A muddle

Some weeks ago we bought a small piece of some rather good cheese from a stall in the market on the Waterloo side of the Festival Hall, a stall which were told was a festive offshoot of the main operation in Borough Market. So last week, off to Borough, discovering on the way that getting a Bullingdon from Waterloo Roundabout to the Hop Exchange is far and away the most convenient way to make the journey, certainly on a morning with neither wind nor rain. Got there, did my business and got back to Vauxhall Cross in little more than half an hour, without attracting even a modest honking.

Found the right cheese stall, distinguished by mainly selling large wheels of just one sort of cheese, which I thought was what I had last time so bought a biggish piece of hard yellow cheese. By way of a garnish a much smaller piece of a soft white cheese and taking away the idea that the yellow cheese was tomme and the white cheese was compté with a 'p'. Both were very good, but checking today on the net I have got myself into a muddle. The stall was clearly that at http://www.boroughcheesecompany.co.uk/ and they say that they only sell comte, which from the pictures is clearly the yellow cheese. While Wikipedia says that Tomme de Savoie is a white cheese, looking very like the white cheese in question, with Savoie being some hundreds of miles to the south of the Franche-Comté from where the comte comes from. There is also talk of something called cantal, which I am sure we have had before, possibly when we were holidaying in the Savoie. Almost as bad as wine talk, but at least the cheese is good. And it is all mountains.

From Vauxhall off to inspect the newly reopened front door to the Tate Proper, which I am pleased about. I had got used to using the side door, which is quite good in its way, but I do like the front door, now nicely restored and refurbished. Off up the stairs to try out the new members' lounge worked into the mezzanine floor around the base of the dome. All very pleasant, including a small but select selection of wine in half bottles, which suit my currently restricted diet. Also quite a decent coconut slice. Must go back to give it a proper going over.

Down from there to walk along the river and over the bridge back to the railway station. River very high, maybe only inches below the level of the pavement, but hard to be sure with the parapet separating us from the water. All looking very splendid in the late afternoon light, as did the newish blocks of flats of St. George Wharf (their web site denies the apostrophe. Maybe the creators were not native English speakers). Much more interesting visually with their mixture of shapes, blues and grays than the much older blocks (one of them including the penthouse home of presently & properly silent Lord Archer) on the downstream side of the bridge. As spectacular as the illustration, although in a quite different way, with the light reflecting off the buildings rather than off the river. But then it is an estate agents picture, the fact that is was taken with the machine that never lies notwithstanding.

PS: the cheese site also tells me that their operation is mixed up with Neal's Yard, an establishment we used regularly for a while near forty years ago. At that time, they operated out of what I imagine was a warehouse once connected with the Covent Garden fruit and vegetable market, and sold things which were dispensed from large jute sacks: grains and pulses. It all looked a bit dusty and a bit hairy and one wondered about pest control. We mainly bought one of the rather good brown rices that they offered, going through a fad for same at the time. Not altogether clear whether the Neal's yard cheese people are the descendants of the Neal's yard brown rice people; perhaps an inspection is called for.