How Hospitals Can Improve - with food, drink, toilets and phone numbers

Hospitals are wonderful, caring people and amazing facilities. UK hospitals are cosy and warm. Singapore hospitals are refreshingly cool.

A doctor in Singapore sent me to a hospital with a covering letter. I was very pleased with the service. (They take your credit card details before anything else. Paying in advance is good. No worry about the bill at the end.)

But there is always room for upgrading and improvement.

1 TOILETS AND WATER ON ARRIVAL BEFORE BED
Get patients toilets and water before putting them into beds. This keeps them happy and alert and co-operative and less stressed . it also saves staff having to bring bedpans.

Give them water - and toilet - on arrival. A human being is like a pipe. Water goes in one end and out the other.

This applies to main wards and also A and E. (Accident and Emergency.)

2 POINT OUT BIDETS IN TOILETS
In National University Hospital I was escorted to the toilet and a nurse pulled the curtain around the toilet.

Later, I asked to go to the hospital toilet just before leaving. Having fallen after being giddy first thing in the morning, I didn't want to risk collapsing in a public toilet on a railway station. I then discovered, with the curtain pulled back revealing the poster on the wall, that the hospital toilet had a built in bidet jet like the toilets in five-star hotels (the Mandarin Oriental hotel next to the Twin Towers in KL, Malaysia, had them in the ground floor ladies).
It would have been helpful if the staff had pointed out this facility earlier.

Selfie of me in the hospital bed in A and E at National University Hospital, Singapore.

3 SERVE A SNACK AND DRINK OF WATER AT TIMED INTERVALS FROM ARRIVAL
Check whether the patient has eaten. I had breakfast but no elevenses or lunch in case I needed an anaesthetic or other procedure which required an empty stomach.
Serve a snack or check they have eaten and drunk water within two hours of admission - unless they are likely to need a procedure which prevents this.
I was given a jam sandwich. I though fruit might have been better. Maybe a banana instead of as well.

4 ALLOCATE A LIAISON PERSON
Hospitals see to have staff whose job is specific, such as measuring blood, or taking a patient's temperature. The person actually in charge, the boss, is nowhere to be seen. Nobody seems in charge of whether you have had a drink, or food, or need to go to the toilet or tell your family how long you will be in the hospital.

5 CHECK HOSPITAL PHONE NUMBER IS IN PATIENT'S PHONE
With the help of the 'geriatric nurse' - gee, thanks, I am now geriatric, who gave me my appointment card with a phone number on it, (guaranteed to go missing when I needed it) I was able to put all the hospital numbers in my phone.
The nurse also suggested adding the ambulance number. I'd noticed that unlike the UK where 999 was once number for all services, the ambulance number in Singapore is 995. If you are confused you might not think of it. If somebody from another country is with you they might not think of it. It's so handy to have the number in your phone contacts list under the word ambulance.

6 BUDDY SYSTEM
I thought I read somewhere about neighbours with similar conditions and no family around having a buddy phone call system. They just check in once a day to see the other person is alive and well.
Even if somebody is at home when you are released from hospital and the month after, there might be a time when you are on your own for several hours or days or weeks.

National University Hospital is a teaching hospital. It has sections dealing with cancer, children, dentistry, and women.
The main entrance/exit by the MRT station faces restful, soothing trees.

National University Hospital is right next to Kent Ridge MRT (railway station on the Circle line).
Useful Websites / Information
National University Hospital
5 Lower Kent Ridge Road
Singapore 119074
Tel: (65) 6779 5555.
website: www.nuh.com.sg

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Surprise Decor, Dishes and Desserts, from France and America to Merry England

Everybody likes to be surprised and delighted. I am going to tell you about three meals I had long ago: the French restaurant meal at Richelieu, the Souffle in London, the magic restaurant; then three meals I had recently which you could try - the chocolate bombe melting at Petrus, the misting ice cream at dinner, the hidden egg at the Harrow in Little Bedwyn.

The French Restaurant
The restaurant in Richelieu France was in a small town with a couple of bedrooms above the restaurant, the sort of place where there are no locks on the doors and one of you is saying that this place is a dump while the other bravely and optimistically insists it's lovely and cute.

Downstairs we weren't expecting much. Up comes the melon, a whole melon, with the top sliced off and replaced. We remove the edible lid to reveal the inside melon part cubed and red wine forming a contrasting lake. The main course, table d'hôte, is fish with almonds. We are expecting a small fish with a few almonds. To our astonishment, an entire tray of food arrives, the central platter surrounded by flowers, the fish for two on an oval platter, the fish entirely hidden inside a mound of almonds. We talked about that meal for years.

A French named restaurant, Le Souffle, in a Hilton hotel in London, supplied a memorable anniversary meal. For a starter we had artichoke soufflé. The soufflé was in the middle of the green artichoke. The artichoke was served half encased in a red napkin folded origami style to mimic the shape of the artichoke leaves, a series of stepped, red triangles.

Le Souffle's decor was outclassed by the entrance to the dearly missed Magic restaurant. First, the entrance was hidden. You descend a staircase and cannot see a person, nor a door, just a set of panels and bookshelves. After scanning for a handle, pulling and pushing, attempting to slide the wall, stamping on the mat in the hope of finding a pedal or button, the door swings open. Did you trip the catch, are they watching from inside or what?

Inside, of course, there was more. The waiter brings a hanky and does a trick, then unfolds the cloth to reveal a menu printed on it. I can't even remember the food. (The Magic Hotel in San Francisco was another unforgettable hotel we were lucky enough to try before the owners said goodbye to the business. When you opened the bedroom's wardrobe door, you saw a mural of a cow. A recorded voice told you where to find the menu, grab it and hurry downstairs to dinner. In the dining room the waiter greeted three of us, each by our first name, although we had not met him previously.)

What can you enjoy now in London?

Petrus
Unless price is no object look out for lunchtime specials at this a la restaurant. The chocolate bombe is a combination of hot and cold, ice cream inside, encased in chocolate casing which melts or explodes to reveal the contents.

Dinner
Dinner restaurant at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel offers assorted surprised. The orange, which is a kind of mincemeat ball covered in something resembling ketchup, think tomato, Scotch egg for millionaires.

The dessert is equally original. An ice cream cart which is wheeled to your table if you choose their special dessert. The ice cream is made fresh to order. You get a grand display of ice cream mixing, with a white mist like dry ice. I wasn't so thrilled with the results, but my two companions thought the taste was every bit as good as the performance.

The Harrow
The hidden egg was the surprise at a recent meal. I hope this stays a feature of their menu. As well as looking amusing, like a boiled egg, the taste of the sweet white swirl of cream on top, and the orange fruit centre, was delicious. Of the three desserts I have described, I think nutritionally a combination of sugar and fruit wins. Not too much sugar, small portions, just right. But perhaps that's because it's the one  had most recently so I remember it more clearly and fondly.

The Harrow at Little Bedwyn

Cauliflower Snow
What if you are not nearby and / or can't afford the time and money to visit these sumptuous places? What could you do at home? How about Cauliflower Snow, my favourite surprise dish when I had just started entertaining. You cook cauliflower with a layer of whipped egg white on tip, hiding the egg yolks under the 'snow'. One egg yolk per person. Grated cheese on top is melted under a grill which cooked the whites and keeps the yolks cooked enough to be runny, not set.

If you cut the egg white to mark the portions, you can be sure each of your two, four or six diners receives a serving containing a surprise egg yolk. It's a relatively inexpensive dish and suits those who don't eat meat. The ingredients won't suit strict vegans (who avoid eggs, milk and cheese) but will be fine for many vegetarians.

If that's too much like hard work, try Petrus, Dinner or The Harrow.

Angela Lansbury B A Hons is a travel writer and photographer.

EXCLUSIVI-TEA AT THE MANDARIN ORIENTAL

I was in the Mandarin Oriental in London opposite Harrods and noticed that during the past year the hotel has redecorated as promised the new light, bright tea room. I was wondering whether I had missed out and should have had coffee in there, rather than lingering around the bar both before lunch and afterwards, and staying at the lunch table with my coffee-quaffing family and friends cum colleagues in Dinner by Heston Blumenthal.

Many restaurants and hotels want to move you out of their main restaurant's tables at the end of the meal to make way for the next sitting who will be ordering something more expensive than a coffee, Some menus actually suggest that you take your after dinner coffee in a coffee corner or coffee corridor. The staff are glad, positively keen, to move you to another area and bring your after dinner or after lunch coffee and even the bill to the coffee lounge or new location. That way they accustom you to patronising not just one but two of their food and drink serving outlets.

However, it seems that the Mandarin Oriental tea lounge only really caters for customers willing to buy cocktails and drinks, or a full high tea. After I got back to my work desk I googled the tea lounge menu, thinking maybe I could try it out next time I am in London and have a spare half hour between meetings or want to treat an overseas visitor to something special.

According to the website the tea lounge serves a set tea with savouries and sweet items plus a drink which can come as it is or with additional champagne- not just one champagne but at a choice of three qualities of champagne and escalating prices. You can order extra teas and coffees at about five pounds or under. However, I noticed the sign minimum charge £25.

The hotel does not cater for drop-in visitors. Two seats at the top of the entrance stairs are suitable for waiting for taxis.

Dinner with Heston Blumenthal - lessons learned

Three of us had lunch, entertaining a former/current colleague who is not a UK resident. Having eaten at this restaurant previously we checked out prices, food choices and wine choices in advance. We were shown to a a table in the bar as we'd arrived early for our table. Excellent - the nuts, some coated, provided with the drinks. Good for people more interested in chatting and not wanting to be distracted. But poor for anybody who wants to read the restaurant menu in advance and see all the wine and drinks menus. Why should I settle for a glass of wine I don't like when I might prefer a juice. Why not show me - all of us - the full range alcohol by the glass, bottle, cocktails/aperitifs, juices. I'm on a two glasses per day - and as I was planning more wine at an evening wine tasting and enticing options at lunch I want a chance to order something else such as a mint tea or non alcoholic mocktail.

The restaurant, as I knew is rather plain and colourless with but light and bright understated elegance. You enjoy views of Hyde Park trees if you sit by the window, less distraction from your VIP host/guest if you are by a wall as we were at our table.

Diners at nearby tables ordered the orange which is actually meat, which we were able to point out to our guest.

Dinner with Heston Blumenthal at the Mandarin Oriental restaurant

I had the set menu. Starter of tomato. Three tomatoes. Nothing else. Very tasty green accompaniment. Just as well. Not much vegetable or fruit in the rest of the set meal.

Main course fish. Salmon. Underdone. Worried what I was in danger of catching. (Today's news is about a restaurant serving underdone turkey - several people taken ill and one died.) Salmon not as tasty as the coated Canadian salmon on a platter which I tasted at the restaurant show the previous day.

Dessert. Opted for chocolate. A mistake. Firstly it was solid like a mars bar. No special taste. Wanted to send it back but fellow diner host thought it was OK. (Came with vanilla ice which I changed to elderberry sorbet.) Got chocolate amuse bouche after which was runny chocolate. At least I then got an edible chocolate.

Ended with the showpiece ice cream which made it all worthwhile. Clouds of mist.

Short on veg, fruit. Overdose on sugar.

Two lovely sweet wines.
Sommelier's advice was accurate and he let me taste both.

Now I've had the ice cream, no need to go back, unless again have an overseas visitor to impress.

Yes, the ice cream cart is the thing. But you get another dessert anyway with the three course set meal at £38.

You'd have to be a strong-willed Scrooge to resist drinking too many of the choices of wines by the glass suggested on the menu and by the sommelier.

If money's no object, go there at least once and you must order the ice cream. I didn't even like the ice cream, and I hated the topping, nasty hard things I thought would break my teeth.

However, the explanation my scientific minded fellow diners gave me was wonderful. Something along the lines of  - about the dry ice temperature being twice the coldness of freezing point. So they (the restaurant) can make ice cream quickly.

Unlike at home where you have to spend 24 hours at it. Also you must churn it half way to stop it forming little ice cubes in the middle. Unless you buy an ice cream maker which has a timed churner - but then you are tempted to over-eat high calorie and tooth-rotting ice cream constantly.

Will definitely take guests. (And avoid over-sugaring.)

Mandarin Oriental Hotel food and drink choices

Opposite Harrods and Harvey Nichols in London is a top hotel. The Mandarin Oriental is a five star hotel.

If you are not staying there you still have at least three choices - the main attraction is the Dinner by Heston Blumenthal restaurant.

At the restaurant entrance is a self-contained bar where you can order drinks. One table is buy a window onto the hallway. The rest are secluded if you like to be away from the street and public gaze, good for a rainy day.

Behind the bar is a display of bright coloured bottles. (But if you want a window on the outside world this room is not for you.) Newspapers provided but such dim light it's hard to read small print on the handy guide to local theatres which I picked up in the hallway. With your drinks you get a small bowl of very tasty nuts, some coated.

The main restaurant is on the hotel's apparent ground floor (actually the hotel entrance is up a flight of steps, so at the back you are overlooking the street level below. The confusingly named restaurant is called Dinner. There you have a choice of interior seats or picture windows overlooking the park. Contrast to the bar, all light and bright with white walls.

Your third choice is the basement Boulud, very pleasant, ideal if you are not staying in the hotel and don't want to feel like you're a second class citizen gatecrashing the affluent hotel guests.

In addition there's the new tea room.

If you've arrived early you can go across to one of the department stores.


Light and bright, lunch at Dinner Restaurant in the Mandarin Oriental hotel, opposite Harrods. £38 for three course set meal, two choices for each course.  But here's an optional extra.

ww.mandarinoriental.com/london/

Bar Boulud Winetasting Wedding Anniversary Dinner

  
 Harrods is a landmark in London, lit by a silhouette of white lights. If you don't arrive on the top deck of a London bus for a view, or in the luxury of a chauffeur driven car, you can use London's underground which is enjoying a continuous upgrade with natty artwork and histories and modern innovations such as posters which turn into movies. 

   One tube (underground station) exit brings you up alongside the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, favourite rendezvous of royals in the ballroom at the back, where the renowned restaurant overlooks the park. We had once opted for lunch at the world famous upstairs restaurant with its view of the park. Why would anybody go downstairs? It's cheaper, but not that cheap. No view. 

   We went downstairs to Bar Boulud for a wine tasting. My feeling about the restaurant rocketed from minus five to plus five star. Why the bad start?

  I asked for the coffee menu. Nothing annoys me more than being told you can have anything you want. I want the menu.

  It's actually a legal requirement. The law was brought in after a murder or two when ordinary fellows lured into a drinks bar by girls were persuaded to order bottles of champagne, not told the prices, asked to pay hundreds of pounds, which obviously they couldn't, and fights ensued. 

   In steps consumer legislation. You must tell the customer the prices. I ask the prices and I'm told that all the coffees are four or five pounds.

  This results in my evening out, my wedding anniversary evening, starting with a row with my spouse because I've committed the faux pas of asking for prices. 

   I shouldn't have to ask for prices. Really annoying for the lady. I've been in restaurants where I've asked for kir, the waiter has suggested kir royale, the price has leaped from £6 to £12, and I've really upset my blind date or acquaintance. 

   Then the next date, I've denied myself the kir royal. Only later I have discovered my host was on expenses. What's more, the only difference in price was 50p.

   In addition, I might order the same as my dining partner, an espresso coffee, but I am missing out on all the other items which are on the menu I can't see. I decide to ask for a juice. Do they have juices? Yes. But without the suggestion from the menu, I might not have thought of that. 
   
   We don't need coffee. My dining partner and I have had three or four already today. He's already over-hyped, irritable and argumentative. Maybe I'd like a hot chocolate instead. Or decaff. 
   Why am I doing all the work? The restaurant manager or buyer has spent ages stocking up with all sorts of delights and I am not being offered them. What can this place offer which I won't get at Costa or at home? 
  My next question is ask what is the choice of juices. The list includes one unexpected item, lychee.  I've never had lychee juice before. 
   I order lychee. Delicious. I still want to know why I didn't get the menu. Don't tell me that the Mandarin Oriental does not have the resources to print. They could even print their own menu. The hotel has an office. A business department. They must have access to a printing machine. Next time I'll ask when they want and print out my own menu and give it to them. 
  
   Or call in Trading Standards.    

   Eventually, on my way to the ladies, I pass a counter with a stack of menus. I take one. Oops - customer seen taking restaurant property - somebody comes rushing over to 'help' me. Yes, I may take the menu.  Still can't find a menu listing coffee and juice. I bet they can make Irish coffees and all sorts of things.   

   By the way, whilst the toilets are on my mind. Coming out, I don't know whether to turn right or left. Neither does another patron. Glad there's no fire. i suppose you just run in either direction. I presume the other door leads you out somewhere.  

   Downstairs, basement level, is Bar Boulud, named after chef Daniel Boulud, with wine looked after and presented by French sommelier David. Some say the restaurant has the best burgers in London. 

   A long, high table, flanked by high chairs, was laid out with semicircles of six glasses, the exciting setting for a Chablis wine tasting. Our pre-booked anniversary treat for two cost about £35 each, which as wine tastings go was good value. We wee given six glasses of dry white wine.

    Plus wonderful little cheese puffs. (Only about one per person, but I was sitting next to the diet police. You could taste two, even three, if you are no on a calorie count diet and the others aren't eating because other drinkers are too busy drinking and dieting). 

   Berry Brothers & Rudd were charging over twice that price. But our recent Berry Brothers tasting included a folder of tasting notes, the setting of a historic wine cellar, a platter of cheese and nibbles per person, two talkers, chocolates (for that tasting which was on pairing wine and chocolates) and a slide show. (See my previous blog.)

   To avoid a row I go off to the ladies. Very nice. On a second trip I discover hand lotion. The dispenser bottles for liquid soap and hand lotion are identical with small labels you don't see from a distance.   

  Back in Bar Boulud we heard an amusing talk on wine, but received no tasting notes. However, I wrote down some notes for you.  

   Sommelier David started by asking us to look at the colours of the glasses of chablis, held against a white, revealing starting on the left from a glass of almost transparent wine through to yellowy. 

  Next we were sniffing the aromas. These ranged from the negligible, through honey and acidic pineapple.

  Finally the tasting. Most agreed we liked the third and sixth of the wines. 

  My favourite lightbulb moment was when David explained the terroir. Your own garden faces the sun in one direction, whilst your neighbour's faces another direction and they succeed with different flowers and fruits. Aha - my UK garden has sun on one side, shade the other, so one side has the wide flower bed, the other just a line of trees. Profuse flowers grow on the flowerbed side. Not a single wallflower, despite plating a whole packet of seeds, two years running, the shady side. So that is why two adjacent vineyards produce different amounts and tastes of wine. Slopes on opposite sides of the river get more or less sunlight and rain, in addition to have different owners, one buying new plants and tools, the other cultivating old plants the traditional way. 

   We stayed in the restaurant for a meal afterwards. The set meal is available lunch time and only early evening so we were too late. Diet police assured me I'd already had enough calories from the wine and cheese and did not need a starter but should save myself for dessert.

   By now the restaurant was getting full. I told the server that we really wanted a table, not to have to walk around London Looking, because we'd already had lots of wine and it was our wedding anniversary. She found us a table for two, not the proper tables, which you find at the back room, or on the left facing the windows, but the lower tables on the right nearer the door. Good enough. 

   What is everybody else eating? The prices are high but no shortage of people willing to spend on an upmarket bite in this upscale corner of cosmopolitan London. Russians inhabit an upmarket tower block next door. Arabs with concealed faces jump out of taxis. 

   Bizarrely, a man speaking French to two lady friends turns out to be an Israeli who was sharing with them a huge platter of pork delicacies. Maybe he's trying to please them - or trying out what he can't get at home. Forbidden fruit? Live dangerously? Novelty? Or just a relaxed attitude, any person or food welcome, so long as it's good.    
   
   We chose one coq au vin main course, another of chicken. Tasty. Quick. Well cooked. 

   However the piece de resistance was desserts. Great choice. More a page back on the dish of the day page. I opted for the rhubarb tart. Beautifully presented. And at short notice, surprise, an extra teeny morsel of dessert with the words written in chocolate Happy Anniversary. Fully marks to the restaurant. We left with a very good feeling. 

   Before we left we took the opportunity to stop to say goodbye to another couple who had been at the end of our tasting table earlier in the evening. They tried to persuade us to book for another tasting. In addition to tasting more wine, a delightful, convivial way to renew a friendship with fellow wine enthusiasts.

Address: 

Bar Boulud

Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park, 66 Knightsbridge, London SW1X 7LA

Phone:020 7201 3899

In case you are looking at this on a small screen such as an iPhone, the middle plate has the words Happy anniversary written in chocolate. Full marks to the chef and management.