Big Monday

Quick update for readers that are not married to me (according to my stat chart there is one, but I think its my friend Kuskusul) ;  meeting at the bank turned out to be a business start-up seminar attended by the deluded (me) and the elderly(everybody else). It was all flow charts and brochures, but there was free tea and coffee so it wasn`t  a complete waste of time. On the finance front I am back to square one. Square Zero, rather.

Still waiting to hear about the property I put an offer on, In the meantime I am going there again today with my celebrity chef friend, to see what he thinks, and to measure it again as I keep thinking that I got it wrong. I hope to be wiser by the end of the day.

On Sunday we had a few people (14 of them) over  to celebrate the birthday of my previous head chef, An incredible guy with incredible taste and talent. He just moved to his new 5 bedroom home, so I was a bit embarrassed about inviting him to our little run down shoebox, but I wanted to invite him over for a while now. Also, It was a good opportunity to try a few recipes for the restaurant, and take a few pictures for this blog. 

 I don’t think I mentioned this but my wife is a chef as well, and is now setting up a very big restaurant that is opening very soon. We know that we are not going to see much of each other in 2011, with me setting up  a restaurant and her running what will probably be one of londons` busiest kitchens, So we spent a day together cooking at home  which we havent done in a while  (maybe because our kitchen space has shrunk since we moved here, in opposite relation to our bodies) so the chubby little hands you see in the pictures are hers. The lady with the dinosaur hands they call her at work. It was great, cooking together again, it’s the one place I can criticize what she does without her going mental and vice versa. We cooked a lot and I intended to get at least 6 posts out of it, but we didn’t end up with as many pictures as we should have, and I blame it on Poland, and on vodka.

 There is a reason we decided to have vodka instead of wine: Our Polish friend B is famous, amongst other things, for the vodka-and-polish-canapes nights she hosts in her Dalston flat, and it is always tremendous fun. We usually end up at Mangal, topping ourselves up with flasks of vodka that we hide under the table, so the notion of middle eastern food and Polish vodka is tried and tested and is great. But than again, few things aren’t great when you’ve had a pint of vodka in you. She brought us a bottle of my wifes` favorite brand, and we supplemented with some stolli

Needless to say, 15 minutes and two drinks  into the evening and I was not thinking of pictures. Or anything for that matter. At first I was still trying to play host, but I soon gave up the pretence, and just plonked the ice bucket in the middle of the room, for all vodka fiends to help themselves.

 Ourselves, I should say.

It was a  good night, even though I didn’t get all the pictures I wanted, And today is a big day with plenty to do. It’s a good thing vodka doesn’t leave me hung over