2009 A Personal Retrospective

Patrick Copenhagen, Entertainment, Food, General, Music, Restaurants, Travel, UK Life

It’s that time of year to look back and see what’s been going on for 2009. It seems like it’s been a quieter year than most before and despite not wanting to do a lot of travel, it still seems like I ended up doing a fair amount.

Travel
The year started off in the US where I spent the day getting back from Boston before celebrating the New Year in New York. Since I was travelling to Marlow for work during the week, I didn’t end up going anywhere until March where I met the rest of the family in Japan.

Rather than hitting Tokyo, we met them in Osaka where we headed out to places like Kobe, Nara, Himeji and then spent the rest of the time visiting the temples and shrines of nearby Kyoto. April saw me head up north to visit my old flatmate, now living in York. The start of May then saw me head to Chicago for the first time, for a wedding and catching up with lots of people I knew living there.

I also took advantage of the great weather to head to Brighton for the first time. The end of may, I headed out to Sardinia for a conference where we ended up pretty much isolated from anyone else for the entire week. Great times yet I still remember the water being particularly cold.

It was around this time that I also started doing the weekly commute to Copenhagen for several months. I think I ended up staying over on the weekend twice – once to see what life in Denmark was really like, and then another to head over to Malmo (Sweden) on a very convenient and modern train.

August then saw me returning to Chicago for another conference before finishing off the year with a trip to Edinburgh in November and then Finland for a pre-Christmas holiday. I’d also mention travelling to Cambridge daily since returning from Copenhagen but other than eating out and resting, I don’t really get to see much of Cambridge.

Music
I don’t think I got to see as many bands this year seeing Aussie bands Eskimo Joe and The Living End in April, followed by amazing musician and talented whistler, Andrew Bird in May. I then saw John Butler outshine the Union Chapel in July. October then saw a flurry of activity including The Cribs, Franz Ferdinand and then Scottish musician, Calvin Harris play a sweat inducing performance at The Forum. The year finished off with a performance by Japanese musician, Ryuichi Sakomoto.

Food
I think this was definitely the year of the Michelin-starred restaurants for me. I was very thankful managing to find the only booking open in a three month window for the world’s 3rd best restaurant, Noma. What an unbelievable experience the tasting menu here was.

Amazingly local food accompanied by great service. I still remember the evening sun setting at just before midnight casting an amazing warmth into the converted warehouse when we sat down to eat.

We had just as an amazing meal at Restaurant Paustian v. Bo Bech before leaving Copenhagen. When visiting Chicago for the second time, I made sure to head out to Moto to enjoy the delights of clever cooking techniques and dining dazzlery. I can still picture the sparkling bombs that explode in the mouth for dessert. I also took my sister out to Rhodes 24 for her birthday (admittedly quite late in the year) and also ended up having a lunch at (overrated) Gordon Ramsey’s Maze restaurant. There was plenty of other amazing food places eaten ate but I woulnd’t be able to list them all.

Book Review: In Defense of Food

Patrick Books, Food, UK Life

One of the best things about the Christmas/New Year period is the downtime you get. For me, this has let me catch up on my reading list which has been growing for a while. One of the most significant books that I’ve read this year is Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food. I think that everyone should read this book, particularly if you are looking at being more healthy.

The book title sounds strange, yet when you read about his definition of food and the strange things the food industry giants have done, it makes a whole lot of sense. Admittedly it talks about problems more prevalent in the US, yet it is wholly applicable to all other nations as more and more drift in their direction. What is so great about this book is that it uncovers how very little we understand about food science and the complexities surrounding food and its benefits on health. Pollan exposes all the marketing tricks and misleading facts that lead to industries providing empty, nutritionless calories only serving to feed the modern diseases of obesity and type II diabetes.

The best part about this book is that it provides some simple advice that you can follow that leads you away from the manufactured artificial constructs you find on shelves towards real food. Simple rules such as don’t buy anything that contains more than five ingredients you don’t recognise, or eat meals not snacks and eat mostly plants, especially leaves. I don’t the UK or Australia suffers as much from the weird chemical contents of food as much as the US, but these rules still apply.

A highly recommended reading that will definitely affect the way that I shop, and the way that I eat.

Towards a Fluid State

Patrick Entertainment, Food, UK Life

Imagine bringing together the boutique suppliers of food, drink and unique innovative art to a warehouse in the middle of Dalston and you’ll start to get a feel for what Towards A Fluid State was all about. Everything was thought down to the littlest detail and every corner had surprises at all turns.

TowardsAFluidState

Not really knowing what to expect was part of the fun to it. All we knew when we bought the tickets is that the event would be located somewhere near Dalston, and even the wet weather and rain didn’t stop us from having a good time. The entrance was small, nothing more than a door down a dark alley (although you did have a blindingly obvious big arrow pointing should you look down from the high street). From there, you enter “passport control” where the lovely ladies behind The Tasting Sessions gives you your passports and the well-formed box that would hold your drinks and bite-sized foods. Any “flights of experience” you bought also end up stamped inside, alongside a free drink (randomly picked from each of the different tasting stands). Each stamp buys an experience, often a combination of three tipples from a particular type of spirit, combined with matching bite sized morsels.

Chair

The organisers divided the warehouse into differently themed rooms, centred around the unique combinations of food and drink, all compete with different types of entertainment. It’s hard to describe my favourite with the strong smells of La Fromagerie Cheese and Whiskey emanating from one (cleverly masking any smells that happened to escape from the restrooms) or the huge dining table near the Gin room atop which two roasted pig’s heads sat complete with sunglasses at night, contrasting the rest of the decadence surrounding them.

Our first “flight of experience” was easy, with a sampling of cold sake, provided by Akashi-Tai, and wonderfully tasting Japanese food provided by Tsuru (located near Southwark). A big fan of black sesame, we all agreed that the black sesame mochi was a definite highlight with mixed reactions to some of the different types of sake present. Present company preferred the classical flavours brought by one of the cleaner flights, although I was particularly interested by the more sharp flavours brought by the darkened sake shot.

We followed this with our free drink, provided by the Cognac stand which I went for the “Courvoisier Cooler.” Described as, “A generous serving of Courvoisier Exclusif lengthened with cloudy apple juice, topped with ginger beer, served long with ice” it definitely helped me cool down from the warmth starting to generate from both the spirits and the body heat generated from all the people present.

HogsHead

Some of our party, more particularly hungry swapped their next “flight of experience” for the roast hog meal, which I chose to take over to the Gin stand to watch one of the cocktail-meisters from the London Cocktail Club work his magic forming, “Sage, mint and lemon caviar” using some interesting chemical reactions. They also introduced me to the Chase Distillery’s unique Gin blend which really hit the spot filled with so much flavour. I was definitely pretty happy to give it a go although slightly disappointed I wasn’t able to yet find it anywhere to buy.

We found ourselves with some “flights of experience” and decided to enjoy ourselves back with various congacs, and with the more dessert-sized bites including a slightly salted caramel lollipop, a small Portugese custard tart, and a dark chocolate truffle matching each of the different spirits. Some of the cognacs we tried were really smooth (I think they were the more than 30 year old ones) and with so much depth of flavour.

CognacTasting

I remember wanting to leave the stronger whiskey flavours to last, but found ourselves at the end of their night where they’d almost run out of the cheese. By this time, they were happy to sample some of the more interesting blends of whiskey including some lovely single malts provided by Highland Park and Macallan.

I have to really put my hands together to thank the organisers, suppliers and all the people that put the event on. I love the passion the boutique suppliers demonstrated about their products, I love the interesting atmosphere and people that turned up and the quality of the whole experience made the whole night very enjoyable. It certainly helped that the food and drink were top notch as well.

SpeakEasy

Well done all for taking us Towards a Fluid State.

An american thanksgiving in london

Patrick Farringdon, Food, UK Life

This weekend I got to share in celebrating the American holiday, thanksgiving with some friends from the US. I hosted it at my place considering we had a little bit of a bigger kitchen.

Finding a fresh turkey at this time of year wasn’t as hard as I thought it could be with turkey being a traditional English Christmas bird. I ended up ordering a non frozen organic bird from the wonderful butchers in Marylebone, The Ginger Pig. I can’t say it was particularly cheap but it was definitely one tasty bird.

Turkey

Thanksgiving ended up a whole day affair since the bird needed plenty of time to cook. This gave us plenty of time to chill out, watch some television and drink some wine. One of the traditions was for each guest to bring or prepare some dish that represents their background, so we ended up with many different dishes for the evening. Combined with a 7.5kg turkey, let’s just say that there was plenty of leftovers at the end of the night.

Now my only challenge has been to work out what other things I can cook with turkey as a meat.

Trip to Edinburgh

Patrick Food, Travel, UK Life

The last couple of weeks have been amazingly busy. I seriously don’t know where all the has been going. I know at least where this last weekend went as I took the train from Kings Cross up to Edinburgh. Figuring that I come into this station from work anyway, I figured it’d be easiest getting on a train that takes about four and half four rather than catching planes, waiting for airport security and then catching a bus on the other side. I’m really glad I did as well. The train was comfy although going first class doesn’t include a meal like the Virgin trains do. These ones to Edinburgh are taken care of by the National Rail East Coast line. I reserved a table so that I’d have access to power sockets although I didn’t need to worry since I think all of those seats came with it.

Our trip to Edinburgh (seemingly like many trips) centred around hanging out with friends enjoying good food and wine. Eight of us went up, having a lunchtime booking for Michelin-starred Restaurant Martin Wishart.

MartinWishart

We had an amazing meal (more of that over here) and plenty of wine to go along with it. Like many great meals I’ve had recently, this one seemed a bit like a marathon taking just under four hours to complete. We were lucky then that this place was a couple of streets away from the vaults of the Scotch Malt Whiskey Society.

Whiskey

We spent the rest of the afternoon until early in the evening sitting around in the dark oaked halls of the vaults, sipping a wide variety of drams and simply enjoying each other’s company. It definitely got busy towards the end of the evening, where we stepped out to grab a quick meal before heading home to our wonderful apartments. The next morning we had breakfast at Urban Angel, one of the best places for a Sunday brunch before walking around town and having to return to London early afternoon.

One other place worth visiting if you’re in Edinburgh and dying for a good coffee is Artisan Roast. It’s got a fantastic little vibe and particularly great coffee.

Breakfast Etiquette

Patrick Copenhagen, Food, Travel

Last week I was staying at the very nice Admiral Hotel, located near the riverside in Copenhagen. Like most hotel breakfasts, theirs was a buffer complete with a four slice toaster. I thought it’d be nice to have a single slice of toast with my breakfast, proceeding to put a single slice into the toaster before wandering off to add a few other items to my plate.

I sat down, watching from afar, waiting for the toast to pop when I saw another guy put some bread into the toaster. Thinking nothing of it, he waited for the toaster to pop and proceed to take both slices of bread, including mine.

I’m not quite sure what he was thinking but I certainly found it strange. At least there wasn’t any shortage of bread to toast.

Japanese Food

Patrick Food, Travel

John asked me to post a review about some sushi in Japan and thought I’d try to cover a little bit more. Admittedly we ate loads of different things, and I’m pleased that the rest of the family were also happy to try lots of different things.

sushi

Sushi
I only had sushi for two (or three?) meals. We ended up at a sushi kaiten (train) place so we got a big variety, although I think most other sushi places were the make-as-you-order variety. The latter also means that you end up ordering lots of small pieces, and the price adds up very quickly. Many places also serve the recognisable onigiri sushi (triangle sushi rice wrapped with seaweed and filled with something) such as the first hotel where a large variety of it was served for breakfast.

One noticeable thing about the sushi is that all of the toppings are super fresh. You can get that here in London, though it can be really expensive. Fresh fish and toppings are super critical to the Japanese and I nothing ever seemed to smell the slightest bit fishy (a huge indicator it’s off). It’s hard for me to conclude whether or not it was better, after all I’ve had some good sushi in London as well (Yo Sushi doesn’t count).

takoyaki

Takoyaki
Octopus balls are the quintessential Osaka prefecture delicacy. It’s almost like fast food with so many little stalls set up to serve the gooey balls covered in a salty brown sauce and topped off with seaweed and bonito flakes. I think it’s an interesting process to watch them make it, pouring a batter on to a black iron cast pan that looks very much like a Poffertjes pan and then quickly turning each individual ball with an elongated toothpick as it sets and seeding it with a touch of octopus in the middle.

I enjoyed trying it but I can’t say that I would have lots more of it. I think I was expecting something a bit more on the lines of a fishball, yet turned out a bit too gooey for my tastes.

okonomiyaki

Okonomiyaki
I love okonomiyaki, yet another regional speciality. I love it so much, I’ve even made it a few times at home (it’s not really that hard!) It’s hard to describe and frankly the common description of a savoury pancake doesn’t really do it that much justice. It’s fascinating to watch the chefs make it on the griddle (although they also have a number of places you can do it yourself), expertly forming it into a round shape, and cooking it well through before drizzling Japanese mayonnaise in fine drizzles and okonomiyaki sauce before topping with the seaweed and bonito flakes again.

unagidon

Unagi (Eel) Don (Rice bowl)
Anyone who’s gone out to eat sushi with me will know of my long standing obsession for the unagi nigiri. Succulent eel meat, grilled and then glazed with a nice sauce makes for such a tasty treat that I don’t think I ever resisted an opportunity to have the larger version whilst in Japan, the Unagi-Don.

Unagi is a speciality and considered a bit more of a luxury dish, therefore it tends to be a bit pricier than other typical Japanese dishes. Compared to the costs of it here in England though, it’s relatively better value.

Other dishes
Of course we had a huge amount of lots of other different Japanese dishes (ramen, udon, katsudon, bento), but the ones above were definitely the highlights of the trip.