Dinner and a show with a one-minute stroll? Here’s a great date night idea: dim sum and drinks at Ping Pong Covent Garden followed by catching a performance of Kinky Boots just round the corner at the Adelphi Theatre.
Kemey and I did engaged in this very duo of evening activity a couple of weeks back. Dinner was tasty and the show was saucy.
Highlights of our meal at Ping Pong included the crispy prawn balls (king prawns fried in shredded pastry with fish sauce, £4.35); prawn toast (prawns on toast with sesame seeds, garlic and spicy mango sauce, £5.35); and (more prawns!!!) the pork and prawn shu mai (dumplings topped with goji berry, £4.95). Other sharing plates were yummy as well. However, the soft shell crab bao (two steamed buns with soft shell crab, pickled carrot and cabbage and sweet chilli sauce, £13.95) wasn’t nearly as tasty as we had hoped or compared to lower priced items.
I paired my eats with a Singapore Sling (Star of Bombay gin, Benedictine, Cointreau, grenadine, Angosturra bitters, lime, pineapple and cherries, £8.50) and was glad to have done so. It’d been a while since I last sipped one. It’s a classic and the bartenders at Ping Pong mixed it well.
Service was pretty quick and very friendly but seemed a little overwhelmed dealing with the pre-theatre crush.
Finished with our dinner, it was a few seconds walk to the Adelphi where we were in our seats in minutes for Kinky Boots.
And the show was so much fun. Cyndi Lauper and Harvey Fierstein’s Olivier Award winning Broadway romp was a cheeky hoot with a feel good message. Here’s the synopsis (from the Kinky Boots UK website) about this musical based on a true story:
Kinky Boots takes you from the factory floor to the glamorous catwalks of Milan. Charlie Price, played by David Hunter (Once, One Man, Two Guvnors), is struggling to live up to his father’s expectations and continue the family business of Price & Son. With the shoe factory’s future hanging in the balance, help arrives in the unlikely but spectacular form of Lola, played by Simon-Anthony Rhoden, a fabulous performer in need of some sturdy new stilettos.
Songs were good (no one super catchy number though) and the story punctuated with plenty of laughs. We left feeling upbeat about the world and humanity (no small feat these dates!).
Ping Pong Covent Garden is located at 23-24 Maiden Lane, WC2E 7NA with seven other outlets across London. Find out more at pingpongdimsum.com.
The Adelphi Theatre is on the Strand, WC2R 0NS. Details at reallyusefultheatres.co.uk.
For more about Kinky Boots, go to kinkybootsthemusical.co.uk.
