Tag Archives: London

May 1, 2013 · 7:41 pm

Scoping out the Ottolenghi restaurants in London!

Last year, my stepdaughter got me a cookbook by the Israeli-born London Chef Yotam Ottolenghi – and I then remembered that a recent New Yorker had a profile of him, so after reading it, I tried a recipe or two. So far so good. The recipes are heavily dependent on fresh produce so I’m hoping to try more if we ever get a real spring and summer here. (Pardon my skepticism but it’s May 1 and there’s talk of snow arriving soon.) Now that I’m going to London, I’m eager to visit one of his restaurants but see that only one – in Islington which isn’t near my usual stopping grounds – is a sit-down restaurant. But may have to make a trek there anyway. I’m particularly curious about his middle eastern food, especially since he’s from Israel and his head chef, Sami Tamimi, is  Palestinian. The other Ottolenghi outposts are nearer to my usual haunts – in Kensington, Belgravia and Notting Hill – but they appear to be primarily take-away food.

Our People

Behind the food stands a dedicated team, full of enthusiasm and creative zeal. They make Ottolenghi what it is. Unfortunately, we can mention just a few.

Yotam Ottolenghi writes a weekly column in the Guardian Weekend Saturday magazine. Together with Sami he is the author of the Ottolenghi Cookbook, published by Ebury Press in 2008.

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April 8, 2013 · 3:07 pm

Maggie Maggie Maggie – Memories of Thatcher’s England

Hard to believe that Margaret Thatcher has died, although she has been long gone from the public stage and eye. I wasn’t a fan of her policies – I worked for the rival Labour Party in 1980 as an intern for a young MP named Jack Straw who went on to become a household name himself. And back then, we used to march through the streets during one rally or another  chanting ” Maggie, Maggie, Maggie, Out, out, out.” But I did admire her courage and determination. And this photo (below) of Maggie berating Jack has hung on my office wall for some 30 years.

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April 28, 2011 · 2:25 pm

Royal Wedding – from afar

Alas, I won’t be as near to this Royal Wedding as I was to the last big one thirty years ago, which I helped cover as a young reporter working in the London Bureau of a Yank newspaper. My British friends emailed today that wedding fever is finally starting to take hold of the capital – and perhaps the country. In addition to a republican (i.e. anti-monarchist) party where guests will dine on red food and NOT watch the wedding on the telly, one friend has been invited to a more traditional garden party at the home of a neighbor who has planted red, white and blue pansies for the occasion. Hope the weather permits (another friend reported its supposed to be rainy.)

I just may get up early tomorrow to tune in – although I’m not sure how early I can handle. I’ve got my new wedding kitsch just in time from my sister, who brought them back from a recent trip to England. A Wills-and-Kate tea towel and Wills-and-Kate mug. Hip Hip Hooray.

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January 20, 2011 · 11:33 pm

Dog Collar Museum – in Kent, England

An old friend from London emailed me last week, after we fell out of touch for um, 16 years or so, and it has me thinking about all the adventures we had during the early 1980s when I lived in London.  Mima (my friend) comes from a family that has lived for generations in Herefordshire and had an crumbling ancestral home there, as well as another smaller country house we used to visit a lot.  It was beautiful.

She had a car – which was a big treat for me (a welcome break from hitchhiking) and we used to go exploring near London too. One place we visited was the Dog Collar Museum at Leeds Castle in Kent. I kid you not. I still have a photo of us with her sister Tilly standing in front of it. Now that I have a dog, I think I’d be even more interested/amused by the place and I’m glad to see that it’s still up and running. It has over 100 collars spanning five decades – many of them ornate metal affairs that puts my dog Ernie’s humble mass-produced cloth collar (it is embroidered with power flowers) to shame. I’ll be some of the hounds I watched during the latest episode of the superb PBS Masterpiece Classics series “Downton Abbey” wore these fancy smancy collars.

for more info see:

See: http://www.leeds-castle.com/goto.php?sess=u4120738|p136|n152|c2466436|s0|g1|d0&pg=Dog_Collar_Museum

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January 18, 2011 · 4:33 pm

The Kate and William Walk – in London

First there was the Lady Diana walking tour of London. Now, just in time for the next royal wedding on April 29, comes the Kate and William walking tour offered by Celebrity Planet, a travel company in London. The tour is part Diana-and-Charles, with a stop outside the posh jewelry shop where Charles bought the diamond-and-sapphire ring for Diana that Kate is now wearing (one might consider this bad karma.)

The walk lasts 2.5 hours and costs $24 (15 pounds). There’s also a chauffeur-driven version for $120.  As if.

for more info see: http://www.thecelebrityplanet.com/london/celebrity-tours/prince-william-kate-royal-wedding-walking-tour.html

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May 12, 2010 · 9:38 pm

oh to be a tourist in London as the election shakes out…

The drama, bordering on chaos, of the past five days in post-election Britain reminds me a bit of the fraught days after the Gore-Bush race in 2000. As a British politics junkie (I interned for a Labour MP in 1981 who was in the Cabinet until, um, five days ago. And I  have a dear friend who worked for another Cabinet member until, um, five days ago) I’ve been tuning into the BBC a lot online. One of the more amusing recent reports includes interviews with tourists hanging around Westminster – and documents the surrounding “media scrum” see: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/8678258.stm?ls

While there, you might check out the even more amusing video where Cameron admits referring to Clegg – in days past – as “a joke.” This is going to be interesting…

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April 23, 2010 · 1:11 am

In and out of Indy

Quick trip to Indianapolis for a writing project and I had just enough time to wander around for a few hours in the Mass Ave Arts & Theater District which is still fledgling but has potential. Kind of makes the East Village in Des Moines seem like a long-established hip neighborhood by comparison. It dawned on me today – and I don’t know why it didn’t earlier – that I’m drawn to these revived neighborhoods where small entrepreneurs open up little galleries, boutiques, cafes and restaurants in old renovated brick buildings because my mom and dad did the very same thing in the 1960s when they opened their gallery in a then-very-unhip Royal Oak, Mi. (The hipness there came, alas, after they moved the gallery.)

Anyway, it was a gorgeous day in Indy – in the 70s and sunny so fun to walk the few blocks down Mass Ave. I stopped at a good gift shop – Silver in the city – and bought some tchotkes for friends; then ate at Yat’s, a hippie dippie fast food creole/Cajun restaurant. It had a line out the door at noon – and better yet a fast moving line – so I joined the crowd. Didn’t care much for the jambalaya (where’s the sausage?) but liked the moch chous or macque choux (or”mock shoe”) a lot – a sweet spicy  cajun dish made w/carmelized onions, sweet corn and chicken. Also found a cute cupcake store and great old shoe store. I wished I had a bike to ride around some of the residential streets just west of Mass Ave which looked like they were filled with restored wood frame houses re-painted in lovely bright colors. Next time.

Walked past the amazing Soldiers and Sailors Monument/fountain downtown which was full of sunbathing office workers lounging on the steps leading to the tall ornate tower erected in the 1860s to honors Hoosiers who fought in various wars. Reminded me a bit of Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square – so I got some postcards of it to send my London pals.

I stayed overnight at The Canterbury Hotel – (yes, someone else was paying ) a lovely boutique hotel right downtown. I had a tiny room on the 12th floor – the door looked like it would open right into the wardrobe but narrowly missed smashing it.   I had a great view of downtown. Ate dinner at 14 West Restaurant – nice ambiance, so-so food – too much mayo-or-cream inspired sauces on things. Word to wise – instead of paying $39 for a cab to the airport (which we did on the trip into town) the best deal around is the $7 airport shuttle which stops near various hotels including mine.

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