It might still have its Michelin star, but I find Nobu surprisingly average

In the dark and distant days before I started this blog, I entertained a journalist with a lavish lunch at Nobu.  Back then there was only one .. the original, on Park Lane.  It was at the height of its fame and was unique in London in elevating Japanese food to the gourmet.

A lot of sushi has crossed the seas since then.  Nobu opened a second branch on Berkeley Street; like its mother, it also holds a Michelin star.  Japanese has gone mainstream and I've sampled a variety of restaurants in London and abroad.  You can pay a fortune, or you can pick up a tasty, reasonably-priced take away box at Itsu.  And it's inevitable that I'm eating a lot of it in January, when I'm trying to make up for the excesses of the holidays with serious dieting.  There's nothing like sushi for healthy eating.

Last week found me back at Nobu, this time at the Berkeley Street location.  In line with my memories of the original, lunch at this one presents a panorama of affluent business people and a lot of willowy model types grazing on exquisitely formed bite-sized morsels within sleek, modern architecture.

Like any sushi place, and you can order by the piece from an a la carte menu.  But at £5 or more a bite, you'll break the bank quickly with that approach.  The logical option is one of their set luncheon menus.  We, like most of the people around us, went for the deluxe bento box at £45.

The presentation is exquisite.  The waitress arrives carrying something that looks like a small, narrow coffin.  She sets it before you and unstacks it, revealing two rows with a total of five segments, each filled with a distinct treat.  Best of all, I calculated this lavish spread at 30 Weight Watchers points.  Which is still a blow-out, but probably far more restrained than an impressive two course lunch at a Michelin star restaurant with European origins.

My first time around, I thought Nobu was far better than any Japanese I'd had before; each bite delicate and distinctly flavoured.  I can't say that again.  It was good.  And, given the variety of dishes and their quantity, not bad value for a posh London venue.  But great?

The individual pieces of sushi (top right) were the stars of the box.  At too many sushi spots one type of fish can taste much like another.  These were distinct and melt-in-the mouth succulent.  And, frankly, from both a price and Weight Watchers points perspective I'd order the sushi and sashimi combo rather than the box if I had it to do over again.  Keeping it simple was the way to go.

Sadly I'd been tempted by the promise of king crab tempura, front left, but I'm sad to say the delicate flavour of the fish was lost in a somewhat heavy-handed batter. The teriyaki rump steak pictured front centre, which no doubt added £8 to the dish price thanks to its "Wagyu" derivation (and 8 Weight Watchers points thanks to its saturated fat), was tasty but nothing special.    The spicy garlic scallops on the bottom right were slightly overcooked.  Which, honestly, is inexcusable for this level and style of restaurant.  If I hadn't been enjoying the company so much I might have even considered sending it back.

The most innovative bit of the meal was the cold Asian vegetables presented as sushi roll on the top left; beautiful, an interesting new taste sensation and doubtless 0 Weight Watchers points.

All in all, a perfectly enjoyable meal but I'd much rather be spending my own £45 (I was someone else's guest for this lunch) at our perennial favourite Hiroba.  And if I were pushing the boat out, I'd return to Zuma, with a tasting menu that was more expensive than Nobu's boxes, but miles ahead in taste and innovation.  I described both here.  And for sheer atmosphere?  Forget the London sophistication and the supermodel crowd.  Take me back to the gloriously over-the-top Japanese movie set that is Yamashiro, with its view over the lights of Hollywood.

If my lunch was anything to go by, Nobu … like the faded movie stars who retire into those Hollywood Hills … has had its day.

Broadcast proves a perfect way to sample ballet

Giselle from the Royal Opera House, live broadcast to the Basingstoke Odeon

I saw my first complete ballet on Monday.

It's embarrassing to admit, but in a world of vast cultural options, ballet has never beat opera or art exhibits for a slice of my entertainment budget.  The world of live broadcasting changed that.

Instead of planning months in advance, finding someone who wants to go with me (husband not an option for ballet) and spending well over £100 for tickets and transport, I could work on the spur of the moment.  Read a fabulous review in the Sunday Times the day before, nip over to the local Odeon when the work day ended on time and slip into a seat for £15.

I'm glad I did.  The chatter of my fellow viewers told me that Carlos Acosta and Natalia Osipova had danced a truly remarkable Giselle.  "We won't see their like again," sighed one veteran.  So I was starting at the top of the food chain.

Even a complete rookie like me grasped the magnificence.  Both leads combine agility, strength and grace in a way that's almost superhuman.  And they can act!  Here's another way the broadcast pays dividends.  I hadn't grasped how close to mime opera was; how, in the absence of words, the story is told with facial expression and subtle hand movements as well as the bigger dance moves.  I can't imagine that much of the the exquisite subtlety would be visible from most of the live seats.  In this way, I suspect ballet may be better in broadcast than live.  At least for the neophyte.

On screen, larger-than-life, you could marvel at Osipova's guileless innocence, and Acosta's transformation from a callous playboy to a broken-hearted love.  When the two stars weren't dazzling, there were plenty of impressive leaps, spins and prances en pointe, pleasant music, beautiful costumes and lush sets.  Worth every penny.

Despite all that, I'm no ballet convert.  The absence of words makes for obvious plot limitations.  Giselle is pretty straightforward.  Playboy count masquerades as peasant to woo village girl.  She kills herself when she discovers the deception.  He, realising he really loves her, is stricken.  He mourns at her grave, where he's attacked by a corps of vengeful spirits jilted dead women (the Wilis), but Giselle's ghost saves him from their haunting.

That's about it.

While the faces of Acosta and Osipova shifted with the action, the music doesn't.  It's romantic and lovely throughout, lacking any of the threat I would have liked the part with the Wilis to have.  I found myself thinking wistfully back to the horror of those blood-soaked temptresses swaying to the building menace of Wagner's music in the Met's Parsifal.  We could have used that here.  Neither Giselle's petite, delicately-attired and pirouetting gang of spirits, nor their soundtrack, convinced me for a second that they were ever a real threat to the vibrant Acosta.

Bottom line, and rather obviously, you have to be into the dancing itself a lot more than I was to really connect with ballet.  As thrilling as the physical performance was, in both acts I got to the point where I thought "enough of the prancing around, already.  Let's move on with the plot."  Which is not, I suspect, a thought that any real ballet fan has.  Nor, I presume, do they spend most of the time when Carlos Acosta is on stage fixated by the musculature of his thighs and the beauty of …

Well, let's just say that, for anyone who appreciates the male form, it's worth the price of admission just to watch Acosta move.  He is one of those ancient Greek statues, the representations of human physical perfection, brought to life.  We mere mortals can simply gawp.

Thus I'm fairly sure that my physical attendance in Covent Garden will remain operatic.  But more ballet by broadcast?  I'd give it another go.  Might have to plan further in advance, though.  This broadcast thing is clearly taking off.  Two sold out cinemas here in Basingstoke by the time the curtain went up.  Had my workday gone any later, I would have missed this pleasure.

New BBC show on the Rococo brings out my inner Disney Princess

TV recommendation:  Rococo: Travel, Pleasure, Madness. Tuesdays, 9pm, BBC4

July, 1978.  A 14-year-old me leaves the USA for the first time to spend a summer with Italian friends.  I'm wandering through the Borromeo palace on Isola Bella; a fairy tale concoction that takes in most of this little island on Lake Maggiore.

I wander through one massive room after another dripping with gold leaf, sensuous paintings and stucco work that looks like it's been piped out of a baker's icing bag. Everything is drenched with light from the towering windows looking over sun-speckled water. Then I plunge into the stark contrast of a narrow, dark stair and come out into an even stranger place.  A lakeside grotto, open to the air and water, where sea gods and nymphs emerge from walls that are a riot of sea shells.  Mouth slack with amazement, I continue on to the gardens, which carry on the shellwork and cavorting deity theme.  But now it's all going up terraces, studded with obelisks. There are unicorns and white peacocks. 

I thought it was the most wonderful place ever.  As if you gave a teenaged Disney princess, unfettered by ideas of good taste or restraint, unlimited cash to build her dream home.  Of course I loved it.  I was 14.

The memories came flooding back this week as I watched the first episode of Waldemar Januszczak's BBC4 series on the Rococo.  It's a style that never got much traction in England, given this country's suspicion of excessive emotion and Roman Catholicism.  My own tastes in design, having matured and been shaped by 20 years amongst the English, now lean towards a cleaner Georgian line.  But I still like a bit of wacky over-the-top-ness in my life.  I couldn't live with the Rococo every day, but it's a lovely, occasional bit of spice.

Where to get that Rococo hit it in England?  In museums, sure.  But where to find it in situ?  It's not so easy, but I do have a few recommendations for English Rococo days out.  I wonder if I'll see any of them in the remaining two episodes…

Claydon House, Buckinghamshire - A smaller National Trust property that's tucked away down long country lanes, it's probably best known for its associations with Florence Nightingale.  But the real reason you should go here is because it's the masterpiece of Luke Lightfoot, reckoned to be the finest carver of the English Rococo.  Several rooms drip with his work but head upstairs for the jaw-dropping stuff in the Chinese room, encrusted with pagodas, fretwork, Oriental curlicues and what the Europeans imagined to be Chinese people.  It's completely ridiculous, so busy it makes your head hurt, but absolutely wonderful.

Waddesdon Manor - Just up the road, and also National Trust, making for the perfect Rococo double bill of a day.  This is a cheat, as it's not truly English Rococo, but continental.  Built from interiors and furniture collected and re-assembled in the 19th century by the Rothschilds, it's a lavish French Chateau magicked on to a Buckinghamshire hilltop.  The whole place is full of wonders but to pick one characteristically Rococo glory I'd head to the remarkable aviary in the gardens, where exotic birds and plants frolic inside even more exotic pagodas and trellises.

Ragley Hall - A bit further north in Warwickshire, you'd never guess the austere neo-classical facade of
the seat of the marquesses of Hertford hides a riot of Rococo plasterwork indoors.  The great hall is the thing to see here.  Pink and white, full of classical allegory, it's as close to continental Rococo as I've seen in England.  The remarkable murals in the staircase hall, completed in the early 1980s, are entirely in keeping with the style despite their modern production.  There's a nice bit of Rococo irony here, as well.  The best English museum at which to see this style is the Wallace Collection, assembled by the illegitimate son of the 4th marquess.  I wonder if the glories of the family seat he could never inherit sparked his love of the period?  His father ended up leaving him every bit of the family fortune that didn't go with the title, which Richard Wallace then used to build up his own collection.  I've already spotted it several times in Januszczak's first episode and suspect we'll be seeing more.

Painshill Gardens - Not to be confused with Painswick in the Cotswolds, which bills itself as a Rococo garden but I, being pedantic, would classify as Gothick.  Painswick doesn't have a grotto and, harkening back to that first experience on Isola Bella, I think that's a must for a Rococo garden.  Painshill in Surrey has what's thought to be the best garden grotto in England.  (Though the one at Stourhead gives it a run for its money.)  The garden has lots of other fantastical follies … a must for a landscapes of this style … and is nearing the end of a long restoration that's bringing it back from dereliction.

Weather Januszczak agrees with me, we shall see.  I will confess to having great difficulty spotting the line where the Baroque ends and the Rococo begins.  My interest in doing so is one of the reasons I'm lapping up this series.  If he visits any of the above, I'll have to reward myself for my accuracy.

Maybe by buying one of those sets of porcelain monkeys in 18th century costume playing instruments in a simian orchestra.  Very Rococo.  Very Disney princess.  But could I live with them?  We'll see...

Leighton House exhibit gives us a beautiful, magical Afghanistan worth saving

Afghanistan.

If I commissioned one of those marketing word clouds to capture your first reaction upon hearing that country's name, it would probably not be positive.  War. Taliban. Suicide bombers. Al Qaeda. Oppressed women.  Spend an hour wandering around a gorgeous little exhibit now on in Holland Park, and you'll replace those words with better ones.  Elegance.  Beauty.  Magnificence.  Geometry.  Sophistication.

Ferozkoh: Tradition and continuity in Afghan Art, occupies a single, medium-sized gallery off Leighton House Museum.  It's a treasure trove.  And one built around a fascinating conceit to explore that concept of continuity.  There are 18 pairs of objects here.  In each case, one is an ancient treasure from a legendary past filled with dynastic names like Mughal and Safavid.  And the other is a modern piece, inspired by the first, created in the past few years by students or teachers from the Turquoise Mountain Institute for Afghan Arts in Kabul.

It's tremendous fun to try to guess which is which before you read the labels, because it's far from obvious.  The stunning pendant above, for example, seemed a certainty for a piece of modern art.  Bold, colourful moulded glass, figures sculpted in clean lines, sitting beside an illuminated manuscript page of a turbaned hero slaying a dragon. The painting? 2012.  The pendant? 12th century.  Another pair offers you a neck-filling circle of chunky red spinel gems, linked by bright gold chain.  It would be at home on the catwalk of the next London fashion week.  Its mate was a 38 carat, bar-shaped emerald with intricately wrought gold peacocks capping either end, hanging from an elaborate chain. Spinels, 17th century.  Emerald, just crafted.

Almost everything here seems to be both intricate and elegant, a hallmark of Arabic art.  There are pots with exquisite forms and complex incising.  Wall tiles, textiles and manuscripts running riot with colour, arabesques, floral patterns and Arabic script, yet all reigned in by a geometric repetition that brings a soothing order.  Wooden screens strip away all but the bare geometry, and dazzle you with the conundrum of something that can be simple and complex at the same time.

It's almost inconceivable that the war-torn, hellish country we see on the news is home to such majestic  things.  And that somewhere outside of Kabul there are men and women who aren't tragic news stories, but fine artists, continuing a rich tradition that we in the West certainly don't know enough about.  It reminds me of the basic point of The Monuments Men, a fabulous book about to become a film. (Of that, more next month.)  

We fight wars to preserve culture, because things like art, sculpture and music are the embodiment of all that is best in humanity.  If we ignore or destroy that culture, we destroy the civilisation itself.  Thanks to the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar, for putting this show together and sending it our way.  It runs 'til 23rd February, and I'd almost insist it's your cultural duty to see it.  You'll be delighted and dazzled, while understanding more about why it's worth fighting for this place.

While you're there, of course, you also get to enjoy the rest of Leighton House.

Fredrick, Lord Leighton was a Victorian artist on the tail end of the pre-Raphaelite movement.  You know the stuff.  Statuesque maidens with flowing, curly hair and soulful heroes in richly-detailed historic settings.  (I wrote about their show at the Tate in 2012.)  Leighton turned up by the time it all got quite establishment; so much so he became president of the Royal Academy and was ennobled just before his death.

He was both prolific and profitable enough to build a generously-sized, lavishly decorated home and studio in Holland Park, now restored to its late 19th-century heyday after decades of neglect.  In addition to Renaissance and ancient Roman settings, Leighton was a fan of the exoticism of the Middle East (thus the relevance of the current exhibit) and made his home's central hall a fantasy stage set for the Arabian Nights.  Tiles, mosaics, dome, carved screens, babbling fountain … it's had jaws dropping for 100 years.  And most Londoners don't even know it's there.

Check it out.  You won't be disappointed.

Newlyns game course builds confidence with meats that deserve more use

With enough cooking schools under my belt, both at home and abroad, to consider myself a bit of an expert, I am delighted to rank our local spot … Newlyns … to be the best.  (For reasons why, you'll have to read to the end.)  The consequence:  we keep taking a few classes a year, working our way through their curriculum.

For us, one of the most eagerly anticipated was game cookery, and it finally rolled around this past Saturday.

Game, for you urban, non-foodie types, is meat that's hunted rather than farmed.  Venison, pheasant, partridge, rabbit, etc.  We're surrounded by hunting estates here in Hampshire, so plenty makes its way into our farm shops.  There's not enough of it, generally, to meet the mass production necessary for the big supermarket shelves, however.  And our affluent Western society channels us towards familiar cuts of familiar meats.  Thus game is strange and, to people who'd prefer to think of their meat as spontaneously generating in skinless fillet form from the pristine styrofoam beneath it, rather horrifying.

I'll admit, it's not for the faint hearted to walk into a kitchen classroom and be greeted by a pile of dead, and completely intact, birds. But buck up, it's worth it.  Game tastes good.  It's almost always local, so fresh and environmentally friendly.  And it's usually far leaner than farmed meat; a Weight Watcher's dream.

The most important thing we learned was how to pluck and draw a bird.  This is mostly obvious, but there were some fine tips.  Pull little feathers towards you, big ones away.  Don't be hesitant; go for handfuls and work briskly or you'll be there all day.  Don't rip the skin; in sensitive areas hold the skin below where you're working gently but firmly and with the other hand pull quickly and vigorously.  Any woman who's waxed will grasp this technique immediately.  Best tip:  If working indoors … which is not really the best idea … spread one bin bag beneath you on the work surface, another hanging from its edge to catch your pluckings, and grease both of them with washing up liquid to snag errant feathers.

While I doubt my marksmanship will ever be accurate enough to shoot my own dinner, I can now accept the largess of hunting friends.

When it comes to cooking, we're too obsessed with the topic for many revelations.  We always take new tips away from classes, however.  Cooking game birds, notoriously quick to dry out, on their sides … thighs to pan … first one side and then the other, before going into the oven gets that dark meat on its way and helps you not to dry out the breast.  Chestnuts make a great, quick chutney that's a tasty side to game; a fine use for the vacuum packs I stocked up on at Christmas.  Add venison bones to your  game bird carcasses when making stock to get a depth the lean birds won't offer alone.

The hands-on part of the day included working with partridge from whole bird to plate, making the chestnut chutney, a parsnip puree and a mushroom duxelles.  The puree recipe depends on butter and cream, of course.  Trying to take the diet seriously, I thought I'd experiment with a simple combo of parsnip, apple and low fat milk.  It didn't look promising, as the milk solids separate into nasty-looking blobs as you simmer everything down.  But blended together it works, and is the sharp, slightly sweet, mouth-filling side you need with game.  It wasn't as tasty or as smooth as my husband's recipe-true high fat version, but it's a passable substitute.

Demonstration and straight instruction included cooking saddle of venison (to go with the duxelles), how to confit pheasant legs, how to deep fry parsnip crisps, how to skin and prep a rabbit and how to make rabbit rillettes.  (I doubt I'll be using my rabbit skills soon because, even in farm shops, it's a rare meat to find in England.  A shame.  It's common in Italy, I've enjoyed it there and I have Italian cookbooks full of tasty recipes.)

We sat down to lunch half-way through the day with the partridge, puree and parsnip crisps, augmented by sprouts and a nice glass of red wine.  The rest of the dishes came home with us.

And this is why Newlyns beats any other course I've been on, hands down.  In addition to our fine lunch, we walked away with two more meals for the freezer:  haunch of venison with mushroom duxelles and pheasant breast with confit legs.  And, noticing how my husband was lingering lovingly near the jar of rabbit rillettes as the class broke up, chef Daniel sent that home with us as well.  There are few ways to make my husband happier than to gift him with meats preserved in goose fat.

We'll be back.  But before then, I need to talk my shooting friend into gifting me with a brace from his next outing.  Must practice...

No better place for a rainy day than the British Museum

If presented with some horrible, cultural "Sophie's Choice" of saving just one of London's magnificent museums for posterity, my decision wouldn't take long.

I'd feel horrible about the whole thing.  I'd weep bitterly about incinerating the National Gallery.  I'd think twice about the Victoria and Albert.  But the one I'd save … the only one I could even consider … is the British Museum.  Noah went for the living things, the British Museum founders built an ark for human civilisation.  The roots of all culture are here, and I can wander here happily, any time, for hours.

Ironically, it's been ages since I did just that.  I pop in a few times a year for major exhibitions, or to cut through and visit a few favourites when Bloomsbury is in between places I need to be.  But a good, old, aimless wander?  It was a perfect way to spend one of the dying days, rain-drenched days of my Christmas holiday.  As work looms, it's a reminder of what I would do with my life if I didn't also like to spend money.  (And therefore need to earn it.)  A selfless, less materialistic Ellen might have followed in her mother's footsteps to become an art historian and museum educator, calling halls like these home.  Without a lottery win, I'll be just a visitor.

What do I visit?  Most people know the Top 10.  (Elgin Marbles, Lewis chessmen, Sutton Hoo treasure…)  Let me introduce you to some of my lesser-known friends.

Let's start with the dying lioness.  This was my mother's favourite piece in the whole museum.  It spoke to her of courage and determination.  Carrying on in the face of overwhelming odds.  The lioness is part of a series of bas reliefs carved to grace the palace of Ashurbanipal, the last great King of Assyria (modern Iraq).  He's on the wall in all his glory, riding his chariot and shooting away.  Dead and dying lions litter the stone fields.  But, despite what he intended when he commissioned his decor 2,700 years ago, it's not his magnificence I dwell on, but the beauty and nobility of his poor victim.

A few galleries over, I pop in on my friend Mausolus, whose tomb at Halikarnassos (modern Bodrum, Turkey) was so amazing it gave its name to any grand tomb: mausoleum.  What's left of it is here.  There's one of of the gigantic horses that drew the quadriga … the four-horse chariot … at the monument's top.  Facing him are the equally larger-than life statues of Mausolus and his wife, and ringing the room you'll find sculptural friezes from the monument.  Not quite as elegant and sophisticated as the Elgin marbles, but similar and in many ways more exciting as they portray the battle between Hercules and the Amazons.  Many people never find these galleries because the main door in is behind the big Nereid Monument in Room 17 (another favourite), and I find there's rarely anyone back there.  On the way, I also get to give a nod to one of the caryatids from the Erechtheion.  They're the stately Greek maidens who serve as columns on the porch of one of the smaller temples on the Parthenon.  When I finally saw her sisters in situ, I was impressed by how much better preserved the one in the British Museum is.

Nearby is the Molossian Hound, born 2200 years ago in what's now Northern Greece.  This lovely mastiff is threatening in his size, yet adorable in the cock of his head and his quizzical look.  Any dog owner will recognise his greeting of genial curiosity. Is it time for a walk?  Did you bring a treat?  I have no doubt he was sculpted from life, by an artist who loved him.  Perhaps that's the reason for his popularity.  At least five copies have been unearthed from ancient Roman sites, and English nobles of the Georgian period reproduced many more to guard their neoclassical piles.  You'll want to pat him on the head, but you'll have to restrain yourself.  He is priceless.

From Greece to Rome, I go in search of the Portland Vase.  This magnificent object is made from what's known as cameo glass.  Glass blowers would blow the main vase, then dip it in another vat of a different colour of molten glass.  When the glass cooled, gem cutters would carve away part of the upper layer, arriving at the final product:  white figures emerging from a blue ground.  This was an enormously sophisticated process.  We don't know who owned the original, but it was probably someone enormously wealthy.  In its complexity, and its survival from antiquity, it's unique.  But how can that be unique, you say?  It looks so familiar!  Indeed.  That's because Josiah Wedgwood became obsessed with the thing, and the idea of reproducing it in his new Jasperware process.  After scores of trials he succeeded, and from there drove the craze for white classical figures on darker grounds that we think of today as quintessential Wedgwood. Which provided the design theme for my wedding.


Upstairs, I drift back to the Ancient Near East.  The room with the Egyptian mummies is always packed, but nobody ever seems to linger in the magic of Mesopotamia nearby.  We're in the same part of the world as the dying lioness, but my favourite here is far more ancient.  A magnificent goat, about 18 inches tall, on his hind legs searching for food in a tree.  He's made of gold and lapis, and shines so brightly you'd think a jeweller had just finished assembling him.  But he came from the royal cemetery in Ur, and he's 4,600 years old.

There's much to delight the gold-lover's eye upstairs.  Jewellery in these Egyptian and Mesopotamian rooms leads to golden Celtic torques and Anglo-Saxon burial hoards.  Keep wandering through the Middle Ages and on to cases of Georgian and Victorian ornament.  But on the way, stop to admire my favourite:  the Mold gold cape.  Dug up in Victorian times, it's almost 4,000 years old.  Showing that the Ancient Welsh could go head-to-head with any of the historic empires on the ornament stakes.  This is the ultimate bling; a shroud of gold that starts as a collar and goes down to the middle of the upper arm.  Wearing it would clearly have been deeply confining, but terribly regal.

Nearby we skip to the almost modern to find my favourite in the clock collection.  It's a miniature galleon rigged up as an automaton.  It was designed to start banquets in a German royal court.  Once set off, its wheels would propel it to the centre of the table, where it would fire smoke from its little cannons while a line of German electors circled past the reviewing emperor.  It's a clock too, of course, with a face worked in to the upper deck and sailors in the rigging hammering bells to mark the time.  Now that's how to start a dinner party in style.

Finally, I like to linger in the Enlightenment gallery.  When I was a kid this was part of the National Library, where historic documents were displayed.  Those items have all moved to a high tech new library, leaving this room for re-deployment.  It is still a library of sorts, but now it's the fantasy library of a well-educated Georgian aristocrat of the type who helped found the British Museum in the first place.  The shelves and display cases mix books with all the collectibles and ephemera our ideal lord would assemble.  Greek vases, bits and pieces of classical sculpture, a "merman" (some ancient fraud assembled from a taxidermised monkey and fish joined together), South Seas war clubs, South American ritual statues … in short, a British Museum in miniature.  It's the spirit of the Enlightenment in one room, and I love it.

I don't expect anyone will ever have to choose to preserve just one London Museum.  But if you're here with limited time and can visit only one, head to Bloomsbury.

"Yes, Minister" fans will enjoy "The Duck House"

Theatre Review:  The Duck House, Vaudeville (London)
Restaurant Review:  The Delauney

British comedy at its best manages to combine sparkling wit and wordplay, current events, silly farce and physical humour in a single package.  That's what's on offer right now in The Duck House, playing the Vaudeville Theatre in The Strand until 29 March.

The comedy re-hashes the expenses scandal of 2009, in which one MP's charging to the taxpayers of a duck house for his pond became a symbol of the whole tawdry affair.  This play invents an MP who combines all of those sins we read about into a single heinous, entitled-but-amusing character, played with comfort and flair by Ben Miller.

You'll know Miller from tv comedy sketch shows, and that's no surprise.  The play's authors work on shows like Have I Got News for You and Mock the Week, and here they've created the same humour in long form, on a single topic.  The whole thing plays out like an extended skit on a television satire show, a feeling increased at our viewing when two different mistakes triggered improv bits that were probably funnier than the original plot.

Miller's MP, Robert Houston, is an opportunist who's about to hop to the Tories as Labour implodes.  The expenses scandal breaks just as he's about to make the move, and he's guilty of every expense infringement you can think of.  Yes, even a duck house, which is the centre of a laugh-out-loud scenario in the first act.

After a quick set up, most of the plot is about Houston, his wife and son (who he's been expensing as his secretary and researcher, of course, though they've done no work) desperately trying to cover their tracks as a Tory grandee checks them out before accepting Houston's transfer and giving him a cabinet post.  As with any good farce, the harder they try to make things right the worse the problems become, and by the middle of the second act I'd challenge anyone to sit quietly.  There's a ribald massage chair, a vengeful Russian maid, a dominatrix, identity mix-ups, super-glue traumas and panda costumes.

It's not sophisticated … and I doubt it will have much of a shelf life given how much it depends on knowledge of news events of the time.  But it is very funny.

We started at The Delaunay on The Strand for a pre-theatre dinner.  It's billed as a "grand European cafe in the Austro-Hungarian tradition", and the high ceilings, dark wood, marble, linen tablecloths and silver, with smartly-dressed waiters, all combines to remind you of Vienna.  As do a formidable array of stunning Germanic-inspired pastries at the take-away counter and coffee bar that's the restaurant's more casual front end.

Seated in the main room, you'll find a menu that carries through the theme, with schnitzels, sausages, borscht and stroganoff.  It's not all Germanic, however.  Dishes of the day include curries, there are plenty of French options and I chose a hamburger.  Served medium rare, on brioche, with a cone of thin and crispy fries, it was the best I've had for quite a while.  Both boys went for steak tartare, reported as good but not fabulous.  But other dishes around the table got raves, including a crab salad and wiener schnitzel.

On a restaurant scene where most dining rooms have the same taupe-and-mushroom-with-modern-art look, and even some of the nicest places feel very casual, the Viennese formality of The Delauney is a nice change.  Had any of the waiters been tall and blonde, I would not have been surprised if they'd clicked their heels together and given a little bow after taking our orders.

Turns out this place is the latest offering from the crew behind The Wolseley, so the general vibe should be no surprise.  It's been ages since I've been to the mother restaurant (before the blog started … prehistory!) but I remember much the same quality and feel.

The good news is that The Delauney is open all day and holds tables at the front for walk-ins.  It's a great atmosphere, in a great location, to linger or to meet for business.  Indeed, this is actually my second visit as I attended a business breakfast in the private room here in November and was impressed enough to want to give it another try.  (The breakfast was just as good as the burger, and was given an admirable sense of occasion with all the grand, old fashioned table silver.)

The bad news is that the all-day hours mean there's no special pre-theatre dinner.  We probably could have done much better, price-wise, at any number of restaurants in Covent Garden.  The Delauney is made for lingering.  If you're going to spend the money, plan on settling in to their comfortable leather banquettes and staying for a while.

Ringing in my Jubilee Year on the Thames, with fireworks

I turn 50 this year, and I plan to make it a year of exceptional celebration.  Seizing the day, every day.  Because you never know how many days you may have.

After two bouts of cancer, despite having the "all clear", the statistics for a long life are against me.   At least, so say the insurance companies that won't offer me life insurance for any reasonable price.  While I have every intention of seeing 60, 70 and beyond, the situation does give me a special perspective on milestone birthdays.  And one hell of an excuse to party.  Thus I have decided that, in royal fashion, I shall declare my 50th birthday to be the excuse for a whole Jubilee Year.

Mr. Bencard, entering into the spirit, thought 2014 should be kicked off with flare.  Thus last night found us aboard HMS President, moored on Victoria Embankment with a clear view of the London Eye, base for the town's New Year's fireworks.

This was certainly not a budget option for starting the new year, with tickets at £230 each for our riverside table.  That got us piped aboard in naval ceremony, into a cocktail lounge where we got a glass of champagne each and a few canapés.  (If you worked hard, you might be able to snag four from the less-than-abundant servers.)  Then in to a three-course dinner of deeply average banquet food (goat's cheese tart, chicken breast, strange and not very successful attempt at chocolate baklava) with half a bottle of wine each.  You could top up at the bar where the good news was serviceable wine at £17.90 a bottle.  A steal by London restaurant prices.  A DJ spinning non-stop dance classics from just past midnight, and platters of bacon sandwiches circulated at 2 am.

If that were the extent of the party, you'd feel deeply ripped off.  Of course, it wasn't.  What you're paying for here is location, location, location.  And the ability to see fireworks without the crowds and effort.  The masses gathered from late afternoon and stood for hours in the cold, steady rain for 15 minutes of dazzle, then had to fight the mad crush to get home.

We sat at our riverside table all evening, from which we merely needed to stand and gaze out the window to see the show.  True, we missed the official soundtrack … though our DJ provided his own … and the much-publicised, coordinated scent sprays.  These were supposed to make this the world's first multi-sensory fireworks show.  We coped with the loss.

And our view was from the side, rather than straight on.  Not a problem.  I'd rather invest my money in comfort and convenience than spend my time and comfort on a central view.  I wouldn't do it every year, but as a one-off, the riverboat party is probably worth the investment.

Besides, we saved money on the public transport.  As it does every year, the Underground runs from midnight to the wee hours, free to all.  That's almost £9 back in the Bencard coffers.  How will we spend it in Jubilee Year?

Come back soon and discover.