V&A Museum

Went to the V & A Museum today to see Alexander McQueen collection plus 33 pieces added since the Met's show in 2011.  Also saw two other exhibits Shoes: The Pleasure and Pain and What is Luxury?  Lunch first at Cote Brasserie

Spinach and mushroom crepes and Cote Brasserie a quaint little French bistro next door to our hotel.

Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty at the V&A Museum 

Courtyard Gardens at the V&A

Walking around London Town

The 8.5 hour flight went fast but meant we were up for over 24 hours.  We each had about 4 hours of sleep.  Two hours on the plane and two hours we gave ourselves at about 1:30pm the next afternoon.  We arrived in London at 6am on Thursday having left the USA the previous day at about 2pm.  Needless to say our room was not ready.  We checked our bags with the hotel and proceeded to walk around London town.  We are staying walking distance from Buckingham Palace and Hyde Park both which happily we stumbled upon on our walk.  We had breakfast then walked around Chelsea and shopped at Duke of York Square.  We were able to get in to our room at 1pm.  Wiled away 6 hours but felt very productive.  One interesting thing we learned.  You don't tip at a restaurant.  12.5% is added automatically onto the check and people rarely tip on top of that.  Our cabbi took the only pounds we exchanged dollars for meaning our cab ride into London was a little over $100!  We are taking the bus back to the airport.  Toto, we are not in Kansas anymore!

Guards at Buckingham Palace.  Changing of the guard didn't happen until 11:30am.  We will hopefully catch that on Saturday when Buckingham Palace opens to the public from summer break.

Fountain across from Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace

Hyde Park Canadian Memorial for those who assisted Britain during WW2.

Bomber memorial for those who served on the Allied Forces during WW2 and lost their lives.

Bomber Memorial

Gift from a King circa 1700s.  Open to the public for tours however not at 8am.

Breakfast at The Botanist

Wiling away time at The Botanist with an English milk tea, Scottish smoked salmon, scrambled eggs and sourdough toast. Yum! Had a lite breakfast on the plane which consisted of dry scrambled eggs, weird form of bacon that was more like athin slice of grilled pork and awful rendition of hashbrowns.  I really don't think that airline food is an easy thing to master.

Saatchi Gallery exhibit. Duke of York Square

99,000 blue plastic "to go" bags

Saatchi Gallery

Wiling away the time in Chelsea

Showered, change of clothes, short nap.  We are ready for dinner.  

Club room at our hotel.   Love the reading nooks and cloud pillows.

Going overseas

Virgin Atlantic and Sir Richard Branson are genius!  Fun music playing when you board and club lighting made the start of this flight feel like you were going to be entertained.  The staff made you feel like a rock star.  I am impressed Virgin Atlantic!

3 course meal and drinks all complimentary for Premium Economy class.  All videos and TV free as well and quite the selection including newly released movies.

Cab ride on the wrong side of the road! ;-)

TESCO sign reminded me of the Lily Allen song "LDN".  Lots of these cute little bikes tootling around London Town.

Alinea September 27, 2014

OSETRA- traditional Caviar. Paired with Champagne Pierre Moncuit Blanc des Blancs Brut NV.

SALSIFY- branch camouflage.  We had to go looking for the hidden food item in the nest of branches.

 Me "smoking" the found root. What's a restaurant blog without a cigar involved?

KING CRAB- melon, lardo, honey. Paired with Keller "RR" Riesling Trocken, Rheinhessen 2006.

SKATE - brown butter, lemon, herbs.
You ate this with silverware but you had to hold it in your hand.
It would not sit on the table without toppling over.
It was an interesting experience keeping the plate in hand while eating.
It was as thin as a paper plate and reminded me of a napkin.

RHUBARB - celery root, celery branch, red wine. Paired with Liquid Farm "Vogelzang" Rose, Happy Canyon 2013.

SWEETBREADS - orange, ginko nut, cinnamon chop sticks. Paired with Vouvray Demi-Sec "Le Mont" Domaine Huet 2007.

TOMATO - ashed goat cheese, pistachio, licorice graffiti. Paired with Habit Gruner Veltliner, Santa Ynez 2013.

MATSUTAKE - pine, huckleberry, tapioca. Tensei "Song of the Sea" Junmai Ginjo-shu, Kumazawa Shuzo, Kanagawa - ken.

LILY BULB - rambutan, distillation of caviar lime.

Melon ball with cheese, chocolate and tapioca.

The corn was cooked and placed back into the husk to look like a corn cob.  The husks were placed in a tin can with Alinea's label and lit on fire and then blown out before the corn was placed in front of us to eat.  The smell was a great compliment to eating the corn.

Boiling broth was poured into a dish of duck and vegetables. Again the smell of the boiling broth was a great compliment while eating the duck.

Duck dish

PORK BELLY - parsnip, black trumpet, kombu. Paired with Broc Cellars Valdiguie, Solano County Green Valley 2013

A type of Bubblegum flavored dried meringue was placed over bits of fruit.

Fruit was stretched and formulated to become as thin as cotton candy when it melts in your melt.  The balloon did the same thing when you went to eat the balloon.  (It also got all over your mouth like cotton candy!)

TROPICAL FRUIT - rum, vanilla, kaffir lime

Ingredients for TROPICAL FRUIT

asked server: what is the funniest thing a customer has ever asked you

At seven glaciers aleyska, Alaska - what time do the glaciers go by? At what altitude do elk turn into caribou? 

And this is where the question originated. When traveling we try to remember to ask our server this question.

asked server: what is the funniest thing a customer has ever asked you

At Ivory Grille in Sedalia, MO -  hmmm, let me think about that and get back to you.  I might need to use code because of explicatives.

Yesterday, we gave Chef Clayton Chapman of The Grey Plume in Omaha, NE his signed copy of The French Laundry recipe book.  I was so excited to give it to him and he seemed pretty shocked that we followed through with our promise that if we got in to The French Laundry we'd bring him back Thomas Keller's autograph to him.  We did just that.  He signed it to Chef C Clayton "It's all about finesse".   I think I might have been more excited than Chef!  He said he was excited to show it to the rest of his staff and that he was taking this copy home.  His copy is 20 years old and sits on the book shelf at The Grey Plume.