Launch of "The National Portrait Gallery/BT Road to 2012 Project"
The National Portrait Gallery
2 St Martin's Place
St James's
WC2H 0HE
by Kipper Sutherland
Riggs and Murtagh
discount and fireworks
Olympic and Breakfast.
There are just some rare and racy conjuctions that really agitate the submandibles - that promise greatness, with just a hint of danger.
It is the last of these pair of nouns I pondered as I found myself tripping down St Martin’s Lane at 8am, on the morning that the countdown to East London’s sportsday ticked past 1000 days to go.
In my hand, an invitation to toast this occasion, to parley “with refreshments” with Kelly Holmes, Seb Coe and company in the National Portrait Gallery, to find out first hand, how the sporting elite fuel up. I wondered if anyone would be in shorts.
As I turned into Trafalgar Square, a phalanx of corporate sponsors were inserting Dame Kelly into a hot air balloon. Waving a cheery, flaming, helium bye-bye, she was released, bemused but beaming into the morning air. My appetite soared with her.
Here I was, a revolving door away from real Olympians and lottery funded catering. My imagination was going to town. There’d be gymnasts mainlining carbs; isotonic grapefruits; Greco-Roman wrestling in Ready-Brek mud-pits. I stood on the threshold of once-in-a-lifetime breakfast experience.
Or so I thought.
But settling into the assemblage, something was wrong. The NPG’s Ondaatje Wing, an all-mingling, cutlery-precluding Corbusian temple of geometry was to be our dining room; vacant box-office workstations our breakfast bar. There was no smell of victuals. The ambience was an appetite-suppressing soundtrack of singsong cultural burblechore and profane media hum. Nobody was holding a plate.
Panic shot from stomach to brain. Then Jonathan Edwards arrived. He was wearing a broad grin and clutching a Pret a Manger bag from which he pulled an egg bap. He clearly knew something we didn't.
Groping for the refreshment table, fears coagulated. Wineglasses, cups, saucers... There would be. No food. I was facing a liquid breakfast. Not the good kind, either, as although the pinkish tinge of the orange juice winked kir-royal I held little hope of feeling that delicious lightening behind the eyes, the gift of a pre 9am cocktail. The coffee was doping-scandal strong and Motherwell brown. I couldn't finish a cup.
And that was it. Someone asked if I wanted apple juice. But I was too sad to answer.
Empty and dejected. I chastised myself for not checking the IOC’s breakfast guidelines, for too readily subscribing to the Olympic ideal of Little Chef.
I glimpsed Clive Woodward, striding through the throng. Here was a man who looks like he starts his day with a weak fruit tea and four John Player Specials. But it made me start. He also looked like a winner.
Maybe, I reflected, there's more to this. Maybe the breakfast isn’t wrong, maybe I am wrong. These are go-getters. An egg for them is not for poaching and covering in béchamel while you’re in a dressing gown at ten to twelve. It’s for putting raw in a spoon, and running 26 miles without dropping. No fuss, no mess.
As a nation, we mistrust mollycoddled or sports-scienced sporting stars, in the same way we mistrust avocado in a full English. Sure, it may be the right thing to do, and if we gave it a whirl it may give us an edge against the Swedes, but it feels like cheating.
We respect a noble loser. Likewise we only really respect a certain type of champion: the Chariots-of-Fire, leave-the-bag-in, stir-it-with-a-biro, knock-it-back, squeeze-in-the-paper-round, hitch-to-the-stadium, three-gold-medals-and-back-to-the-village-in-time-for-Countdown Champion. Come 2012 that’s who should carry the torch.
I felt like doing a star-jump. I vowed from now on to eat all my food in bar form. I left feeling lighter, sportier. I caught the bus home, had a bacon sandwich and went back to bed. Maybe these aren’t my games. There’s always Rio 2016.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Friday, December 11, 2009
York & Albany, Camden Town
York & Albany
127-129 Parkway
Camden Town
NW1 7PS
020 7388 3344
www.gordonramsay.com/yorkandalbany
by Damon Allbran
They say that Gordon Ramsay has a magnetic personality. This may well be true given that he seems to attract and repel with equal force. To me, the idea of dining anywhere even loosely associated with the scrotal wundermensch is anathema whilst, for provincial businessmen, up-in-town for a meeting or assignation his imprimatur is virtual catnip. They patronise his restaurants in barking hordes, their brittle, hard-eyed wives attached to their arms like less benign remora fish, and imagine they have arrived.
The awfulness of both Ramsay and his clientele is really rather problematic for me. You see, the York & Albany, run for Ramsay by Angela Hartnett, is in Camden Parkway - though the extensive PR from the GRH deathstar places it in ‘Regent’s Park’. It’s my local, has a fantastic bar and does a great breakfast.
A few weeks ago, hungover, in need of fortification and unable to face the greased egregiousness of the New Goodfare at the opposite end of Parkway, I dropped into the Y & A for their full fried breakfast, £12.
The place, as usual, was nearly empty so I was seated by the charming and professional waitress in a corner. It was only after the coffee arrived (overextracted, with scorched milk but drinkable) that I noticed the three salarymen sitting in the high-backed armchairs over my shoulder. One was a loud Texan in a glistering blue suit, abidingly awful brown loafers and an aggressive hairpiece. The other two sat opposite in attitudes of supplication; one a beardless junior with artificially spiked forelock, the other an older man whose face formed a rictus of happy compliance while his eyes bled bitter loathing. Their mellifluous Welsh accents seemed strangely out of tune with the Manhattan cocktail-bar roomset and the agonisingly controlled beige decorative palette
My breakfast arrived. A single artisanal Lincolnshire sausage, a slice of Old Spot bacon, a perfectly presented free-range poached egg… but my reverie was interrupted by the urgent voice of the younger suit. He was bartling some vile jargon-laden tosh about how empowering it would be to work with the Texan Mothership. I was overcome with a surge of predatory savagery. Maybe it was the solid whack of haemoglobin from the glorious slice of Irish black pudding, maybe a response to the waft of terror hormones drifting in from the next table.
The Texan was now taking an advantage of a pause in the flattery to hold forth, at length and volume, about his golfing prowess. I hope I betray no sense of anti-Americanism when I say how delighted I was at that moment to see a grilled tomato and mushroom on my plate rather than a smear of baked beans. Full marks to Gordon.
Finally, unable to control himself any longer the young thruster interrupted the Texan’s stream of self-aggrandisement.
Have you considered, he almost pleaded, the financial benefits of locating somewhere outside central London…
I watched as the Texan’s eyes died
…somewhere like Port Talbot.
As I mopped the last of my egg with a crust of sourdough toast, I watched the door swing closed across the broad back of the Texan as across the echoing and empty dining room his two erstwhile partners gazed, disconsolate, at the bill.
127-129 Parkway
Camden Town
NW1 7PS
020 7388 3344
www.gordonramsay.com/yorkandalbany
by Damon Allbran
They say that Gordon Ramsay has a magnetic personality. This may well be true given that he seems to attract and repel with equal force. To me, the idea of dining anywhere even loosely associated with the scrotal wundermensch is anathema whilst, for provincial businessmen, up-in-town for a meeting or assignation his imprimatur is virtual catnip. They patronise his restaurants in barking hordes, their brittle, hard-eyed wives attached to their arms like less benign remora fish, and imagine they have arrived.
The awfulness of both Ramsay and his clientele is really rather problematic for me. You see, the York & Albany, run for Ramsay by Angela Hartnett, is in Camden Parkway - though the extensive PR from the GRH deathstar places it in ‘Regent’s Park’. It’s my local, has a fantastic bar and does a great breakfast.
A few weeks ago, hungover, in need of fortification and unable to face the greased egregiousness of the New Goodfare at the opposite end of Parkway, I dropped into the Y & A for their full fried breakfast, £12.
The place, as usual, was nearly empty so I was seated by the charming and professional waitress in a corner. It was only after the coffee arrived (overextracted, with scorched milk but drinkable) that I noticed the three salarymen sitting in the high-backed armchairs over my shoulder. One was a loud Texan in a glistering blue suit, abidingly awful brown loafers and an aggressive hairpiece. The other two sat opposite in attitudes of supplication; one a beardless junior with artificially spiked forelock, the other an older man whose face formed a rictus of happy compliance while his eyes bled bitter loathing. Their mellifluous Welsh accents seemed strangely out of tune with the Manhattan cocktail-bar roomset and the agonisingly controlled beige decorative palette
My breakfast arrived. A single artisanal Lincolnshire sausage, a slice of Old Spot bacon, a perfectly presented free-range poached egg… but my reverie was interrupted by the urgent voice of the younger suit. He was bartling some vile jargon-laden tosh about how empowering it would be to work with the Texan Mothership. I was overcome with a surge of predatory savagery. Maybe it was the solid whack of haemoglobin from the glorious slice of Irish black pudding, maybe a response to the waft of terror hormones drifting in from the next table.
The Texan was now taking an advantage of a pause in the flattery to hold forth, at length and volume, about his golfing prowess. I hope I betray no sense of anti-Americanism when I say how delighted I was at that moment to see a grilled tomato and mushroom on my plate rather than a smear of baked beans. Full marks to Gordon.
Finally, unable to control himself any longer the young thruster interrupted the Texan’s stream of self-aggrandisement.
Have you considered, he almost pleaded, the financial benefits of locating somewhere outside central London…
I watched as the Texan’s eyes died
…somewhere like Port Talbot.
As I mopped the last of my egg with a crust of sourdough toast, I watched the door swing closed across the broad back of the Texan as across the echoing and empty dining room his two erstwhile partners gazed, disconsolate, at the bill.
Tuesday, December 08, 2009
Book Club, Shoreditch
Book Club
100-106 Leonard Street
Shoreditch
London
EC2A 4RH
020 7684 8618
by Gregg E. Bread and Moose Lee
Good morning breakfast fans! Good morning ping pong fans! Today, at long last, we witness the bringing together of these two glorious pastimes.
With the blue bat, drinking a passable latte, hailing from way down south of the river, the two-time ping-pong champion of London Fields, Gregg ‘The Eggs-ecutioner’ Bread.
With the red bat, drinking a nigh-on perfect if overpriced tea, the undisputed bantamweight of Welsh table tennis: Moose ‘The Metabolism’ Lee.
It’s a rainy morning here in Shoreditch. We’re in the Book Club, formerly known as Home Bar, now refurbished to include a full-size ping-pong table amidst the exposed brick and photo-art.
Ding ding! We’re off, and both players order French toast with bananas and strawberries drizzled in maple syrup. Before the food arrives, they step up to the ping-pong plate. Honours are even (1-1) as the first course arrives: the ‘Metabolism’ shows good early form, mopping the nicely crunchy eggy bread and snarfling it before his opponent has time to chew. The Eggs-ecutioner makes a considered start, lingering over the ripe banana and saving the last sumptuous strawberry for the strongest possible final mouthful. Nothing can separate these two.
Our contestants are still hungry and signal to the referee for a shared Full English in the hope of breaking the deadlock. Back on the bigger table, slightly impeded by their sticky fingers, these giants of breakfast-ping-pong are still gut and gut. 2-2.
The Full English arrives and the rivals touch cutlery. Moose is almost defeated by the inhumanly big – and judging by his expression – distinctly average sausages. He doesn’t fare much better with the button mushrooms which – as this replay shows – are watery and tasteless. Gregg E Bread sets about the scrummy toast with a series of aggressive chomps before the fried egg checks his progress with its peculiar and disappointing underside.
Moose comes alive on tasting the bacon, making an elongated ‘mmmm’ sound – his trademark. Gregg E Bread replies with a cute combination of the cherry tomatoes - but wait a minute he seems to be signalling to the bench that they are cold and uncooked.
The knives and forks are down as the valiant eaters, now sluggish and glazed-eyed, return to the ping-pong table for the finale. The crowd, a lone woman on a laptop, witness a gargantuan tussle that leaves Gregg E Bread to lick the commemorative plate as he triumphs 3-2. No matter the result, it is clear that the real winner here is the sport of Breakfast-Ping-Pong which has, finally, found a permanent home in East London.
100-106 Leonard Street
Shoreditch
London
EC2A 4RH
020 7684 8618
by Gregg E. Bread and Moose Lee
Good morning breakfast fans! Good morning ping pong fans! Today, at long last, we witness the bringing together of these two glorious pastimes.
With the blue bat, drinking a passable latte, hailing from way down south of the river, the two-time ping-pong champion of London Fields, Gregg ‘The Eggs-ecutioner’ Bread.
With the red bat, drinking a nigh-on perfect if overpriced tea, the undisputed bantamweight of Welsh table tennis: Moose ‘The Metabolism’ Lee.
It’s a rainy morning here in Shoreditch. We’re in the Book Club, formerly known as Home Bar, now refurbished to include a full-size ping-pong table amidst the exposed brick and photo-art.
Ding ding! We’re off, and both players order French toast with bananas and strawberries drizzled in maple syrup. Before the food arrives, they step up to the ping-pong plate. Honours are even (1-1) as the first course arrives: the ‘Metabolism’ shows good early form, mopping the nicely crunchy eggy bread and snarfling it before his opponent has time to chew. The Eggs-ecutioner makes a considered start, lingering over the ripe banana and saving the last sumptuous strawberry for the strongest possible final mouthful. Nothing can separate these two.
Our contestants are still hungry and signal to the referee for a shared Full English in the hope of breaking the deadlock. Back on the bigger table, slightly impeded by their sticky fingers, these giants of breakfast-ping-pong are still gut and gut. 2-2.
The Full English arrives and the rivals touch cutlery. Moose is almost defeated by the inhumanly big – and judging by his expression – distinctly average sausages. He doesn’t fare much better with the button mushrooms which – as this replay shows – are watery and tasteless. Gregg E Bread sets about the scrummy toast with a series of aggressive chomps before the fried egg checks his progress with its peculiar and disappointing underside.
Moose comes alive on tasting the bacon, making an elongated ‘mmmm’ sound – his trademark. Gregg E Bread replies with a cute combination of the cherry tomatoes - but wait a minute he seems to be signalling to the bench that they are cold and uncooked.
The knives and forks are down as the valiant eaters, now sluggish and glazed-eyed, return to the ping-pong table for the finale. The crowd, a lone woman on a laptop, witness a gargantuan tussle that leaves Gregg E Bread to lick the commemorative plate as he triumphs 3-2. No matter the result, it is clear that the real winner here is the sport of Breakfast-Ping-Pong which has, finally, found a permanent home in East London.
Thursday, December 03, 2009
Franze and Evans, Shoreditch
Franze and Evans
101 Redchurch Street
Shoreditch
E2 7DL
020 7033 1910
www.franzeevans.com
by Joyce Carol Oats
Franze and Evans is the kind of place you want to have in your neighbourhood. You want to say to someone who you are trying to impress (probably because you want them to sleep with you), ‘hey, meet me at my neighbourhood cafe’ and for them to come and find you there and sit with you at a table in the light, pleasant space, surrounded by very high-end Italian groceries, and you want them to think, ‘my, this is a neighbourhood cafe of a sophisticated, cool, person who I rather want to sleep with.’
I am with Nurse Friend, however, who I do not want to sleep with me, so this effect is somewhat wasted. Instead, we look at the menus and decide what we want to eat. And then we wait to be served. And then we notice that Franze and Evans requires customers to order at the counter. This is a terrible mistake. Such is the layout of this sophisticated, cool neighbourhood cafe that the counter ordering system creates an awkward bottleneck. I want to draw them a flowchart to show how they are doing it all wrong, and I have never drawn a flowchart in my life.
I place our order: eggs Benedict for Nurse Friend; for me, a newly-minted vegetarian, eggs Florentine, which comes with Portobello mushrooms here. Both cost about £7.50. I pay for juice, which is served only in tiny glass bottles imported from Italy, and which are only good for a few gulps. I order coffee.
And then Nurse Friend and I sit. And wait. And watch as food and drinks are delivered to people who definitely came in after us. There are three people behind the counter. There appear to be three people working in the kitchen, but maybe more – they keep emerging, like clowns out of a very small car. The chap in charge – Franze? Evans? – brings us some glasses for our juice, long after we’d finished drinking it. We are forced to read The Sun to pass the time.
The food arrives. The eggs are poached too hard, and aren't especially hot: the yolks are a deep shade that indicate that happy hens were their source, but they don’t run, which makes Nurse Friend unhappy. The hollandaise could do with some more joie de vivre, but it’s nice enough. But the fact that I have mushroom only on one half muffin, and spinach only on the other half, makes me frown: it just seems stingy. Oh, Franze. Oh, Evans. Being stingy is neither sophisticated nor cool, and now I don’t want to sleep with either of you.
101 Redchurch Street
Shoreditch
E2 7DL
020 7033 1910
www.franzeevans.com
by Joyce Carol Oats
Franze and Evans is the kind of place you want to have in your neighbourhood. You want to say to someone who you are trying to impress (probably because you want them to sleep with you), ‘hey, meet me at my neighbourhood cafe’ and for them to come and find you there and sit with you at a table in the light, pleasant space, surrounded by very high-end Italian groceries, and you want them to think, ‘my, this is a neighbourhood cafe of a sophisticated, cool, person who I rather want to sleep with.’
I am with Nurse Friend, however, who I do not want to sleep with me, so this effect is somewhat wasted. Instead, we look at the menus and decide what we want to eat. And then we wait to be served. And then we notice that Franze and Evans requires customers to order at the counter. This is a terrible mistake. Such is the layout of this sophisticated, cool neighbourhood cafe that the counter ordering system creates an awkward bottleneck. I want to draw them a flowchart to show how they are doing it all wrong, and I have never drawn a flowchart in my life.
I place our order: eggs Benedict for Nurse Friend; for me, a newly-minted vegetarian, eggs Florentine, which comes with Portobello mushrooms here. Both cost about £7.50. I pay for juice, which is served only in tiny glass bottles imported from Italy, and which are only good for a few gulps. I order coffee.
And then Nurse Friend and I sit. And wait. And watch as food and drinks are delivered to people who definitely came in after us. There are three people behind the counter. There appear to be three people working in the kitchen, but maybe more – they keep emerging, like clowns out of a very small car. The chap in charge – Franze? Evans? – brings us some glasses for our juice, long after we’d finished drinking it. We are forced to read The Sun to pass the time.
The food arrives. The eggs are poached too hard, and aren't especially hot: the yolks are a deep shade that indicate that happy hens were their source, but they don’t run, which makes Nurse Friend unhappy. The hollandaise could do with some more joie de vivre, but it’s nice enough. But the fact that I have mushroom only on one half muffin, and spinach only on the other half, makes me frown: it just seems stingy. Oh, Franze. Oh, Evans. Being stingy is neither sophisticated nor cool, and now I don’t want to sleep with either of you.
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