The views from Min Jiang over Hyde Park were stunning on the day we visited — London at its autumnal finest. In the distance, we could see all of London’s tall buildings. I could have sat in the bar forever, drinking Min Jiang’s excellent Mai Tais, and watching the leaves turn more golden and more brown.

Because the restaurant is a narrow space, it’s hard not to have a table with a view but should you book a table (and you should), make sure to ask for a table by the window because really, the views are that pretty. London, I forget how beautiful you are sometimes. (To be honest, I really don’t forget. But it’s still nice to be reminded.)

We did not choose our own food so you will have to rely on the detailed notes over on London Unattached for a complete list of everything we ate. Fiona very capably got the restaurant staff to point out what was arriving with each dish. I always find it a little odd when restaurants invite people like us in and then don’t provide us with any information about what we’re having and don’t seem to want us to take a menu either.)

Now, although I am slightly scolding Min Jiang for not being as prepared for us social media beings as they should have been, I have to say that I really, really, really loved our slightly omniscient server, who told us later in the meal that he’d been with Min Jiang for five years. He’s a keeper, that one.

As dim sum should be, our lunch started off with a veritable parade of dim sum.  Soup dumplings, pot stickers, baked char siew puffs (can’t. stop. eating. them.), and an assortment of steamed dumplings. The highlight for me though was the yam croquette with seafood. I remember asking if it was taro and I could swear someone said yes so is taro yam? I had no idea! (LMGTFY…apparently, taro and yam are not exactly the same.)

While we were very happily demolishing all the dim sum, I kept wondering…where is the duck? What will the duck be like? When is the duck coming?

Our lovely server

And it came, along with a very shy chef who wasn’t too keen on having his photo taken. (That’s our server in the photo.) But suffice it to say the shy chef’s carving skills are excellent. The duck was — as duck is supposed to be — beautiful. Crispy skin, and darkly dark flavors.

While our shy chef was carving up the duck, I watched him take small choice bits that he carved from the neck and set them aside. These were presented to us along with a small bowl of sugar. If you’ve never considered dipping your duck in sugar, YOU REALLY SHOULD. It was pretty amazing. Stick a fork in me, I was done.

But we weren’t done! There was more! Was this one of the best days of my entire life? I wasn’t quite sure, but I was sure that if life on earth had ended at that moment — as it sort of had because the US election and had just happened and now Donald Trump would be the next president of the United States — I would have died a very happy woman. Tiger prawns, a beef dish, and some asparagus with lotus root completed our lunch.

And then they brought us dessert! Flaky egg tarts, cutesy sesame dumplings shaped like mice, and a little dessert wine too.

May all our meals be this delicious, this varied, and this interesting.

The Verdict: Go!

Thanks to  Traverse for inviting me along to lunch. And thanks London Unattached and 2 Food Trippers for the company.

The post Min Jiang, South Kensington first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Kitchen W8
11-13 Abingdon Rd
W8 6AH  

Date of Last Visit: Friday, November 27th, 2009

The Victims: Craig, Leanne

The Damage: £35 each

The Background: I'm heading to Cardiff. With a bunch of Australians. For the rugby. Australia-Wales. Craig and Leanne have rented a car so we're leaving first thing Saturday morning. They invite me to spend the night at their super-gorgeous flat on the other side of town–Westbourne Park–and we make plans to have dinner the night before. My choice.

I choose Kitchen W8. Because it's new. And because sometimes, you read stuff. Like here. And here. And here. And sometimes, I wonder…how is it that we all have different views on the same thing? See, I went to Catholic school my entire life…grade school, high school, university. It was a lot of sameness. Looks. Clothing. Prayers. Thoughts.

But then I went to business school. And there was a lot of differentness.

Who were these people, I thought, and why hadn't I met them sooner?

Sometimes, us here in the food blogging community get slagged off because we all write about the same things. I, in fact, have slagged this very topic. (Sorry, "slag" (v. NOT n.) is new favorite word.) Yes, I am very inconsistent. Don't listen to anything I say. Really.

But you must remember that I'm also kinda into math. And new restaurants…well, it's somewhat of a numbers game. X many new openings. Y food bloggers (Y > X). Probability of Y – N food bloggers visting New Restaurant Z = Very High.

The Entrance: We're a little late, but they don't hold this against us. But then I see our table, and it's sort of in the bar/waiting area. There are three other reservable tables in this area, but then there's a general "sit here and drink your drink til your table is ready" six-top. I feel like I'm at the kids' table at Thanksgiving. Just a little. Off in the back are all the "real" tables. But I get over myself quite quickly.

The Little Freebies: Cod-y fried puffs of deliciousness. I could have had more of these. Really. Delicious!

The Main: Craig and I had the special of the day…the venison. And you know what? I thought it was pretty gorgeous. It turned out to be smoked venison and the two of us kept looking at each other, saying, "This is really nice, this smokiness." This was served on a bed of spinach which was neither here nor there…not bad, but not oustandingly good. Just nice. Really, the venison was pretty super.

The Funny Bit: This guy stopped by the table to pour the wine and I bursted out with, "Wait a second…I fell like I know you from somewhere!" He was the lovely sommelier from Hibiscus back in 2007. And funnily, he looked at me and said, "I'm glad you said that because as soon as you walked in, I knew I knew you and checked the name on the booking"

The Service: Sweet and enthusiastic. But I'll note four main things:

• When they described the cod fish puffs, I had no idea what they were saying.
• And at one point, they delivered our mains, while we all looked at them in a confused fashion…these weren't the mains we ordered. The staff very politely swept the dishes away and then put them on the table behind us. I kinda thought that was just a little weird. The dish was in front of me for at least a full minute before they figured out that they had served us incorrectly. I wouldn't have wanted to be on the final receiving end of those dishes.
• It took a pretty long while for us to get our mains. Venison was worth the wait however.
• When we asked why the venison was so smoky, the answer was, "Because it's smoked." Um, thanks.

The Dessert: Lemon tart! My favorite! I have a photo of it, but it was after I had already dipped into the ice cream, and you don't want to see that. But it was pretty darn nice.

The Verdict: If K&A were still here–they used to live right down the road–I imagine I'd go here all the time. But they've left me for somewhere in Connecticut. Still sad.

The Question I'm Dying to Ask: Where do you go when you're in Notting Hill and South Kensington?

The post Kitchen W8 first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Date of Last Visit: Friday, September 12, 2008

The Victims: Many. Kellie, James, Matt, Tahnee, Simon, Feathers, Julie, Bryan, Stacey, Carrie, Dave, Feathers’ Little Brother

The Damage: £40 each

The Background: Feathers has organized us. We are wandering the streets of Notting Hill, en masse. It seems like everyone is out in Notting Hill tonight. In a good way. I feel absurdly festive.

Geales is not what I was expecting. It’s all gray and black and hotel bar-esque. They have nice hand soap in the ladies. (Although to dry your hands, there was just a stack of cocktail napkins. Classy.) Our waiter is good. Very good. There are 13 of us and we are all talking at once and he has no trouble dealing with this. (And when the food arrives, it is all CORRECT.)

The Starters: Kellie and James have just been here, and they heartily recommend the mussels. And I can understand why. These are good plucky mussels. The calamari is less exciting. The tarmasalata is nice, but only nice.

The Mains: Mine is haddock. I like it. It’s golden and crispy and they are generous with the lemon wedge and the tartar sauce. The fries–not pictured–are good but they could have been a bit crispier. And goldener.

Afterwards: We go to Montgomery Place for the cocktails and we see Claire from The Apprentice. And then we go to a very dirty but strangely filthy but charming basement bar on Portobello Road (Baltic something or other) where we drink 275 ml Carlsbergs and I narrowly I escape the clutches of a drunk Scotsman.

The Verdict: Geales was good. I’d go back.

The post Geales first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Buttercup Cake Shop
16 St. Albans Grove
W8 5BP

Date of Last Visit: Saturday, March 22

The Victims: Sarah, Rachel, and Arielle, all of us on a little bit of a sugar high.

The Background: After polishing off our Crumbs & Doilies cupcakes in the car, we make our way to Buttercup in London’s South Kensington. It’s tucked into a sidestreet, and Rachel wants you to know that the parking is crap. It’s a sweet little shop with two little tables. We order three big steaming mugs of tea and an assortment of cupcakes.

The Cakes: My favorite is the peanut butter and chocolate cake…the icing is just right. Just peanuty enough, not cloying. I have trouble with the vanilla cake…the icing is so sweet, my teeth ache.

In comparison to the Crumbs & Doilies cakes, the cakes at Buttercup look a little amateurish. Part of me says that’s part of their attraction, but the other part of me says I could probably do better myself.

I start to get a headache from all this sugar…and we’re not done yet…

The post Buttercup Cake Shop Cupcakes first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Date of Last Visit: Thursday, August 16th 2007

The Victims: Mr. and Mrs. Feathers, James, Julie, Anna

The Damage: £25 each?

The Background: The movies on my flight back from LAX sucked. With one exception. The Bourne Supremacy. I don’t normally like Matt Damon, but man is he great as Jason Bourne.

Well, The Bourne Ultimatum was set to debut in the UK on the 17th, but somehow, we found it at the Coronet in Notting Hill on Thursday the 16th. This was perfect because I had to catch a flight the next day to Sardinia.

We chose The Mall for its proximity to the theatre, and man am I glad we did. Because it was a really good meal. (With one exception, which I will mention in two secs.)

The Starters: We get a plate of hummous and babaganoush to start. The hummous is fine. The babaganoush is lackluster. It’s missing something. A lot of things, actually. It’s just plain eggplant. No seasonings. Weird. Anna and James get the prawns and they look really really nice and fresh.

The Mains: I get the roast chicken with broad beans, and man, I gotta tell you…it was PERFECT. Really really great. I was so very pleasantly surprised. It was a nice and simple dish, perfectly executed.

The Service: A bit spacey. And did not know what beers they had.

The Loos: Eh. Saloon style doors are weird.

The Movie: FANTASTIC. If you haven’t seen it yet, you should go immediately!

Language Lesson Learned: Theatre vs. Cinema. You can drink beer at the theatre, apparently. The Coronet is a theatre.

The Verdict: I liked it. If I’m ever in the ‘hood, I’ll be sure to stop by again. But I’ll skip the babaganoush.

The post I Heart Jason Bourne: The Mall Tavern first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

63–97 Kensington High Street, London W8 5SE

Date of Last Visit: Saturday, June 9th, 2007

The Victim: Me.

The Damage: £60 plus public transport.

In Chicago, I used to live about a 15 minute walk from the Lakeview Whole Foods and I would drop in all the time. I loved their salad bar. And I loved their artichoke dip. And their wine section. And their cheese section.

See, Whole Foods employs people who are either experts in things like wine or cheese or who want to become experts. So it was always a pleasure talking to the staff about wine. And about cheese. They always had a recommendation.

On-site food and wine experts don’t exist in Dominick’s or Jewel in Chicago. Maybe behind the meat counter, or the fish counter. But not anywhere else.

So I was excited when I heard in 2004 that Whole Foods was planning on opening a shop in London in 2007. Three years seemed like an awfully long time to wait though!

But here we are, three years and one London food blog later, and here is Whole Foods South Ken. And I’ve just dropped £60 on all the goodies I could carry back on the tube.

Here’s what I liked about the Whole Foods on Kensington High Street…
1. The staff are friendly and omnipresent. I saw tons of people asking for particular products, and Whole Foods’ team members were practically holding their hands as they led people across the store.
2. You’re not just staring at food on shelves, it’s all around you in stacks, particularly the fresh fruit and vegetables.
3. The fish counter is beautiful.
4. I loved the way the eggs were displayed…it was pretty much serve yourself.
5. When I went to check out, the salad dressing I bought was not on the register. So they gave it to me for free. My cashier noted that it was their fault that it wasn’t in the register, not mine, so why should I have to wait while they sent someone to check the price? He said they are really good at making sure that once that happens once with a particular product, it doesn’t happen again. I thought this was a fantastic piece of marketing/customer service…because you know, I bet you at other stores when stuff is not in the system, once they manually key in the price, the product probably still doesn’t get into the system. By taking the loss on my dressing, they give themselves an incentive to solve the problem. Permanently.
6. The baskets. Rather than just plain old hand baskets, they have little baskets that you tote around behind you like carry-on suitcases. This is clever. Because hand baskets get heavy. (I think these would be even better if they were like those newish suitcases that you roll along right beside you, as opposed to behind you.)
7. The cheese room.
8. The sun-dried tomato pesto from the antipasto bar. DELICIOUS.
9. The marcona almonds. YUMM.
10. The coconut macaroons.
11. I liked how they took a Disney World approach to the queue at the till…as you enter the queue, they tell you how much time it’s likely to take. I didn’t time them, but the 3 minutes they noted seemed about right.   

What I didn’t like about the Whole Foods in South Ken…
1. I kept going to the wrong side of the store to get to the right escalator. They need better Up/Down signage.
2. The wheelie baskets are GREAT, but every five year old in the store seemed to have one. So it was a bit of a traffic hazard.
3. People who don’t get the "no sampling" thing. As I was filling up on sun dried tomato pesto at the antipasti bar, an American woman was considering the regular pesto with her daughter who was about eight. She gave her daughter the serving spoon and let her stick her grubby little fingers in it. I gave the mother a "You are a disgrace to my country" look.
4. They didn’t have my artichoke dip. They had another type of artichoke dip, and although it’s nice, it’s not great.
5. The checkouts make you feel like you should have your passport and boarding card ready. They need something going on while you’re standing in the huge queue.
6. The crowds. I wish I had gotten there at 10 on a Saturday instead of a little after 11.
7. Despite my request to be invited to their launch events, I wasn’t. 🙁 If I were them, I’d want me there! Their loss.

Well, as I write this, I’ve just boiled up some Whole Foods linguine and I’m getting it ready for the sun dried tomato pesto. And then I’ve got Whole Foods salmon steaks in the frying pan, crackling away. And I’ve made a nice Whole Foods baby spinach salad with my free Italian dressing. (Yes, I do cook occasionally…when inspired!)

The post South Ken Whole Foods first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Date of Last Visit: Sunday 11 February 2007

The Victim: Me, myself and I

The Damage: £18

The Background: I was over on High Street Ken for some retail therapy. Therapy realized, I thought sushi might be a light refreshing way to re-energize. So I seriously wandered the streets, knowing there must be a Japanese restaurant somewhere. I found it on Ken Church Street and was happy. To start.

The Entrance: Feng is not a large place. It is very very small. I kinda liked this. It was also very empty for 2 p.m. on a Sunday, but they seemed to be doing a good take-away business so there was that.

The Menu: I wanted an assortment, but I would have had to offer everything individually and probably would have spent £30 doing so. So I went for a box combo, but to be honest, I really didn’t like all of the box combo options. They were very vertical in nature…all tuna, or all salmon, or all (insert fish here). I went with the tuna, mercury poisoning and my mother be damned!

The Food: I kinda got the feeling that the tuna had been frozen and defrosted on a number of occassions. It just didn’t have that freshy-freshy quality to it. Hmmm. It was tasty, don’t get me wrong. And I probably wouldn’t have noticed it had everything on my plate NOT been tuna. But because everything was tuna, well, I noticed it. Interestingly for me, the nigri was served with chilli sauce. I’ve never had nigri with chilli sauce before. Again, this was not a bad thing, and maybe in Japan, they serve nigri with chilli sauce all the time–I cannot speak knowledgeable because I myself have never been to Japan. But given that all the staff up front was Brazilian, well, a girl has to wonder.

The Verdict: Eh. Did I mention it was a little dark inside–and not in that romantic way (which wouldn’t have mattered because I was all by my lonesome anyhow), but rather in that "We could turn the lights on but we’re not going to" type of way. I want more variety in my "box" sushi, and I don’t want to pay a fortune for it.

The post Sushi: Feng Sushi first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Date of Last Visit: Friday, October 21 2006

The Victims: K & A and A’s mom

The Damage: 50 quid. Ack!

The Damage: A’s mom was in town from Denver, on a whirlwind trip of the British Isles. I missed them earlier at Borough–the office on a Saturday, unfortunately!–so I caught up with them at Zaika.

Now Zaika, from what I understand, used to have a Michelin star. Atmosphere wise, I can see it. It’s a pretty dark and romantic place. (I get the sense it’s also one of those "You can only have the table for two hours" types of places.) If someone took me here on a date, I’d be impressed.

The Cocktail: I was there right on time, if not a little early, as is my thing. I sat alone at the bar, learning about the cocktails from the (somewhat affected) bartender. He sold me on the French martini. Note I am not a martini drinker, but he convinced me. It was like iced tea. I liked it.

The Service: A number of different people, all from different places. (i.e., not necessarily all from the general vicinity of India.) Nice enough, particularly the guy who described every dish to us.

The Starters: We went with the Zaika platter and the cheese platter.  These are both supposed to be for one person, but I honestly thing they could be easily split by two if not three. There was salmon, duck sausage, a goat’s cheese samosa, and something else that escapes me. On the cheese platter, there was some paneer (yum) and some stilton cheese balls (Bobby Rubino’s anyone?) But then there was the delicious chickpea tower…the menu online notes it’s made up of the following:
Potato and asparagus ‘tikki’, chickpeas laced with tamarind chutney, sweetened yoghurt & ‘garam’ flour vermicelli, topped with crispy artichoke. Well, I didn’t see much potato, but it sure was delicious.

The Mains: I went with the "TIKHI MACHLI / Spicy sea-bass Pan fried spice marinated sea-bass with ‘Dosa Aloo’-crushed potatoes tempered with lentil and mustard seeds served with ‘Sambhar’ sauce." It was really good. But £17 of good? Of that, I am not sure. K&A got the butter chicken and it looked really nice, but I do wonder if it’s any better than my local curry shop, which is so absolutely fantastic. A’s mom got the Lamb Roganjash, and while it did look lovely, my local curry shop is just so wonderful that I don’t know if the atmosphere is worth the premium?

Drama: I pulled apart my nan a little too forcibly and threw my water glass across the table at K and down to the floor, where it shattered into a hundred million pieces. Good grief.

Tea: I went with the indian tea and it was lovely, and they gave me some little petit fours, which were a nice touch.

The Verdict: You will leave here happy but poor and with a new appreciation of your local curry shop.

The post Expensivo Indian: Zaika first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Date of Last Visit: Friday, July 29, 2006

The Victim: Kristi

The Damage: 35 quid each

The Setup: K and I hadn’t seen each other in ages. Or so it felt like. A was sick (or ill as they say here), so it was a girls’ night out. I was hoping to check out The Ambassador in Exmouth Market, but K has this thing about smoke, so that was off the list. (I will quote her as close to directly as possible–"Having a no smoking section in a restaurant is like having a no peeing section in a pool.") As it turns out, L does allow smoking, just upstairs at four small tables. So hopefully K is still feeling guilty about depriving me of The Ambassador. All that being said, she remains redeemed. L was a very fine choice.

The Starters: Well, we went with the tapas menu, so there were no starters per se. But there was fantastic walnut and raisin bread. That was very nice. And rosemary and something-or-other bread. Yummy. But before I get into the food, let me just focus on the drink: for those of you that know me, you know I do not enjoy hard liquor. Vodka tonic? YUKKK. Gin and tonic? Double YUK. Rum and Coke? Gag! The only two mixed drinks I will really ever drink are margaritas (it’s the salt) and white russians (it’s the milk). So when K persuaded me to try the 3.50 mojito (yes, let me write that again–3.50!!!!!), I was tentative. But ultimately, I appreciate a good value, so the Mojito it was.

The Drink: Yes, let me call it "The Drink." Because it was, is, and forever will be "The Drink." Mojitos are not so good at the very beginning. They are minty, but not pepperminty. They are limey, but not really-good-limey. And they are not so sugar-y, even though there is supposedly sugar in there somewhere. But stir and stir and stir and man do you have a nice drink. And for 3.50? Is this the cheapest high quality mixed drink in London, or is it me? I will return for the mojitos alone! (Feathers, are you reading this? Our next girls’ night will be here.)

The Food: As always, I digress. K and I ordered a plate of Iberian ham, which was much more ham-y than its Italian counterpart. It was thick, meaty, and smokey and tough to chew. It’s not that I didn’t like it, but it wasn’t my absolute best thing ever. The tortilla was the highlight–eggs, potatoes and basil all cooked up nice and hot and delicious. We had some bread with tomatoes–bruchetta-like, but not called bruchetta, and that was nice. And then we had this cucumber/radish/anchovy/cheese thing, and although that sounds pretty random, it was actually kinda nice. And the most interesting thing of all was the special of the day–cod and olives and oranges and red peppers. It wasn’t super-delicious, but I actually mean that in a good way; it was super-interesting. As my old roommates from college would say, "Interesting. Very complex."

The Loos: Very sparkly tile work. Clean. Nothing exciting.

The Service: Too efficient! Let me be, please! As soon as I had drank a tablespoon of water, they were refilling my glass.

The Verdict: I would go back here. Particularly for the 3.50 mojitos. Fantastic.

The post More Mojitos, Please!: L first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Date of Last Visit: Sunday, May 7, 2006

The Victims: Al, Louise, Michael

Al & Louise are fantastic at organizing Sunday brunch, and it’s funny because just the day before, I had walked by Launceston Place and thought, "That looks like a nice place."

Indeed, it is a nice place. And it was their anniversary, so we all got free Bloody Mary’s. Problem is, I HATE Bloody Mary’s. Uggh. Yuk. Yuk!!! I tried to swap it for a Buck’s Fizz (aka Mimosa) but no luck. I could have OJ, so I did. And ordered some sparkling wine on the side. 🙂

So the Launceston is where you should take your grandparents. And I don’t mean this in a bad way. But we were definitely some of the youngest folks in the place. Everyone there was deliciously well-dressed and wealthy looking. I was in jeans and trainers.

I started with the potato and leek soup, only my favorite soup ever. It was really, really good. For my entree, I had the duck with chorizo. Oh my was it delicious. But there was so much of it, there was no way I could finish it. And this made me, as usual, very very sad.

We drank some wine, we enjoyed the sun coming through the windows. We were the last people left in the restaurant in that lull between lunch and dinner. And it was good.

The Verdict: Bring grandma here.

The post Sunday Buck’s Fizz: Launceston Place first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Date of Last Visit: Saturday, April 22nd

The Victims: Kristi, Adrien

The Damage: Unknown because they paid and I forgot to pay them back.

I hadn’t seen K&A in ages, and if you consider that 10 years ago, K was literally in shouting (and throwing) distance from me, just a bunkbed away, I was going through withdrawal! So we made a plan to meet up.

K&A spent the afternoon climbing the white cliffs of Dover. I myself engaged in such similar strenuous endeavors. Armed with only my Persil tablets and Bounce Summer Breeze–imported directly from my country–I successfully conquered five (English) loads of laundry, an endeavor worthy of many pints of beer in the finest of English establishments. (Don’t even get me started on English washing machines. I can’t believe that English women can put up with the abysmal size of these things. )

Being a balmy night, we enjoyed a few Carlings in the great outdoors at the Devonshire Arms. We had a little table, tucked into the corner of the outdoor patio. It was perfect. Being worn out from all my folding, I sent K&A in to order my sustenance. There was only one directive: no carbs. They returned, triumphant, having successfully ordered me chicken skewers. As it turned out, I could have had the burger, because the Devonshire was out of buns. (And apparently, it was not possible to ask one of the local convenient stores to supply the same.) K&A’s burgers arrived, bunless, and I was jealous.

My chicken skewers were good. Not great. Just good. Not bad. But just not so hot otherwise. But my beer was cold and the outdoor patio was delightful.

The Verdict: Food is serendiptous. Just go for the beer and the patio.

The post A Pub with Food: The Devonshire Arms first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.

Date of Last Visit: Sunday, February 5

The Victims: Feathers, Feathers’ Boy (Boy, you need to come up with a new name for yourself.)

So on Saturday night, February 3rd, I was present at a party about a groundhog. This is my second such party in London. I remember seeing Groundhog Day, the movie, back in hmmm–1993?–and not liking it so much. But boy, have my tastes changed. It’s a classic all right.

So there I was, in my ugliest shirt (affectionately known as a "vommie shirt,") sunglasses at midnight, someone else’s hat, and Aunt Helen’s old jewelry (bling, baby, bling) when I accidentally dropped my purse and everything spilled out across the (unfortunately for Destri) wine- (and salt-)soaked floor. Being a generally orderly person (except when it comes to my desk and my bedroom), I picked everything up, didn’t think twice about it, and continued on my merry way.

Fast forward to 1 a.m. when I arrive home. I have not one, but two mobile phones. Yes, they’ve gestated, duplicated, multiplied, and given birth in my bag on the short taxi ride home.

The other mobile belonged to Feathers, and knowing that without her mobile, she is like that guy in A Million LIttle Pieces with no arms, I quickly organized to bring it to her. As long as there was a new restaurant involved.

All of this is my very long way of saying that I had Sunday Lunch at The Scarsdale. (See, aren’t you glad I’ve taken 1.5 months off? I can feel the words coming faster now.) And it was delicious and perfect. We were by the fire in the corner and enjoyed some great burgers (although I swear there was lamb or something else besides beef in mine) and some awesome potato wedges. Feathers’ boy had a very gourmet looking chicken type of sandwich–roasted red peppers and goat’s cheese and all that. We were very cozy. And the crowd was just right–not totally crowded, and not totally empty either. (I tried to go back last night, Feb 18th, and it was packed packed packed! No dice.)

The bad part was when Anna and Stephen arrived with little Miles, all bundled up in his Bjorn. He was asked to leave. The waitress made up something about it being a licensing law thing, but she did not deliver this message with the voice of authority, thus we were all convinced she was lying. Apparently, babies are only allowed outside in the garden–where it’s FREEZING.

Anyhow, that bad part aside, my VERDICT is…delightful. I wish it was over in my neck of the woods.

4 days til Gordon…

The post Why Can’t You Be My Neighbor: The Scarsdale first appeared on Passport Delicious | Solo Travel Blog | Solo Female Travel.