who only by moving can balance

A few weeks ago now, on a Friday, A & I went to Vanilla Black, in what was initially a belated birthday celebration (A having been wretchedly ill with a cold on my actual birthday) but morphed into, also, a Progress On The PhD celebration.

(I note slightly sheepishly that I apparently failed to post write-ups for 2017 and 2018; I think I know which notebook I scribbled in, so maybe I'll try hunting those down, but in the meantime: whoops.)

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Because I had a birthday, again. P had arranged to be Elsewhere this year, so A was my only dining companion. I was a little nervous about that, partly because I am a seething mess of anxiety at the moment but partly because my understanding had been that last year he'd enjoyed it well enough but hadn't been anything like as impressed as P & I. Which, you know, fair enough -- but in fact this year his main arrived and he proceeded to sit looking stunned and rapturous for several whole minutes, which I of course found utterly charming.

For my part, this year they took me well outside my comfort zone and it almost all just worked.

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sebastienne, shortcipher and I went to David Bann on our last day in Edinburgh. My overall verdict: interesting and tasty, but nothing I couldn't identify and nothing I'm not confident I could (work out how to) make to equivalent standard, and nothing so utterly baffling I'd never have considered putting it together and was astonished by how well it worked and how much I liked it. I'd happily go again and enjoy myself, but it's not something I'm going to spend time thinking about starry-eyed and dazed in the same way I do Vanilla Black. Which is an unfair yardstick, because by any other measure it's very good!

(At this stage, I'm afraid this is going to be brief notes rather than anything more in-depth, in a slightly desperate attempt to get it done before I forget everything. Sorry also for the terrible phone camera photos; still very much suspiciously getting the hang!)

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... yep, everything was tasty and I would happily go back. :-)

... and twice makes a tradition. P-the-ethical & I have a habit of going for A Fancy Meal most times we end up in the same place, which we probably need to curb a little now that we see each other more than twice a year, and he was keen to go back and is an excellent dining companion; I'd been wanting to know what facesfriend thought of the place since he'd mentioned to me that work owed him a fancy dinner; and I was wanting to introduce them in a context that wasn't in point of fact A Party. Plus taking more people out to fancy vegetarian dinners means I get to try more of the food, so. That was a motivation.

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As one might expect service was unobtrusive except when they had no option, e.g. the committee that assembled to gape in amusement at how badly I'd got my hair tangled in my coat on arrival; and the point at which we came to pay, my boys looked at each other and me and pulled out their cards and said we'd sort out my contribution later, the waiter was very carefully very impassive, and I ended up going bright pink and burying my head in my hands and giggling because yes, in fact, it was exactly what it looked like. But also at a point earlier in the meal I'd mentioned that It Was My Birthday Treat, was wished a happy birthday, and then my dessert came out on a plate with "Happy Birthday" in the glaze and a candle on top of it. So! It was showy but also judged exactly right for me. It was lovely. <3

So I have some friends visiting, and they have a different friend visiting, and she was craving Ethiopian food, so my friends asked the internet (... in the basement at work where there is internet). They found Kokeb and it is great. It is so, so good.

It is run by auntie, right, who cheerfully self-described to us as "bossy auntie". Auntie went to university in Ethiopia and had her first daughter there, moved to Bulgaria and had her second child and became sufficiently fluent in Bulgarian to work for the Bulgarian government, and then she moved to London and set up an amazing restaurant. As far as we can tell it's an entirely one-woman show; like, she will take orders, check that everybody's ordered everything they want with cheery warnings that if you don't get in now you'll be waiting for a while, and then disappears out back until reappearing Some Time Later with food.

There were four of us; we paid under £40 including tip for Plenty Of Food and also tip.

... food. Food. The "hot and spicy" was well within my tolerance; we had weekend-special-wot (shiro - chickpeas), fule (delicious fava bean thing), ayeb be-gomen (delicious cheese thing), and lots of misc veg - misor wot (red lentil), alicha kik (yellow lentil), spinach, fosolia & carrot (I was so excited about how they use the correct green bean word), ye-atiklt wot (potato carrot misc veg thing), and four injera (delicious sour bread product). We inhaled it all and it was brilliant and we were so happy and it was so good. Like, I cannot do justice to how happy we all were about putting it our faces. I think my absolue favourite was the yellow dal or possibly the fosolia&carrot but I would really not want to have to pick just one thing.

... and as we were leaving auntie hugged us all!! She did not do that to all the customers but like friendpeople semi got into an auntie-off with her and she clearly decided to adopt us a bit? The food was brilliant & she was wonderful & just -- yes, yes I will be going back.

The only thing to be aware of is that she has a fairly strong preference for you to phone ahead so she knows how many injera to make each day so she doesn't run out (and also that the card machine is currently broken so she is cash-only) (and that it is an entirely one-woman show so service is not as fast as it might be if, you know, there was more than one of her) but aaaaaaaah need to find an excuse to go back asap. With company. The better to order EVERYTHING rather than being restricted to just one or two dishes. (Four people seems to be optimum - that way you can get pretty much every veg item on the menu and have the right amount of food without making auntie stick tables together.) So, you know, volunteers? ;)