Salmon – Page 12 – Beauperi Investments

Posted on July 29, 2017July 30, 2017 by beauperi

Back to the Continent

Thursday, 27 July, 2017 – weather: OK

Today we leave London to go the Eurostar under the Chunnel to Lille in France. The weather forecast is revolting, supposedly raining heavily on both sides of the channel.

Julie goes out early to her favourite Pain shop and gets a croissant and a coffee and fills it up with smoked salmon from the market yesterday. I have stuff Julie has bought during our stay, turkey, ham, toast. Then it is time to get going. Katerina arrives a bit late and Julie had gotten impatient and drags the suitcases upstairs. We depart and go to Earls Court station one more time, fortunately the rain held off. We get on the train to go to Kings Cross and it is totally packed. Hard to survive with two heavy suitcases.

Eventually the crowd starts thinning out and we make it to Kings Cross Station, quite early. We go through the security and immigration (for Britain and then France) and still have a long wait in the departure hall.

Eventually they announce boarding for our train. This is the only bad part of this kind of trip because there is a massive crush up the ramp escalator. The primary issue is when you get into your carriage is there space for your luggage, and we have some big suitcases. We barely find space for our luggage and then settle into our seats. Other customers have tickets for seats that do not exist but I guess they got that settled out.

Once we got started everything was OK. No obvious Internet, no laptop power at the seats but we are moving. There is one more stop to pick up a few passengers and we are certainly on our way. I get a bit distracted as food and drink starts to arrive, we are in Standard Premium, a tautology it seems to me, but there is a cold lunch.

Decent chicken slices with bread and cold vegies like grilled peppers. Not bad. There is a small bottle of red too

The people that were receiving food ahead of us had a cold quiche instead which I would not have been able to eat. We arrive at Calais and in another 30 minutes reach Lille. After getting into the station, finding out about our next train trips we exit the station expecting to catch a taxi. Censorship of what happened next, suffice to say we finally got into our apartment 75 minutes later after major missteps from us, lugging of suitcases over blue stone and other uneven pathways, our GPS and our Hosts.

Julie in front of the saxaphone player waiting for our connection

The apartment is disappointing in that although there is a lift it only takes us half way up, so there are stairs for Julie to drag suitcases up to reach the apartment. The apartment itself is good, roomy and well featured albeit could have been slightly cleaner.

Oh, I should mention that the weather is actually pretty good considering the forecast had said heavy rain all day. Also another point is that I thought Lille was a small town – actually it is the fourth largest city in France.

The lounge room which we are already spreading out into

I am still trying to get over my grumpiness but Julie goes out for a short prance around. A bit of a nap helps. Some photos from Julie:

Looks interesting but we did not go there

An interesting bar with interesting people

Julie returns around 7:00 and gives a report. We go out and look at some of her findings.

That is a pedi-cab with Deliveroo advertising all over it

We go into that weird bar – I will use the term again amazing.

We select Jour de Peche which we believe has had some kind of Michellin rating

Julie selects the Menu Balade which is two courses of fish plus a dessert

I select the Bouillabaisse with coconut and lime

A special appetiser which is sort of a Mussel soup. Note the seaweed butter with the bread

Julie’s first course – Mullet. Perfectly cooked

My Bouillabaisse – not what I expected but OK

A very nice meal albeit it seemed somewhat expensive e100 for the two meals and a wine. Never mind, I guess that is France.

A photo of the Big church steeple on our way back to the apartment

It has been a big day so it is off to bed.

Posted on July 28, 2017July 30, 2017 by beauperi · 1 Comment

A Smoking Mormon Market

Wednesday, 26 July, 2017 – weather: could have been worse

It is our final full day in London and boy do we have a lot planned. The weather is supposed to be awful with heavy rain for most of the day. It started wet, but not that bad, and then slowly improved as the day went on, as above said it could have been much worse. Having said that, I was fairly rugged-up in our first jaunt out into the world as you will see in the photos below.

Our first journey of the day is to the Borough Market. Two trains gets us there. It has been one of our favourites for a long time now. The idea is to take some photos and pick up some breakfast.

Julie’s first stop is the smoked salmon shop

The following are my shots around the market.

The Duck Confit stand – a favourite of mine

I went back to the Confit Duck shop and ordered a Duck wrap – Dainty little thing, eh?

Me, my rain gear and my dainty duck wrap. I could not finish it all

Well, that was just the start of the day. We make our way back to the apartment where I shed the plastic rain coat and have a bit of a nap. Then it is back on the train again to Piccadilly Circus. We are off to see the “Book of Mormon” – I had bought tickets for it while still in Melbourne.

Walking through Piccadilly Circus to the Prince of Wales Theatre

When we arrive, there are people everywhere. I ask where the box office is, as we need to pick up our tickets, and I am pointed to a long queue in front of me. We move to the back. It is a bit of a wait but the queue moves relatively quickly and we finally get our tickets, grab a drink and go to our seats. Julie has a long chat with the people next to her, nothing new there.

Not allowed to take photos during the show but here is the stage at the start

As for the show, BoM was loved by Julie who found it quite funny. I thought it was a bit silly but maybe it is just the old grump coming out again. It certainly was irreverent – attacking lots of things and beliefs. For example, near the start the two Missionaries arrive in Uganda and the locals, who are down and out, sing a song they join in with. The translation of the song title: “F**k You, God”. Any way, it was a sell out, Julie loved it, has won prizes as the best musical around, etc.

As we leave the theatre, it is still two hours before the restaurant that is our final part of the day is open so we decide we will kill time having drinks.

A logical choice although we do not have any food

The Manager allows us to sit at a table at the back of the bar that was probably reserved for people ordering bar food.

We ordered water and wine, Julie had a coffee too, and an interloper muscled in

We head out towards the train station but get a bit lost as the GPS lets us down, again. We eventually reach Piccadilly Circus Station and get going. We change to the District Line at Earls Court and, a good thing, the first train goes to Wimbledon, our destination. We then catch a bus to get closer to our final destination – it takes about 15 minutes for everybody to load on. Finally, after close to 70 minutes of travelling, we arrive – over 30 minutes later than we had indicated.

Holy Smoke! We were there two years ago when it had just opened

The owner remembered us and was a bit worried because we were so late. Any way we settled in and the Owner brought us a smoked drink which was quite tasty – turned out to be smoked cream sherry, an interesting start.

We peruse the menu and discover there is nothing smoked on it. He said that he likes to keep things lighter in Summer – you could have fooled me that it was Summer.

We order some wine, a Californian that was a real fruit salad of grape varieties

Our host is behind the flowers at the bar, huge beard

Julie orders Prawns with Mango and Avocado as a starter to share

Our generous host brought us each a glass of Semillon to sip with the prawns. BTW: he had an interesting idea relative to corkage. Another table brought a magnum of a red, BYO. The corkage – the owner took a generous glass of it for himself. Original.

Guinea Fowl main for me – very good, lots of food

A special smoked creation for Julie’s liquor coffee

All very good and enjoyable. I decided I did not want to fight another long ride back so ordered an Uber – it worked out very well and not that expensive given the distance we had to go. The end of a very long and fruitful day.

Posted on July 27, 2017July 30, 2017 by beauperi · 1 Comment

Tooting

Tuesday, 25 July, 2017 – weather: great

Actually the weather report is fake news. It is supposed to be a fine day but starts grey and slowly improves throughout the day. That hardly makes it great but by comparison to what we have seen it is superb. We start the day by going out for brekkie at a local pub.

Smoked salmon with the Egss Benedict quite niggardly

Since the weather is OK we decide to look around the private park across the way

Julie took a number of photos of the flowers in the private garden

After leaving the garden and returning to the apartment, Julie prances out again and takes some more food shots.

What does the title of this Post mean? Is it rooty, toot, toot we’re the boys in the Boy Scout troop? No, Tooting is actually a suburb in South London and we are going on a tour of Indian foods in Tooting that Julie found on Airbnb. So we take the tube to Tooting Broadway to meet our guide Aidan at 4:00.

Julie finds Aidan at the back to the cafe

We are joined by 4 other guests and go to our first place

We are a diverse group with 2 Americans, two Australina, a German, a Hong Konger and Aidan an Anglo-Indian

More vegie dishes including the famous Dhosa

We then depart and stop by a couple of fruit shops that have some unusual fruits which are commonly used in Indian cooking.

Its JEJ in front of us. Joshua, Edmund and Julie

These guys need a bit more to themselves

Great name, good propietor who explained a lot that was going on

We walk for quite a while through two markets and a number of shops. We end up at a eating place that opened as a very small shop a while ago and was very popular, grew and has now expanded here.

Yukkie looking sweet thing in the window

Potato Curry. The dish in front was lamb ribs which should have been my favourite for the day

My problem is that with all the walking I am totally wiped out by the time we got there. Some nice meat dishes and sambals but I wasn’t up to it.

One thing I will say about this place is that it has the cleanest toilets I have seen for a long time in public places.

Our booty – logged in with a fruit shop nearby

After boarding the Tooting Bec train we make our way back home. Way too much food today but liquid grapes were required and in demand. A good day, a huge one tomorrow.

Posted on July 25, 2017July 27, 2017 by beauperi · 1 Comment

Continued Grey in London

Monday, 24 July, 2017 – weather: grey, cold and drizzly

It is another dreary day. Julie has a business meeting this afternoon. We vacillate about going out for breakfast, e.g. to Borough Market but decide not to do so today. She goes out and returns for some stuff for her to eat:

A great croissant from a busy deli named Paul and salmon, of course

Julie then goes to her business meeting. Apparently she passed through an interesting food stall street market around St James but did not take photos. It was gone when she returned. I decide to go out to tour Earls Court and get some lunch. I have stayed here several times before but of course many shops keep changing. Let me say a bit more about the apartment. The following shows the type of blocks in which they are contained.

These apartments have access to this private park in the middle of the square block of apartments

The apartment is located in a very quiet street.

Our Earls Court Apartment link. Highly recommended

While out I grab a burger and explore up and down Earls Court Road. No photos as I have seen most of it before. I was looking for a restaurant for tonight – there was a Thai place off the main road that GB and then Julie and I went to on previous trips but it looked like it was closed for repairs. I had pretty much decided on another Lebanese place that Julie had spotted in her first reconnoiter but I missed it because I turned the wrong way into Old Brompton road. Any way, it is still very cold so I return to the apartment to warm up.

When Julie returns, we decide we will go up to Old Brompton Road to select the Lebanese place or one of the recommendations from Katerina. The weather has improved a little bit from earlier in the day. In the Post of a couple of days ago there was a photo of a multi-coloured door with no explanation. We run into it now.

This is a famous music venue from the past

They still do live music downstairs. I guess this where the term Basement Bands came from

We decide on the Lebanese restaurant Meejana

No customers, no obvious staff anywhere, very weird. It remained that way for at least 10 minutes we would call out and get no answer.

So we took matters into our own hands and grabbed some menus to look at

Finally, some one comes up the stairs from the Kitchen below. It is the same kind of deal we experienced in Lyon, the owner, waiter and chef were all the same single person. We order some wine.

While I was up for the photo, two Irish Ladies enter and assumed that I am on the staff. I correct them but show them to a table and give them some menus.

Julie was somewhat disappointed. She gave all the Scallops to me, too much aniseed for my taste, found the salmon over cooked despite discussion with the waiter about not overcooking the fish – maybe the waiter did not convey the message to the cook (same person) and the white fish was OK.

My Lamb Shank with Lebanese Rice with minced lamb and vegies with vegie stock. Quite good.

A couple of other parties came in and our Waiter/Chef seemed to handle them OK. The last guy, obviously a regular, asked are you on your own again so that must not be an unusual occurrence even for a restaurant that size. End of night for us.

Posted on July 24, 2017July 27, 2017 by beauperi

Oils is Oils

Sunday, 23 July, 2017 – weather: grey but not too wet

Julie has a bit of a sleep in, until nearly 10:00 and I get some extra as well. The rain has mostly stopped but it is still grey and cool.

Last time we were in Earls Court, probably about 5 years ago, we had gone to a little French restaurant in one of the side streets. I had asked around about it but nobody seemed to know. So I did the right thing and Googled it, sure enough I found it.

Website for the little French Restaurant in Earls Court

I then discover that LFR was open for Lunch and Dinner on Sundays. After much discussion and consideration of the menu, especially the f13.95 three course meal, we decide we will have our main meal of the day at lunch time and at LFR. We go there and are a little early so it is not yet open.

I go run another errand and when I get back Julie is settled in, there is one other couple in there too.

Julie settled in – the restaurant had not changed at all from 5 years ago

We decide to go with the three course meal, especially since Julie had worked out with our Waitress that we could substitute the dessert for salad or French Fries, which we do. I also order a Cotes du Rhone.

Julie picked this table because the ledge there was useful bottle storage

Julie’s starter was a smoked salmon terrine

and I had to order the French Onion Soup

The fries were among the best I ever have had

Julie ordered the baked salmon including her side salad

With language difficulties sort of overcome, Julie has an Irish Coffee

Tons of really good food, way too much. I go back to the apartment for a couple hours nap. As I get up, Julie returns from more prancing.

So Sal, what is the Oils is Oils stuff? It is when it refers to Midnight Oil who is on a great circle trip appearing in many places around the world. Tonight they are playing at the Hammersmith Apollo. Julie had booked tickets for the show back in Australia. We catch the Tube there, two stations away.

It is a very impressive theatre with around 6 bars in the foyer with tons of service staff so no customer has to wait long for drinks. We are up a floor in the circles and there is a bar the full length of the back wall, again with tons of service staff.

There is a support group which we go into see. An 8 piece group of decent musicians but we really did not like their music at all. Then Midnight Oil appears after the stage is rearranged.

The Oils were good doing all of their hits plus many others. They did Beds Are Burning as their second number. They played for nearly 2 hours without a break. Peter Garrett was defying his age, bouncing around and all over the stage like a 20yo. The gig was a sellout with the audience really into it, singing out the well known songs and dancing at their seats, annoying me when people in front did that.

When it was over, after an encore of two songs, including Truganini we slowly walked out of the Apollo and through Hammersmith Station. We boarded a train that seemed to be waiting for concert goers. We have a nice discussion with the people on our carriage who had all been to the concert and were marvelled by the performance of Peter Garrett and Rob Hirst the Drummer.

Back home around 11:15, it is too early to go to bed so various drinks before crashing out. No further food for the day for me.

Beauperi Investments – Wine Consulting

Tag: Salmon

Back to the Continent

A Smoking Mormon Market

Tooting

Continued Grey in London

Oils is Oils