So it appears that I’ve fallen a tiny bit behind on my posting, because yes, for a control freak like myself, a week in the behind is a lot in the behind. I had grandiose plans to catch up on my blogging over the weekend but instead, I went and learned a new word.
Dictionary.com’s Word of the Day email is hands down the best thing to land in my inbox because it teaches me a new word almost every day. I say almost because I mean, you can’t expect it to feed me new words every day given that my big fat brain already contains a squizillion nouns, verbs and adjectives. Or something.
But yesterday’s word was indeed a new one.
Slugabed [sluhg-uh-bed]
noun: a lazy person who stays in bed long after the usual time for arising.
Slugabed. Sluhhhh-gahbed. Sluhgah-bedddd. Let it absorb, settle, roll off your tongue, slugabed. What an intrinsically beautiful word!
I feel an unusual connection to this word, not in the least because it is kinda sorta really cute and makes me visualise a Gloworm wiggling in bed, but honestly? Because They’ve Made A Word To Describe Me.
Amen, sistah.
Anyway, yesterday was all about catching up with my blog, but as you can imagine, slugabed me, I didn’t wiggle my little butt out of bed til close to midday. And then I was hungry and there’s no food in the house so we had to go out… and you can imagine how the rest of the day went down.
So now, a week late, I’m finally getting around to blogging about my final London Restaurant Festival meal at Criterion Restaurant, very graciously sponsored by American Express.
American Express, the key sponsors of the festival, have done a phenomenal job with organising festival menus across dozens of restaurants and offered a number of bloggers the opportunity to share the festival love with our readers. My reader who won dinner for two at Criterion came back and told me how amazing it all was, and this my friends, makes blogging all worth while.
Ok, collective *awwwwwwwwwww*
Anyway, back to my meal. Me me me.
Panu and I had dinner at Criterion last Saturday night. Despite its disgustingly prime location Right In The Middle of Piccadilly Circus, upon entering the restaurant, you’re immediately whisked away into another place, another time.
The interior decor is grande to say the least ~ high ceilings, lavish couches, even a live piano musician, belting out tunes from from Nat King Cole to Snow Patrol.
After settling in with a glass of champagne, bread and butter is brought to the table, and hot-damn, isn’t this just the most lemony looking butter you’ve ever seen?
Well, lemon it wasn’t but instead the slickest, richest butter I’d had in a while. And it’s not like I talk about butter a lot, so you know this one’s good.
And the rest of the food did not disappoint. I ordered the crab bisque to start, made with Cornish brown crab and cream fraiche. It was richly, odouressly, stenchfully crab, full of hepatopancreas goodness. I couldn’t get enough.
Panu had the ‘head to toe’ pig’s terrine with homemade piccalilli, and from what I could tell, the dish was more than a little bit enjoyable.
For mains, Panu ordered the pan fried Gressingham duck breast, served with creamed cabbage, orange and beetroot. Not normally a duck fan, I honestly didn’t think he’d love it, but hey look! The one in a thousand times I’m wrong! The duck was tender with a thin strip of fat and cooked to a perfect medium rare, which explains why I was wrong because on those rare occasions, you’d better believe there is a damn good reason.
My main. Sometimes it’s the simplest things in life. I had the leek & potato ravioli served with baby leek, braised leek and leek puree. Sounds simple right? It was utterly frackingly scrumptious. I mean, it was leek and potato dammit! Match made in heaven
Dessert time. My choice, the walnut crème brulee with blackberry compote. A delicious nutty crème brulee. What can I say except that it was too small.
And Panu’s indulgence: a dark chocolate and Cointreau brownie, brandy snap, served with peach and rooibos tea ice cream. Luscious and rich though lacking in Cointreau. Or so we thought, although… we had had a couple of champagnes and wines so…
And that there was our festival meal at Criterion Restaurant. The festival menu priced this meal up at £25 per person for a set three course dinner. I mean, really, if that isn’t good value… I’ll uhhh… never be a slugabed again. Big call!
Anyway, don’t take me too seriously, I’ll always be a slugabed.
Happy Monday y’all xx
Criterion Restaurant
224 Piccadilly,
London, W1J 9HP
0207 930 0488
website
