Tales from Clerkenwell

Peter Ackroyd is a fabulous man. Literary biographer, novelist, historian of London, he's Clerkenwell's most learned and lively scholar, as well as a one-time resident and Three Kings regular.



In the spirit of enhancing my knowledge of Clerkenwell, I've just finished reading Ackroyd's 2002 novel The Clerkenwell Tales. It pulls together many strands of his enormous learning - medieval language and literature, social and religious history, and a street-by-street knowledge of Clerkenwell - in the framework of a medieval mystery novel.

It's 1399, and Henry Bolingbroke is leading his army against Richard II. Meanwhile Dominus, a secret group of clerics and city leaders, is in cohoots with an apocalyptic religious sect led by a mad nun. Spicy stuff, and in the wrong hands it could have turned out like The Da Vinci Code.

Ackroyd takes the characters from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and imagines their lives in London. Except they turn out to be rather different to Chaucer's pilgrims. The Wife of Bath, for example, is not Chaucer's good-time girl cannily working her way through husbands and their fortunes, but a brothel keeper in Turnmill Street, notorious home of medieval stews and bawdhouses, pimping a 13-year-old girl to an elderly lawyer.

It's amazing for local detail - like the labyrinth of tunnels between the convent and the priory for clandestine assignations, and the mystery plays held on Clerkenwell Green. Acrkroyd immerses you in a radically alien understanding of the world, in which your doctor will read your humours and prescribe green ginger, poached eggs and marigold juice. There's lots of farting and appalling table manners.

Historical fact and fiction melt into an authentic whole. But as a novel it's only partially successful. The rapidly changing point of view - following a multitude of different characters - means there is no central character to invest your emotions in. And the need to explain words or interpret beliefs often gets in the way of the plot, encumbering the emotional development of the novel.

Not a bedtime page turner, but it would be hard to find a better way of imagining yourself into Clerkenwell 600 years ago.

Cooking without tears

What I love about Clerkenwell is discovering the unexpected just around the corner. A wonderful Christmas present was a voucher for a group cookery class run by a company called eat drink talk.

On investigation, the company turns out to be based just around the corner in St John Street, a few doors from Tesco. The courses are hosted by a vivacious blonde Canadian called Jennifer Klinec, in her immaculate loft apartment in a former shoe factory.

Arriving for a 'cuisine of the Middle East' class, we are invited to take off our shoes, wash our hands, and settle down with a grapefruit and basil mojito - a recipe which will definitely be making an appearance at home. There's ten of us in all - men and women, all 20- and and 30-somethings in couples or on their own.

Cocktail in hand, we sit back while Jennifer gets to work on a menu which includes spinach, walnut and feta fatayer (triangular parcels, a bit like samosas), an aubergine dip, chicken pilaf, and - yummiest of all - plump golden pastries called tahini spirals.

Part demonstration, part DIY, the class is a great lo-effort introduction to ethnic cooking. With just the right amount of activity - lots of therapeutic dough rolling and artistic sprinkling of sesame seeds - it's not too taxing for straight after work. When each creation comes out of the oven, we get to eat it. Plus, unlike an ordinary cookery school, there's no washing up - Jennifer's assisant whizzes round clearing used plates and utensils.

Jennifer is not professionally trained, but that's a plus - her extensive travels and huge knowledge of food anchor these courses in reality. This is not fancy restaurant food which ordinary mortals can't reproduce. We learn the difference between bruising and muddling, the best types of pastry brush to use (silicone, not hair), how to tell counterfeit saffron from the real stuff, and where to buy Middle Eastern ingredients in London.

At the end of the evening we leave relaxed, well fed and inspired by a new spirit of culinary adventure, ready to track down our nearest purveyor of pomegranate molasses. This would be a great event for a team away day, a hen party or just a present to yourself. Yum.