Friday was spent in Dover at Linda Maclean’s funeral. She was a lovely lady, very reminiscent to a young Nigella during the 70′s. She had cooked for Vivienne Leigh, Sir John Gieguld before becoming a Home Economist, sorry Food Stylist, working on many Cook Books including Nigel Slater.

Linda with her lovely quiffed hair and coloured scarves will be sadly missed. Jonathan & Sanjana Lovekin, Graham Ford, Christine Hanscombe, Martin Thompson & Simon Lee were the photographers present along with over a 100 other friends including Bridget & Chris Sargeson. She was 70.

Before Christmas we lost the eccentric Peter Cole. A great character and model-maker. Mark, my friend & agent too has just lost his Mother after a long & very brave fight against cancer – very sad & a great loss to all the family and friends.

This year, possibly because of Twitter we all seem to be obsessed with pancakes & it’s a pretty good thing to obsess about. The radio stations had Raymond & ex-Masterchef winners all suggesting recipes.

Of course, without any prompting Dave has been whisking and created this delicious pancake, filled with brie, avocado, roasted pistachios & crispy streaky bacon with a creme fraiche and honey drizzle. Wonderful!

However thin the pancakes are, it is a pretty filling meal & I wondered how the young lad I saw exhausted this morning will be looking on his return journey after enjoying one or two (or 3).

I was rummaging around in the market last week and found these beautiful lead spoons and forks in between the Trolls & skulls. I’ve never had a Troll, let alone a pair of them and was severely tempted. Imagine I could be plaiting their hair on the train (whilst my wife thinks I’m invoicing). The truth is, I’m more of a smurf man (& I like the lead cutlery).

I love dark gloomy pictures where a mid tone just holds against a darker background. In this case it took a bit of magic to create a beautiful still life. Very simple, very classic. Originally I thought we had a great shot without the water but, like a  kid, once I had the  water gun there was no stopping me firing my ammunition. I now think it completes the picture.

If you have the right props you generally will have a good result, but if you don’t you could be compromising all day.

If our Easter lamb shot wasn’t cancelled we would have missed out on a lovely still life for the website. From start to finish, including lunch, it took under 2 hours to go live on site. A really enjoyable, satisfying day – we’ll talk about the Smurfs another time.

We hear stories that queues snake out of the doors of tapas style restaurants in Soho. Spuntino http://www.spuntino.co.uk is hyper trendy and the food is fairly good with the guys behind the counter really helpful. I like enamel plates but drinking coffee in a chipped enamel mug doesn’t do it for me. Spuntino is part of the very successful chain with Polpo, Polpetto, da Polpo & Mishkins. Of course, sorry no bookings, too cool!

For a great cocktail, the best in Soho, travel to the basement below London’s funkiest Mexican restaurant http://www.elcamion.co.uk, 25-27 Brewer Street. Dick Bradsell shook-up, excuse the pun, the London Cocktail scene making it sexy, cool & fun. The Pink Chihuahua (Altos Blanco tequila, freshly squeezed lime & pomegranate juice, orgeat syrup & egg white) is the camp & kitsch signature and perfect for central Soho. Tequila is the star in the glass, sweetened by the pomegranate & syrup and appeals to both men & women.

From the 80’s club scene at the Zanzibar (now a blur memory), later at the Atlantic Bar & Grill, Graucho’s & Detroit, Dick made a success of everywhere he worked and now the Baja Room is his venue.

His inventions go down in our liquid memory: Russian Spring Punch, Bramble, Espresso Martini. Dick mentored other now established ‘shakers’, Tony Coniglaro & Nick Strangeway.

Benefiting from the recent Pop-up scene he has set up the Colony Club & Circus in Romilly Street

Because it is cold and Valentine’s Day, come in from the snow & indulge in some lovely buttery mash, studio-made by Geordie, Dave.

Utterly butterly and quite delicious, even the ‘ittle one enjoyed it’.

The natural north light creates a very soft glow; the subject matter (mash) and props keeping the image warm. We added a lot of black poly’s to moody up the picture darkening the shadows. As a result the shutter speed was a long 8 seconds (just long enough for another spoonful of mash,mmm).

The only thing needed was to poach a couple of eggs and break them into the mash for lunch…D’, D’, Dave, Dave. (& crispy bacon on top…get innnn!!)