Mother’s Day in the UK is in March but is celebrated around the world at various times. All the whilst living overseas, my own mother would always be upset that I never knew when Mother’s Day was, I could be excused not having siblings to remind me!

This year, my two living in the UK took it in turns to treat me, one for breakfast and bubbles and the other for afternoon tea!

The willowy brunette summoned me to one of my favourite local cafes/restaurant. The Wolseley on Piccadilly.  I love the Wolseley, the decor, the service, always impeccable and of course the food, simple but divine!

One of my favourite breakfast is, as I am sure I have said before, smushed Avocado on Sourdough toast and poached eggs! This has become a firm favourite ever since trying the various versions available in Mexico City, add some some Chilies or some Tabasco and Perfect!

Several restaurants/cafes near by me have their own versions of this yummy breakfast. The first one that the Brunette and I tried is The Ivy Cafe in Marylebone. This is one of the “baby” Ivy’s, off shoot of the famous The Ivy.  All of the Ivy cafes have this on their menu, including The Ivy, but there is just one thing wrong with their version. The bread! The menu says:

Chopped avocado with roast plum tomatoes, poached hen’s eggs on toasted granary with sesame dressing, the Avocado , good, the eggs, good, the tomatoes and sesame dressing, also good but the bread! The sesame dressing seeps into the toasted granary bread and is a soggy mess! My dear Aunt used to comment, ” Nothing worse than cheap bread”  We did ask on our last visit, if they had Sourdough, but the poor waitress had not a clue about that which we were asking! Maybe next time I will ask for my toast on the side! Umm now that is a thought!

Another place we tried this was Hardys, also in Marylebone. A small local restaurant. I made a reservation for the blond the brunette and myself, for 11.30 one Sunday morning. We went for an early morning walk and by 11.30 we were ready for a good coffee and breakfast! A little surprised, there was only one other table occupied , but never mind. Eh Voila, on the menu, Smushed Avocado with poached egg on Sourdough! Perfect! We all ordered it. However, what a disappointment, maybe a quarter of an avocado smushed on half a slice of Sourdough and a poached egg! And at £9.50 or thereabouts, more expensive than The Ivy not substantial enough. The girls decided to pass on the coffee and find somewhere else to finish breakfast. To top of this experience, the restaurant was cold, we needed to keep our coats on, and there was, of course 12.5% added on for service. Not usually being mean spirited, however, this time I declined to pay it, much to the chagrin of the waiter! So a place to avoid, too bad as it is a stones throw from home!

So now at the The Wolseley  they serve smushed Avocado on toasted Foccacia. But the eggs have to be ordered separately, hence making the whole thing a tad more expensive, but yummy! Along with a Mimosa, perfect Mother’s Day breakfast.

After breakfast, a stroll around St. James park, a film crew on location, horseguards, and the changing of the guards, all perfect, the sun was shining. To make the morning more perfect a quick visit to the new handbag department in Selfridges on Oxford Street. No not to ogle the handbags but to try out the new Champagne bar, this too was perfect, the Sunday hordes had not yet descended and if you don’t like champagne on a Sunday morning, they also serve coffee and tea!

Himself is not known for his cooking skills. Upon retirement he did declare that he would cook at least one night a week. I’m afraid that did not last for long, but now he was declaring that by being in the kitchen he was in my space. That last part could be true, as the kitchen also serves as my office, but I can always leave !

Anyway, having left him home alone for two weeks, whilst I went on a girls golf trip to China, he decided he would put his cooking skills once more to the test. I have to say that we  were in our house in the French Alps, so it made his choice of dinner slightly easier. Oysters Rockefeller, apart from Fish and Chips, my childhood favourite, Oysters Rockefeller, has to be my perfect dinner, and in France in the supermarkets they are cheap and abundant. And so it was we ate 40 oysters for dinner that night. Heaven! 

And they are not complicated to make and can be easily made in advance, refrigerated and thrown under the grill just before serving. As we were driving back from France we bought another casket of 40, to have in the UK upon our return.

Even if you do not like raw oysters, try them cooked this way, it may just change your mind.

This rich dish is named after Rockefeller and was created in 1899 by Jules Alciatore, the chef in the famed New Orleans restaurant, Antoines. As with Coca Cola, Worcestershire sauce and Tabasco, the original recipe is a secret. Consequently there are as many variations around as types of Oysters, but the basic ingredients are the same. Onions, shallots or green chopped, celery breadcrumbs, butter, Tabasco , Pernod or Absinthe. 

For a starter portion, allow 4-6 oysters per person.

3 Shallots or 6 green onions chopped

1stick celery, chopped

4 oz butter

4 tablespoons fine white breadcrumbs, can use Panko crumbs if that is what you have in the pantry!

3 cups fresh spinach chopped 

A sprinkle of fennel seeds ( these have the same taste as Pernod 

Dash of Tabasco, Worcestershire sauce and Pernod or absinthe, some finely grated Parmesan cheese, 4 strips of bacon, chopped and sauteed until crisp, this is an optional extra.

Rock salt or crumpled aluminium foil to balance the Oysters on in the oven.

Preheat oven to 450 F, 230 C gas 8

Sauté the onions and celery in some butter until tender. Add the spinach and when wilted drain, as it will give off some water. Add the breadcrumbs, Fennel seeds, Tabasco ( or any other hot sauce) Worcestershire sauce and Pernod. Blend together adding more butter if necessary, to make a soft but stiff mixture. , shuck the Oysters drain off some of the water, loosen them from the shell, arrange on a baking tray. Divided the mixture between the oysters top with the Parmesan and crumbled bacon if using. Place in the oven for about 10 mins. Until bubbling. Serve at once with a slice of lemon.

Oysters tend to be fairly expensive in the UK, though I did find some at While Foods, in Kensington high street which were English, very large and a £1 each! Otherwise, if you go o a Chaney supermarket, one can buy frozen oysters, which work well for this recipe, just make sure you have saved some oyster shells from a previous dinner!

The girls who golf have spent the last week in China, about 1 1/2 hours drive from Hong Kong, in the most amazing golf resort. Mission Hills is more than a golf resort, it is a huge development that includes shopping malls, cinemas, state of the art gym, arts and crafts centre, international school and much much more. For starters, the actual resort has 12, 18 hole golf courses in this area alone and then another resort on Haikou Isalnd with another 10 courses.

We stayed in the newer part of Mission Hills ( it is in two parts with a shuttle bus between the two). The courses here have all been designed and named by famous golfers, so there is Rose-Poulter, Norman, Annika, Olazabal, Leadbetter, Workd Cup ( Nicklaus) Faldo, Dye, Vijay, Els, Ozaki and Zahng Liau Wei.  All are intertwined within the Chinese Hills and are challenging, for me at least. And they are all in an amazing condition, even though it rained hard one day, the course stayed firm and no Mud!An amazing fact is that here there are about 1,200 female caddies, who are very pretty and very professional. They know the layout and yardages of all the 12 courses. And they were great fun, my Chinese is minimal and they all have golfing English but we all communicated with them well! Lots of laughs on the course ! My caddie Zheng taught me “Hä qiú” Nice shot! But I had to teach her “Too Nice” when my ball went rolling off the green into a bunker! Just one of the holes, on the Olazabal course had 24bunkers and 151 in total!

So apart from us playing golf many have been having massages, facials, pedicures and manicures, as there are excellent spas  also in both facilities. And on top of that we have been eating. The resort offers a myriad of restaurants and we have tried many of them and we also tried our hand at cooking Chinese food in the World Kitchen  with one of the chefs!

I have taken many, many photos of the wonderful food we have eaten and will load as many as I can with only the briefest explanation

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So for me a week in the resort was too short, the food was wonderful, the staff could not have been more helpful. If you ever get the chance to come here then grab it! A truly wonderful experience.

But now onto Hong Kong for more wonderful food ( and shopping !)

One day Annie said ” who wants to come with me and play golf in China?” Why not said the intrepid few, and so here we are! We arrived in Hong Kong and hit the town, first stop for Peking Duck, wow was it good! So after eating our full, we decamped to the top of an office building for drinks and desserts and a wonderful of view of Hong Kong Island, the peak and Kowloon!

Some ordered coffee ( boring) some sake, some decadent cake and one even Two portions of Ice Cream!

I have once made Peking duck once and that was many years ago. I started out by getting two car jacks and balancing a broom handle between the two. And then hanging a duck on the broom handle and painted the duck daily for several days with a glaze. I was following a Chinese recipe that told me to do this for several days. The family were not unduly impressed. Since then I have found many recipes that let you make your own Peking Duck in a fraction of the time.

Peking Ducks were originally a black feathered type of duck, but this has fallen out of favour for the white feathered variety. 

Traditionally the ducks are free range for 45 days and then are force fed for about three weeks. Once slaughtered they are washed and then air is forced between the skin and the meat, to separate the two. They are then hung and the ducks are then painted with a sugar/honey/maltose/soy mixture before being cooked. A special oven was developed for cooking the ducks, so that they are hung during the cooking process , this was created by the Imperial Palaces during the Qing dynasty and has since been adopted by the Quanjude restaurant chain.

For the home cook, simply make sure that the duck is roasted on a rack, so that the fat can drain away and for the skin to become really crisp.

The other thing that was very interesting in this Peking Duck restaurant was the noodle maker. As a demonstration, a chef appeared and whirled around a lump of Chinese noodle paste which in no time at all became noodles! Very impressive!

After a day of Golf at the Hong Hong Golf club, we decided to go down market and eat like the locals. So we went to a noodle bar. We sat at tables for four and at my table one chose noodles with goose, her all time comfort food, whilst the three westerners chose, crispy fried/roast pork, fried shrimp with egg sauce and noodles with seafood. All were absolutely delicious, the shrimp were very crisp and the noodles spicy and cleansing! Would eat either of them again. The next instalment will be from Mission Hills in China.

Three girls in New York City recently ate well. Apart from Marta which was my previous blog, we ate in great places for breakfast and  a really good one for dinner, disappointing insomuchas it was almost empty. The food was good and so was the service but sadly not many people to enjoy it.

After our foray to the wonderful Marta for Pizza, the next challenge was Breakfast, we had in mind the Clinton Street Bakery, the Willowy Brunette and I had been there previously and remembered it was not the easiest place to get to and that it is also inevitable to stand in line and wait, the place is so popular. So this time we took a taxi, poor man didn’t really know where to go , but we got there in the end.

Quelle Surprise! We were there before they opened and a small queue had already formed, BUT it has expanded, they have taken over the adjacent property, and is now at least twice the size it once was. Once they opened up, the queue moved very quickly and we asked to have a table in the orginal room. No Problem !

We started with Mimosas ( Bucks Fizz) as it was the BIRTHDAY! The Brunette chose as was expected Pancakes, these are usually a post Marathon event, but again as this was the Birthday, Pancakes it had to be. The Blond and myself chose, scrambled eggs along with chorizo, spicy but not overly so. 

Post Breakfast, we headed down to TriBeCa , where the Blond knew of a wonderful independent shoe shop. Amazingly it was Clearance  sale up to 80% off, needless to say, we did well.

SO the next question, was, What to do for the rest of the day? Birthday girl declared that she wanted to do something Special!


So we went on a March! Me on a march?, the girls had been on the anti War March in London years ago, but this was the first for me. It was the Anti Trump March, the sun shone, the crowds were fun and it lasted for hours! About 6 or even 7. Tha camaraderie was great and we met some fun people, all who could not believe that this man had been elected. So this was indeed special.

Onto the Birthday dinner, we ate at Charlie Palmer at the Knickerbocker. This sounded so much fun, but as I have already said, the food was really very nice but there were only about 4 tables occupied, which was a shame.

We all chose the Octopus, which was grilled and was divine. Followed by Wagu Beef Hamburger, and again this was lovely. I mentioned to the waiter that this was a birthday, so he produced a cake but unfortunately no candles..!!!
The following morning it was time to find another breakfast joint. And we did., This time we headed into the West Village and found Joseph Leonard. Again it is a very small restaurant , but again the food was very good.It is not only open for breakfast and lunch, but also for dinner, so next time!!!



My girls and I arrived in New York City last night (via way of London Mexico and Geneva, and we arrived almost at the same time). We arrived to much excitement. The willowy brunette has a birthday and we are here to celebrate. Consequently eldest sister and I have several things up our sleeves and some other things that were not up our sleeves, have poked out as options.

We are staying in a small boutique hotel,  a short hop from Times Square. So after a bottle of wine had been delivered and the champagne stashed in the refrigerator, the next question was “Where to eat?” somewhere not too far away, if possible.

A quick “google” on the “Open Table ” App, found us the perfect place, Marta, just around the corner, well almost around the corner. We were at 31st St. and they are at 29th St, so not too far to walk. So we quickly booked a table for three and descended to the lobby where it was “Happy Hour”, and a happy hour it was indeed as wine, white or red, was on the house !

Onwards to Marta, and thank goodness we had booked, the place was full and buzzing. People were standing in line, seated at the bar, and just hovering and hoping!

Marta is Italian and Pizza, but a distinctly up market pizza place. I am not known for my love of pizza and as such found it difficult, or so I believed. One is used to seeing pizzas along the lines of a Margharita, 4 cheeses or Calzone, the ones on the Marta Menu left me in a state of panic.

To start with there was a choice of red Pizza, or white Pizza? oh Help! I used o make pizza for the kids, and it was always Red, because of the tomato sauce and of course the tomatoes and the pepperoni, but white pizza?? So to clarify these were the choices on the Red list .

MARGHERITA •Mozzarella, Basil, STRACCIATELLA •  ( Home made shredded Buffalo mozarella type)House-made Stracciatella, Basil, Olio Verde, MACELLAIO •
Sopressata, Guanciale, Pork Sausage, Mozzarella, Grana Padano, SALSICCIA •
Pork Sausage, Cremini Mushrooms, Pecorino,and  MERCATO •
Marinated Sweet Peppers, Crushed Tomatoes, Provolone, Ricotta

And then onto the White Pizzas*PATATE ALLA CARBONARA •
Potatoes, Guanciale, Black Pepper, Pecorino, Egg, FUNGHI •
Fontina, Mozzarella, Hen of the Woods, Yellow Foots, Red Onion, Thyme, CARCIOFI •
Artichokes, Mozzarella, Fontina, Garlic Breadcrumbs  and  TESTA •
Pig Head Terrine, Mozzarella, Fontina, Arugula, Red Onion

So forgive me my confusion, however the slender blond came to my rescue by saying, “Mommy try the Funghi”, not that she would ever ,having an aversion to mushrooms, but she was right, this was for me.

We shared three different starters, way too much of course, but hey ho, we were in Birthday holiday mood. :-BIETOLE AI FERRI ( Ember-roasted Beets, Salmoriglio, Ricotta Salata)  ZUCCA FRITTA •Crispy Butternut Fries  and CAPESANTE • Grilled Scallops, Romanesco Cauliflower, Pine Nuts.

All of these were delicious, especially the roasted beets and the butternut squash fries. Then onto the Pizza. The slender Blonde chose the STRACCIATELLA, the willowy bruneete the SALSICCIA  and me the white pizza funghi. the mushrooms on this pizza were not just boring old mushrooms but hen of the woods and yellow foot mushrooms ( a type of chanterelle). Yummy !

We ate our full, drank our wine, declined dessert and tumbled along the road and bed.

What will await us tomorrow? wait and see!

An interesting little fact about Marta, SERVICE IS INCLUDED!

 Today, for a change we went out for breakfast but to somewhere completely different. We went to El Moro in the central district of Mexico City. This establishment is open 24 hours a day and they only serve variations of Churros, hot chocolate ( and maybe the odd coffee)!
It was found in 1935, by Francisco Iriarte,who had arrived in the city in 1933. Previously he had sold Churros from a cart in Spain and this he did in the beginning, in Mexico City but within two years he had bought the premises which now is the home of El Moro. The operation is very simple, Churros, which are a form of doughnut, are pumped in a stream from a machine into boiling oil, twirled around to make a maze like structure and cooked until golden brown, about 4 minutes. They are then lifted out with elongated chop stick like tongs, drained and then coated with sugar, either plain or cinnamon flavoured.
Apparently Francisco died young but the business was run by his siblings and today it is Santiago,the grandson of Francisco, who runs the churrería. Santiago has expanded the business and now has three new branches one in the Mercado Roma one at Rio Lerma and one at the upmarket shopping centre Palacio de Hierro in Polanco ( the Mayfair of Mexico City ). For Mexicans and tourists alike it is a must visit place !The way to eat Churros is to have a mug of hot chocolate of which there are several types to choose from. The one I favoured was the Chocolate light. We also tried the Especial and the Mexicano one of which was literally melted chocolate,so thick you could stand a spoon up in it ! Delicious for a sip or two, but not for a whole cup. Alternatives for an accompaniment for the Churros one can choose, melted chocolate, condensed milk or nuts, or if you are really daring try the Consuelos  which is basically a Churros ice cream sandwich ! It all makes for a really healthy breakfast !!

The place is always crowded, usually having to wait for a table, and even those who want take away have to stand in line. All of the waitresses are in a uniform of a bygone era, blue dresses, hats and white shoes.

Following on from sugar overload, we visited the wonderful exhibition on the City of Mexico, which is a light and sound show over an amazing scaled model of the city, which took several months to build. From there we scaled the Torre Latin Americas up to the 42 nd floor, this was  a great place to view the whole of the city. All of these activities should be included in any visit to the city. We also found a great boutique Bed and Breakfast hotel just around the corner!