Inspiration

On Friday 3 May, I headed down to London House in Battersea to take part in a Gin Masterclass (it’s a tough job, but somebody’s got to do it…) In sunny weather the masterclass takes place on the Tonic Terrace, a secluded courtyard decked out in whimsical wisteria, but the weather was not our friend (typical bank holiday), so it was brought inside. The cosy lounge area of London House, with its squishy sofas and arm chairs, was the perfect place to spend a Friday evening drinking gin!

The 39th London marathon is fast approaching, with this year’s event set to take place on Sunday 28 April. Sir Andy Murray will be the official starter of the race, with the elite wheelchair races setting off from Blackheath at 8:55am, and then at 10am the mass race will begin.

Union Street Café’s Executive Head Chef, Davide Degiovanni, has a passion for Italian food, as he hails from Northern Italy. He started his culinary career at the one Michelin-starred Picasso Room in 2002.  Since then, he has worked in several Michelin-starred restaurants and five-star hotels in London and abroad before opening Union Street Café in 2013.

Our brand-new pop up, The Rum Shack at the York & Albany, got us thinking a lot about rum. We asked ourselves ‘what is rum actually made of?’, ‘who invented rum and raisin ice cream?’ and ‘did pirates really drink rum?’ The first two questions are easy – rum is made (primarily) from sugarcane, and rum & raisin ice cream hails from Italy (we should have figured – thanks Italy). The third question took us longer to figure out, but we’re sure that if pirates did drink rum, they’d most definitely have a rum old time at our little slice of the Caribbean in Camden this summer!