When I first came to London, more than 20 years ago, it was difficult to eat a great meal unless you went to a Michelin starred restaurant – or cooked it yourself. Much has changed since then and this city has turned into such a foodie heaven, and haven, that we are spoiled for choice.
In my family, we generally like to eat out in ethnic restaurants, and we have a particular passion for Asian food. Of course we have our favourite local haunts where we are recognised at the door and that are easy to get to. But since it was
We went for lunch on a weekday, and hadn't booked in advance. Upon arrival there were only seats at the bar, so we took them. It turned out to be a great spot because I had a bird’s eye view of the kitchen. We ordered dim sum, and I was pleased to watch as they added the finishing touches manually to each and every dumpling and sesame ball that was ordered. We had a wide variety, including 63 degree ‘tea egg’ with shredded filo accompanied by a smoking piece of cinnamon bark; foie gras sticky sesame dumplings; Shanghai steamed dumplings with ginger infused vinegar; clear shrimp dumplings, sweet chilli sauce, citrus
foam; and many others which were divine. While I don't usually order desert in a Chinese restaurant, there was something very appealing about the Snow ball meringue, lychee granita, mango puree and lime sorbet that called out to me – and did not disappoint!
To continue on our Asian food theme, one of my sons loves to cook and came across a recipe on a site called Manila Spoon to make Filipino spring rolls. Most of the ingredients were easy enough to find in our local super market, but we made a trip to a specialty market to find the ‘lumpia’ or pastry for the rolls. While time consuming, because you have to prepare the ingredients in stages, it was relatively simple to do, and the results turned out to be delicious!
As I have recently learned from my Malaysian colleague, Chinese New Year celebrations last over 15 days. To ensure that we at FOCUS didn’t miss out on the celebrations, Irene arranged a New Year’s feast for lunch on Monday. We were all instructed to bring a coin and to know the animal of the year of our birth. The room was decorated in red with paper lanterns and the infamous red envelopes. There was a magnificent feast on the table, including crispy duck, dim sum, Singapore noodles and other delicacies, lovingly prepared by Dragon
Palace in Earl's Court. Irene entertained us with stories
It may have been a starving Oliver Twist who sang about food, glorious food; but little did he
know what would be available in London in the future!
Written by Eva Stock. Eva is Director of Sponsors Relations at FOCUS.
For more information about FOCUS visit: www.focus-info.org
Should you wish to share your expat experiences in the UK, please contact us: office@focus-info.org
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