Gregarious Wading Birds

I MET TWO flamingos behind the anonymous face of 99 Kensington High Steet, overlooking the Babylon Restaurant's furtively tucked Hanging Gardens. Not being one to dwell on disappointment, my father facilitated a classy feast post publisher Webster's declination. The flamingos (alas) were not on the menu.

We licked proceedings with charged flutes of Beaumet 'Cuvée Brut' Rosé NV cerise plush shampoo, gaining an effervescent, wild strawberry tinted perspective via the quadruple glazed filmic vista of the world's most complex city.

A city which promises to turn dreams into reality but more often than not sharpens reality.

A hearty truffle-whipped wild mushroom soup (let's use the Russian for soup 'cyn', it sounds more apositely decadent) was hot on its vibrantly beady tail, met dunkingly-fine with just born soda bread picked-out with shaved almonds and sun-dried apricot morsels.

Black Lagoon vdp d'oc evocatively 'dawn picked' Viognier '03, followed as the low November sun shone its rays through the glass, its gentle confected pineapple influence quelling adeptly fried baby seabass, al-dente, whole asparagus and a sheath of dill (a tough ingredient when it comes to non-argumentative wine marriage).

Chateau Les Arroucats, Sainte Croix du Mont '03 provided a slight rose bush thorny bitterness to my crisp pastry, fig-full Eccles cake, whilst '87 Hutcheson port minced convincingly alongside my father's cheeseboard, calming blushing sour grapes with its "texture thing" attribute (soft, beguiling; silty but not naughtily-tannic).

Down below, luminous flamingos overtly absorbed the breath-condensing cold, wandering why they wandered so far from their eastern hemisphere home. Rustling, vellum feel vine leaves and a gauche olive turned softly to russet. Tropical looking, bright mottled ducks meandered with docile notes played in harmony on beak trumpets.

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J. Springer-esque 'thought for the day': intrinsic knowledge of wine is not automatically equating to passion. Wine writers with overriding concerns over 'specific gravity', please don't ever taint this wannabe communicater who is in love with the sensous pleasures proferred innately in the powerful pulse of food and wine and the presence of words...