Showstoppers, 22nd February

What can a musical that is completely improvised from audience suggestions possibly be like? A lot of fun I can tell you.

We take our seats and three musicians come on stage, along with Dylan Emery who turns out to be our show’s director-cum-narrator. A red phone rings. The premise is thus set – on the other end of the line is the producer (ostensibly Cameron Mackintosh) wanting to know if Dylan has a new show up his sleeves. Well, of course he does! Oh, what is it? Um… well… and here is where the audience has a chance to suggest the direction the show takes. We are asked for some settings and we end up with The International Space Station, Battersea Dog’s Home, the Titanic and one other. We then vote by cheering for the one we like the most. Battersea Dogs Home wins. We’re then asked for some musical styles to incorporate and the audience proffers Seussical the Musical, Fiddler on the Roof and South Pacific. Finally, Emery asks us for a style of musical that can be played on guitar. Of course we give him flamenco, the hardest to play.

Dylan gets back on the phone and tells Cameron he’s definitely got something and he’ll send over the script in about… ooh… 45 minutes? Just enough time for the actors to make something up. And hilarity ensues.

It really does. It’s improv so it’s not completely polished and you shouldn’t expect it to be. There are moments where the ‘actors’ don’t quite pick up each other’s cues, or they overlap but this is incredibly rare. They mostly succeed in putting together a very funny show, with a real narrative arc, and real, actual songs, that may even get stuck in your head! They sing in harmony, they dance in synchronization (nothing too fancy, mind) and each show is different from the last. I can’t guarantee this, having been to only one, but there were people in the audience who had clearly been before which I took as a sign that it doesn’t get too samey.

Our director doesn’t get involved in the storyline himself but instead his role is to interject and move the story along when necessary, or to interrupt in order to, basically, mix things up and challenge the performers. So, in the first half, he stopped the action to say they needed to sing the next number in a fun, punny, rhyming kind of way a la Seussical the Musical, and in the second act, he made them all sing one in the style of ‘the fast one’ from Urinetown – very fast-paced and quite the challenge to the actors.

Audience participation didn’t end with the beginning of the show. In the interval we were asked to tweet our suggestions about what would happen, which lead to our main protagonist (a female dog who wanted to be adopted and just get away from Battersea Dogs Home at any cost, despite having an admirer) being adopted by Snoop Dogg, and realizing that living with a human isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Of course, the other Dogs Home inhabitants come and find her and they all live with Snoop in a happy ending.

As well as being fairly consistently funny, they managed to get a few touching moments in, as each couple had their own lovestory and sometimes even a backstory. It was so entertaining that the first half positively whizzed by, although I must admit the pace slowed a little in the second half. There were still plenty of laughs to be had throughout.

I had thought £19 was a little expensive for this, but considering it is practically a real, full-length show, I think that’s a pretty decent price. If you love musicals and like to laugh, this is for you. 

Kouzu, 21st January

I’d noticed that this Kouzu restaurant kept popping up in my Twitter and Instagram feed and lots of lovely things were being said about.  So I was more than delighted when I got an email inviting me to come and review the place. Invites are still very much a novelty for me, and they do help me keep the blog going without ending up too much out of pocket.

And, like I said, everything I’d seen so far had been positive, though I didn’t want to read too much in case I formed a view before I went there.

As much as I enjoy the privilege, I do find these things a little awkward. I’ve never been one for much one-on-one attention so I made sure to enquire in advance what the deal was. We were told we could have three courses each plus a drink but in the end we had so much more than that! Much more than we probably would have ordered for ourselves if left to our own devices, but I could see they were keen for us to see what they could do in all areas.

I don’t know what I can say that hasn’t already been said but wow. This place is the business. And they also have quite savvy business sense. January is such a slow month for restaurants and bars as everyone decides to make up for all the money and calories they spent in December. Perfect time to invite a bunch of bloggers in and create a bit of hype then. And they deserve it. They’ve chosen a rather odd location in London to set up – a few minutes’ walk from Victoria station. While this is in fact a nice part of town (as soon as you escape the immediate environs of the station), it’s not really known as a destination for food. But if you’ve got a bit of dosh in your pocket then it is worth coming over to St James to try this place out.

To start we had some sashimi. I had the sea bass with salsa and green pepper sauce, Stephen had the yellowtail with truffle dressing but of course we shared. The truffle in the seabass more like a fragrance than a taste, very delicately done so as not to overpower the fish, giving way to a sweeter taste. I don’t know whethe to attribute that to the shiso, myoga or ponzu! While this dish was perhaps the more exotic I was drawn more to the flavours in mine of lime, micro herbs and pink peppercorns. Both were faultless though.

Next up was a choice of sushi roll (we went with crab) and a Nigiri each. We’d been told the Aburi were their speciality, particularly the toro and the sea bass. We had one each. The difference with the aburi compared to nigiri is that the fish on top is seared with a blow torch. It makes all the difference. Our fantastic waitress explained how we should try to eat it ‘upside down’ so that the garnish and fish touched our tongues first. I’ve never had anything quite like it and I shall never forget the way the smokiness filled my mouth. Amazing.

For our mains, Stephen had the miso cod, and I had the duck breast with sansho (though very tempted by the lamp chops). We weren’t sharing but I did have some of Stephen’s fish. It was exquisite. They marinate in miso for three days resulting in a firm, sweet, almost candied fish with the sharper fennel and celery salad setting this off nicely. My duck was a pretty pink covered with a sticky sweet but peppercorn studded sauce. By the end of this I was stuffed but of course I was going to take advantage of trying their desserts. After savoury food this good, I had to see what they’d do with the sweet stuff.

I had their special which was a celebration of sesame. I love sesame’s sweet and nutty taste and it was put to good use here in ice cream, sesame tuiles and tiny madeira-like cakes. It ticked all the boxes without being too heavy.  Likewise Stephen’s chocolate mousse with an amazing hazelnut ice cream. Indulgent but not heavy and with a slice of chewy, candied orange adding a bit of flair. 

We had a couple of nicely balanced cocktails to accompany our dinner, and we ordered another with our dessert as well. 

The only bad thing I’d have to say about the place is that they say it’s a ‘sharing’ ethos, which basically means they can bring you the food whenever it’s ready rather than together because it is presumed everyone will tuck in at the same time. Normally this doesn’t bother me too much but Stephen was doing a pescetarian month and I had ordered duck. So his miso cod arrived way before mine and apart from having a couple of bites I had to just sit there and watch him eat. Mine literally didn’t come out until he’d finished and then our roles were reversed. So, just something to bear in mind.

The food was not cheap (the miso cod was £28), but they use quality ingredients and, more  importantly, have some inventive and utterly delicious food. Put this on your list for your next special occasion. Or go along and have a few bites of sushi and sashimi as a light dinner without it breaking the bank.