November is a rather grey time of year and when it’s foggy and rainy all I can think of doing is snoozing my alarm and cocooning myself in my duvet. However the other day I had a museum date so pulled myself away from my nest and headed into town.
Tag: London
Gallery Hopping
I am a huge museum and gallery lover, as I am sure some of you will know and I love finding new places to go and explore. Mum and I went into town recently to scout out two new places starting off at the House of Illustration.
Richmond Ramblings
My Top 5 Places to Eat in London
I am very partial to a meal out; preferably with an old friend or family so that we can spend a long time in the restaurant lazily making our way through the courses whilst reminiscing and putting the world to rights. Being a Londoner I have a vast array of choices but have somehow managed to narrow it down to my top five places to eat in (and around) London.
Ping Pong
Kicking it all off with a well known chain Ping Pong; my favourite DimSum place for good service and amazing food. I embarrassingly frequent the Southbank Branch mainly with A by my side shoving pillowy pork buns into my mouth as fast as possible – attractive I know right. They have a great range of both vegetarian and gluten dishes and the main aim is sharing the food with your friends which makes it a great place for a catch up.
I highly recommend: Pork Buns and Duck Spring Rolls.
Website – www.pingpongdimsum.com
St Margarets Tavern
A little outside of London is a gorgeous local pub which I visit a little to often, it’s menu changes according to the season so for a regular it never gets boring but your old favourites always stay – Yes that towering burger is regularly in front of me! Each dish is packed full of flavour and there is something for everyone. It is so much more than just pub grub!
I highly recommend – Bravette and Brisket Burger and Sticky Toffee Pudding.
Website – www.stmargaretstw1.co.uk Instagram – www.instagram.com/stmargaretstw1
Grace Bar
Grace Bar is technically a night club, bar and restaurant all rolled into one but the dining area is quite separate from the rest of it that you don’t really realise. The menu which changes regularly and cocktails are equally amazing, their range of mojitos is right up my street. It’s not a mind blowing place but you know that you are going to have good food and some yummy drinks and that’s all I really look for in a place.
I highly recommend – The whole cocktail menu.
Website – www.grace-bar.co.uk
Brocca
Another one that is a little outside of Central London but trust me its worth visiting; my family and I have been visiting Brocca for years with birthdays, graduation lunches and farther and mothers day dinners taking place there. Brocca is good italian cooking paired with an amazing atmosphere and fantastic service.
I highly recommend – Everything; seriously i’ve never had a bad dish!
Website – www.brocca.co.uk
Seawise
I’ve raved on about this seafood restaurant on this blog a lot so I’ll keep this short and simple. This is the best seafood restaurant in London. Fresh fish that hasn’t travelled a long distance, that’s cooked to perfection in simple dishes that change with the season and are served with a sizeable portion of chips or salad or if you’re lucky both. Amazing staff and decoration, I highly recommend booking for the evening it gets busy quickly!
I highly recommend – The Lobster and the Bang Bang Prawns
Website – www.seawisecamden.com
What are your favourite places in London to eat?
Peace Out and Pixie Dust XO
The Shack 68|Review
Cocktails, barbecue sauce and your best friend sounds like a recipe for a good night out. K and I ventured into The Shack 68 the other evening for a good old catch up.
We kicked the evening off with some cocktails, they have a great drinks list but we both loved the sound of the Carribean Shack Cooler – Bacardi Oakheart, pineapple juice and lime. Watch out these cocktails have a kick to them.
The whole idea of the restaurant is sharing platters and mini plates. We decided to share two starters before the main event. Pork Belly Bites – quite literally some of the best pork I have ever tasted and Grilled Halloumi with Sweet Potato, Broad Bean and Pea Wings.
Although we were already a little full from the starters we cracked into the main event. K went for a classic Cheese Burger with a side of Fries and Slaw whereas I went for a 1/2 rack of ribs with a side of mash. The ribs, oh my the ribs. Meat that melted off the bone smothered in the most amazing sauce paired with smooth, creamy mash.
Somehow K managed to squeeze in some pudding before we had to roll ourselves home. I would highly recommend bringing your best appetite with you because the food is very filling but so amazing and there is something for even the pickets of eaters.
Peace Out and Pixie Dust XO
For menus and bookings click here.
Picnics at Painshill Park
My sister and her husband came down to visit for the weekend, which was the perfect excuse for a Saturday picnic at the beautiful Painshill Park – a place we had driven past many times but never ventured into.
We started with the picnic, although there is an excellent cafe which we discovered later. We chose a spot by the lake watched over by some ducks.
Painshill Park was created by the Honurable Charles Hamiltion who wanted to create something beautiful for the public to visit. He created certain follies along the walk including the Turkish Tent, a Gothic Tower and the Temple of Bacchus which has since become a ruin.
It’s such a quirky expanse that you never know what you are going to stumble on next. Perfect for budding photographers like my mum.
Top- H&M|Shorts – H&M|Wellies – Hunter.
The crowning glory at Painshill is the man-made crystal grotto. It’s such a curious little thing but is also rather beautiful.
We finished our day off with a good old cup of tea pleased to have discovered a whole new place which is in London but makes you feel like you are somewhere else.
Peace Out and Pixie Dust XO
To find out more about Painshill Park click here.
We’re going to the Zoology museum…
As something of a museum geek it was not unusual for me and my museum pal A to be wandering down a backstreet of London towards the Grant Museum of Zoology.
Linked with the University College London the museum is host to around 67,000 specimens. Now A and I seem to be attracted to weird collections – check out our visit to The Natural History Darwin Collection. The prospect of animal skeletons and samples preserved in fluid caught our attention.
Just one room is home to all the specimens with cats and dogs sharing a cabinet and some Dodo bones chilling with a sabre tooth – if Night at the Museum was real then this would be the horror movie version.
After working up quite an appetite filling our brains up with knowledge we jumped on a tube and headed to Camden and my all time favourite seafood restaurant Seawise – read my full review here. I opted for an early afternoon G+T and a lobster tail.
Blazer – River Island|T-shirt – Pull&Bear|Jeans – New Look|Shoes – Topshop|Bag – Accessorize.
If your looking for a fun activity which is free and suitable for all ages definitely check out the Zoology Museum it’s well worth it.
Peace Out and Pixie Dust XO
Easter Sunday Funday
Easter Sunday was a slightly quieter affair than normal, we are having building works going on so the usual huge family lunch was limited to just a close few.
I love bunnies and couldn’t resist these rather kitsch bunny cups from Tesco.
I was left in charge of my new favourite domain the kitchen and with a little help from my mum managed to cook up a little feast.
Roast chicken with all the trimmings followed by mascarpone and passionfruit clouds.
Feeling a little bit over indulged we finished off the day with a walk, before tucking into our easter eggs.
Hope you all had a lovely Easter weekend.
Peace Out and Pixie Dust XO
Ping Pong|Review
*apologies for lack of photos I hadn’t planned on blogging but couldn’t resist snapping a few*
I’ve been wanting to go to Ping Pong since, well what seems like forever, finally after some nagging and organising I managed to get the girls together for dinner.
First thing is Ping Pong is super popular we went into the Embankment branch at around 6:30 and it was buzzing. We managed to squeeze onto a sharing table and order some drinks before tackling the menu – the ordering system is a little odd, you tick the items you want before handing the list to a staff member, basically doing their job for them.
Having not been there before and having heard great things about the pork buns I ordered them along with an array of other goodies.
The food is amazing, full of flavour, warm fluffy dough filled with succulent pork, another food description sentence. However I wouldn’t suggest Ping Ping for a catch up dinner. I could hardly hear myself speak amongst the chatter of other tables and clinking at the bar.
Peace Out and Pixie Dust XO
For menus and info click here.
London Calling|OOTD
Coat – H&M (similar)|Blouse – Boutique (similar)|Jeans – ASOS|Shoes – H&M|Bag – DKNY.
London Southbank is one of my all time favourite places to go and recently I went there with some of the family for a day out at the Aquarium. Its still not entirely spring in the UK yet so I wanted to layer up so wrapped up with a pussy-bow blouse, a jerkin that you can’t see and then my favourite military style coat from H&M. This look is slightly more sophisticated than what I normally go for but I really love it. I went for trusty favourites on the bottom half with my ASOS Ridley Jeans and H&M Chelsea Boots.
Peace Out and Pixie Dust XO
What Kate Did Next 