Wine 2020 – WSET Level 2 in Wine, London

Saturday 18th and 25th January, 1st February 2020 – WSET Level 2 in Wine So as some people will know last year (2019) I turned 60 and a group of my friends clubbed together to pay for me to take at least one of the Wine and Spirit Education Trust wine courses, the WSET Level…

Food 2020 – Lino, London

Wednesday 22nd January, 2020 – Lino, London It is quite possible that Lino, which only opened towards the end of 2018, may have crashed and burned in the Covid-19 lockdown of the City of London. If so, that would be a great pity. I went there with colleagues, one of whom was picking up the…

Food 2020 – The White Horse, Kings Sutton

Sunday 12th January, 2020 – The White Horse, Kings Sutton As it was my birthday, and I didn’t want to do any cooking (much as I enjoy it normally) we decided it would be good to head out for lunch somewhere not too far away. That meant I was looking at no more than 20…

Food 2019 – Vlet, Hamburg

Monday, 2nd December 2019 – Vlet, Hamburg Feeling altogether more human after Saturday’s illness, I have to say I was really looking forward to our final meal in Hamburg, lunch in a restaurant in the Speicherstadt, Vlet in der Speicherstadt. On their own website they wax lyrical about their location: “Among the red brick buildings,…

Travel 2019 – Hamburg, Day 5

Monday, 2nd December 2019 – Hamburg Feeling a lot better than I had on Sunday, we had breakfast (I still wasn’t risking anything more solid than yogurt, followed by scrambled eggs) and then we packed up our bags, checked out of our room, and left our luggage with the hotel while we headed off to…

Food 2019 – Hamburg, Day 4, Heritage

Sunday, 1st December 2019 – Heritage, Hamburg After a Saturday to forget, by the end of Sunday afternoon I was starving, and dinner looked like a very welcome detail in our day. For Sunday evening I’d got us close to our hotel again, with a table reserved at Heritage, overlooking the Aussenalster. I hadn’t realised…

Travel 2019 – Hamburg, Day 4

Sunday, 1st December 2019 – Hamburg Feeling fragile but at least vaguely human, I was back up and about on Sunday, starting with a cautious breakfast of plain yogurt with a spoonful of sugar, followed by a small portion of scrambled eggs, with a large mug of mint tea to settle it all down. Outside…

Travel 2019 – Hamburg, Day 3

Saturday, 30th November 2019 – Hamburg I’ve had better days is all I can say. Having started feeling ill the night before, I’d clearly got norovirus. I managed to get out of bed long enough to get to the local Apothek and buy some aptly named Vom-ex tablets and a dose of Immodium, and had…

Food 2019 – Hamburg, Day 2, Wolfs Junge

Friday, 29th November 2019 – Wolfs Junge, Hamburg Friday night’s restaurant booking saw us again getting on the number 6 bus (I’m beginning to think there’s no other bus route worth bothering with in Hamburg – though I suspect I’m wrong) and this time getting off just three stops from the hotel as we headed…

Travel 2019 – Hamburg, Days 1 and 2

Thursday, 28th November/Friday, 29th November 2019 – Hamburg We always aim to go somewhere that has plenty of Christmas markets, and plenty of other things to see and do as well for the first weekend in Advent, and so this year we headed to Hamburg, in the North of Germany, for our “get in the…