Bully for El Bulli

Hard to believe, but this gigantic bulldog is covered in icing sugar, its garland of flowers - and seemingly random fried egg - made from spun sugar and jellied fruits. But this is no ordinary giant icing sugar bulldog (does such a thing exist? Hopefully), but one made by the pastry chefs at world-famous Spanish restaurant El Bulli. 

Celebrated in an astonishing exhibition at Somerset House, El Bulli - famous for head chef Ferran Adrià's 'molecular gastronomy' - started life as, of all things, a mini-golf course. In its first restaurant incarnation - if the photos are to be believed - El Bulli was a stereotypical Costa Brava tourist restaurant, not dissimilar to the sort of venue we'd have seen in ill-fated 90s soap Eldorado (but with sturdier furniture and, one hopes, door frames that didn't wobble when people passed through). Menus included all the Spanish classics (paellas, gambas and  sardinas aplenty) that the well-heeled tourist had come to expect. 

But in 1987 Ferran Adrià became head chef, and things started to get interesting. What struck me most about the exhibition was that it takes a very special mind to think of the things he did - never mind actually making them. Ravioli that's a bubble, rather than the traditional pasta envelope. Soup that - rather than the liquid you'd expect elsewhere - arrives as a foam spelling out the words 'THE SOUP'. Olive oil caviar (looking alarmingly like tiny cod liver oil tablets). 

And the detail of it all. One of the most fascinating exhibitions was a huge glass case full of rough plasticine models of bits and pieces of food, used to mock up each dish before it appeared on the menu. All helpfully labelled, because of course in the world of El Bulli, nothing is as it seems. 

The restaurant closed in 2011, but the El Bulli Foundation is due to open its doors next year. On the same site, it will be much expanded and is billing itself as a 'centre of creativity'. The emphasis, says the team, still headed by Ferran Adrià, will be on the development of cooking and other fields of creativity, rather than simply on making money. 

That said, this exhibition will no doubt be the closest most of us will get to Adrià's cooking. Whether you're a cook or a chemist, or simply a lover of beauty, it's well worth a visit. 

Lasagne followed by apple crumble

We have a friend from home staying tonight, and I am breaking with tradition by actually cooking. I will have to warn him that tonight's dinner represents my entire culinary repertoire (apart from soup). Rather embarrassingly, I have every cookbook under the sun, but I really just like looking at the pictures.

Tonight's recipes come from two of my favourites. The apple crumble recipe comes from The Dairy Book of Home Cookery. This has special memories - published in the sixties, it was the mainstay of my mother's cooking when we were growing up. She gave her copy to my sister (she's the domesticated one), who in turn bought me a copy when we were browsing in a sadly shortlived second hand book shop in Stromness (in the Orkneys).

The lasagne recipe comes from Eating to Win - a collection of favourite recipes donated by leading Irish rugby players of a couple of years ago. Thank-you Kevin Maggs! It's a great book - not least for the photos - but you can tell a lot about the players by the recipes they've suggested. Some of them are obviously from swanky restaurants, while others were clearly supplied by their mammies. Aw, bless!