Why You Should Tell The Hotel it's your anniversary - for four-posters and freebies

 Sometimes they offer you Champagne or a bottle of sparkling wine fizz, in your bedroom, or when you book dinner at their best restaurant. Other times they have a package you have to pay for. You might still want to book it.

In Vietnam my son and daughter in law were celebrating their anniversary..

The hotel had strewn pink rose petals across the white bedspread. Two towels were foled into the shapes of kissing swans with beaks together forming a heart shape.

A bottle of white wine ws in an ice bucket. The management had included for them a Happy Anniveray card.

Photo by Angel Lansbury.

Organising Birthdays and Weddings - Be prepared

When organising a birthday or wedding be prepared to chase up every organisation and organiser the day before, to get everything in writing, and to have contact details of who will be responsible for action on the day. This year I have experienced two events where the bride and birthday girl were stressed by delay.

First, I shall tell you about the wedding. The officiant due to perform the ceremony could not be contacted during the Saturday of the wedding, his office had an answering machine, and he was late. Since the bridal couple were serving free-flow champagne and drinks at a reception before the wedding ceremony, a half hour delay could have doubled their drinks bill.

The photos were meant to be taken on a bandstand in gardens outdoors. Delay would have meant that the photos could not be taken in the light.

In the end I conducted a dress rehearsal ceremony so that the photos could be taken outside in the light. We were prepared for the signing of the contract to be made at a register office later. The anxious bride was talking of cancelling the dinner as there was no point of having a dinner to celebrate a wedding which had not taken place.

I did not speak to the officiant about the delay, but understood from the bride (bride and groom are both close friends) that the officiant claimed to have had trouble finding the venue.

Later I heard of another ceremony at a house in London where the officiant had turned up four hours late, claiming to get lost.

At an earlier family wedding I attended, the bride's father was expected a seated meal, but the hotel supplied a buffet, with waiter service to the bride's table but not for the guests. The bride's elderly grandparents and others of the grandparents generation did not want to have to stand up and queue. The bride's father demanded waiters, but the hotel said they had another wedding event the same day and simply could not supply more staff.

The bride's father said that he was not prepared to have stress or time wasted on an argument on the day spoiling the day for the bride and her family. Supply extra waiters, at whatever cost required, and we will sort out the finances later. (This was in Exeter, England.)

Birthdays and Anniversaries
The first time I had a hiccup at a birthday was at a restaurant which is now closed called the Alpine in Bushey Heath, north west London. We had visited them many times over the years because of their good food.

I once had a meal and a family member ordered strawberries. Before the dessert arrived I thought this was a waste of money, because you could buy strawberries in any supermarket, so when
I went to a restaurant I ordered a made up dish which would have taken me hours to prepare.

However the strawberries were so exceptionally tasty that I went to ask the owner how he got strawberries so much better than the ones in the supermarket. The owner told me he got up at 5 am to travel into central London to visit the fruit and vegetable market and select top quality, high priced produce for the day, hence his high prices for 'ordinary' fruit salad.

I wondered whether he had to economise on staff or staff training. What happened at the family birthday was that we waited for the birthday candles to arrive with our dessert and they didn't. Another nearby table had birthday candles and I eventually went to enquire what had happened to my birthday tables candles. I was assured they were on their way and would arrive with coffee.

Meanwhile the next table were eating their birthday cake, not looking very happy. I want over to ask them how was the birthday cake. The frowned, then got chatty and confided, "The cake is OK - but it says Happy Birthday and it's our wedding anniversary."

I went back to my table amused at this revelation which explained what had happened. The chef who wrote on the plates now had to find time to write on the plate and supply a replacement happy anniversary (perhaps the original order was wrongly written) as well as a replacement happy birthday for us, and the extra cake, either freshly made or defrosted.

In some London restaurants, such as Cafe Rouge, you are given sparkling wine free, albeit in previous years there has been a minimum number of diners, such as if you have brought four, or six, or ten, whatever that restaurant chooses, and in recent years Cafe Rouge in North West London has instead made a minimum spend.  We have three or or four family birthdays when we eat out at restaurants.

At the Tanglin Club in Singapore we had another kerfuffle, delay. We had booked a birthday meal, the club knew my birthday date because they had sent me a birthday voucher. We turned up and presented a birthday voucher at the start of the meal. We ordered, at our expense, sparkling wine. Dessert came with no birthday message or candles. I had brought my own birthday badge which I had seen on a birthday card in London. I had bought one for boy and one for girl. Since I had mine prominently displayed, I thought they might take the hint.

When I went to the desk and asked if I could have a plate with happy birthday written on it in chocolate, I was asked if I wanted to order a cake from the deli with the happy birthday message. I asked, Are you offering me a complimentary cake or asking me to pay for it. They confirmed the latter. I said I did not want to pay extra for a cake, as I had already eaten my dessert (which we would be paying for) and had expected the words happy birthday or a candle on the desert. Please just supply something with the words happy birthday.

Finally, along comes a small cake with a candle and a small oval of chocolate with the words happy birthday in even script. (It looks like they might pre-order these by the dozen or pre-prepare them). I know from investigating what you can order in the way of cakes for a birthday that these items are available from chocolate and cake suppliers. Most large restaurants, especially those in hotels, have a dedicated dessert chef in the kitchen who will make up fresh cakes or chocolates on the day and add the happy birthday to the plate. The reason they like to be told in advance is because even a five minute delay in writing out happy birthday three times for different tables would delay the service of desserts and coffees, especially if a cake has to be made up at the last minute.

So I got my cake with a candle and a chocolate with the words happy birthday. The waiter even managed to wish me happy birthday at the end.

I suggest you announce to staff at the beginning that such and such a person is the birthday boy or birthday girl. Tell both the waiter and the head waiter. I've had a lifetime's experience or weddings and birthdays where you didn't get what you expected. It's a regular pattern. And not just in the bad old days, the past. My experience of weddings and birthdays where you didn't get what you expected in time, twice by March. Learn from my mistakes and successes.

Birthday and Wedding Tips
1 If time is of the essence for meals, drinks, ceremonies, make it clear to participants and explain why.
2 Check phone numbers of contacts - where you can contact them on the day, evening, weekend.
3 Check numbers of waiters at Weddings and timing of cake and ceremony. Have a toastmaster/best man whose job is trouble-shooting.
4 Have the wording of all ceremonies or speeches written out, printed, on phones, with two or more people to guard against loss of paperwork or delay or illness of participants.
5 Have backups for everything, including speeches, cakes, candles, photographers and cameras.
6 Supply maps and directions to all.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer.

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.