Proms, 9/11 musical offer different takes on the glories of live music

My father lands at Heathrow tonight from a small town in mid-Missouri. He already has seven outings booked in his six-week visit: two musicals, one opera and four orchestral concerts. His home may be the state capital, but it's still a tiny place with limited possibilities for live music. Especially on a big scale. So when Dad comes to England, he indulges himself.

It's something those of us who live in the orbit of London forget. We have so many opportunities, they're easy to take for granted. And until you're starved of it, you can forget just how different live music is from the recorded alternative. Whatever the quality of your audio system, nothing compares to being in the same room with the people making the music.

I was twice-blessed with such magic this week, first with Wagner night at the Proms and then at the musical Come From Away.

The latter is the story of how tiny Gander, Nova Scotia and its surrounding communities coped with 7,000 passengers from re-routed planes grounded by the terror attacks on 9/11, 2001. We saw it on September 11th, which made an inevitably poignant evening even more so. I can't think of any better way to mark such a grim anniversary, since the story celebrates the essential goodness of human nature. In times of real crisis, people tend to find their best selves and take care of each other.

The staging is reminiscent of Hamilton, with a sparse set, a handful of props and a large turntable put to clever use. An ensemble cast of about a dozen slips in and out of characters with simple costume changes, doing a remarkable job of playing both villagers and the "plane people". I assumed they'd copied the more famous musical, but Come From Away's origins pre-date Hamilton by at least a year. Score one for the Canadians.

Score quite a few for the Canadians, actually. This is as fine a piece of national promotion as you can get. The storylines of stereotypical New Yorkers and Los Angelenos being transformed by the wholesome goodness of their friendly neighbours to the north might be a bit hackneyed, but it's heartwarming. The show is essentially a series of short vignettes stitched together, all based on real people. Though the authors created some composite stories to move the plot along, many are pretty much as they happened: Beverly Bass, American Airlines' first female pilot, doing her best to take care of her plane, crew and passengers; Hannah O'Rourke, mother of a New York firefighter (who was later confirmed amongst the lost); Gander's heroic Mayor Claude Elliot; Bonnie Harris, the manager of the local animal shelter who defied airport lockdown regulations to get to and take care of dogs, cats and two rare bonobo chimps stuck in aircraft holds. There's even a real-life love story of a Dallas divorcee and a workaholic, lonely Brit whose lives are brought together by the madness, and end up together after it.

Most of the music is toe-tappingly infectious, drawing heavily on Celtic melodies and at its best when the whole cast breaks into a ceilidh. Though there are a few traditional musical theatre belters ("I am here" as Hannah longs to hear news of her son, "Me and the sky" as Beverly tells the story of her life), the tunes aren't memorable enough to send you out humming. Like the cast themselves, the songs are an ensemble brought together in support of the greater story.

It's not all sweetness and light, and doubtless wouldn't be taken seriously if it was. The initial stress of the passengers as they're locked inside the planes for long hours with no information is stomach-churning, especially for frequent fliers. Though set only 18 years ago, Come From Away reminds us that there were few mobile phones then and none of them "smart". Have tissues ready to mop up your tears when the plane people finally learn what happened. And there's a dark, important storyline of the Muslim passengers who were suddenly treated with suspicion and cast out as others react in fear. It's an important reminder that the worst part of terrorism is how the fear we carry with us afterwards can change us. Few respond as well as the residents of Gander.

One wonders how Siegfried would respond in a modern crisis. Wagner's hero, despite achieving a happy ending, had to rush off on more adventures, trash his relationship and ultimately bring down the old world order. Fortunately he did it to one of drama's most stirring soundtracks.

The 68th Prom of 2019 was Wagner night. Promoted as "the world's greatest classical music festival", the Proms make a bumper crop of concerts (75 this year) accessible to the general public. Our upper circle tickets were just under £17 per person, the equivalent of a couple of drinks in a London pub. You can spend more, but the point is: you don't have to. Proms are also broadcast on TV and radio, so people who can't be there in person can get in on the fun.

It was the joy of "in person" that brought us, of course. All music sounds better live, Wagner even more so. Regular readers will know that our affection for the bombastic German extends to patronage of Longborough Festival Opera, England's Wagner specialists, and we travel there for one Wagner production each summer. Their work has become justifiably famous and Wagnerian conductor Anthony Negus is regularly praised for his orchestra. But the Royal Albert Hall does things on a very different scale. The orchestra of almost 100 players, complete with four harps and a jumbo percussion section, would have trouble fitting inside Longborough's entire opera house, much less its orchestra pit.

The result was a sensuous blanket of romantic sound. I defy anyone not to tremble with emotion when hearing Siegfried's death and funeral march in such surroundings. It was, quite literally, breath-taking. The whole programme was a delight, enhanced by bringing in composers who influenced, or were influenced by, Wagner's work.

The first half brought the theme of the enchanted forest to life, anchored by a piece from Siegfried called Forest Murmurs in which our eponymous hero has acquired the ability to understand the forest birds and listens to their conversations. It's magical. Things had kicked off with a bit of Carl Maria von Weber, and ended with a fantastic Cesar Franck piece called Le Chausseur Maudit (The Accursed Hunter). I'm a big fan of music that tells a story, and this one is a corker. A French nobleman skips church to go hunting on a Sunday, breaking the laws of God and man. The devil turns up to dispense justice and the hunter becomes the hunted for all eternity. Hunting horns, waves of strings, escalating tension: this is a piece that deserves to be better known.

Part two pulled together the best parts of Gotterdammerung, the last of Wagner's ring cycle, into a continuous run of music for about an hour, with singers giving us a bit of Siegfried and Brunnhilde. The joy of live isn't just the big, bold bits, but the quiet as well. If you've ever listened to Wagner (other than the continuously energetic Ride of the Valkyries) you'll notice that he builds drama by interspersing the bombast with quiet, gentle parts. You end up either constantly fiddling with your sound levels to hear it all, or missing whole sections. In person, you get it all and appreciate the magnificent scope of the music.

We made a night of it by eating in the Elgar Room inside the Royal Albert Hall, which you can book at the same time you get your tickets. The irony, of course, is that we spent about three times as much per person on food and drink as we did on the music, but I suppose the profits all go back into keeping entertainment like this functioning so we can feel worthy about it. The Elgar does a three-course set menu for £35 with upscale British bistro food. It opens at 5 giving you time for a leisurely two courses before heading to your seats, then you can return for pre-ordered dessert at the interval. They helpfully provide plastic cups for you to take remaining wine with you into the hall.

If Dad's upcoming experiences are anywhere near as good as these, he'll have plenty of great memories to take back to Jefferson City.

Avebury, HMS Belfast and Glyndebourne show the diversity of English attractions

The plunging pound may be killing my holiday spending power, but it's drawing foreign tourists to British shores like bees to a spring orchard. We've seen more American guests this summer than the total for several previous years. Before each arrives, I ask them about sightseeing preferences. The variety of answers illustrates why England has such broad appeal.

Culture vultures are ecstatic at the density of museums, theatres and galleries. The history nerds head to castles, country houses and re-enactments. Americans are particularly keen on Downton Abbey and royals, and there's still a surprising amount of Diana-themed tourism. Fashionistas, foodies, landscape painters, hikers, surfers and music lovers can all easily craft itineraries focused on their specific interests.

A surge in my own sightseeing levels over the past fortnight drove this point home. Three destinations with three different companions. All radically different. All wonderful.

AVEBURY: For the new age spiritualist and the countryside lover
More than 1.5 million people flock to Stonehenge every year. It's one of those Top 10 "must sees" that a lot of foreign visitors feel they need to check off their list to claim that they've "done" England. Yes, it's impressive. And a much better experience these days thanks to the 2013 addition of museum and visitors' centre. But it's also one of the most expensive tourist attractions in England (£19 for an adult entry), packed with jostling hoards of bus tours, and you can only stand at a distance and gaze respectfully at the stones. Venture 24 miles further northwest and you'll be in the middle of the world's largest megalithic stone circle, without a group tour in sight. At Avebury you can actually touch the stones, see much more of the original monumental landscape and have a charming old-world village thrown in as a bonus.

And you don't even have to give up Stonehenge to visit. Though there's always talk of running the road through a tunnel, for now the A303 passes within a few hundred metres of the more famous henge, giving passengers a chance to have a good look from the roadside without paying for admission. (There's no stopping on this stretch of road, but there's inevitably traffic that slows things down.) The additional half hour's drive takes you through some striking landscapes. Dramatic, broad sweeps of Salisbury Plain's vast rolling fields alternate with small wooded valleys and charming villages with a tourist-pleasing percentage of thatch. You might even see a tank: besides being a picturesque landscape, the army uses much of it as a practice range. Look carefully as you pass through and you'll realise many hills and ditches are too regular in shape to be natural; Stonehenge was just one monument in a massive complex of henges, tombs and ceremonial sites that spread across this area between 4,000 and 5,000 years ago. (Roughly the same time as the great pyramids were built and people were making legends in Troy.)

Avebury has three stone circles: the gigantic outer one that's more than 1000 metres around and 347 across, once made up of almost 100 massive blocks, and two circles sitting side-by-side within. All of this was surrounded by a deep ditch with a high bank on the outer side, and a single ceremonial avenue cutting through it into the main circle. You can make out most of this today, though at least half the stones are gone and there's a village tucked into half the circle. The remaining stones stand like ancient, petrified giants, twisted by eons of weather into fantastic shapes. Touch them, stand beside them in communion, picnic in their shadow; there's no one to stop you here. In fact, there may well be more sheep in the fields in which you're standing than fellow tourists. The views from the top of the encircling mound are fantastic and the walk around the half of the circle standing in splendid isolation is one of the best in England. You can even bring your dogs.

The village itself sits in the other half of the circle, perhaps most distinctive for its handful of "New Age" shops. Avebury, even more than Stonehenge, is the emotional home of modern paganism and those who seek to connect with an earthy spirituality. If you're in to wicca, crystals, animism, Tarot or anything along those lines, the small shops here are a treasure trove. The less spiritually inclined can enjoy The Red Lion, the kind of thatched, traditional pub that's everyone's fantasy of ye olde England. Nearby Avebury Manor is one of the most unique houses in the National Trust's care. An exquisitely mellow 16th century stone pile on the outside, its interiors weren't significant so the NT offered it up for a posh reality show in 2011 where academics and designers re-created rooms in five different historic styles. Thus you can sit on chairs, touch stuff and have a play at being lord of the manor.

There's no charge to wander the stones, but you'll need to pay for the car park. It's £5.60 for admission to the small museum and £12.30 for the manor; all free for NT members.

HMS BELFAST: For the WWII and nautical history buff
She's been moored on the South side of the Thames, just upriver from Tower Bridge, since 1971 and draws about a quarter million visitors a year. The Royal Navy cruiser has been preserved much as she was when in service, and makes a fascinating counterpoint to anyone who's scrambled around HMS Victory in Portsmouth. Though the technology is vastly different and they're separated by 200 years, there are striking similarities in their layout and the way they functioned.

Belfast shares a name with the city where she was built, in the famous Harland and Wolff yards that also turned out the Titanic. She launched in 1938, just in time for the WWII North Sea service that made her famous, later transferring to Asia and playing a big role in the Korean War before being decommissioned in the 1960s. The way she spans eras of technology makes her particularly interesting. Some of her "bones" are charmingly old-school, like the wooden main deck, the ship's bell and the elegant patterned weave of the sick bay's blankets. But the red-and-white checkered lino flooring throughout is pure 1950s, and her navigation and weapons technology was incredibly advanced for the '60s. (If you're at all interested in the history of communications technology the areas on display here are particularly fascinating.)

This is a magnificent venue to expend the energy of restless children and a no-go area for the disabled, since seeing the ship properly demands scrambling up and down at least a score of ladders. The highlights for me were the two bridges in the front of the ship (one for the captain of the Belfast herself, and another on the deck below from which the admiral of the fleet could command accompanying ships) and the gun experience aft, where you can climb into a gun turret to get a sense

of what working there in battle would have been like thanks to a dramatic film using interviews with real sailors, and some simple but dramatic effects like gun smoke and a rumbling deck beneath your feet. I was shocked to learn that the men working the guns had no sight of the outside world. More than 20 of them were essentially packed into a dark, heaving metal box, taking aiming and firing instructions from elsewhere in the ship. It must have been horrifying.

The Belfast's location means she also benefits from some of the best views in London, which she makes the most of with a cafe up top and lots of places to stroll, linger and look. Wandering amongst bristling guns makes for an odd pleasure garden, but that's what her decks can be on a sunny day.

Admission is £18 at the door (less when purchased online in advance) or free for Imperial War Museum members. That includes an audio guide. Or you can just wander and benefit from informative displays throughout.

GLYNDEBOURNE: For the gardener and opera aficionado
You'll need connections or deep pockets to get into this one. (I, thankfully, have the former.) Tucked into the rolling chalk downs above the Sussex Coast, Glyndebourne is the mother of the whole English Country House opera tradition. Given our regular involvement with Longborough (most recently covered here) I was fascinated to take a peak into these sacred grounds on a members' open garden day.

The lovely manor at the centre of things looks venerable, but is actually a "Jacobethan" shell built around an older house and its additions early in the 20th century. The open day included access into "the organ room" where Glyndebourne's love affair with opera started. Its enormous windows, wood paneling and blue-and-white ceiling make it a treat to get inside.

Owner and music lover John Christie built this barrel-vaulted, 80-foot long room to house one of the largest organs in the country outside of a cathedral, then started hosting opera evenings here.  Originally amateur affairs with friends, he decided to get more sophisticated by hiring a professional troupe, then fell in love with and married the soprano. Eventually a purpose-built theatre sprang up next door to show off her talents. That original was replaced by a 1,200-seat, four-level, horseshoe-shaped auditorium in 1994 with state-of-the-art acoustics and all the backstage sophistication needed for what, by then, had become one of the country's leading opera companies. This space was open as well, allowing us to appreciate the light wood paneling in thin, vertical strips which is both dramatic and elegant and, I suspect, great for sound quality.

The real purpose of this day, however, was what lay outside. Glyndebourne is surrounded by glorious gardens that are now famous as a venue for posh pre-operatic picnicking. Given the age of the house, it's no surprise to find lush, romantic borders of mixed perennials in a style similar to contemporaries at Sissinghurst and Hidcote. There's an aromatic rose garden that spins around a fountain memorable for a bronze of one of the founder's pugs taking a nap. Broad lawns sweep down from the house to a ha ha, that marvelous English invention of a sunken wall and ditch that keeps sheep off the lawns, beyond which the woolly flock grazes in pastoral scenery. Elsewhere there's a long reflecting pool dotted with lilies and a productive bit of the grounds with greenhouses, orchards and vegetable beds maintained with Chelsea Flower Show-worthy precision.

There's plenty of modernity and innovation here as well. The grounds are dotted with sculpture, the most striking pieces made of rusted iron sheets of  geometric shapes that contrast beautifully with the greens and blues in which they're set. The most surprising bit of the garden is a bit wedged into a slope between the old, formal gardens and the opera house. Part jungle, part fernery, it has an enchanted "secret garden" feel about it that makes it feel like something very alien and exotic has been hidden in the landscape. A bit like the opera itself...

Glyndebourne isn't open to the general public but it's a great reminder of the stunning gardens found throughout Sussex. Check out Great Dixter, Hever Castle or Parham House for some gardens with equal appeal in the same area.

Tivoli: the "original" Disneyland keeps a charm long gone from Anaheim

My first holiday with the man who would become my husband included a trip to Disneyland. Back in the early days of our relationship and still keen to impress me, he managed to repress his cool disdain of the place. A year later he introduced me to Tivoli Gardens, and I started to uncover how he really felt. Disneyland, in his mind, is just an over-commercialised copy of Copenhagen's historic amusement grounds and would never match his childhood days at Tivoli.

Given my own idyllic Disney track record in both Anaheim and Orlando, I'm never going to concede
victory to his opinion. After years of visiting Tivoli, however, I've come to treasure the place's distinct magic and understand why Walt copied it. Yes, copied. A stroll around the grounds makes it quickly obvious that the original Anaheim park did not spring solely from Disney's imagination, but evolved from his visits to this Copenhagen original.

There are the themed areas sweeping you to another part of the world with relentless attention to architectural detail. A balance of high-quality shows with rides. Attractions for all ages. Gorgeous landscaping lining winding walks between attractions. The Pirateriet (pirate ship) is a dead ringer for the sailing ship Columbia that plies Disney's "Rivers of America" and the Roller Coaster is the Matterhorn in miniature.

The similarity is even stronger if you are old enough to remember Disneyland in the '70s, when entry to the park was a reasonable admissions fee, on top of which you bought tickets for each ride. Tivoli still works that way, and it makes me nostalgic for those old days in Anaheim. The difference is distinct. Tivoli is a pleasure garden, not an amusement park. People come here just to stroll, appreciate the gardens or eat at one of the restaurants. Like Disneyland, Tivoli is an oasis completely surrounded by urban mayhem; though it's so much smaller that you can spot the towers of central Copenhagen from almost everywhere inside. This doesn't diminish the sense of quiet relaxation that permeates, however. I remember the original Disneyland being much like this. Grown-ups would go to dine, relax and shop, handing us books of ride tickets to go amuse ourselves. It all seems much more sophisticated, and far friendlier for the visitor's wallet.

Adult entry is £16. You can add an unlimited ride pass for about £30 pounds, though pricing varies depending on weekends, weekdays, whether there's a big concert on, etc. But you can grab a single ride ticket for around £5. So if all you want to do is have a wander and go on a couple of rides, it's a steal compared to Disney's modern all-inclusive model.

This was my fourth visit but my first to try a ride. Which had to be the proto-Matterhorn (photo above). Built in 1914, this wooden coaster is one of the oldest still in operation in the world and thus has earned the right to its simple name: the Roller Coaster. (Perhaps with an emphasis on "the".) The Alpine setting around the boarding area and the model mountain above you are a dead ringer for Disney's adaptation, though you're in regular cars rather than bobsleigh and it's only about a third of the size of its Californian daughter. But size isn't everything. It's still gives a fine ride, with plenty of speed, incline and plunges. Some of the journey, like the Matterhorn, is in the darkened interior of the artificial mountain, adding to the suspense. But here you have the satisfying "clickity clack" of the wooden tracks, which lends a charm that modern rides can't match.

There are plenty of modern options here, too. The Demon is a triple loop-the-loop in a Chinese fantasy land, with the option of virtual reality headsets if you want to enhance your chills and spills. Fatamorgana is a 45-metre tower with spinning cars and discs hanging off it, the Star Flyer is an 80-metre high swinging carousel (based on the planetary discoveries of Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe) and Vertigo's spinning arms take you on a high-G plane ride. On some future visit I'm particularly keen to check out The Flying Trunk, which in design looks suspiciously like It's a Small World and in description (travel through 32 fairy tale scenes!) sounds like it spun off about half the attractions in Fantasy Land. If you splashed out for unlimited rides you could certainly get your money's worth, with 28 attractions ranging from the high-thrill stuff to innocent, child-friendly pursuits like an old-fashioned carousel or two-person boats on the lake.

Plenty of people just come here for the atmosphere, restaurants and entertainment, however. Locals get a particularly good deal on season tickets, from as little as £5 a month. We chatted with one couple in the gardens who come regularly for concerts (there's a large hall that hosts both classical and popular artists) and to appreciate the gardens. And their fantastical backdrops. The Nimb Hotel is a particularly famous centrepiece, looming above dancing fountains like Ali Baba's palace.

This low-bar entry fee also makes Tivoli a logical place to go out to eat, meaning that restaurants here tend to be higher quality and better value than their Disney counterparts. (Though, to be fair, Disney does have some great places to eat, which I've written about here.) We whiled away the afternoon at the Bryggeriet Apollo (the Apollo Microbrewery), a charming place that looks like an old Danish
inn, or "kro", sitting on the lake just across from the pirate ship.

 There are decks along the lakeside with moveable shades and heaters, offering al fresco dining and drinking for much of the year. Indoors ... which was empty on the glorious summer day we were here, is all exposed brick, scrubbed wood and shiny copper brewing tanks. The Bryggeriet offers a variety of classic Danish open-faced sandwiches, including a delicious trio of seafood options. There's a heavier menu for dinner.

The home-brew is delicious and there's a separate snaps list for those all-important toasts. (If you're going for a proper Danish lunch, you drink both beer and the local acquit called snaps, saving the later to toast your friends and accompany your fish dishes.) They had some more unusual options including "Porse", or Danish bog myrtle, which is extremely herbal to the point of being medicinal. It reminded me of drinks made with another herb, genepi, in the French Alps. While it did provide a satisfying counterpoint to pickled mackerel, it's not something I'd order again. Certainly not when my favourite dill snaps is on offer.

While Tivoli's tiered fee policy brings the nostalgia of the Disney of my youth, is has changed, most notably in its opening days. My husband speaks fondly of an attraction that was only open during the summer, making Tivoli time something particularly precious. No longer. There's now a winter opening for the month of February, presumably to capitalise on Valentine's Day. When Easter is early there's a separate opening or, when late as this year, it's rolled in with summer. In 2019 the gates opened 4 April and will close 22 September. But not for long. The newest holiday opening is for Halloween, 11 October to 3 November. (This one leaves my husband sputtering with rage at the incursion of a commercialised American holiday into European traditions.) Then about two weeks later Tivoli re-opens for its Christmas extravaganza.

Considering that all of my visits before this one were in these extraordinary holiday times (twice at Christmas, once at Easter), I'm delighted about the change. In fact, though summer was a hazy, lazy joy, I think the other times are more spectacular. The Christmas decorations are magnificent, as is a holiday show on the lake with dancing water and lasers. It can also be bone-numbingly cold at that time; booths selling blisteringly-hot mulled wine every few meters make the outdoors survivable. Easter brings a display of bulbs just as impressive as the famous Dutch gardens at Keukenhof, though on a much smaller scale.

Whatever the season, Tivoli is one of the wonders of Copenhagen. Don't miss it.

Krebsegaarden, Relae show why Denmark pulls the food tourists

Early in the next decade the Danish chamber of commerce expects the country to have enough hotel beds to accommodate up to 10 million tourists at any one time. To put that in perspective: The population of Denmark is about six million. No wonder it's gained the dubious honour of being in the top 5 countries suffering "over tourism" (calculated by the ratio of residents to tourists).

What do all these travellers see in this tiny Nordic country? For many, it's all about the food.

Denmark has 27 Michelin-starred restaurants. Two-starred Noma has been named top restaurant in the world four times and three-starred Geranium currently sits at No. 5. (Noma lost its third star and slipped in the rankings while it closed for a year for renovation. Many expect it to regain its dominance this year.) Some of my most remarkable dining experiences have been here, including at the dearly departed Restaurant Herman at Tivoli and at Aarhus' remarkable Domestic. Whether the explosion in interest in Nordic cuisine sparked the tourism boom or vice versa is a "chicken or the egg" conundrum, but whatever the answer there's no doubt this one of the top "foodie" destinations in the world.

Thus it was no surprise that the top priority of travelling friends we were meeting in Copenhagen was restaurant reservations. Our challenge: use my half-Danish husband's insider knowledge, our travel experience and the big network of Bencard cousins to come up with some exceptional meals. We delivered with a traditional lunch at Cafe Petersborg (described in an earlier article here) and two fine-dining wonders: Relae and Krebsegaarden. Relae holds one Michelin star and is anchored by a Canadian. At Krebsegaarden your hosts are two Norwegian chef/owners Mats (pictured above) and Carsten. The food scene is a magnet for international cooking talent as well as diners.

We had the chef's tasting menu at both restaurants with the matching wine flight. Both restaurants have an obsession for local produce and lean heavily towards seafood. Both offer creative twists on preparation and source wines from interesting small producers. Both have charming servers who talk you through the dishes in as much detail as you want. The cost of both experiences was roughly the same (£120 per person; but note this reflects a very weak British Pound at the moment).

Krebsegaarden's quirky differentiator is art. It's a combined gallery and restaurant where the kitchen takes its inspiration from the seasonal exhibitions on the walls. There's a small a la carte menu and an invitation to let the chef design a multi-course tasting menu for your table based on your preferences and hunger. It looked like most people take the latter option. Mats chatted with us a bit, then started the food and wine rolling.

We opened with some delightfully fat scallops, seared with a coat of brown sugar and smoked salt and served with a puree of green apple, onion and dill. Next a salad plate of small pickled radishes, goats yogurt, salad leaves, caramelised walnuts and rye crackers; one of those plates that shouts out "you don't need animal protein to create something special." But there's no way I'd want to go pure vegetarian in a country with such great fish. So on to red fish "escabeche", sitting atop a sweet and sour melange of finely diced green beans, olives, capers and bell peppers, accompanied by a sweet potato puree. How good is this kitchen? That list features at least two things my husband dislikes intensely, yet as prepared here he savoured every bite. The meat course brought a stuffed guinea fowl breast with a "meatloaf" prepared from the dark meat, sitting on a creamy wild rice sauce and accompanied by a mix of carrots, peas and corn that looked exactly like the frozen, mass market stuff.  But tasted very different. As it was supposed to. Mats said the inspiration for the dish was the frozen TV dinners of their youth. They've done homage to the memory while creating something gourmet.

The table was liberated to personal preferences for dessert, with me going for their take on cheesecake (really a misnomer; it was a tangy, cream cheese-like parfait with fresh and pickled strawberries and some crumble for crunch) while others went for creme caramel and the plate of

chocolate petit fours.

There's no Michelin-star daintiness or formality here, and while the plates are attractive nothing is a work of art. With the way Mats and Carsten work the room, discussing inspiration for their dishes, where their ingredients come from and why the wine matches, you feel more like you're dining in their house than discovering a fancy restaurant. If you like something a lot they might bring out extra portions. If your taste leans towards one wine they might pour a similar one to see how you compare them. It was as intimate an experience as we had "private dining" in Grenada earlier this year. We loved everything about Krebsegaarden. This is not, however, a place for a quiet, romantic dinner or just being left alone. Mats is a big personality, and the discussion of what you're eating and drinking here is almost as important as the dining.

Relae is a bit more traditional in that respect, though you'll still have chefs explaining what you're eating and the room's exposed brick walls, natural wooden tables and world music mix are a world away from white tablecloths and old-fashioned fine dining. The presentation, however, leaves you no doubt you're at the high end of the culinary spectrum. From the custom-made tables with individual drawers for each diner's range of cutlery to a staggering array of beautiful plates and bowls to the food's exquisites presentation, Relae is gorgeous.

The restaurant's heritage traces back to Noma; founding chef Christian Puglisi came from the famous kitchen to start a place that was more approachable (and affordable) while still holding on to Noma's values. Those include a veneration for organic produce and local sourcing; so much so that Relae has its own four hectare mini-farm half an hour away and tries to raise as many of their menu elements as possible. It's impossible to miss this. When you arrive, you'll step down into a welcoming space with the kitchen on view and a large central table heaped with the day's produce, as artfully arranged as the displays in Harrods' food halls.

Canadian Jonathan Tam, another Noma alumnus, took over the kitchen three years ago. His Chinese and Vietnamese family roots give both menu and presentation a distinctly Asian feel. The amuse bouche of griddled cucamelon and spears of swiss chard showed the unusual preparation of ordinary veg that would characterise the whole meal. We chased that with shot glasses of potent tomato water before going on to slivers of cured mackerel wrapped in spinach leaves. Very Japanese. Next came freshwater crayfish, a passion of the Danes, served with a creamy crayfish soup that was one of the highlights of the meal. You can, however, get a bit carried away with the vegetable worship. The stack of grilled squash slices covered with cream sauce and sprinkled with marjoram leaves was beautiful, but didn't taste special enough to deserve its solo placement.

The meat course featured delicately flavoured, rare salt marsh lamb and a beautiful swirl of salad leaves plated to look like a crown. Excellent, but the friend who went for the pescatarian option here was the winner with rich turbot in a cream sauce. Vegetable madness let them down again on the sweet front. While incorporating chunks of cooked squash into lemon verbena ice may prove the point for the possibility of using vegetables for every course, it's an underwhelming end to a meal if you're a dessert lover.

If I were hosting a vegetarian, Relae would win hands-down. It's a more thought-provoking experience in the way it uses its ingredients, and is probably more "Instagrammable." But I'd give the edge to Krebsegaarden on the overall experience and my satisfaction across all of their dishes.

Even at its worst, Copenhagen is worth the effort

The Danish countryside in August is a vacationers paradise. While most of Europe heads south, this rolling land of farms, long beaches, comfortable manor houses, half-timbered villages and Viking heritage is little explored, especially after the Danes go back to school in the middle of the month.

The same can not be said of Copenhagen, which is now so firmly established as a capital of cool and a culinary hot spot that its normal crowd of visitors accelerates to a heaving mass in the summer holidays.

It's almost impossible to walk in a straight line down the famous pedestrian shopping street of Strøget. You'll wait in a long queue for one of those famous Danish hot dogs and every canal cruise leaving Nyhavn is packed to the gunnels. The crowds, unfortunately, seemed to bring out things I'd never noticed in usually pristine Denmark: beggars, rubbish blowing down streets, homeless people and crime.

Sadly, we were the victims of the last as ... returning in a taxi from dinner one night ... a man assaulted my husband on the steps of our hotel, stripped him of his watch and ran off. Two conscientious police officers were on the scene in 15 minutes, took a full report, collected the hotel's cctv of the event and even did a swab of my husband's arm in hopes of finding the bad guy's DNA. (Tourists, don't expect that in London!) Their care, and the horror of the hotel receptionist who saw it all, somewhat assuaged the shock of the whole thing. But we learned a lesson: tourists should be as wary in Copenhagen as anywhere else in Europe during high holiday season.

Fortunately, crowds are a relative thing. Nowhere in the Danish capital is going to be as unpleasantly jammed as Florence or Versailles, and most people stick to a very narrow tourism flight path. It doesn't take much to step outside of it and see other wonders. Though the area near the (underwhelming) Little Mermaid statue is uncomfortably packed, if you linger at the far more impressive Gefion fountain nearby you'll find a comfortable seat from which you can appreciate the cascading waters and watch busloads of tourists on the far side of the fountain trudging to and from the more famous landmark.

Walk a few yards Southwest and you'll be in the pretty Churchill Park, almost free of tourists. St. Albans, the English church on its edge, is well worth a visit. At the time of its construction Britain's Princess of Wales was a Dane (Alexandra), so the building went up with significant royal backing. Royal Doulton contributed a custom-created font, lectern and reredos, now recently cleaned and well worth a detour for decorative arts geeks.

So is a fantastic life-sized sculpture of a wind-whipped Valkyrie on horseback, on the other end of the park.

Even the main attractions aren't so bad if you bide your time to let the tour groups pass by. There are, however, more of them than ever to dodge. Copenhagen's tourism board said it expected a record 1.2 million cruise ship passengers to visit Denmark this year, almost all of them stopping off in the capital. Fortunately they're usually on tightly-timed, escorted tours so never linger long in one place. This was particularly obvious in the National Museum, a treasure trove of pre-historic and Viking artefacts and one of my favourite gift shops in town. I've written a full article about it here.

Even if you've visited the collection before, it's worth a return to check out the new "Meet the Vikings" galleries. They've divided opinions in Copenhagen, and in the Bencard family. Clearly feeling pressure to modernise and no doubt influenced by the reach of Amazon Prime's television show, the museum has turned three galleries over to a blatantly populist approach. Created by a Danish designer and TV presenter named Jim Lyngvild, the exhibition plucks some of the most significant pieces out of the collection and uses them to "dress" imagined Vikings. We see the characters and the artefacts in highly-detailed, oversized photos and in vividly-lifelike models (complete with tattoos, scars and showy moustaches.) Artefacts are in cases below and beside the characters. You're even invited to sit on the king's throne.

It's good fun and does bring this world to life, but there's a lot of imagining and "what if" going on here. I thought it was a fun way to spark the imagination and get kids (or simply the less interested) into the topic. My husband was irritated by the leaps into historical fiction. When it opened last year, a lot of serious art historians were frustrated than the museum poured money into this at the same time it eliminated more than 20 jobs. Visit the exhibit to make up your own mind; it's included in general museum entry.

You'll be both cruise-group and controversy-free at the Medical Museion, an unlikely destination unless you are in the health care field, studying to join it or have a relative who's a curator here. Our detour to say hello to my husband's cousin turned into an unexpectedly fascinating hour of exploration.

There's a large collection of medical samples, not for the squeamish, assembled by doctors a century or more ago to study the human body and its diseases. An architectural highlight is the neo-classical dissection theatre, a grand indoor amphitheatre facing a "stage" backed by tall windows letting in all-important light. In the basement there's an award-winning exhibition (curated by Adam Bencard) called Mind the Gut, which examines the relationship between the brain and the stomach. (Something I, sadly, have far too much experience with. Though it does provide you, dear reader, with a lot of fine restaurant reviews.) There's a lot of fun stuff to balance the academic inquiry here, including an artsy and entertaining film that shows how digestion works (yes, really) and an interactive quiz that generates your healthy mind and gut diagnosis.  I'm supposed to always remember to escape and not let ideas leak away. No change there, then.

Neither tourists nor locals seem to take much notice of another of my favourite sites in Copenhagen: the central train station. People make pilgrimages to see the station in Porto, Monet immortalised Paris' Gare du Nord, yet I find this building just as striking and almost unknown. There's little information in any guide books about it, other than revealing that it was built at the start of the 20th century and designed by Heinreck Wenck in what's known as National Romantic Style. This was a bit like the Gothic Revival in the UK, but when the Brits looked backwards, the Danes mixed their historic architecture with modern elements to come up with something more like Viking Art Deco.

The station is most striking for its wooden roofs, both in the main hall and the train shed, which give the buildings a grand yet deeply historic feel. The exterior is castle-like, and both interior and exterior share design elements recognisable from the collections back at the National Museum: Romanesque arches; ironwork in looping, Viking-style filigree, statues of Danes in historic dress, crests in glazed terracotta, stained glass windows. It's a delight. And is one of the easiest and most direct connections from airport to city centre in all of Europe. If you're flying to Copenhagen, don't waste your money on a taxi. Take the train into town and enjoy this architectural masterpiece on your way through.

There's a vast variety of hotels within a short stroll of the station, but it's worth appreciating some nuances of geography. To the North and East of the station's main entrance are some of the city's most expensive lodgings. The pleasure grounds of Tivoli and its world-class Nimb Hotel are literally right across the street from the Eastern exit from the main hall. Exit to the West, however, and you're in the old red light district. As such places go, this one is fairly innocuous and the city is doing its best to redevelop it into a trendy tourist area. In the blocks closest to the station it's mostly hotels and restaurants. There's none of Amsterdam's blatantly seedy sexuality on display, and the less observant wouldn't even note the change in neighbourhood. In the four square-block area between our hotel, the station and the neighbourhood dividing line of Vesterbrogade, there was one low-key sex shop and one "gentleman's club" with fairly upscale branding. I wouldn't have noticed the handful of working girls on the street corners had my husband not pointed them out.

Though the hotels here are just a few blocks from their posh counterparts, the subtle shift in neighbourhood brings the prices down. And perhaps makes management try harder. The Andersen Hotel here is my favourite of all the places we've stayed in four trips to Copenhagen. The staff works hard to earn their boutique branding, with hand-written notes welcoming you to your room, a free wine happy hour in the afternoons and an honour bar at other times, and a basket of knitting in the lobby ... which feels more like a living room or cocktail lounge than a hotel ... inviting you to make scarves for homeless people. The rooms have individual temperature control, including air conditioning, which is a bit of a luxury in old European buildings. The decor includes fun light fixtures and splashes of bright colour, a relief in a country where traditional Danish modernism can fade into boredom when applied on a corporate scale.

Unfortunately, I also have to factor getting robbed within clear view of the hotel's front desk into my review. (It was 11:30 at night. Late, but by no means unsociable hours.) The hotel staff was mortified, getting the police there quickly, apologising repeatedly and leaving a note and chocolates on our bed the next day. I would happily return here with my husband or a group of friends and keep my guard higher, but I wouldn't recommend it for a single female traveller.

Bottom line: Copenhagen is worth visiting at any time of year, but August can make this delightful city hard work. Spring and autumn are much better for drinking in the city's laid back aura.

Mayfair's Umu celebrates perfection in every element

Obsession is a necessity for Michelin-starred chefs. Nobody survives in a gruelling industry that robs you of your social life, rises above fierce competition and delivers perfection night after night without a bit of mania over what they do. In my reading about Japanese culture in advance of our trip later this year, I've seen something similar. The gardeners who groom every leaf on a tree to a painterly perfection, the generations of swordsmiths who hand down and hone their skills to create the ideal samurai blade, the calligraphers who strive for years to get a character just right ... there's plenty of obsession on display.

I began to suspect that fine dining and Japanese food would be an eminently logical match. An evening at Mayfair's Umu validates that suspicion.

Head Chef Yoshinori Ishii does more than deliver exceptional food. He matches a range of pottery (some of which he's designed) and lacquerware to the food and its position in the parade of dishes to make a visual statement. His biography tells us he's also a keen calligrapher, so no surprise that one of the courses is served on top of a poem, written in bold calligraphy by Yoshinori, illustrated by his own drawings. If that sashimi tastes fresher than any you've ever tasted, thank his love of fishing in the traditional Japanese style. Not only has he found his own Cornish suppliers; he's taught them the art of ikejime ... dispatching a fish quickly with a needle into the nervous system, curtailing the fright and struggle that releases meat-toughening hormones and acids. When that fish comes to you as a hand roll, it's presented by a Yoshinori-designed wire arm, symbolically from his touch direct to yours.

Umu specialises in kaiseki, the highly-ritualised, multi-course gourmet tradition of Kyoto. The biggest splurge during our upcoming trip involves an exclusive ryokan (inn) in the hills above the ancient capital where our courses will be brought to our rush-matted, paper-screen-walled room by our kimono-clad hosts. Before diving in at the deep end in a language we don't understand, I thought it made sense to get familiar with kaiseki on home turf. It was also my husband's birthday; a two-Michelin-starred Japanese restaurant was suitably celebratory. (And the price of a full kaiseki meal definitely needs to be reserved for a special occasion.)

Our eight course (but nine dish; one course had two parts) celebration started with "mukozuke." From what my post-meal research tells me, this is the word for a small, intriguing snack served in or on an interesting piece of pottery, often with a rough but beautiful finish and some kind of artful deformity. Here, a battleship grey bowl with a slightly pitted surface and a slightly shiny glaze would have been a perfect circle had the potter not bent one side in, forming a shape like an apostrophe. It was a quirky and beautiful piece that demanded inspection before you ever paid attention to the food. Inside was a lovely melange of gently-cured sea trout, wafer thin slices of turnip, pickles and caviar. Two generous bites or four dainty ones, it was an elegant foreshadowing of all to come.

"Nimonowan" is a simmered dish or soup cup, here titled "Ocean Breeze" and served in an exquisite lacquer bowl with lid that you remove to create your own little tabletop drama. Inside, a layered disc of Cornish lobster, abalone and nori seaweed sat in a broth so clear it almost disappeared. Later, we both agreed that the menu probably had one course more than it really needed, and this is the dish my husband would cut. He's never been a fan of lobster and thought the example here was slightly overcooked and too chewy. (Which is what he almost always says about any lobster.) I suspect the chewiness was the abalone. Whatever the truth, it was still one of the most exquisite interpretations of soup I've ever had and very tasty.

The next course was the double dish. "Tsukuri" is the set up to executing a Judo throw. One assumes that implies a partnership with the course to come, or maybe the first plate set up the second, but nobody told us. My only real complaint with Umu was that the serving staff (entirely European, heavy on Italians) doesn't really give you much information on your food beyond the basics, even though they knew we were interested. Many Michelin-starred places will go into detail about their supply chain, the inspiration behind the dish or even how you're supposed to eat something. We could have used more of that in this delightful, but very alien, environment. It seems that's simply not their style.

Tsukuri started with slices of raw turbot. People often claim "you can read through it" when describing  how thinly they've sliced something. Yoshinori plays with that idea by serving the slices on top of a poem he's written about the joy of food. Unless you can actually read Japanese characters, you can't test the "read through" claim completely, but it's a fun touch. Delicious as the turbot was, the highlight here was my first taste of real wasabi. The stuff you get in almost all sushi restaurants is an industrially-produced approximation made from horseradish, mustard and food colouring. Real wasabi is a root, notoriously difficult to grow, that releases a piquant kick when grated that fades within minutes. Obviously, most restaurants don't want to dabble with an ingredient with no shelf life after preparation, even if it doesn't cost £22 for a thumb-sized piece. The taste of the real thing, grated into a paste by moving in a circle on a piece of shark skin, is a mind-blowing blend of sweet and hot.

The sauces and the wasabi stayed around for part two: sashimi. This is probably the ultimate expression of the idea that the best ingredients don't need much done to them. Five pieces of top quality fish, incredibly fresh, taken from the best part of the fillet. I've had a lot of great sushi in my life, but the only time I've come close to this freshness was when we tried slivers of the fish we'd just caught off Puerto Rico before we left the boat. When fish is this fresh, it's almost a crime to cook it. And every kind tasted significantly different from the other. (Something, let's face it, you don't really get at Itsu.) The most fascinating morsels here were the back and belly tuna, side by side. Belly is a rare delicacy, and I've had it before ... but never this rich or pungent. We're talking the foie gras of the piscine world here. Honestly, the flavour was too much for me; I could have happily substituted another bite of back, but am glad I tried it.

Next came my dish of the day. "Agemono" means deep fried food in Japanese, and I suspect we were into the comfort food section of the menu. The description was sweetcorn three ways. I am from a corn state. I have an annual moan about the poor quality of the corn in the UK while I indulge in memories of buying sacks full fresh ears from the fields down the road from my childhood home and eating them before they'd been off the stalks for four hours. As glorious as those Missouri memories are, they couldn't touch the expressions of that noble vegetable here. There was a kernel-stuffed spring roll, a quarter of a grilled cob and a croquette I can only describe as deep fried creamed corn. We may have been in a Japanese restaurant, but it's as if the chef had distilled the essence of the best of an American midwestern summer onto a plate. I almost wept with joy. And if that wasn't enough, you unrolled the husk to find a line of perfectly popped and seasoned corn. Four ways! And each perfect.

"Hiyashimono" followed: smoked and cured mackerel with somen noodles and Japanese ginger. I couldn't find a translation for this title, but this was my husband's favourite dish. I suspect he was experiencing a similar cross-cultural childhood flashback, given how essential mackerel is to Danish cuisine. It is, however, the dish I would cut. Not that I didn't like it: the mash-up of sashimi and cold noodle salad would be a huge hit with me for a summer lunch. But at this point I'd reached satisfaction point on the raw fish and didn't need more.

"Yakimono" means grilled or pan fried and brought us out of the ocean for the first and only land-based meat dish: lamb two ways, with accompanying sweetbreads. Regular readers will know I'm not keen on lamb or offal, though I'll soldier through anything on a chef's tasting menu. (Which is how I got familiar with sweetbreads in the Loire Valley.) A benefit of the Japanese love of bite-sized morsels is that anything's tolerable this small. In fact, the rump and fillet were both rare and delicately spiced, avoiding the lamb-y flavours I dislike. This bit of sweetbread was more solid, chewy and unadorned than the heavily sauced French version. Not bad, but still not anything I'd order for myself.

Kaiseki traditionally ends with a bit of white rice, which explains the seemingly odd appearance of sushi hand rolls as the final savoury dish. The menu delivers up two per person which is, frankly, more than even the biggest appetites need at this point. But the options are so tempting it was a relief not to have to choose just between the smoked eel and the tuna. This was the dish that came out held aloft by the wire hand, or "gohan".

While I love Japanese food, I remain sceptical about the cuisine's ability to deliver on the dessert front. Umu didn't change my mind. Their offerings were beautiful ... we actually had two since my husband's tomato allergy precluded the dish included in the kaiseki ... but a bit too experimental for satisfaction. Both had vegetal elements, which I always find difficult in dessert. As a work of art, however, "ajisai", or hydrangea, was a wonder. Tiny cubes of blue and pink jelly, coloured naturally by butterfly pea flower and pink amber tomato, covered a mound of sweet white bean puree. This looked remarkably like a hydrangea flower head, with a smooth, creamy and mildly floral taste. Unfortunately the shiso sorbet beside it didn't work for me. Even though shiso is related to mint, it was too much like having a salad on the plate with my pudding.

I thought my husband's dish was more successful: mango with a panna cotta-like cream and a caramel sauce. The experimental element here came with more wasabi, served as a whole root as a side with the grater. You were supposed to grate your own and add it to the sweet for a flavour contrast. It was a bit like putting pepper with strawberries and worked to an extent, but my husband found it tough to get the wasabi / mango balance right.

As usual with a blow-out tasting menu, we went with the matching wine flight. Except that at Umu, a sake flight is an option. That seemed too experimental for my husband, so he stuck with the grapes while I threw caution to the wind with fermented rice. I was the clear winner.

By course three it was obvious that sake in your bog standard Japanese is restaurant is to the good stuff what a wino's rotgut is to Burgundy or Bordeaux. Every glass was balanced and nuanced, with a range of subtle tastes. Most, in a blind tasting, could easily have passed for wine. And unlike my husband's selections, mine came with a fascinating array of cups, from rough pottery to cut glass to fine porcelain that looked like a sea urchin. I learned from our sommelier (who got more chatty once we determined that he was from a Sicilian village in the same mountain range where my grandfather was born) that though rice has some aspect of "terroir", variations in sake flavour have much more to do with yeasts, fermenting processes and production decisions. The variety was exceptional, from a bone-dry, almost mushroomy offering to a slightly effervescent lemon treat that was like limoncello re-invented for sophisticated grown ups.

Most two-starred restaurants tend to steer everyone to the tasting menu, and if they have a la carte it's often more expensive than the chef's choice. That's actually not the case at Umu. You could pop in here at short notice, grab a seat at the sushi bar and get a couple of dishes and a glass or two of sake for something that approximates the cost of an average meal elsewhere in Mayfair. Not cheap, but a lot less than the full blow out.

Lime Wood lives up to the Angela Hartnett promise

There’s much hand-wringing these days about the effects of positive screening on social media. Because we only share the best of our lives, the idea goes, people are lured into a damaging, un-achieveable and unending cycle of keeping up with the proverbial Joneses. The hand-wringers seem to discount the possibility of any common sense that reasons posts are probably the best minute of an otherwise tough day, or understand those glamorous holiday photos as a reward earned after a year of earnest toil. Evidently we need to show our work to get credit on this exam.

Last week, I could have shared my disgruntlement with two consecutive commutes getting caught in train delays through Waterloo after days coping with London’s sticky heat. (The climate may be changing, but England’s ability to deal with a heat wave remains abysmal.) On the second, thinking I was being clever by re-routing through Paddington, I arrived at Reading to find the last train to Basingstoke cancelled. I could have done much better things with the £45 taxi fare it required to get home. Then there was the excessive tooth pain I was trying to mask all week with unwise levels of ibuprofen. Turns out a hairline fracture my dentist has had her eye on for years may finally be giving way. I’m not sure which will be more painful, the root canal to come or the bill that will equal 20% of my first job’s annual salary. Meanwhile, at work, a legal department’s excessive (IMHO) interpretation of data protection legislation just added a Herculean task to a project I thought concluded.

There was, in short, not a great deal worth celebrating last week. I could have Instagrammed a photo of my molar, but … really? Nobody likes a moaner. I suffered in silence. Thus I felt I was getting a bit of karmic reward when I discovered that the restaurant some friends were treating us to on Friday night was the Lime Wood Hotel. (That was on my Instagram feed before starters hit the table.)

Lime Wood is a country house hotel and restaurant sitting in classic Georgian splendour on the Northern edge of Hampshire’s New Forest. The restaurant here was my culinary hero Angela Hartnett’s first foray outside of London, with business partner and fellow chef Luke Holder. It had been on our “must try” list since she started her association in 2014, but we'd never managed it. To get there by unplanned serendipity was a treat.

This is a very different proposition from either Hartnett’s flagship Murano or her Murano Cafes, but her signature touches are there: tiny, succulent arancini as pre-meal snacks; traditional Italian four-course organisation (anti pasti, pasta, mains and dessert); and an Italian-style focus on simple dishes done well. But the menu (top photo) and décor take their inspiration from the house. There's no doubt you're in England here, with formal gardens and classic perennial borders on view outside, cozy upholstery, classic prints and warm wood inside.  The menu celebrates local ingredients:  Wooley Park Farm guinea fowl, Glenarm estate beef, catch of the day from the nearby coast. Everything was presented in a style that, like the room, balanced elegance and informality.

I started with an exquisite little deep-fried artichoke (above) served on a foundation of partially sun-dried tomatoes; they'd been dried enough to intensify their flavour and get a bit chewy, but still qualified as fresh produce. My veal chop main was succulent, pink and substantively different from beef ... something that, sadly, doesn't happen enough in this country. Italian-influenced cuisine typically isn't known for its sauces, but they made both my dishes. There were raves around the table for other choices: a barely-solid burrata on slices of fruit, the day's fresh-caught red mullet, that guinea fowl. Generous portions ... including refills on bread and arancini before the main meal ... left us too stuffed for desert.

We adjourned instead to the courtyard around which the square house was built. No doubt a service yard in its original creation, it's now a chic yet country-casual cocktail lounge with a glass roof that slides open on glorious days. Coffee came with little bowls of new season cherries, another nod to Hartnett's constant message that the finest ingredients need little embellishment. 

I was particularly impressed by the local nature of the place. Yes, there were obviously exceptionally well-heeled visitors staying in the hotel rooms. But our friends weren't the only regulars recognised and warmly welcomed by the staff. At a table near us, two such locals had popped in for a drink and a quick snack in the courtyard before heading off somewhere else. It's basically the local pub every foodie dreams of: Michelin-quality food in a laid-back atmosphere with a staff that remembers you and treats you as a beloved guest. It's a shame ... though probably a blessing for our wallets ... that Lime Wood is an hour away from our house. 

I wonder if Angela and Luke could be enticed to acquire one of Sherfield-on-Loddon's charming but deeply average pubs? Perhaps the power of positive thinking can influence them. I'd better get Instagramming.