Great food, coffee... and chain stores

We had the best dinner last night. There's this Italian restaurant near our place called Zizzi, and we've eaten there a few times now. They do the best garlic pizza bread - it comes with just a bit of olive oil brushed over the top, and fresh rosemary leaves scattered over it. It is so good. Then I had this brilliant goat's cheese crostini with caremelised onion on top - it was such a strong taste, almost blue-cheese strong, but so good. Admittedly it did come with a lame, overdressed little salad thing, but I can overlook that. All washed down with some yummy Trebbiano, which I've never really had before but which isn't bad. Then for desert, I had vanilla bean and pistachio ice cream (shouldn't that be gelato at an Italian restaurant?). And Mark had an affogatto, although I had to tell them how to make it?! They did do a brilliant job in the end though - I love affogatto...

So that was great. But then when I just looked it up online to put a link to it above, I found out that it's a huge chain... not surprising really, everything that's good in London turns out to be a chain. I don't know why that takes some of the gloss off, but it does. It just seems less authentic and less loved somehow, like the owners don't really give a poo about the food but are just out to make a buck. But I guess if they make good food then nothing changes that - enjoy it for what it is right...

Like this great coffee place I went to yesterday morning near my work, that I'd read about online. It was called Benugo, and they made me a great coffee to start the morning with. Lucky, cos it also made me 15 minutes late to work. But then this evening I saw another one a few blocks away from our place! Bloody chain stores...

One place that kicks bum and that I know is not a chain store is this little place near work called Brill. It's a funny little blend of CD shop and cafe, and it prides itself on being independent. There was this guy who opened up on Monday morning, and he made me, without exaggeration, the best coffee I've had in London ever. So I had another one. The owner, who normally works there, makes an OK coffee but not as good as this other dude. He's good value though - he very clearly absolutely loves his music and talks loudly and enthusiastically to anyone who goes into the shop about whatever CD is playing or whatever type of music they happen to be looking for.

NoGo Moto

Didn't go up to the MotoGP. Went down the to train station to buy a ticket. 95 pounds return. "Cheers mate. No thanks." That's almost $250 before I'm even in the door. Oh well. Watched it on TV, the start of the race was good. Wet day though. We had a pretty good weekend in London as well. Just doing not that much.

We went to see Oceans 13 at the movies last night. That was pretty good! We are big fans of the previous two movies, and this one was good. We both enjoyed it, although we don't get a lot of the jokes! (I think you have to be American to understand some of them). They've left the door open for a fourth movie, but I don't think it will ever happen.

Bergen, here we come...

We just booked Mark's birthday weekend away - on the west coast of Norway in the midst of the fjords!! It looks absolutely stunning! Here's us when we get there (and die our hair blonde...):

We're going to this little (??) place called Bergen, which has direct flights from London and is apparently a great place to go to check out the fjords. I did also read somewhere that they do these crazy viking tours, where at the end they dress everyone up like a viking and you go out on a viking ship. That just sold it for Mark, so off we go... :)

This is Bergen:

Land of odd shop signs...

We seem to be in the midst of a whole stack of crazy zany shop signs here. Not only do we have a local BoConcept store, but a local Mr Topper's hair salon, a cryptic farting dog store, and also a local Spearmint Rhino gentleman's club. How have I ever lived without these??