One day, two London underground restaurants and a lot of calories....
The fact that we really need to get a grip of Google Calendars was brought home to Hot Dinners this weekend when we managed to book ourselves into two underground restaurants in one day.
We’d made the first booking what seemed like aeons ago, when Lady Gray’s Hidden Tea Room first opened its 2010 booking dates last year. And then when friends said they were braving it and opening their own supperclub in Highbury, well of course we had to be there for the first night. So this was going to be a day of the kind of calorie intake Jamie Oliver was trying to persuade those fat Americans to eschew.
Ah well, next week it’ll be nothing but lettuce and water... maybe.
Tea and cakes in Old Street
First then to Lady Gray’s Hidden Tea Room. It’s been going just over seven months in a secret location in central London. Lady Gray herself is an American, who together with her husband not only holds down a full-time job doing something very sensible indeed, but also finds the time to play host to 12 strangers every Saturday and Sunday, serving up exemplary afternoon tea.
The event kicked off with a glass of champagne and American cheddar biscuits – or what we would call scones. In fact I’d call them knockdown delicious, effortlessly light, deeply savoury and flecked with chives. From here we picked our tea from an extensive menu – one of us chose Ceylon, the other a "choco-truffle" tea that was a lot nicer than it sounds with strong cocoa overtones. Next on the menu was finger sandwiches – everything from smoked salmon and cream cheese to turkey breast and cranberries. Vegetarians were equally well catered for with a selection including parmesan and rocket.
At this stage we needed a break, which came in the form of the palate cleanser – an intense mango and pineapple sorbet.
From here it was all downhill to a coronary with heavenly scones and clotted cream (fruit and plain) a selection of cakes including an unctuous toffee brownie. Still we continued, finishing off with a selection of American cupcakes topped with vanilla frosting (apparently the secret here is to include a little salt in the frosting).
Only one of us made it as far as the peppermint truffles served with Jasmine tea; apparently they were great.
Lady Gray told us she's seriously looking for the right venue to open her own tea room, but in the meantime, is also available to cater for private dinners and weddings.
You can also sign up for future events on their website.
The Sitting Room - Highbury
Four hours later and we were knocking on the door of another private house – this time just beside the Emirates Stadium in Highbury.
This was the opening night of The Sitting Room – a supperclub run by six friends of ours, including a flight engineer, a DJ and a published cookery author. Heading up the kitchen was that author, Elisa Beynon, whose book The Vicar’s Wife Cookbook was published last year. Elisa had also enlisted the help of fellow Highbury cookery writer, the venerable Nigel Slater, for help on honing the menu for tonight.
The evening kicked off with some tasty morsels of quails eggs and crostini with mackerel pate while we shrugged off the winter chills with a glass of mulled perry. For starters we had a fabulous lobster ravioli – perfect pasta, stuffed with sweet lobster with a white wine sauce. To follow there was braised lamb shanks with crushed leaky potatoes and green beans tied with bacon and fried in anchovy butter.
Finally we squeezed in a sliver of lemon tart, tangy but not too mouth-puckeringly zesty which showed off DJ Rob’s pastry prowess.
Will they do it again? We hope so, because this is the kind of eating out experience Highbury dwellers could do with more of. To go on a waiting list for news of any further dates email thesittingroomhighbury@gmail.com
