I went out to dinner with the relative plus one, as well as her old friend who lives in London and is an academic. The old friend has recently moved to a university I was once employed at, so we shared some gossip about members of her department-to-be. We met at Bobo Social, which is a once-trendy burger joint but appears to be on a downward decline: it was occupied exclusively by what appeared to be a hen party and when it left we had the restaurant to ourselves, with ‘La bamba’ playing dismally over the carefully lined up chairs. The food was unmemorable. The much-praised crispy squid was well cooked but not actually crispy, the ceviche was poor and the burgers themselves dry. I feel like having another burger to compensate, but have already had more meat in the last two days than in the two months preceding them.
London is very sunny. It is actually hot in the sunlight (though the air is cold). There was never once a summer like this when I lived here, when you were lucky if there was a week of warmth, followed by cold and wet as usual.
I happened to go to Temple Fortune to collect some sushi today, and it made me think how I’d like to explore some of the Jewish food in these parts. Might as well take advantage of being 10 minutes from Golders Green.