Taste of London Part 1

After a brief fandango with table bookings at Duck & Waffle, and thanks to Emily and D&W's executive chef, Dan, Mum and I boycotted a bird's eye view of London and moseyed on down to Regent's Park to go to Taste of London.

Taste of London is a restaurant festival.
Think of it as going to the cinema, and you're watching all the trailers before the film starts, only except you're in a beautiful park, on a glorious summer's day and the trailers are restaurants showcasing their dishes, their very best dishes.

We arrived, starving, and went straight to the first familiar name.
Remember Flesh & Buns?

We went for their roasted pork belly with mustard miso and pickled apple, all bundled up in one of their cloud like steamed buns. 

Think hog roast, but Japanese style, and just as delicious.

It filled enough of a hole to be able to wander around the smaller brand's stalls, swiping tasters off of their plates as we went.

Smith & Sinclair are an alcoholic sweet company, pretty cool packaging with some pretty cool ideas, Mixed Berry Daquiri Pastille, anyone?

Next we dos-a-dosed to Sushi Samba, where we poured over their Wasa roll: shrimp tempura, quinoa, shisito, coriander, wagyu chorizo, spicy mayo and red onion...

… And their tuna seviche served with watermelon leche de tigre, maize morado, wasabi peas
and basil...

But in the end we couldn't miss out on trying their icon dish: Lobster Taquitos: avocado purée, aji amarillo served with roasted brazilian nuts.

 This was Mum's favourite dish of the day, it was like eating a more oriental taco, with lobster, mmm mmm.

Seeing as it was right next door, and that our plans had changed we popped into Duck & Waffle, it was quite busy, but we managed to get to the front and choose our dishes;

BBQ Pigs Ears, they sound more like something you would give to your dog, not something you'd order in a high end restaurant, but they were tasty, chewy with a barbecue kick, sealed up in their own little paper bag.

The second dish we ordered was smoked chilli braised ox cheek, with cheesy polenta and a fried pickle on top, which was almost like a stewy casserole.
 I really wanted to like this because I've always heard such good reviews about D&W, but it was heavy and hot, probably my fault for choosing something like that on such a warm day.

I'd probably have really enjoyed it if the nights were drawing in early and it was November.

After Duck & Waffle we strolled over to Intercontinental, where Theo Randall had whipped up some pan-fried scallops served in the shell with pancetta, red chilli, parsley, capers, lentils di Castelluccio and chopped rocket.

The attention to detail was amazing, look at the seahorse pancetta!
I'm a bit of a sucker for scallops, especially when served with pancetta, and especially when they're presented as nicely as this.

Next we went to Roka, a restaurant I hadn't heard of before, which is now firmly under my radar for black cod, crab and crayfish gyoza with chilli dressing.

Both Mum and I are huge fans of gyoza, deciding instantly what we wanted, this over exceeded our expectations and I'd gleefully demolish a whole plate.

 So as not to bombard with photos of some of the tastiest food London has to offer, I've split the festival into two, part two coming soon!!!

Flesh & Buns

On Friday Mum and I hopped on the train from chilly Suffolk to an equally chilly London.

A while ago I mentioned wanting to go to the ballet, and a few weeks ago she surprised me with a festive trip to see the Nutcracker, but that was going to be after lunch, and seeing as it was already 11 o'clock and I was feeling peckish on the train we were thinking about lunch.

I sent Katie and Caroline tweets to see if they had any suggestions, which they did, but Caroline was the one who suggested Flesh & Buns, and I'm flipping glad she did!

It's not very obvious until you're right infront of the big black door which leads you down some stairs into an underground heaven.

As soon as we walked in the staff were checking with us and giving us their tips on the menu.
It was so relaxed, and this cheeky little chappie kept flailing and flapping a ribbon of cucumber about and nobody tutted and disapproved, probably because the food made everyone happy.

First we started with edamame, I have them at every opportunity, it may be boring but I love them. These were served piping hot sprinkled with salt, but in Wagamamas they can be had with chilli and garlic salt which is equally deeeelish.

My mother is a bit of a squid fiend, so when she saw that they had crispy squid she went for it, and I devoured it.

I spied some Korean Fried Wings on the menu, expecting them to be normal chicken sized… They were enormous, not the most elegant thing to eat whilst wearing a white dress, although that didn't stop me, sleeves got rolled up and the waitress sneakily slipped us a couple of wet flannels so we could sort ourselves out.

Lastly were the flesh and buns.
I can't even type down how excited I was to eat these, I spent a lot of time craning my neck to look over at the kitchen to prepare myself for their arrival.

All of the meat sounded so tasty that we went for the crispy duck leg with sour plum sauce.
Like duck and pancakes?
Now think of duck in essentially a cloud. You are welcome.

You choose your buns, we went for four, and your little babies arrive in their bamboo steamer carriage.

You load them up...

Sandwich and tuck in.

These are one of the best things I have ever eaten.
That is the best way I can put it, the bun, which is more like a flat dumpling, surrounds the duck like a fluffy cloud and when you bite into it, it is complete heaven, and I wanted to keep eating and eating them forever, but my clothes wouldn't allow it.

After lunch we staggered off to the London Coliseum, which was only a 10 minute walk away, to see the English National Ballet's performance of the Nutcracker.
But first, look at the theatre.

It was one of the best days I've had in a long time, I'm starting to feel festive now!