startcookin.com

We started the day with breakfast at the Abbey Hotel in Bath.  LJ finally got his traditional English breakfast, eggs, wiggly bacon (as opposed the the American streaky kind), broiled tomato and baked beans.  Ugh!  The we took off to tour the Roman baths.  How amazing!  They were beautifully preserved and the tour is set up so you are given real insight into who used them and how they were run.  There are now two levels to look at the underground pool.  The second level walkway above the pool was added in the late 1800’s.  Here are a few pictures of the baths and museum.

We checked out and took the train back to London and arrived about 2:00pm.  Back at the flat, we cleaned up and went to tea at the Botonist.  It was just delicious.  They have a wonderful pastry chef.  One of the special pastries we had was a nutmeg custard tart that was really special.  The scones and finger sandwiches were really good.  I had no idea how much food was served at tea.  It really is a meal.  I was very glad our dinner reservations were not until 9:00.

We took the tube to Jamie Oliver’s restaurant, Fifteen.  It was 45 minutes by train from our flat.  The restaurant is really cool, as you might expect.  It had a young, hip vibe with crazy graphics and very young, beautiful servers.  Ours was a Brazilian guy named Fabio.  LJ and I had the 4 course tasting menu.  Almost the best thing we had was the amuse bouche.  It was a scallop with fresh ginger, lime juice, cilantro and a tiny something crunchy.  It really did jump in the mouth.  My first course was a salad with baby greens, a grilled peach, burrata cheese (which is an artisanal cheese made with mozzarella and cream), toasted almonds and balsamic vinegar.  LJ had prosciutto di San Danielle with Italian black figs, gorganzola dolce and pea shoots.   His next course was risotto bianco with mushrooms and truffle pecorino.  My primo was potato gnocchi with Cumbrian pork ragu.  LJ’s secundo was pot roasted pork with apricot, rosemary and white wine.  Mine was char-grilled salmon with spinach and black olive sauce.  Finally, desserts were honeycomb semifreddo with lemon sorbet and strawberry limoncello soup (LJ), and elderflower panna cotta with gooseberry compote (me).  OMG!  Yes, we took a taxi home and collapsed.  This was the actual day of our 40th anniversary and what a day to remember it was. 

Jamie wishes happy 40th

We got up very early and had a toasted crumpet at the flat and were on our way to the tube station by 7:30.  We caught the train to Bath at Paddington Station and were in Bath Spa (that’s what they call it) by 10:00AM.  We had hotel reservations at the Abbey Hotel, a 5 minute walk from the station as promised.  The hotel let us stow our bag while we met up with the walking tour outside the Roman Baths at 10:30.

AND WE WALKED for 2 1/2 hours.  It was a wonderful tour!  We went by the home of Beau Nash who was responsible for the popularity of the Bath as a resort for London swells in the 1700’s.  He was interested in having all the titled folks visit, but also the middle class.  According to him, the titles had names, but the middle class had money.  We stopped in Queen’s square where there is an obelisk in the center as an homage to the Romans.

We walked on to the next park called the Circus.  It is a larger, round park with 3 crescent shaped buildings surrounding towering plane trees.  They are residences now.  The Roman architecture is awe inspiring.  We walked on to the next major architectural area which was called the Crescent.  Outdoing the Circus built before, this has one huge crescent shaped building, now townhouses.  One was purchased by Nicholas Cage for 4 million pounds (about $6.64 million by today’s exchange rate).  In our tour group we were happy to meet John (Gio The Blogger) and his wife Dana from Chicago who were traveling on to Italy (jealous!). 

After the tour, we ate lunch in a lovely little French restaurant called The Arch.  I had sea bass with a poached egg on top, and LJ had pork tenderloin.  Everything was delicious.  After lunch we shopped.  I bought two tops and a caftan and a pair of shoes, and LJ bought a T-shirt.  Fitting, right?

LJ at the Arch

We had dinner at another French restaurant called Casanis.  I had lamb chops and LJ had pork again.  Everything was beautifully prepared.  We walked back through the town to the hotel and fell wonderfully asleep.  It was a great day.