Tea Time in Wonderland

Posts Tagged ‘Brick lane’

Oh well, I have tried and tried but my thoughts keeps strolling from my work files but they do keep straying towards the week-end…

- Fancy a free haircut on Friday? Check this way…

- The Natural History Museum will stay open late. Jazz? Glass of wine on the Darwin center terrasse? Night walk in the wildlife garden?

- Party @ the V&A Summer Camp. Bombay Sapphire will have a design cardboard bar with stylised cardboard glasses (but real cocktails). A great way to enjoy their late evening.

- You can even go on to the Serpentine pavillion and sleepover… Midnight feast, films and even breakfast in the morning…

- I really must try to find a free Saturday morning and do this guided tour of the Somerset House!

- The extraordinary Chilly Gonzales will be @ the field day on Saturday…

- Latin fever @ the Carnaval del pueblo!

- Even more music with the Croydon festival…

- A classic, but have you done it yet? Buckingham Palace is open for the summer….

- Have a spooky evening…

- Saturday, head for Brick Lane: free cocktails, demo of Urban Art and even a tattoo session! You might also decide to stay around and go bowling in this fab diner… Perfect for Sunday’s festival: bowling but British, music and dancing!

- It’s open air cinema season! A whole programme @ the Somerset House… Act crazy for Mamma Mia and choose funky colours… The Wapping Project proposes a barbecue with your movie…

- You already knew routemasters could ne recycled as veggie restaurants (the root-master is my favourite). Well, one of those goes around, proposing German food!

- Oooooh, as soon as I’m on holiday, I am going to book myself one of those fab afternoon teas… Now, chocolate or pink? (vegan and gluten free versions are proposed)

-What about the kids? Little ones will love the teddies picnic @ Covent Garden on Saturday… Teenagers will much prefer to go to the underage festival!

- Give! Exchange!

Pssst, heads up for next week! There will be a maze @ Trafalgar (with dragons and Chinese cooking on Tuesday). And Selfridge’s is to open their Xmas shop too…

Hey, anyone has a great address for a roof terrasse for cocktails?

Have you seen the weather forecasts? Extraordinary: 24 degrees on Friday, 22 the rest of the week-end… Grab your T-shirt, a pitcher of pimm’s, invade the  beer gardens and lawns!

- Start on Thursday night by dancing in a park…

- Or try one of those summer walks…

- Isn’t it the ideal time to have lunch on a terrasse overlooking Kensington Gardens?

- unless you’re up for a picnic?

- Forget central London and have a look at the Wimbledon Mill…

- If you did not get a chance to enjoy the Night of the Museums last week-end, no worry, here are a few more opportunities…

- Fancy some exotism? Baishaki, the bangali festival is on Sunday: delicious food, music, parade…

- Street art fan? It’s the Dream Factory you need!

You’ll find me shopping for cupcakes and heading for the late opening of the Enchanted Kensington Palace. How will you celebrate summer?

Pssst: don’t forget that next Monday, the boat in the bottle is moving to Trafalgar square!

Another rainy week-end ahead… Smile! Just take your umbrella on an adventure…

Here’s to put you in the mood:

- The Portobello Winter festival starts this wednesdau and will have thematic nights every Wednesday till Xmas

- Don’t forget to get prepared for those Xmas parties and meals: celebrate Thanksgiving!

Feeling better? Here’s for the week-end:

- Head for the new pop-ups before they blow away with the fashion wind… Nes-cafe @ Liberty and the famous Parisian Colette on Brick Lane

- Need your weekly dose of street art? Hoorray! Mutate opens its doors again @ Portobello.

- Even Damien Hirst is back @ the White Cube Gallery. It’s still time to see his No love lost @ the Wallace collection

- Spendid news pictures @ The Royal Festival Hall…

- Alternatively hum Only you @ Proud Chelsea… Great pics of a young Elvis.

- Kids will find happiness in Covent Garden – there will be a real reindeer to pat Saturday afternoon. Parents will probably prefer the amazing jewel exhibition that flashes magic lights under UVs…

You’ll find me @ the Secret Cinema… and having an underground afternoon tea. What’s YOUR program?

My notebook is full. So much going on, where to start this week-end?

- Feeling like breaking the routine? Funny knittin? Hoola-hooping? Try the alternative village fete on Southbank!Free!

- Rush and see the extraordinary/shocking Anish Kapoor @ the Royal Academy of Art (£1 reduction here)

- Travel through the Mexican civilisation with the Moctezuma exhibition @ the British Museum

- Pause @ the latest pop-up cafe, Central Perk, a copy of the one in Friends? Free!

- Love design? Redecorate and lighten your bank account with Tent @ the Truman Brewery

- Try the Wonderland exhibition, inspired by classical fairy tales @ the V&A childhood Museum with my daughter? Free!

- Celebrate Eid, the end of Ramadan @ Trafalgar square. Music, poetry, wonderful food, persian art exhibition… Free!

And on Sunday…

- Don’t miss the Pearlies parade @ the Coastermonger’s harvest festival! Marching band, colours, even donkeys… (be there at 13.00) Free!

- Aller feter le 10eme anniversaire de Regent St, ferme a la circulation pour l’occasion. Musique! Venez danser dans la rue!Gratuit!

Discover different kinds of apples @ Fenton House for their apple day (11.00-16.30). Wokshops for kids, demonstration, apple delicacies, mmmmh…. £2.50/adult, free for children

- Have a musical time with the Peace concert @ Trafalgar Square. Free!

- Feeling peckish? Try the Brick Lane Curry festival…

Root-master is definitely my best address at the moment. I am going to bring all my visiting friends there!

I came accross it completely hasardly. I wasn’t hungry either but c’m'on, this is so iconic: I just couldn’t resist having dinner in a double decker bus! This one actually drove through the capital from 1967 to 1994 and is very atmospheric. Of course, you have to be on the first floor. Candles in the evening, stools on the side, a few tables, a whole corner turned into little sofas and just perfect for celebrations.

I wasn’t disappointed. Rarely have I had such a warm, funny, splendid welcome. They treated me as if I was a favoured regular.

The menu is entireley vegetarian. Intimidates? Don’t be. I’m a carnivore. I never resist a nice a steak. But the root-master burger is just out of this world, it litterally melts in your mouth. It’s so good you don’t even pause to wonder at the fact that there is not a gram of meat in it. And believe me, I have tested my share of burgers, basic, greasy, market ones to food fusion, quality, experimental, delicious, juicy ones. No, for me, this one is the best ever. And the potato wedges are splended too, lightly salted, tender. I wonder if they do extra servings of these? And do try the home made tomato sauce too -  what a lovely texture! I hesitated to lick it off the plate. With a ginger lemonade this was nirvana-like.

My only regret? I really, really wasn’t hungry enouh for a desert. The girls at the next table mentionned the Banana Cream pie as being amazing and I am truly intrigued by the Sweet Mumbai carrots -  slow cooked carrots with caramel served in a sangunello orange cream sauce,  with sanguinello oranges and rum soaked raisins. Sounds finger licking good!

Prices are very reasonable: £6.5 for a burger that is a real meal. Deserts are £5 et £6.5.

Everything is cooked on the ground floor of the bus -  and the team is French! That makes me real proud. They focus on being green too – local products, recycling, limiting waste. Take-out dinnerware is made of corn and potato starch and is biodegradable in 180 days.

An easy conclusion: bravo! Keep going!

Parents: the first floor is not for pushchairs (ah! Public transports!) not a baby. However, this is perfectly manageable with a 2-3 year old and +. You can also settle for th outside tables – sounds wonderful on a sunny day especially as the kids can run around on that place safely. You’re only a minute from Brick Lane and a 5 mn walk to the Spitafield City Farm. And if your kids prove fascinated by the bus, get the tube to Covent Garden and take them to the London Transport Museum with its collection of historic buses…

Old Truman Brewery car park
Off Dray Walk,
London, E1 6QL
Metro/tube: Liverpool street

Each year takes place the traditional boat race between Cambridge  and Oxford. An institution! 2009 actually shows the 155th one. It’s a question of honour for both universities.

Others, like the Spitafiled City Farm, much prefer a fun version of it…. and are launching the Cambridge vs Oxford Goat Race. Elementary, my dear Watson!

Amazing how many people actually came to what I was expecting to be a small event. Many actually decided to play the game, worked on their looks, mad it a little Ascott like.

Others, like me, will bet on a winner. Did the length and elegance play a role in choosing them?

I can already hear some whispering Poor things! How cruel! Well, believe me: had you seen Oxford make the orgnaizers go round and round, you would have been reassured. That part was actually as good as the race itself!

But now pressure is mounting. The crows is getting enthusisatic. the goast are racing, the cameras are flashing, people are clapping.

Cambridge, no matter how small she looked, will win by a mile. In real life, Oxford 9counting a world champion in its team) wins the race.

The race was over in less than a minute (17 or so on the Thames) but the atmosphere was so very Alice in Wonderland! I’ll be there next year, with my teapot, and will play the Mad Hatter.

Spitalfields City Farm
Buxton Street
London E1 5AR