You are what you eat

Which normally would mean I bounce between an overzealous and occassionally successful cook and a skint student living on Heinz baked beans, but when the parents come to town it is a whole different matter. This is why I have decided to share here the treasures that we have discovered during a 4-day gastronomic orgy.

Due to my mother's excessive need for shopping our first destination can be found spitting distance from Oxford Circus, just off of Carnaby Street, under 14-16 Fouberts Place (map). Carnaby Burger Co. serves massive and delicious yet healthy burgers and its broccoli and courgette soup had me licking my fingers. Don't recommend however their Welness Salad, which is bland and tastes like a handful of grass (despite the avocado). You went to a place that has the word 'Burger' in it. Eat a burger. Or at least the chicken wings.

To get away from the often unbearable hustle and bustle of the Selfridges' area, we wondered up towards Marylbone and found Seabass on 40 James Street (map). Lovely service, friendly environment (you can see into the kitchen and unlike a lot of places it looks clean and orderly) and the food was great. Simple, but delicious, you can literally hear the waves of the sea in this highly recommended little Mediterranean place!

If you are looking for a great gastro pub after a walk through Regent's Park (granted you are at the Great Portland Street corner) look no further than the Queen's Head and the Artichoke at 30-32 Albany Street (map). Quaint atmosphere and the food, organized in tapas style, is to die for. Soups, meat, and an abundance of small vegetarian dishes is waiting for the tired traveller-walker. Weekend nights I suggest to make reservations. If we are talking about tapas, not the English interpretation of it, but the real deal, well we have found a gem, without a doubt. Under 195 Great Portland Street (map) lies Iberica, a place where you will have earth-shattering gastro-orgasms in your mouth, believe you me. The cheese plate comes from cheese that have their own humidor (!) and the legs of ham hang from the ceiling like morning dew on the grass. They even have their own delicatessen, which can be admired while trying not to 'un-Spanishly' devour my food faster than my wine. Naturally, I can recommend the Serrano Ham and the mixed cheese plate, if you are looking for a well-rounded general experience. The padron peppers (nothing like when I attempt it in the kitchen) are succulent and not overly salty, and the thought of the white bean stew with chorizo and morcilla makes my stomach growl. They have a good paella selection as well, although for that I cannot vouch, but will provide an update as soon as my parents return. And finally, if you are looking for a great Japanese, this one is especially recommended if your night is taking you to the Famous London Jazz Cafe, as it is located right next to it (map). Bento Cafe is adorably authentic and has a great selection of food besides sushi. The portions resemble more of a Chinese restaurant than the more moderate Japanese sizing. The only downside is, try not to peep into the kitchen on your way to the loo. It is not sightly and I would strongly urge them to put a door to cover up the mess.
Overall, if I am what I eat, I have become a world-traveller in the space of 4 days, and I haven't even left the wonderful city that gave us all this exciting foodly experiences!

Orphans' Easter

There is a delightful tradition in Hungary originating in the countryside that on Easter Monday the boys come to the houses of the single girls and they 'water' them to presumably make them cleaner (?) or more attractive (?) so as to help them find themselves a man, while chanting some little poem to speed up this process. The girls, in exchange, give the boy brightly painted eggs. Of course modernity and city-life has considerably altered this little custom. Now it is more often than not cheap perfume that is sprinkled, leaving you stinking to high heavens at the end of the day if you are not careful. It is possible that instead of eggs the boys are given money(!); how terrible is that? And the poems have gradually transformed from cute, into flirty to outright offending sometimes. But no matter how much modern times have altered the habits of Easter Monday, today I am definitely longing for them. To eat ham, hard-boiled egg and horseradish sauce with the family! To wake up to my father mischievously sneaking into my room and soaking me in my own bed and then cook for the boys, family members or friends, who trickle in during the day for a bite, a painted egg and to see my sister and I standing in front of them, in raincoats, prepared for the screaming and the shower to begin.

All I want is a bucket of water to stick my head in this hangover Monday morning. Friday's housewarming was a success, we managed to not piss off any neighbours and friends from all parts of my life seem to bond with each other and with M. I just let about two hectoliters of beer somehow trickle down my throat, so I just sat in the corner lovingly and sentimentally admiring all this bonding. Saturday, M and I started exploring our territory, marking it not (necessarily) with urine samples, but with the (non-) memories of alcohol fueled nights. First on the list was the two centrally located, non-paying Camden establishments, the World's End and the Camden Eye. Cool-randomer numero uno of the night was the old dude who, out of his numerous fanny-packs, was selling cigarettes for 4 quid and tiny bottles of vodka for 3. Or lighters if that was what you wanted, and I am sure that wasn't the whole extent of the contents he carried around, just to make you the deal of your life. Cool-randomer numero dos was the guy dressed in black with large circles of make up around his eyes, from Glasgow. Surprisingly we did manage to understand him, and he shared with us the reason for his celebration, as around supper-time he managed to bump into Pete Doherty and was extremely excited about that. On this note I gotta say, maybe his story left such an imprint on my mind that I could've sworn I also saw PD from the bus the next day jumping into a cab with two other people. Anyway, the PD fan from Glasgow decided to hug it out with M, he kept saying that we are such good people and extensively wishing M good luck on his start in London. I think M was just simply over excited about his first drunken chat in London. Well, I understand. The dude was fun. 

Hoping for a quiet night in, because I was aiming to go to the library the next day, I laid low, trying not to arouse the attention of anyone who might want to party. This of course shot to hell, when a friend appeared with a bottle of vodka, which I of course topped up with an other one, and we proceeded to have a raging night in Proud, the hip-hop, tip-top club, Camden's belle-de-jour. The two main rooms contain different and ever-changing music styles, but if you want to drink yourself silly before hopping on the dancefloor you can do that in the stable boxes located all the way to the terrace kept up for the crazy smokers. Really great place, will be returning soon. 

And now, for your viewing pleasure the photo of the day

Novelties

It's been over a week I've moved into my (presently 'our') new place, and haven't had internet since, which led to the curious finding that I can procrastinate by reading non-required material, instead of taking notes on any of the 15 books that I should. So I am typing away from a cafe in Camden, and trying to conjure up the number of happenings of last weekend. 

The new apartment is fab, and I didn't notice any real problems with it until I fancied myself up, put on my Saturday-dress and headed for the door. Promptly I bounced back. It was stuck. Locked. Unmovable. Yanking the door. Panic. More yanking. More panic. You know what is more terrifying than being stuck outside of your place? It's to be stuck inside. There is very little to do there, if you are alone that is. There is a whole world outside, so I came to the, maybe surprising, conclusion that any day I would rather be stuck outside with the world, than inside, with virtually nothing to do, just circling around like a poisoned mouse. I had a randez-vous with a friend I met in Colombia. Unfortunately, his cell is Swedish and I quickly ran out of 'foreign credit', so after begging him to come and rescue me, I had to resort to calling an other friend with a UK cell to call Sweden and continue the directions, while I glued myself to the little window of my entrance door. The door was pried open after some considerable efforts by my friend and later on by the neighbour's part. At this point I only had time for a quick catch up drink with my knight in shining armour, before heading up to fancy restaurant numero dos this weekend, Tamarai. Unfortunately, the night before, I couldn't properly enjoy numero uno, as I already had dinner at a remote, little, nevertheless exquisite, phillippino restaurant at the end of Charlotte street. So when I arrived to Gaucho , and they brought out the glisteringly beautiful and mouthwatering stakes on a cutting board to choose from; in tears I had to resign myself to the idea of having a miserable little ceviche, which, naturally, was nothing compared to the ones to be had on a Peruvian beach under lot less glittery circumstances. Saturday night was spent, well, spending. We ended up in Sketch, whose egg shaped toilets still cause me little shivers of joy when casting eyes upon them. I'm pretty sure it is quite bizarre to get so excited about toilets, but I can't help it. 

I can no longer pretend that I still have even a morsel of bagel left on my plate, so I will dutifully and with head hanging proceed to pack up my stuff and head back to the library. Tear. 

Out and about

I met up with a former classmate and friend from the alma mater tonight in the chic, up-and-coming bar Aqua Nueva. Beautiful design, amazing smells of food streaming in from their Spanish and Japanese themed restaurants and the usual uptight and overdressed crowd. We had a great time, and she suggested that, after two bottles of Cava, we take a wonder down to Cuckoo Club, her often frequented place to hang out. Which would have been, supposedly, great fun, except that she has been drinking since lunch, so the doorman whom she was tight with, deemed her unfit to enter even before she opened her mouth. We hang around for a bit, trying to convince him that she wasn't as unstable as she may have appeared, but he was unmoved. Sharing a fag, trying to figure out the future party options, I mentioned that as she usually went out alone, my presence as a sort of chaperone, could have impeded her chances of getting in. Before long, she bade me goodbye to attempt her way into the club on her own. 

This is a thing I really hate about London. You can never actually aim at going out on a weekend night without sufficient amount of planning. You either circle around town like 'bird-shit in the air' as the Hungarian saying goes, or you are giving up all your self-respect, trying to beg your way into where you want to party. A total buzz killer. 

I was expecting having dinner before the catching up deteriorated into the Cava, so I was pretty gone and completely exhausted from a day of library-ing after only the alcohol part of the night delivered. Catching the night buses to Notting Hill I got the chance to observe the desperate crowd lined up in front of Amica. There was even a guy in wheelchair involved, for the sake of persuasion. For crying out loud.

Optimistically enough, I was wearing heels, despite the breaking and tumbling incidents of last weekend. I usually speed-walk to the rhythm of my music, so, my Ipod on shuffle, out of the 3631 songs (just checked for the sake of accuracy) I stumbled upon the following two great tunes, which I kept playing over and over to slow me down, to cheer me up and to give me a nice chilled way of walking, without tripping over anything. 

Ok, never mind, somehow I can't upload or attach the videos from YouTube, but here are the links. 

I Heard It Through The Grapevine by Marvin Gaye

and

Nika Pata Lambo by Kaissa