The nearest city to where I’m living at Soul & Surf in Varkala, Kerala, is Thiruvanthapuram. Confusing westerners with the pronunciation since BC.
Thiruvanthapuram (let’s go with TRV) is the largest city in Kerala, referred to by Mahatma Gandhi as the “evergreen city of India” (which I’m not too sure about) and is where most of us fly into when visiting deep southern Kerala in India. Continue Reading →
I’m back in Varkala and it’s been a crazyyyyy few weeks. Fresh after the monsoon, in fact it’s been raining along with the most OTT thunder storms every day. The horizon and the sea blurs together as the storm marches over the water and fifteen minutes later, the heavens open. The thunder is so loud I keep having to check if I’ve been shot or not. Continue Reading →
I thought about you on the hospital bed. They wanted to take off the bandage. My hand stung as I held it out into the light… Continue Reading →
What else could possibly be the title for my latest post than this? It has reached the mid – high 30’s and yesterday I challenged myself to go the whole day without saying ‘It’s sooo hottt’.. and lasted until 11am.
Festival season is in full swing here and it isn’t unusual to come out of the house and have to stop and wait 30 minutes for a series of jazzed up elephants to pass by, snacking on bananas and jack fruit handed to them by the neighbours. Continue Reading →
As the first two months of my trip to India draws in, I think I’m in a good position to give a quick round up of what I’ve seen so far.
I’m going to keep it brief, and let the pictures do most of the talking…
After a very long journey from Heathrow – Mumbai – Thivandrum – Varkala (Kerala) I finally arrived at Soul & Surf and to the little piece of pardise on the cliff edge where I would be now spending most of the next few months. Continue Reading →
Clockjack Oven is a smart chicken rotisserie. You choose your chicken of choice whether it’s half, whole or in a bun, and then pick one or two accompanying extra salads.
Overall it’s a bit like a smarter, generous, homemade version of Nandos. A bit like them – but much better. Continue Reading →
I get quite excited about coffee shops and the new wave of ‘baristas’ that have leapt out of the last 5 years and are making coffee into art.
And I don’t just mean drawing a swan on my latte, I mean the entire background, process and tasting experiences we once only really associated with wine. Continue Reading →
After a most fantastic time in Jarnac, Cognac at the Courvoisier Chateau, seeing the beautiful French countryside and tasting the best cognac in the world, we didn’t think our weekend could possibly get any better… we were wrong.
We boarded the bus after lunch and so did our luggage, this meant only one thing – we were leaving Cognac. But where were we going now?
One of the lovely members of the Courvoisier team got to the front of the bus, took the mic and said ‘Right then you lot, who wants to go to Paris?!’
A group of writers, bloggers and competition winners were asked to ‘take a leap of faith’ and drop everything for one weekend to do something totally spontaneous and par-take in a trip of which they knew nothing about other than they would be leaving the UK, and would need to bring their glad rags.. Continue Reading →
Last week I went to Claridges Hotel in London to eat in the restaurant that has replaced Gordon Ramsay’s Petruse – Simon Rogan’s Fera. Rogan is quite literally a vegetable genius. His restaurant L’eclume has 2 Michelin stars, and his other venture Roganic is well on its way to achieving the same. It will without a doubt not be long until latest opening Fera follows in Michelin pursuit. I’d bet my BBQ’d salad leaves on it Continue Reading →
