La Dolce Vita, Olympia

Friday was a rare day off when we went to La Dolce Vita at London's Olympia, an exhibition of all things Italian. We last went two years ago, when John was so impressed with the taste of freshly made pasta (after a cookery demonstration by Aldo Zilli) that he asked for a pasta machine for his birthday. I must say that although it takes longer than opening a packet, the results are definitely worth it.
This year one of our quests was to look for ideas and food for my parents' golden wedding party which I'm catering for at the end of March. We were not disappointed, although some items will need to be purchased nearer to the date itself.
We also booked ourselves into the cookery school for a session on filleting fish. I've attempted this a few times in the past, but have found it a little challenging. This time though we both managed to produce good fillets from the sea bass we were given, with very little left on the bone. What they hadn't mentioned was that we were also gutting the fish - fortunately we were also given latex gloves! An aside here, many years ago, just after I had moved into my flat, I was busy gutting mackerel in the kitchen. The door bell rang and I went down to open it smelling of fish and covered in fish blood. I opened the door to an immaculately dressed lady, who introduced herself as one of my new neighbours. Not a good start, but she's still speaking to me!
Later in the day we attended another cookery class, this time for aubergine sauce and stuffed aubergine. Interestingly, I don't like aubergine! However, I am sure that the recipe will translate to other vegetables. (John keeps saying he wants to make the meatballs again).
Another highlight of the show was a stall giving away ice cream. I had a rich, bitter chocolate and a pistachio and chilli - the latter being very spicy but very good. John was on red wine sorbet and a ginger and lemon sorbet. We went back to the stall to find out how we could buy these, only to discover that they can only be bought in one shop, and it is in Turin!
Needless to say that by the end of the day we were exhausted, but we had managed a good few hours without mentioning the business once - quite an achievement.