The Real Greek

Oh the joys of going Travelling on Tuesday without having to cook anything !! What with last week's oven ready meals and this week's restaurant option perhaps it's a slippery slope?

I really wanted to get to the Hayward to see the Light Show but suddenly found all the tickets were gone for the weekend. So whipping the kids out of school on a Tuesday afternoon seemed like the only option. I do love it when things like this come together. Mostly I am too much if a lazy mum to bother but when there is no alternative option I throw caution to the wind and just go for it and its so much fun when it works out.

I sprang the kids out of school at 3pm and we were in Waterloo by 4.15. Apart from leaving both the boys fleeces on the tube it seemed really easy. I guess we are right out of that buggy or carrying phase and it makes cities a whole lot easier to navigate.

N was even able to meet us too as his shoot in Plymouth finished early. It was a great exhibition. I do love the Hayward. A very typically playful exhibition. Very amusing and moving and accessible. Lots of fun quirky sculptures playing with different aspects of light. Included works by the Danish artist Olafur Eliasson who did the Weather Project and the Little Sun at the Tate and James Turrell of skyscape fame.


The kids loved it. The sun shone. We bumped into old acquaintances. Everyone was happy.



I had forgotten quite how far a walk it was to the Real Greek. But we had announced a visit to Greece and I just couldn't bear copping out and going to Pizza Express again. But, in fact, The Real Greek is a lot like Pizza Express. Just without the pizza. And with more hummus. But the pens and colouring sheets are the same, the kids' menus, the offer of chips and fizzy drinks and ubiquitous ice cream. N and I should have, in contrast, ordered some crazy stuffed testicles or something. Actually I don't think the RG does those. Have to head to a Hackney Turkish place for that. But we went down the 'play it safe' road. I dunno. I think it's good to show kids and parents alike that they can find something they like to eat even on menus of places they don't usually go to. But I am not sure how much 'expanding of the repetoire' we actually did.

The kids ate: chicken kebabs, roasted halloumi, hummus, flatbread.

Off our plates they tried: Gigandes plaki (butter beans in tomato sauce), tiropitakia (pastry parcels with spinach, leek and feta inside) and greek burger patties (which I hadn't appreciated where authentic Greek food).

Baklava and Greek coffee rounded it all off nicely. Especially as the kids didn't even like the baklava - ha ha all the more for us! I do love that cardamon coffee. It reminds me of all the Arabic hospitality I've had the good fortune to be the recipient over the years.

Verdicts ranged from the Eldest's "Wow, this is just like the Turkish restaurant I went to with Evie. I love this food!" through the Middle's "Pleeeeeeeeeeeeease can we have chips?" to the Youngest's "Actually I don't really like this food mummy" (which is at least an improvement on the tantrums he's been known for in the past). So pretty much par for the course I would say. Still, it was nice not to have to cook!