I recently went for dinner to Daniel Clifford’s Midsummer House restaurant in Cambridge.

Myself and the Marmoset had planned the trip for her birthday – we’d long held a desire to try the food at this 2 Michelin star establishment.

I don’t always take pictures of my meals whilst in restaurants – I want to, but sometimes for the sake of other diners or the ambience I don’t do it.  On this occasion, I refrained due to the enjoyment I was taking from the food  as well as  not wanting to ruin the intimate atmosphere of the dining room!…back to the tale.

We spent an afternoon of mooching in Cambridge …we are expert moochers and we walked ‘the backs’ of the university buildings as well as pottering around the abundant shops in this vibrant city.

Then we made off, across Midsummer Common to the lovely quirky House of Midsummer….

I fear that blow by blow accounts are rather dull, so I’ll just pick out a few highlights and then cut to the chase… let me just say the staff and theatre injected in the tasting menu’s are exceptional. There are ‘magical’ trolleys, designed to delight by producing bottles of champagne as if from nowhere… we dined on the most imaginative and delicious fare from the Sautéed duck liver, gingerbread, pear and chicory salad to the Pousse Cafe. We were both agreed when all is said and done that the celeriac roasted over open coals, was a thing of such sublime and soft melting delight – that we will never forget it and I plan to spend much of the summer bent in concentration at the foot of our barbecue trying to recreate it.

So, I can very often guess or find a recipe somewhere with clues to food items but I’ve been unable to get the bottom of the precise method as yet, even after pestering the restaurant! Rocket had a bash at it while working away in Scotland and concluded his effort had potential but was lacking on several fronts and he is also resolved to try again….once we have cracked it, there will be a recipe!

A word for http://breadandmeat.co.uk/ where we brunched the next day – fantastic little place where the porchetta fell to pieces and the poutine melted soft. A simple menu, with specials of the day and some artisan beverages such as the cider we enjoyed – really worth a visit and I will go back just to try their Philly cheese steak….

On this auspicious day, the final word must be from The Bard himself, naturally  from A Midsummer Night’s Dream,

“The lunatic, the lover, and the poet, are of imagination all compact”

So true of this other wonderful poet, without whom the soundtrack to my teenage years would have been so much less…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baPsgmDexno