Five things Fay Maschler ate this week

1 Piquant soup made from the scarlet flavour grenades that are locally grown tomatoes in the Greek village house of friends Celia and Allan Brown.

2 Green pasta shaped like olive leaves under braised chicken with stamnagathi (Cretan spiny chicory) on an Aegean flight from Athens, helped along with assertive Nykteri white wine from Santorini.

3 Peking Duck (half for £30) served faintly pink, delectable enough to drag eyes away from the 33rd-floor view and minds from the extraordinarily uncomfortable chairs at Hutong at The Shard.

4 Mucilaginous — but in a good way — catfish fillets with pancakes in chilli and garlic-spiked gravy at Baiwei, the newest Chinatown outlet in the Barshu group.

5 Barbecued sausages — Donald Russell’s Swiss selection including cervelas — at Cassidy Warwick’s first birthday party. Then iced Victoria sponge filled with raspberry jam, which the little lady loved.