A Window on Marylebone

There is a couple that I secretly think of as the most Beautiful Couple in Marylebone. Not a secret anymore, but anyway… I rarely see them in the supermarket, bank, dry cleaners, or any other ordinary place. But I often do see them sitting in the window of Peter Gordon’s renowned Marylebone eatery, The Providores, our New Zealand local that is not a tapas bar.

How do you like your coffee?

Edith and I had a ball at the Bibendum Wine tasting last week, and I apologize for taking a week to blog about it. I can only blame the January doldrums, as Heloise so succinctly put it in an email to me this week. Heloise darling, sit down, put your feet up, play some Jimmy Reed blues, indulge yourself and have a Bellini on me. Those doldrums will just fizzle away…

Wine Tasting No. 1

Lou, media maverick and noble Bellini friend, sent me a link to his favorite Prosecco, made by the Bisol family, and through their website, http://www.bisol.it/default_eng.asp, I found out about the Bibendum Annual Tasting 2010. Just in time! My education begins… Bibendum is a ‘fine wine merchant,’ to put it mildly, here in London.

On the Fizz

 

                         granadillas from the Edgeware Rd.

It has occurred to me that a blog on Bellinis requires a certain amount of specialized knowledge on fruit, Prosecco, and the region of the Veneto, among other things. I have none of these. I like fruit, all kinds- my favorite is the granadilla, a delicious near-relative of the pomegranate, which we eat for pennies in huge quantities in Colombia, but which I can only find here for £1 each, on the Edgeware Rd. And I love wine, though again, my expertise is limited, and my preferences are actually reds from places like the Langhe hills of Piedmont, the La Rioja region in Spain, and the Rhone Valley in France. But please don’t ask me to name them.

It’s all in the Timing

                                                Will Rogers circa 1898

I keep thinking about this phrase and others like it, which deal with timing and time. I particularly like one attributed to Will Rogers, ‘Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save.’ Besides being a movie star in the 1920's and 30's in more than 70 films, Rogers, famed for being part Native American Indian, was also a comedian, a Vaudeville performer, and a much loved columnist and social commentator. All these things accomplished in one life, and not even a very long life- Rogers died in a plane crash in his 50's. If he felt he was rushing through life, looking for pause, then we were the ones who benefited from his too short, but prolific career.

Peach or pink?

My dear Lady G, constant friend, good editor and writer, and her rock-n-roll, philosopher husband Ernesto invited us up to their house in Primrose Hill on Saturday night, along with our other mutual friends, Matilde and Finbar. Matilde is another writer friend, and is also an accomplished photographer and painter, while her husband Finbar is just really smart.

Holiday Homebrew

Gadzooks! The Holidays just flew by this year, and with them, many wonderful opportunities to mix, match and inadvertently murder our own beloved homebrew of Bellinis.

Christmas Day brought us to Lulu and Sinclair’s kitchen table, where we ate, drank, spat and put the world to rights. There was no spitting actually, there would never be any spitting at Lulu’s table, but we did laugh a lot, and I may have spewed a bit of roast parsnip on to Sinclair’s shoulder. Anyway, this year, Lulu had the good fortune to receive a stuffed goose as a present, flown in directly from France the day before.

The goose from Toulouse- isn’t that an Irving Berlin song?- was a gift from a foodie friend, who apparently 

Why the Bellini Project?

It all started last year when I went out for lunch to celebrate a few mutual birthdays. It was raining that day, and the recession was starting to hit home for all of us. Feeling the need for some joy, I ordered a Bellini. Obama had been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize that morning, so perhaps all was not lost. Our bill for 7 Bellinis alone came to about £100. I was embarrassed, enlightened, and just darn mad.