Tuesday, 2 September 2014

Hen party celebrations

My cousin, Donatas is marrying the loveliest girl; Edita - a wonderful person who has become a bit like a sister to me. The wedding is in two weeks and I was lucky enough to be asked to be Edita's maid of honour.

One of the maid of honour's responsibilities is to organise a hen party. I, for one have never been a maid of honour, nor attended a hen party so this proved to be quite a daunting task, as my nearest and dearest have been made very aware - it has been a stressful time. Anyway, after much planning, I decided to celebrate Edita's last big night out before the big day at a cabaret show. To be more precise, we went to Proud Cabaret Camden for the Beautiful and Damned show. 

So on Saturday, having prepared a couple of snacks and dressed myself back into the glitzy '20's, I had a visit from Edita and one of her bridesmaids. We snacked, opened a bottle of sparkling Rosé and chatted away before heading out to Camden (to Edita's ignorance) to meet the other girls.

We entered a dark, smoky room, being welcomed by waitresses dressed in bras, bottoms, suspender belts and heels who showed us to our table. The music was low and we had just about enough light to decide on cocktails and settle ourselves in before our pre-ordered starter was served. I had the prawn and mango salad which was very simple, having one large prawn with a tomato and mango salsa. It was a little basic but did taste quite good. Some of the other girls had smoked salmon with horseradish which seemed to be more substantial and tasty. As for the main, I had bream with mango, coriander and lime puree. I have to say, the fish was cooked perfectly and tasted wonderful but with no side dish, it wasn't quite as filling as the chicken and potatoes which was one of the other choices.
Having had our mains, the first part of the show started. The best part of the entire show was by far the hostess, who was so funny and entertaining. She struck the perfect balance of being funny, inappropriate and had quite a voice for her moments of singing. At one point, she even brought on all the hens onto the stage and made them mime L-O-V-E as she sang. The performers were generally really good, consisting of women only, which was a little disappointing. I have only ever been to one other cabaret show, but whilst this one was a lot better, I do feel like Guanabara had struck the perfect balance by having male and female performers.

During one of the intermissions, we had our desserts - I had the poached pear and ice cream but having also tried the passion fruit cheesecake, can confirm that they may have the second best cheesecake I've had in London (the top place going to Roxie's). Once the show had finished, the middle tables were moved apart, creating a dancefloor. The music was so old-school and feel-good, we spent most of the evening dancing about; afterall, who wouldn't want to dance to 'My Girl'?! Our ticket package got us in to the club right next door, but with the music being current pop and the place far too busy, we returned to the best type of hen party music: classic cheese. 

Whilst planning the party proved to be more stressful that I ever thought it would, Edita had a great time and was so appreciative of the effort. That, combined with a genuinely good, fun night out meant it all paid off in the end. There is only one big event left now, of course. The wedding...

Muah


Roo xx

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