As part of the celebrations commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Festival of Britain at the Southbank Centre in London, megachef Heston Blumenthal and I will be presenting an early evening 'devoted to the pleasures of afternoon tea and sherry' at the Queen Elizabeth Hall on 9 May.
The idea is that both afternoon tea and sherry were much more popular in the 1950s than they are today, and Heston and I would like to draw them to more people's attention once more. Heston has long been a sherry aficionado but is currently preparing for a mid to late May opening of his hugely successful new restaurant Dinner at London's Mandarin Oriental for tea (though how they manage to persuade lunchers to leave in time to make way for the scones and cakes, I know not).
From 6 pm to 7.15 pm those with a ticket are invited to taste from a wide range of fine sherries, up to three per producer, from the likes of Barbadillo, Fernando de Castilla, Gonzalez Byass, Hidalgo and Emilio Lustau. In all there will be 24 superior sherries covering a wide range of styles – mainly dry with a few PXs, more than at any of the sherry and tapas bars I wrote about recently in London's sherry and tapas explosion, I think.
At 7.15 we will move into the auditorium for a short talk on the wonders of sherry from me and a much longer talk from Heston and his chief teatime collaborator about the pleasures of afternoon tea.
WHAT Tea and sherry with Heston Blumenthal & Jancis Robinson
WHERE Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre, London SE1
WHEN 6-8.30pm Monday 9 May
HOW MUCH £45-60 per ticket.
HOW TO BOOK See here
