Dinner at E&O, Without John and Mandy, 9 January 2010, With John and Mandy, 6 February 2010

My dairy reads:

9 January, John & Mandy?

…then…

6 February, John & Mandy? 8:30

The e-mails disambiguate. John to me on 11 January:

Sorry we didn’t make it on Saturday, probably the sensible thing not to travel but I was a bit miffed when the 6 inches of snow never turned up. Anyway 6th of Feb is fine by us.  Same arrangements?

Me to John, same day:

Great. Janie and I decided to go to E&O anyway and enjoyed the meal so much we’d be very happy to go there again 6 Feb if it took your fancy.  Otherwise we could go somewhere else if you two have a special request. Let me know asap so I can get a booking sorted.

E&O is a superb Asian-fusion restaurant – still around at the time of writing (2017) – click here.

I first came across E&O a few years earlier than 2010; I recall having a lunchtime businessy meal there with Michael and Jeremy. This seemed a good location for a little lunchtime over-indulgence, as my doctor’s surgery is just a short crawl across the road. Not so useful location-wise on a Saturday evening. But I digress.

I remember both of those early 2010 evening meals reasonably well, although to some extent they merge into one in my mind.

I recall bumping into the then ubiquitous Richard Russell and his family at a nearby table, but I think that was the January visit when I was with Janie only, but perhaps it was the gang of four February evening.

I can’t remember exactly what we ate – perhaps John can. It is an especially good place to go with a small group (e.g. four) so you can share and taste lots of different dishes – I remember thinking that when Janie and I went as just a pair.

I’m pretty sure John and Mandy didn’t stay that time – I’m guessing the kids were being baby-sat but perhaps the girls were staying with aunts or grandparents.

I’m hoping John will chime in with some more recollections about the evening, if he has them.

Dinner At John and Mandy’s House In Saffron Walden, 5 April 2008

All the diary says is…

6:00 John and Mandy

…with their Saffron Walden telephone number. Nothing on the e-mail about it.

So I think this must have been the occasion we went to their house in Saffron Walden for dinner, probably the first time, without arranging to stay anywhere.

I think Janie volunteered to drive home but afterwards said that she was through with night driving on unfamiliar country roads – don’t blame her – so we have always made an overnighter of it since.

On arrival, I seem to recall that we got a guided tour of the estate, several elements of which I seem to recall were still up for debate at that time – e.g. where would John locate his drum kit and where would Mandy locate her professional practice room.

This was a very enjoyable family meal with the girls there as well (perhaps Lydia only joined us later in the evening, or perhaps I am now confusing two such evenings). For sure John cooked a blinder (he always does), I suspect it was loosely based on Indian cuisine but not too hot and spicy as he knows that Janie only enjoys spices if the food is not too hot.

John might remember the exact details of the meal; if so, with a bit of luck, he might be persuaded to chime in with a comment to flesh out the delicious details.

Dinner At John & Mandy’s Place In Cambridge Road Wanstead, 21 April 2007

Janie and I were trying to trawl the details of this evening from our memories.

I remember travelling to the house by tube, getting a little lost walking from the tube to the house and then travelling home by cab.

 

Image “borrowed” from an estate agent’s site. Right road, probably wrong house.

We both remember having a really good time.

We both remember that the girls were there and that they were now old enough to join us and participate in much of the evening.

Did we take a stroll around the neighbourhood that time or was that a different evening?

Janie remembers taking drinks in the garden.

Janie remembers dancing with the girls in the living room.

Janie remembers roasted vegetables with thyme and Balsamic vinegar.

Janie remembers conversation about Sartre, existentialism and that sort of thing.

We both wonder whether all of Janie’s memories of this particular evening relate to this particular evening or whether several evenings have merged into one collection of memories.

I am 99% sure this was our last visit to John and Mandy in London – i.e. it was Saffron Walden the next time we visited. But frankly I’m not much help on this one memory-wise.

“JOHN! MANDY! You’re better at this than we are. What did we eat? Are Janie’s memories impressively good or a mixture of different evenings?”

Whatever – we know we had a great time.

“8.00 John & Mandy For Dinner + Lydia”, 25 September 1998

John, Mandy, Me & Janie in August 2022

While researching Janie’s and my historic visit to the Donmar Warehouse…

…the evening that Nicole Kidman and I had our magic moment ‘n’ all…

…I came across the above headlined diary entry the day before.

Delving into Janie’s diary for more clues, I discover that Janie “collected wild boar” on the Thursday when in town (that would have been from Harvey Nicholls in those days) after collecting red cabbage and marinade from Waitrose first thing.

Wild Boar at Chicos – JIP, CC BY-SA 3.0

Strangely, just the other day (25 years after the above wild boar evening), Janie and I were discussing our inability to get wild boar any more . [Insert here your own joke about me having progressed from wild boar to wild bore in the space of 25 years.]

Less strangely, we’re still very much in touch with John and Mandy 25 years later…

…and still in touch with Lydia, who has been giving me singing lessons since the pandemic and whose career as a singer/actress is now burgeoning, as she has just started a run for the RSC as Miss Honey in Matilda The Musical at the Cambridge Theatre.

From www.uk.matildathemusical.com

I think this wild boar dinner visit might have been the first time that Janie and I met Lydia.

In the coincidence department, the Cambridge Theatre (where Lydia now resides) is within spitting distance of The Donmar Warehouse in Earlham Street, where 25 years earlier, Nicole and I…

…I’m not boring you, am I?

Dinner At John & Mandy’s Place, 10 July 1993

The diaries are consistent on this – Saturday evening dinner at John & Mandy’s place (Dangan Road, Wanstead).

I think we went for a walk around the area before dinner on that occasion, as it was our first visit to that house and the days are long at that time of year. I remmeber doing that walk in the light.

We had a very good meal, although in truth I cannot describe exactly what we ate. I’m guessing that John cooked something with a southern asian theme, but not too hot and spicy because he knew that Janie doesn’t go for very spicy food.

I think it is fair to say that we probably drank some good wine too and I know that we did all enjoy the evening, as was our wont on those occasions when we four got together for meaks back then…and still, 26+ years later.

I wonder whether John remembers any details.

An Evening With Janie, John & Mandy; Death And The Maiden by Ariel Dorfman, Royal Court Theatre at the Duke of York’s Theatre, 17 October 1992

I believe this was the first time that either John or Mandy met Janie; Janie and I had only been going out together for a few weeks by then.

This was also only the second time that Janie and I went to the theatre together – the first time having been our first date; The Street of Crocodiles.

My diary is a bit of a confusion for that evening – indeed all that it reads is “Madness”…

…which I’m sure means “The Madness of George III”. But my theatre log is very clear that 17 October was this particular evening with John and Mandy and my diary also shows that “George III” reigned on 30 September for me:

What I think happened was that Bobbie, once again, could not make the planned theatre visit to see Madness of George III on 17 October, but was very keen to see that play. I vaguely recall Bobbie arranging a ticket swap with friends so that she/we could see “Madness” midweek a couple of weeks earlier and her friends got the prized Saturday night tickets that I had procured.

That freed up the evening of 17 October for Janie to meet John and Mandy and for all of us to see Death And The Maiden, which was still one of the hottest tickets in town that year, even though Juliet Stevenson (who had wowed audiences as the lead) had moved on.

Penny Downie played the lead in the cast we saw, which, as super subs go, is pretty darned super. Danny Webb and Hugh Ross played the male parts.

Janie and I are struggling to remember what other arrangements we made with John and Mandy around this evening. I think we might have had Chinese food in Soho with them before or after the theatre. Perhaps Mayflower? Or Joy King Lau in those days?

I also realise that my diaries at that time are littered with clues that John and Mandy must have recently moved house around that time:

Guessing that John and Mandy moved to Dangan Road that August, hence the address and phone number scrawled on 12 August…
…did I really escape the carnival 30 August to join John and Mandy in the George at Wanstead 30 August? Guessing that “birthday thing” 28 August would have been with my parents, but I’m not entirely sure about events of that weekend other than the 29 August hot date with Janie.

Anyway, on the day I am writing this up (29 August 2017), we shall be seeing John and Mandy later in the day, so I’ll pick their brains on these matters this evening and update this piece accordingly.

Back to Death And The Maiden.

The play is set in an unspecified nation emerging into democracy from brutal dictatorship. Ariel Dorfman was a Chilean exile during the Pinochet years and the brutal regime is clearly based on that one. It is one of those hugely affecting plays about torture and the abuse of power. It brings to mind also One For The Road by Harold Pinter and Fermin Cabal’s Tejas Verdes.

I’m sure we did something after the play – perhaps we did eat afterwards. For sure we’d have needed a drink. For sure we found a way to discuss and decompress together for a while.

I remember being very pleased that John, Mandy and Janie all seemed to get along so well; in that regard alone the evening was a tremendous success (to use John’s favourite adjective). But it was also an excellent evening of theatre and I’m sure we must have eaten and drunk well…if only Janie and I could remember those details too.

Postscript: A strange coda to this story. Both Janie’s and my diairy say “The Madras House” for this evening, not “Death And The Maiden”. But my log says Death And The Maiden and I have no recollection of going to the Lyric with John and Mandy to see The Madras House – Janie and I saw that play at The Orange Tree many years later. Did we make a late switch of play choice or have the memories and documentary records got into a terrible muddle? I think probably the former.

Huis Clos by Jean-Paul Sartre, Lyric Studio, 5 August 1989

John White loves a bit of existential angst, so what could be a better choice for a Saturday night out than Huis Clos? Mandy was up for it. Annalisa was up for it. Off we went to the Lyric Hammersmith – the small Studio theatre there.

The play is set in hell, which is said to be a hot place.

It really was o-t ‘ot that evening. Clammy August and naturally the air conditioning system in the Studio wasn’t working.

Here’s my database/diary note for this evening:

The air conditioning had broken down on one of the hottest days of the year.  The Lyric gave us all free squash in the interval because it was so bad.  It did make the play about hell truly multi-sensory.  The line “it’s so hot in here” had the whole audience in stitches.

You don’t need to take my word for this. Here’s a link to a review from “The Stage”.  As Maureen Paton puts it in that review:

…the oven-temperature heat in the Studio does the rest. Hell is too many other people in the audience on a hot night.

Still, we had a good evening as far as I can recall and all four of us dined out on that story for some time. Indeed John still seems to be talking about it as I write in October 2016, as John’s comment on my piece about I, Daniel Blake – click here – confirms.

The rest of the programme follows – heck it was quite a job this evening to dig it out, so I thought I might as well scan the lot while I was at it.

huis-clos-2-of-4-tiny

huis-clos-3-of-4-tiny

huis-clos-4-of-4-tiny

 

Listings Huis ClosListings Huis Clos Fri, Aug 4, 1989 – 30 · The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

Huis Clos ListingHuis Clos Listing Mon, Aug 7, 1989 – 35 · The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

John & Mandy & B For Dinner, 4 February 1989

I think my hieroglyphic for 4 February reads:

John & Mandy meal +B

…which I take to mean that John and Mandy and Bobbie came over to Clanricarde Gardens and I cooked them dinner.

I suspect that this was John & Mandy’s first visit there, so perhaps one or both of them remember the occasion better than i do.

John has so far signally failed to respond to my request for him to remember what he and I did a few weeks earlier:

…despite the fact that I can’t remember and cannot read my own handwriting. Infuriating.

My guess is that on 4 February I probably cooked something East Asian, although it might have been Southern Asian cuisine for that crowd.

Thoughts most welcome.

A Busy Weekend Socialising, Hoity-Toitying At The National Theatre And Setting Up My New Flat, 25 to 27 November 1988

Celebrated clinching the deal for the flat with Bobbie on the Friday evening, starting with an early evening visit to the National Theatre to see a platform talk about Kenneth Tynan. I think those Platform things were a new idea that autumn…an idea that is now more than 30 years old. Our first one had been Tony Sher some weeks earlier.

This Kenneth Tynan one was in the Cottesloe and was a really interesting, varied panel: Adrian Mitchell, Jonathan Miller, Edward Petherbridge, Kathleen Tynan and Irving Wardle.

As the diary says (if you can read it) we went on to the Archduke afterwards for dinner.

On the Saturday I collected the keys to Clanricarde Gardens and did some shopping. I remember spending more than a few bob in Tylers (which was up on Westbourne Grove back then) – I probably still have one or two of the items I bought that day – I’m pretty sure I am still on my first clothes horse, for example.

I also bought food for the Sunday, but the crowd that visited that day – John, Mandy, Ali Dabbs, Valerie and Bobbie would all have traipsed to Woodfield Avenue for that meal – I must have shlepped the grub from Notting Hill to Streatham Hill on the Saturday evening – the new flat was not yet fit for habitation.

What did I cook that day? Can’t remember. Bound to have been Chinese and/or South-East Asian food though…just possibly Southern Asian for that crowd. It would have been good, whatever it was, though I say so myself. I must have been knackered by the Sunday, though. What a week it had been.