elizabethian tuesday

tuesday, tuesday, tuesday. it was rather overcast and rainy - so what better to do than pretend to be 17th century peasants? emma and i headed down to the globe theater for a 5lb matinee performance of a midsummer's night dream. and honestly it was awesome. better than i expected.

this current globe theater was built in 1991, as a better-flame-retardent version of the original. and we watched theater as shakespeare intended it - no amplification, beer/crisps sold, and we got to watch the suits drinking martinis in the balcony seats. YES PROLETARIANS.

it did rain for most of the show, and umbrellas are not allowed as they block the view, but luckily em and i had scarves to go over our heads.

took a jaunt over the millenium bridge to listen to evensong at st. pauls. very lovely service.

meanwhile, back at the ranch, our friend david came over for dinner with his lovely girlfriend eleanor. adam made us all leek+potato soup from this recipe , handpicked by its many color photographs.

now, swayed by extreme bargains, i had purchased a bag of "cooking apples" at sainsbury for like 40 p or something ridiculous. they were green granny smiths, so i figured the british just didn't know that you could eat greens straight, because i feel a lot of people don't use them that way. WRONG. these were sour as fuck. i'm sorry england. i'm sorry.

so, i originally was going to do some sort of free-form rustic apple tart thing, but it turns out that we didn't have a flat baking sheet in the apartment. so, hey presto, apple pie.

it was pretty tasty - i just threw the sliced apples together with 1 1/2 cups of sugar and a bunch of spices. in retrospect, i should have put some cornstarch in - the filling got a bit runny.

and i haven't mastered celsius baking temperatures yet, so the crust dried out too much . . . . alas. next time we'll have it down.