Diary of a Culture Hedonist

Having  seen Hänsel und Gretel only a few months ago at Glyndebourne , I was looking forward to see how the Royal Opera will bring this fairytale opera to life. Christian Fenouillat  pastoral set worked well. Like many operas with a small cast, he added a bounding box to reduce the size of the stage without losing perspective. Angelika Kirchschlager and Diana Damrau were believable Hänsel and Gretel respectively. Their stage acting (how they walked, jumped and cuddled) conveyed a real sense of innonance. Thomas Allen (their father) was on good form. The Dew Fairy (by Anita Watson) was fabulous with an orange duster and a yellow squirty spray cleaner. All in all, the creative team managed to strike a good balance between serious opera and fairytale. Colin Davis also did real justice to Humperdinck's lush Wagnerian score. It would be nice for this lovely work to remain in repertory around this time of the year to counter-balance the sickly sweek Nutcracker.

Rolando Villazón was ill, so Zvetan Michailov (Bulgarian) sang in last night's Le Contes d'Hoffmann. I was not sure how much notice Michailov had, but his singing was uneven and the diction was not great. Even Pappano's magic touch at the helm did not bring out the magic. Olympia (Ekaterina Lekhina), Giuletta (Christine Rice) and Antonia (Katie Van Kooten) made up for this otherwise lack lustre performance.

From the moment Sir Mark stood on the rostrum, I was gripped by this most powerful Greco-Wagnerian opera by Strauss. Susan Bullock was a fearful Elektra, Jane Henschel was a believably deranged Klytemnestra. Charles Edwards used the same set design but tweaked the stage direction. All worked remarkably well. I came out feeling slightly drained.

"I have got to eat before my friend's wedding." So it was my mission to track down somewhere nice to eat before the wedding in Marlow. Upon a friend's recommendation, my fellow wedding guests and I got a table at The Hand & Flowers . Although it looked like an ordinary pub on the outside, when you stepped in it felt more than your olde worlde public house. The tables have side plates, napkins and cutlery laid out. My glass of house merlot (I was gasping for a drink) was smooth and flavourful. The carte was a lot more exciting than the typical pub lunch menu. I ordered the home cured sardines on chopped capers (see picture above), onions and shallots on a toasted slice of bread. The slow cooked Oxford beef (Oxfordshire being a short distance away) came with bone marrow bread pudding (yum). All very tasty. My friend's parfait of foie gras looked velvety, though his wife's red snapper soup was apparently a bit too salty. We had no time to do pudding (shame)...

This site on Wardour Street in Soho had seen many bars and restaurants come and go. The latest occupant is Princi, an up market Italian bakery brought to London by Alan Yau (of Hakkasan, Yauatcha fame). Natural stones, polished brass and water reflections dominate. The long communal tables ( de rigeur for any Soho eatery), leather upholstered chairs and perfect lighting make this a stylish choice for a slice of cake (made from organic "00" flour) and a caffé machiato from the Italian barista (yes he is, I talked to him in Italian). They seem to have an alcohol licence - so perfect for an early evening spritz , or a late evening caffé correto . The downside is that this is a self-service joint.  While everything is stylishly done, all eating implements are disposable. So never mind the side plate.

Right, back in Bologna. One more place worth mentioning is Zanarini. It's off the posh via Farini (though there aren't many posh shops - it appears that the Bolognese eat and don't shop). The coffee is devine and their selection of paste mignon were fantastic. Perfect any time of the day!

My friends wanted to go to Basilica San Antonio in Padova. So we hopped on the Trenitalia Eurostar from Bologna. The church was a bit of a blur. The weather was miserable as it rained non stop - and thanks to the portici we weren't too drenched. We found a table at Trattoria dei Paccagnella. It's a quiet establishment with a narrow entrance - if you didn't look you would have missed it. OK, we were no longer in Bologna, but the food was still fabulous. I pinched my friend's deep fried baby cuttle fish - every mouthful was "melt in the mouth" delicious (OK I only had one as I wasn't allowed more). My gnocchi was made of chestnut flour sitting on a bed of cream of baccala. Somehow, all the tastes really worked well together.