Abstemious

So, after a week full of vegetables and roasting and fun, I've come to a very large amount of rather indulgent food in a very short space of time. But, honestly, it's been GLORIOUS. Glorious. Thursday night was spent with extraordinarily inventive small plates at Casa Mono, where my personal highlight was a virulently garlickly sopa de ajo, pungent and sweet, that served as the bed for a crispy and extremely tasty little fillet of fresh mackerel; the duck egg, fried and gooily spooling over the duck confit was perfect.

And then last night was even better, possibly. Dovetail is one of my favourite restaurants, and not just because one of my closest friends works there. But that does help. We sat at the bar and ate our way through so many good things, it's hard to single anything out, but the goat ravioli was wonderful and the soft boiled egg on a bed of bacon, oyster mushrooms, butternut squash was one of the best things I've eaten in a very, very long time. I also had a Slovenian white wine (liked it - very unusual) and tried a phenomenal red wine that I've not had before, a Bonarda.

And tonight, one of the best cooks I know is preparing a giant feast for us. It's a hard life.

Except I DO have to do some work for the next few hours and it's cancelled my day plans. So, you know, it's not all fun and games.