Ice cream! with pantomime

Credit: Suzanne Christiansen
Today, a lot of people are back in the office after the Christmas and New Year holidays. It’ll be a few weeks and then Chinese New Year will kick in at the end of January (29th), which will be the Year of the Snake and my indication to go into London and go enjoy baked goods in Chinatown. I personally am somewhat addicted to azuki moon cakes, which I know are for the mid-autumn festival, but I seem to shovel them down around the New Year. I consume mine with a brown sugar milk bubble tea. We may also catch the dragon dancing around the neighbourhood, which is a sight to behold. It is a mid-winter treat for everyone.
Speaking of treats, this weekend we went to the pantomime at our local theatre in Greenwich. The offering this year was “Dick Whittington and his Cat,” whereby Richard went to London to make his fortune and wound up being Lord Mayor of the place. He had a talking cat that could also play the saxophone. Miraculous. There were dancing rats, time travel and of course a dame wearing quite ridiculous clothes.
A very typical British event, and one I’d recommend (if I haven’t already) that people head to next year in December and January, should you be in the UK. Often, they’re not in central London, but they are worth a train ride outside it.
There are famous pantomimes, with ones that celebrities star in. For example, Priscilla Presley (yes, it was her) was in Aladdin at the Milton Keynes Theatre in 2023, starring as the Genie of the Lamp. It also seems every soap opera star and comedian in the land goes and does pantomime here too.
The one thing that panto shares with all its British theatre counterparts, both inside and outside of London, is the intermission ice cream. It is now a family joke at how fast my spouse can get over to the person who has set up an ice cream dispensary in the theatre aisle. Which is what dairy is all about. It adds that extra joy to an already fun occasion, while sneaking in nutrition.
- Suzanne Christiansen, editor, Dairy Industries International.
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