I finally gotten around to writing this post after the brutal grilling period of revision over the xmas and new year break. Managed to head to the Hampton Court Palace during the break. The palace’s is surprisingly interesting compare to the other palaces I’ve been in many European cities. It also has a “live” Tudor…
cookery where you could see how the fancy feasts were processed back in the palace’s golden days.
The Hampton Court Palace is not far from the Hampton Court Train Station (a place in the outskirt of London). Just walk across the bridge and you’re pretty much there.
The palace originally belonged to Cardinal Wolsey, a favorite of King Henry VIII, before he fell out of favor.
We went just after Christmas so the skating rink, carousel, cafe were still there.
The palace is quite large and different parts of it belong to different time.
As visitors, you can wear one of these gowns to walk around the palace.
You may also encounter some nobility as you wonder through the castle and remember to do the proper curtsy!
At the time of King Henry VIII, the kitchen had to provide 600 meals a day twice a day for the people at the court. So you’d definitely need some efficient kitchen and production line here. Lots of “pies” already back in the old days but actually the “pie” part is more like a bowl than something to eat.
The natural “fridge”, an alley where fresh ingredients / food to be processed will be sent here to be stored.
At the Hampton Court Palace, you may get to see the “Live Tudor Cookery” where people dressed up in the chef outfit of the period making some Tudor court dishes.
The guy in the photo before this was preparing for a marzipan masterpiece. Desert used to be prepared for the more important people at the court and they are more elaborate (the design of this is a carriage).
A lot of the court dishes at the time are “roasted” because it was important to show the king has a lot of power and wealth and the most expensive food to get at that time was “roasted” food because it involved having a person sitting by the fire for hours turning the stick and roasting whatever he needs to roast.
Because managing a kitchen staffed with 200 people providing hundreds of meals a day requires some management, there is a small bookkeeping room beside the kitchen.
For some important members of the court, there are also some exotic dishes, like this peacock dish! I think it’s unbelievably crazy!
When you exit from the kitchen and pass by the wine cellar, you’d see a sign to get to the gift shop.
They sell all kinds of interesting stuff here. if you fancy some Henry VIII beer, you’d ind it here. Or if you wonder how fat Henry VIII got after having super fat meals everyday, there’s a book for that as well.
The more Georgian part of the palace where the design was changed to match the rulers’ interests at the time. But they never managed to transform the whole palace to this Georgian style.
Christmas tree here is filled with fresh lilies!
Passed through the banquet hall and there was something going on in there apparently… Joker and the ladies are playing some game.. You see these people dressed up in the Tudor costumes and they speak like they’re from that time and don’t notice your strange gaze and seem to live in their own world.. it’s pretty cool I think.
Photo of Queen Anne Boleyn based on the paintings of her. Must say she does look quite pretty and have a very determined look to her. In case you didn’t know, she was the woman who pretty much drove Henry VIII to divorce his queen. Couldn’t do it with the Roman Catholic Church so he broke off and formed the Church of England to break away from the Roman Catholic Church.
Other halls where other kings and queen presided.
Rooms that we quickly passed through. There was quite a bit to see and you have a audio guide with your ticket. So you can easily spend a full day here to go and hear the stories of the different places in this palace.
Outdoor festivities with the joker playing with fire.
You can get a piece of the Henry VIII in the form of a teddy bear!
At the Tiltyard Cafe near the parking lot at the palace, you could try something like have some vague resemblance to Tudor time food… and I mean vague.
It’s a bit pricy and get a bit crowded in there though so just in case you’d like to go, be prepared!
After a late lunch, we ware back in the palace to see how the dishes were passed on to the king and how the king dined!
This is the part with everyone moving form the great hall where there hundreds of guests invited by the king would dine.
So this is a mini version of King Henry VIII dining scene.
Other halls in the palace from later time.
It’s kinda scary to have turned around and saw a shadow like this whisk through the door.
Like many large palaces, the Hampton Court Palace also has a large back garden.
But it was too cold so we did not go out for a walk.
Hampton Court Palace
W: http://www.hrp.org.uk/HamptonCourtPalace/
A: nearest station – Hampton Court (about 30 mins from London Waterloo Station)
