I needed to do some electronic archaeology to ascertain that John White & I ate at Cigala that night. But I do remember the evening and the restaurant well. A great meal and, at that time, a rare opportunity to meet up.
Work was at full pelt at that time for both of us, plus John was up to his elbows in little ones. Here’s a quote from our e-mail exchange arranging this one:
We must get something in the diary. Call me at the office. Here all day Friday. Home is usually not good because I am either in the middle of cooking, eating or controlling children. When you rang on Monday I was literally up to my elbows in vomit. Joy. Don’t ever have children.
Cigala was a new opening at that time and had been getting rave reviews. Here’s Jay Rayner, for example.
Cigala Jay Rayner Observer 25 Feb 2001 The Observer (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
John chose Cigala – I paid for it.
I ate “well posh” all day that day. I had spent the morning running a Fishy Bourse game at St James’s Palace for delegates at a Marine Stewardship Council event. I got Prince Charles to hand out fluffy fish in the prize-giving, which I thought was pretty cool and His Royal Highness didn’t seem to mind.
MSC At St James’s Palace 15 Mar 2001 The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
The Daily Telegraph was strangely silent about the fluffy fish.
Lunch included the Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC) as well as the MSC (coincidentally, John White was soon to move on to the timber trade and encounter FSC certification a lot).
Fortunately for we guests, the St James’s Palace chefs cooked MSC product rather than FSC product. Even more fortunately, at that time, Western Australian rock lobster was one of the few species MSC certified, so that’s what we ate. It was delicious. I mean, someone has to eat that sort of thing.
I subsequently discovered that my mum called Linda at our office several times to ask for more copies of the photograph below – she must have sent the darned thing to everyone she knew…and maybe even some people she didn’t know.
Oh mum!
