Janet at Royal Albert Hall: Number Ones: Up Close and Personal Tour

Posted on June 30, 2011 by Grace

Janet Jackson is an absolutely legendary singer and her music played a large part of my life in the 1990s. I couldn’t believe it when I heard that she was coming to the Royal Albert Hall for a concert. I was immediately on the website looking for tickets but was put off by the very expensive prices! Jo wanted to see Janet too so we comprised and got tickets Circle … which is only one level down from Standing! and it was still nearly £60 …

Doors opened at 7.00 for a 7.30 start. We thought that she might have had a support act but to our surprise there was no one! Finally, after 50 minutes, Janet made her appearance on stage! I couldn’t believe how good she looked – you’d hardly believe that she was already 45 years old!

I went to one Janet concert when I was about 16 years old. I know – a long time ago! And I remember how amazing the concert was from the cool sets, to our outfits to her way over the top energetic dancing. It was so theatrical and more than just Janet getting up on stage and singing/dancing. We didn’t really get this tonight … perhaps it was the venue which was limiting and yes there was smoke, there was a dance troupe, but it was fairly stock standard. Apart from the fact that there were a lot of videos that were used to fill in time – like showing all her clips from when she was on TV (like on Different Strokes), and her movies (Mo’ Money), and all her photo shoots. Each clip went for what felt like 10 minutes. If I had to guess I’d say Janet was on stage for about 70 minutes at most?

However, that is not to say we didn’t have a good time. It was fantastic to hear Janet live again. She has lost none of her voice or her moves and she was very gracious to the audience – blowing loads of kisses, saying she loved us, tagging those in the front row etc. but she didn’t really chat much (so it was more Up Close and less Personal.)

From the audience reaction she is still a much-loved icon which was really lovely to see. When she sang Scream in duet with Michael – the crowd reaction was just ridiculous. Fan loyalty was very touching. Her encore was a tribute to Michael, singing Together Again with arms outstretched to the air – so beautiful.

It was a nice trip down memory lane and if there was anything Janet inspired me to do tonight, it was to get out all her old stuff and onto my iphone!

PS Disappointingly no wardrobe malfunctions! 😉

Wimbledon 2011

Posted on June 25, 2011 by Grace

Akh proved he once again has the lucky charm when it comes to winning Wimbledon tickets. This year he couldn’t go so I was very lucky that he offered them to me. Best thing was that it was on middle Saturday on Centre Court so not only did I not have to take a day off, we were also guaranteed some high caliber matches.

I met D fairly early so we could have a look at what was going on around the outside courts. A group of protesters in the queue, however, held us up a little bit – officials had decided to shut the gates so gate opening time was delayed for nearly an hour. I was impressed that the protesters were identified – apparently they had paint and other stuff hidden in bags to make their protest banners. This didn’t delay the start of play, however, nor dissuade anyone from visiting Wimbledon. There were sooo many people inside already by the time we made it inside the gates.

The weather, though a little bit sketchy this past week, had been clear enough that matches had been moving on schedule so as a result many of the outside courts had mostly doubles and junior matches. The biggest star that we saw, that I knew at any rate, was Tamarine Tanasugarn who was playing a doubles match. Because Wimbledon was so crowded today it was actually quite difficult to get around to many of the courts to see many other matches. Just as well D and I had our centre court tickets!

Our seats on centre court weren’t quite the last row … but they practically were! I didn’t mind though because it meant that I could come to Wimbledon. The good thing about our seats were that we were sat with a view of the Royal Box – and today a whole heap of sports starts were in the box including Martina Navratilova, Sir Steve Redgrave, Dame Kelly Holmes, Jonathan Edwards, Sachin Tendulkar, Sir Roger Bannister, Amy Williams (won gold at the Winter Olympics if you don’t know) and a whole host of rugby, football and cricket stars. We were also marking Armed Forces Day so there were 14 members of the armed forces, nominated for exceptional service, in the box.

Three matches on Centre court for us today. First up was women’s number one seed Caroline Wozniacki who defeated Aussie Jarmila Gajdosova fairly handily but I must say that I felt that Jarmila lost the match more than Caroline won it. Though Caroline had some good shots – it was Jarmila who was going for everything. Unfortunately her unforced errors outweighing her winners meant she went down … but at least she went down fighting.

Next up on court was Roger Federer who outclassed David Nalbandian. Roger was just pure class and it was great to see him so comfortable in his element. There is just such an ease to his game and its like he can just turn the power or touch on just like that.

And yes, there were the shirt taking off moments too …

Final game of the match was Novak Djokovic (the number two seed this year) against Marcos Baghdatis. I really find it hard to like Novak. In today’s match he came across a spoilt little boy, he even broke his racquet! Nice butt though …

Marcos did well to keep up with Novak but the actually game wasn’t the kind of match that was very entertaining even if it was quite a close one. There were lots of long drawn out and often unexciting rallies. D and I left at the end of the third set!

Viajante

Posted on June 19, 2011 by Grace

When Viajante hit my to-eat list it was before it was awarded its Michelin star, and the reason I added it to my list was that it promised El Bulli / Fat Duck-esque type exploration of food without the El Bulli / Fat Duck-esque prices. It was supposed to be exciting, innovative, challenging. It’s a shame I didn’t get to visit before it was awarded its star this year, so I can never really know what impact the award has had in the restaurant.

Nevertheless, I thought it would be a nice restaurant to take Sandra to for her birthday.

Viajante is located in what used to be Bethnal Green’s Old Town Hall – a beautiful edifice, now also converted to a Hotel – and inside it is light and airy and actually a lot more casual than you would imagine. The kitchen is an open kitchen though those in the second room, like us, can only catch a glimpse because of the wall in between.

Rather cutely the wine list is incorporated into a “100 Great Wonders of the World” book to reinforce the “Traveler” theme of the restaurant (viajante is traveler in Portugese.) The personal touches of the restaurant came in little things like being given a bag hook … though rather oddly we were only given one … and bringing out free champers to celebrate Sandra’s birthday. 🙂

The first innovation that was evident in the restaurant was the bread. We were served hot potato bread served with two brown butters – one with crispy potato and black pudding and one with crispy chicken, iberica ham and potato powder. Neither were overwhelming in flavour but were sufficiently different to put them into a nice for a change category.

We were then served two amuse bouche: “Thai Explosion II” which consisted of crispy chicken skin on one side, coconut something on the other and chicken confit and quail egg and the second this Home Made Cheese with Peas and Spring Flowers. The first dish was great but the second dish was, despite how pretty it looked, was very plain tasting, except for the crust of salt! It was like tofu it had so little flavour.

Then it was on to our 6-Course tasting lunch. First course was Mackerel, cream sponge, preserved lemon and wood sorrel dressing. Not a fan of this sadly. The cream sponge rather oddly had the consistency and taste of the home-made cheese from our amuse bouche (namely flavourless and rather like tofu), and the mackerel was much too strong tasting for me, and I like fish! Both Sandra and I agree that the best part of this dish was the preserved lemon. It was the tiniest part of the dish but the best tasting!

The second dish continued on with the looking pretty but containing mild flavour concept. White, green and wild asparagus with milk skin. Very disappointingly bland! Though the clear jelly like “sauce” poured at the table around our dish did have a good asparagus flavour.

A photo break

And on to more food. This is a better close-up of the dish that is sitting in front of Sandra. Acorda de camarao (Confit egg yolk, Japanese prawn, fennel, and bread salsify.) This was very interesting and very rich. The egg yolk had been perfectly cooked and the prawns were fresh. Not sure I was feeling the bread salsify. I’ve had a bit too much of that this year.

The next dishes came as a pair – Bacalhau dos Mundos (Cod of the Worlds). The first thing to come to our table were two orange peels which was part of part one of the dish. Cod influenced by Japan, orange and tomato water, dill , seaweed, orange peel spritzed. Yeah, I couldn’t see the code either.

Part two was nicer – Cod from Portugal with crispy onion and potato and caramelised onion. This was really really lovely! The texture from the crispy onion did well to offset the silken texture of the cod.

Moving on to our meat dish (and our final savory dish) – lamb with coffee, macadamia and broad beans. I’m not a huge fan of lamb but this was actually my favourite dish at lunch. It was so full of flavour and contrasts. Everything that had come before it, with probably the exception of the second part of the cod dish and our amuse, was just too sub-par on the flavour levels.

Desserts were a delight. First a pannacotta ice cream with shiso granite and green apple cubes. I just didn’t like the bowl it came in – because it felt horrible to scoop from, it was like someone running their nails down a blackboard.

Reduced ilk ice cream, condensed milk, cucumber raw, smoked and pickled and black sesame made up our final dessert. I was rather surprised that, despite the different ingredients, that it was very similar to the first dessert. Thought it could have been taken into a totally different direction.

The petit four were interesting – there was a shot glass of cinnamon something, a jelly and then a mushroom (cep) truffle. What? A really odd flavour on the tongue!

So, food was quite below my expectations at Viajante. I was expecting to be stunned, to be surprised, to be excited but I wasn’t. Sure, I could see that there was an attempt to challenge our preconceptions of how food should be delivered and combined but from a flavour-perspective it just didn’t deliver. This was the greatest disappointment of the day. In all other aspects it was an enjoyable experience – the food looked good (though was quite minimalist), the restaurant had a nice relaxed atmosphere, food was pricey (£50 for the 6 courses) but filtered water was free and they didn’t overcharge on our soft drinks, and finally service was great throughout the meal, everyone made an effort to say happy birthday to Sandra and we were each given a menu upon leaving.

Perhaps we just visited on an off day for the kitchen. Reviews seem mixed as to whether food delivers on taste – would I come back again? The jury is still out on that one.

Visit to Paul and Kelly’s

Posted on June 18, 2011 by Grace

The snow last year prevented our visit to see Paul and Kelly, their new daughter and their new house so finally, months and months later, we finally had a chance to visit. I couldn’t believe how big Eimer had grown already! As much as she has grown in the last eight months or so it was rather entertaining to watch her unwrap the present I got her – it was nearly as big as she was!

What a little cutey!

It was great to catch up with Paul and Kelly and see their new digs. Kelly cooked us up a delicious lunch including a gorgeous pasta – white, just how I love my pasta sauces!

Royal Ascot 4.0

Posted on June 16, 2011 by Grace

This year is the first year that we’ve been to Royal Ascot where the weather has been really sh!tty – that didn’t stop us (and many others) from making the most of the day though and, actually, it was quite nice to change things up a little bit. Never mind the fact that I destroyed my shoes (my brand new heels!) within the first half an hour of being track-side! Ha ha. Just as well I’d brought another pair of shoes (flats) and my thongs! LOL!

Getting to Ascot is always a good move any year but in particular this year when space under tents and tables were at the premium. We were rather amused to watch the people around us and how people were sneaking chairs away from tables where they could!

It was pretty civil to begin with …

… but got very crowded and crazy later on …

… and I love this moment where we were surrounded by the granny brigade! I felt bad about not giving them our seats but they soon found seating around us anyway.

Due to the rain this was the closest I go to the Queen this year. She was in a lovely peach outfit and was looking very bright considering the weather on the outside.

The weather might have been a downer but the race results were pretty good for me this year. Was it because I’d promised the guys at work that I’d donate all winnings to their 100km walking effort in the South Downs? In either case my race plan of choosing by name and choosing horses with larger odds worked quite well with wins in four out of six races. And its always nice to win on the last race of the day – so was very happy to be celebrating along with owner of the horse Mark Owen 🙂

The boys and I had a lovely day and we’re looking forward to Ascot 2012. Let’s hope for better weather though!

The Mercer Restaurant & Bar

Posted on June 13, 2011 by Grace

A groupon deal promised a 7-course tasting menu at The Mercer and it seemed like good timing with Rache visiting London for work that we could go and dine in her local ‘hood. The Mercer has a very city-feel so the diners this evening were, in the majority, suits. But, we had no problem with that as long as the food and the service was good 😉

You’d be hard pressed to actually call every dish that we had tonight an actual course so to describe it as a 7-course tasting menu was a bit ambitious, it was more like 3 or 4 full courses with 3 or 4 half-courses. However, there could be no complaining about the quality and taste of the food and actually it was probably just the right amount for a satisfying meal tonight.

We started with a spring pea and mint soup with crumbled feta. This was divine and one of the best tasting pea soups I’ve ever tasted. The feta (with fennel), however, didn’t really add anything and was the first thing that Rache and I tried to get rid of.

Smoked mackerel spread, capers, malted toast was okay though I’m not the best person to judge such dishes as pates and like are not really my thing. They could have been more generous with the toast – we couldn’t finish even half our spread despite best efforts as there wasn’t enough toast! and it was simply too rich to eat on its own.

Next up – Watt’s farm asparagus hollandaise. The hollandaise was delish – again like the spread we could have done with more than just two pieces of asparagus!

The Mercer pie. This deserved a “The” – it was great tasting (though would have preferred a bottom on the pie) combination of beef flank, field mushrooms, Guinness, and short crust pastry. Even the ladies next to us had cause to comment that the pie was so good they couldn’t help picking off the pastry from the side of the bowl. They were practically licking the plate!

Eton Mess was more like a shotglass than a full dessert – think it could have done with more meringue.

And finally we finished with British cheeses, biscuits and chutney (could have done with an explanation of what the cheeses were) and Devils on Horseback consisting of prunes, smoked bacon and chutney. This had a bit of bite or some sort of heat which was a good touch. And was more like a mouthful than a whole dish.

Really pleased with our dinner tonight at The Mercer. Service was excellent and very approachable. Food was yummy and well-cooked. I would definitely come back for The Mercer Pie again!

X-Men: First Class

Posted on June 12, 2011 by Grace

I was a bit skeptical about X-Men: First Class as having seen the trailers I was left feeling a bit under-whelmed. However, the movie actually turned out very well and I think that was due for the most part to the back to basics story-telling and less on just it being about special effects (though there was enough to keep the action going.)

X-Men: First Class tracks back to the beginning of the X-Men, back to the end of WWII when all these secret experiments were still going on, back to when mutants first start to discover their powers and the alliances of heroes and villains start to form.

I loved the focus on the relationships between all the characters, especially that between the two leaders, Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr (who is later known as Magneto.) Good acting. If there was one thing that I think was slightly mis-balanced it was the final battle which seemed overlong and never-ending. Otherwise a “first class” movie.

Phoenix Palace: Happy Sense of Satisfaction

Posted on June 12, 2011 by Grace

ITV1’s Red or Black

Posted on June 11, 2011 by Grace

Rather excitingly Rache was selected to be part of Simon Cowell’s new £15m TV gameshow on ITV called “Red or Black”, to be hosted by Ant and Dec. Top prize on the live show was going to be £1 million! This weekend was the start of the elimination rounds to cut down thousands of contestants to just the lucky seven people who over seven nights on live TV would get a chance to become a millionaire … simply by choosing red or black on a giant roulette wheel. The chances of Rache getting through were pretty small – there were ten of these stages to get through!!

The lead-up to the giant roulette wheel was that contestants would have to choose from one of two outcomes on a series of challenges – one would be marked black, one red in keeping with the concept of the show. The challenges are supposed to be fun and exciting and exhilarating and involve celebrities.

I was very happy when Rache asked me if I wanted to be part of the audience (contestants get to bring along a guest) and of course I jumped at the chance. It ended up being a very very long day! Fun, but long. I’ve been to my fair share of TV recordings so shouldn’t have been surprised at the level of disorganisation there was today. I guess we have to be slightly forgiving in the sense that this was the first day of the whole program so there were bound to be a few teething problems. But my biggest nitpick with today’s event was the lack of communication – not only a lack of it actually, but also the total mis-communication. For example, telling us we needed to be in seats or at the arena by a certain time (10.15) but actually they didn’t start moving us in until 11.30, or when there were delays in the stunts we were told there would be sweets and prizes distributed and that delays would only be a moment (when in fact in most instances the delays were over an hour), etc. etc. They didn’t even really ever tell us what we could expect during the day which was really annoying.

The way it worked today, from how we worked it out and from gossip amongst various people, was that the contestants were separated from their guests and sat in various sections of the Arena. This was so when they were filming who got chosen to choose red or black it would seem like random blocks of the audience when in fact people had been pre-selected. We had to practise the cheering and contestant selection a few times.

There were actually a couple of thousand contestants who came down to Wembley for today’s event (with several more thousand coming later that tonight and more tomorrow) and from speaking to everyone around me found out they’d come from all over the UK including as far away as Scotland (like Rache.) There were about four “groups” to get through in the day session we were attending. Luckily Rache was in the second group – because of how long the day took with all the pauses, re-shoots etc. she didn’t get done with her bit until nearly 5pm … not sure what the other two groups are going to do!

It was lucky I was sat around some pretty friendly +1s – from what they were saying the majority of them were professional game show applicants – having applied for every game show there was to enter! Ha ha. One of them even knew a person who won £0.50 and another who won £30,000 from Deal or No Deal.

The first “challenge” featured the “celebrities” for the day: Jedward. I know. I was like really? Well, I guess they have links to Simon Cowell and, say what you want about them, they certainly have plenty of energy and are great for getting the crowd going. The event was Twinball – which basically involved each of them getting into a human hamster ball and running around an obstacle course with little tippers batting them back like they were in a pinball machine. It was absolutely hilarious. I don’t think they really practised with the balls before hand because it ended up being a lot tougher for the twins to get through the obstacle courses than producers imagined. Unfortunately one of the twins, Jonathan, actually got injured so had to get stretchered off. Oops! Too bad for the people who chose his colour!

Rache’s challenge was Overdrive which basically involved two stuntmen on top of the roof of cars who then have to race to the end of a straight course whilst jumping and ducking under various poles. They were going to run a few practise runs in front of the contestants but changed their mind and got the contestants to leave before they did their runs … which was probably a smart move because the practise run said everything. One guy was terrible! The rumour goes that one of the original stunt men had got injured the day before so his replacement hadn’t had a chance to refine his skill …

Rache, pictured below, unfortunately chose Black, who was the replacement stunt guy. It wasn’t quite the wipeout that we were all expecting it to be … though one suspects that was a bit of a ploy by the producers to make it a little bit more interesting (the race was best out of five.)