The Ritz and Flowers

No, we are not staying at The Ritz. That is the preserve of Russian oligarchs, dying baronesses and Arabian oil merchants; but the hotel restaurant has a lunch deal, £47 for three courses. Here is a picture of the restaurant:

http://www.theritzlondon.com/restaurant/dining-en.html

which looks like an early scene from La Traviata, resplendent in vivid pink velvet and gilt. It is quite beautiful, if you like Fin de Siècle flamboyance. The waiters were beautiful too. All male, under 30 and European, two to a table, wearing tails. We were given four little amuse bouche before our entree, one of which we were told contained lobster and was pink and frothy and tasted like medicine. Very disconcerting. Entree was soup, red pepper soup and for me, tomato consommé with lobster (again) and heirloom tomatoes.

Both our mains were ordinary, but dessert was a gorgeous banana souffle with banana and rum ice cream. The food is presented with great pomp. The mains were brought out covered in little porcelain hats and removed simultaneously by the spunky waiters. I had to stop myself from saying, "ta DA!" and was a little underwhelmed when I saw the chicken breast in gravy with three veg on the plate. The turnip was a tiny nouvelle one, but still. Overall the experience was worth it, just to see the Ritz, which has such famous associations.

I first visited England in about 1995 for a conference in Liverpool. I stayed at a small hotel recommended by Vogue Australia while in London. It was on Warwick Way in Pimlico and happily the name escapes me. Breakfast was served in the basement in a low ceilinged room with florescent lighting. The tea was the colour of English women before the invention of the sun-bed, the toast was burnt and soggy, which is quite a feat when you think about it. Fortunately I was so beside myself with excitement to be in London that no small inconvenience mattered, but the memory lives on.

One of the flower beds at Hampton Court Palace 

I have been trying to determine whether the quality of English food improved with my budget or independently. It is definitely the latter. I don't know the reasons for this-I started googling, "why is English food..." and the predictive text finished the sentence with"so bad?" I actually wanted to type in "why is English food so much better" and came up with this article from a food blog. And this one from the Telegraph.

These beautiful hanging baskets are everywhere

On the way to Ede and Ravenscroft we wandered into St Clement Danes, a beautiful church designed by Sir Christopher Wren, which is the central church for the RAF. We passed three Wren churches between St James Square and Chancery Lane. Wren was enchanted by Versaille and wanted to create Baroque splendour throughout London. Coincidentally, the Great Fire of London happened in 1666 and paved the way (so to speak) for him to live the dream. Eighty-seven churches were destroyed by the fire, including St Paul's Cathedral, which was much, much bigger than the new one, designed by Wren, who also designed 51 other churches. He lived until he was 91, but I still suspect any invitation was greeted with the response, "Can't. Designing a church".

St Clement Danes

Today we passed a new memorial in Hyde Park, built in 2012 in honour of the bomber pilots of the Britain and the Commonwealth that did so much to save us in WWII: