Back to the Capital!

The strangest things about living in England, is that London is only a two hour train ride away.

It's not a matter of being close to a big city, or even a global city. I live an hour away from Los Angeles, a world city in its own right. It's that Los Angeles,was never the seat of a vast imperial empire that at its height owned nearly two thirds of the planet. It's being two hours away from THE global city.

The National Theatre is an amazing place. We have one in the States, but it's not publicly funded, so the name is a bit of a misnomer. I corralled two of my UC friends into going to see Twelfth Night with me. We had to read it for our class, and the production was going to be good, Sir Peter Hall was directing, and his daughter, Rebecca Hall, was playing Viola. Tickets were sold out but apparently that doesn't mean anything here, because we got obscured-view tickets for £10, and when we got there, people were still buying tickets mere minutes before the show was going to start (of course, as we learned later, not all obscured-view seats are created equal.)

This is Kelsey. She's sassy. We left for London at about eleven, and our friend Ashley left at noon (We weren't sure if Ashley was coming when we bought the train tickets, otherwise we would have waited the hour for her.) I bought a bacon sandwich on the train. And may I just say that, as much as it shames me, English bacon blows American bacon out of the water. And they do not mess around with their bacon sandwiches. Bread, bacon, other bread. Done. Kelsey would have none of it because she's a vegetarian. Everyone's a vegetarian these days. It breaks my heart (or perhaps it's just all the English bacon... or the cake balls... or the cupcake\macaron\donut combination that you will see in a few moments.)

This is a TARDIS. Apparently. They're from Dr. Who, which I don't watch but would like to. Kelsey brought us here because she loves Dr. Who. In doing this, Kelsey has shown that she is more of a nerd than even I am. I will never forgive her for that.

Me being me, we of course had to go to somewhere and get overpriced food. The whole impetus for Harrod's was that you could literally get anything. If you wanted an elephant, they would get you an elephant. I'm almost certain that there are shadowy departments in the basement where you can have people killed, right next to the yacht salesman.

This being the case, Harrod's has a Krispy Kreme. Right next to Laduree. I took Art History in high school, and as such, whenever something so sublime is juxtaposed with something so mundane, I must assume that it is a sign. A sign that I also needed a donut. They don't have them here. Or they do, but not in the quantity or quality that we have them in California. Sure you can get a donut at Tesco, but it's not going to have the luscious airiness or the paradoxically soft crispness that donuts made by Asian immigrants do. Not that Krispy Kreme is in any way a good substitute for these donuts, but nostalgia forced me to do it.

We then made our way to the thee-ay-tah. That's Ashley in front of the London Eye. If there's one thing I love as much as food, it's the thee-ay-tah. I plan my life around my theatre tickets, and expect others to do the same. When I have tickets for a show that I really want to go see, I'll have nightmares where I somehow forget to go. I'll check the tickets daily just to make sure I've made arrangements for the right day. I think this is a healthy way of living.

For nearly as long as I've been obsessed with theatre, I've heard about the National Theatre in London. The History Boys and Amadeus premiered here, Angels in America premiered here before it even made it to Broadway. Just about every great modern director has worked here, Peter Brook, Peter Hall, and of course, Laurence Olivier. This is a theatre-nut's Jerusalem.

We went in, got our tickets, took our seats, and waited. I was nervous. I'm always nervous when I sit down to see something I'm really excited for. Sometimes the cast just isn't feeling it, or your dinner isn't sitting right in your stomach, or the director didn't consider that not everyone will be sitting front row center. It's so hard to get that alchemy that makes the theatre so addicting. But the play started, and it was so magical.

Shakespeare plays are often done with a "concept" in mind. They transpose the action to modern times or to Mussolini's Italy or to Jamaica. The whole point of this is to clarify relationships and situations that sometimes don't hold a lot of weight in our society anymore. But Sir Peter Hall (who used to be the Artistic Director of the National Theatre) did not do this, everyone was in period dress, the sets were minimal; a patterned sheet and the silhouette of a town in the back. And yet every word and every emotion came across with utter clarity. Shakespeare's comedies are filled with such magic and metamorphoses. So many productions try to manufacture this for you, and it's not something that can be made, it can only be summoned. I left the theatre feeling as though I had been cleansed, which is why I go to the capital-T Theatre, for catharsis. It is one of the many necessary functions of art and we so seldom get it.

On the train ride back I pulled out the cupcakes I had bought at Harrod's. In the three times I've gone to Harrod's, I spend a good five minutes ogling the cupcakes. A good cupcake can be almost as hard to find as catharsis. I've grown weary of high-falutin cupcake places. They never live up to their hype (I'm looking at you, Sprinkles.) But I decided to give in and bought two cupcakes, an Oreo one, and the perennial Red Velvet.

Not the best. Too crumbly for my taste. In my opinion, the best cupcakes are found in small, unpretentious places. For my money, Martha Green's in Redlands is about the best cupcake you can get, though I do have a soft spot for Sift up in Ronhert Park.

Our train arrived at 2:00 in the morning. Ashley, Kelsey, and I trudged our way back to our various accommodations. We had class in the morning, but losing a few hours of sleep is worth it when you have London as your pay-off.

Indian With Kam

On Saturday night, my flat mate Kam made us Indian food. And it was delicious. In an unrelated noted, Kam told me that she thought my last blog post was harsh to British food, while I hold that I was actually championing British food. Such is the sign of a true artist when one's work can be taken and interpreted in many different ways. Even if they are wrong interpretations.

Kam made a potato and chickpea curry, with handmade roti (a word that I had to google,) and a delicious yogurt sauce. I made brownies. I feel that sometimes, we can achieve harmony in the culinary world that we may find inescapable in our larger sociopolitical lives.

From right to left is Hannah, G, and Sam, G's boyfriend. Gillian was there too but she wasn't here for this picture. Our kitchen is nice. It's the only one that has this corner-booth type setup. All the others in the building have a picnic table arrangement. All the others in the building wish they could be as cool as we are.

Kam is from Hong Kong originally (though she is ethnically Punjabi.) She speaks four languages. She is an amazing cook. She will one day be in running for world's best mother.

Look at those. She made each and every one of those from scratch and rolled them out by hand! I get antsy when I have to buy cupcakes for people who aren't me.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. You can practically see the flavor bursting forth from the pan.

But back to me. This is my blog after all. I made Nigella Lawson's "Every Day Brownies" from her book Nigella Kitchen. This was my first attempt at baking in a country that has adopted the Metric System. (Away from me for a second you can see Gillian taking a bite of Nutella in this picture as well as G successfully hiding her face.)

Metrication, or the process of adopting the Metric system, began at the end of the eighteenth century when the system was adopted by France. Like most things from France, the Metric System confuses and worries Americans. By the end of 1970s, most of Europe had fallen to the flash and jazz of the meter and the gram. But not the USA. Officially, the Federal Government adopted the Metric System in 1975, but it never caught on (even if it is easier, makes more sense, and not based on Henry VIII's various dimensions.) In fact, most recently, my great state of California has actually been moving to demetrication. A decision that I stand by.

But back to Nigella. I was using her recipe from her newest book. It was simple and I already had most of the ingredients. Because Ms. Lawson is British, and the cookbook was originally published in England, the original recipe (indeed, the recipe she gives on her show) was in metric, but mine was in US Customary because my book was bought in the states. Just to clarify, I needed to convert my recipe that had been conceived and published in Metric, from US Customary, back into Metric. It was truly the Victor/Victoria of brownie recipes. I eventually gave up on conversion and decided to use the other side of the measuring cup where "cups" was listed.

And they were good. Chocolate here is different. It doesn't have the bitter chemical aftertaste that some cheap chocolates have in the states. Even the bar of "Tesco's Best" that I threw in with the brownie batter was really quite good.

I'm of the opinion that brownies aren't allowed to have a long life on this Earth. They must be eaten as rapidly as possible, otherwise someone else might get more than you, and that would be bad.

Great night, great food, great friends. AND, if you look closely in this picture, you can see two of my fillings.