puglia

Selection of British and French cheeses
NV Ratafia de Champagne, Henry Giraud, Ay, France

Iced Nougat parfait of Candied roots, Physalis coulis
2007 Tokaji Furmini Late Harvest, Disznóko, Hungary

Catching Up

Since I last put finger to keyboard I have been hijacked by the Irish, distracted by the football, amused by vegetables and looking after my guests - oh, and so depressed by the weather that I have found it hard to get motivated.

My Irish guests arrived on Thursday evening and after settling them in, I sent them off to eat and went out to meet Patrick for a drink at the Makhila. We were close to calling it a night when my guests, Tom and Niamh (pronounced Neve - I'll never get the hang of Gaelic) turned up. Well, it appears that because everyone in Ireland knows everyone else who's ever been to Ireland or is a distant relation to someone that left the Emerald Isle two centuries ago, that Patrick's neighbour in Chicago is Niamh's (pronounced Neve's don't forget) best friend who spent a year and a half travelling round the world together. So naturally we were all best mates and practically related which meant that we had to try and drink the bar dry for some reason. Being an innocent (sic) bystander in all this, I introduced them into the joys of pastis and several locals tried to introduce Niamh into, well, themselves actually and Tom said "Aw, she's havin a grand time" even when she was looking a bit scared of the various moustaches circling her. I finally managed to exert some influence by persuading everyone not to go to the nightclub (good thing Chris wasn't with us!) and we made it home.

As a result, Friday wasn't as productive as it might have been - but breakfast was made and the Apartment was prepped for Saturday's guests and the paint was ordered for the renovation upstairs.

It rained all day on Friday, with some particularly nasty downpours from time to time and Saturday wasn't much better and Sunday was at least dry if dull and overcast and cold - I actually got my fleece out again! Frankly, we have all had enough of this most unseasonal weather. Apparently, there was record rainfall in May and today we had cloud, and then a lovely sunny afternoon and then another monstrous thunderstorm this evening - just when the locals were settling into watching France at Euro 2008 on the big screen erected for the occasion.

Despite no British presence at Euro 2008, I have, of course, watched every bit that I've been able to see, working around canapes on Saturday and dinner on Sunday for my new guests. I have been enormously underwhelmed so far, but as a true fan there is no limit to my perseverance - so having sat through another numbingly boring game (France v Romania) - I finally got the match I had been waiting for when the World Champions, Italy, took on the Masters of Total Football, the Dutch, this evening. The result will see many large spliffs being lit and lots of crying into camparis in Milan and Rome - rarely have the Italians been so beautifully humiliated - what joy. Inevitably, the Dutch will play like the Masters of Schoolboy Football next time they play, but then that's the fun of it all - peaked way too early in my opinion.

Vegetables, you ask. What about the vegetables? Well despite the well known benefits of eating duck, foie gras and cassoulet until you burst and drinking as much red wine as possible, it appears that the French Department of Health wants us all to eat more fruit and vegetables! As a result, there was a display and a promotion of their health benefits, in the square, on Sunday - with a band to jolly everyone along. It was a typically avant garde French display with fruit on sticks and a vegetable scarecrow and strawberry trees and produce piled all over the fountain in a fabulously decorous way - and everyone was drinking wine to celebrate the occasion before the inevitable 'free-for-all' at the end when everyone tried to grab as much produce as they could. Hmmm - not sure they got the message across to those that need converting.

One last carrot and apple juice and I'm off to bed