The best events in London this week, as the capital goes cabaret

If variety is the spice of life, you’re going to need a big glass of water because what we have this week is so spicy it might just blow your head off.

We’re talking afternoon tea with dogs, a ride on an electric motorbike, a Margarita museum to celebrate International Margarita Day, edgy cabaret, free chocolate trees and so many pop-ups you might end the week totally popped out!

How would your dog cope with super luxury surroundings? Well, right? In that case he/she is very welcome to come to afternoon tea in The Parlour at the swishy Great Scotland Yard hotel – it’s where, like, the police was invented – in the heart of London’s glittering Westminster.

It’s a collaboration between canine nutrition experts Talula Eats and the hotel’s highly successful Floris sensory afternoon tea. Pooch can expect three tiers of goodies, finely decorated china and a pink peony ‘pupcake’.

You, meanwhile tuck into head pastry chef Verónica Garrido Martinez’s passion fruit and coconut tarts, smoked salmon, truffled egg…

Don’t tell him/her down there, but we think you get the better deal. Oh and Veuve Clicquot! 

Thursday – Sunday, Dogs £25/humans £49, 3-5 Great Scotland Yard, SW1

Get your motor running

That’s what Maeving is unveiling – it’s like poetry! – at a pop-up in London Bridge until the end of February. Get on down and you’ll be able to get your bottom on one of the bikes, which has removable battery technology (that’s such a great idea! To charge indoors!), to see if you like the cut of its British-made jib.

It’s called the RM1 and it’s out to seduce you.

8am-8pm, London Bridge Rail Station, Western Arcade Shopping Avenue, SE1

The kindness of strangers

Then head to Heliot Steak House, where they are marking the occasion with randomly applied 50% discounts, free cocktails, bottles of wine on the house, free chocolate trees for your table while you order up prime steaks, lamb dishes, meat balls and Dover soles (not quite so randomly kind to the animals but you can’t have it all).

Spread the love, people. And the chocolate trees.

The Hippodrome, Cranbourn Street, WC2

Happy hour

Now you can expand your little grey cells at the Patrón Museo de Margarita, a one-off immersive event to celebrate – guess what! – International Margarita Day! Bearing in mind no one apparently knows where the Margarita comes from (apart from Mexico), it’s going to be light on actual information, this museum, and heavy on the sampling of Margaritas made with the crème de la crème of tequilas, including recipes dredged up from the past.

We hope there’s a gift shop!

Tuesday (February 22), NoHo Studios, 46 Great Titchfield Street, W1

Lightbulb moments 

Let there be light! Or lights. Or City Lights, the installation that puts key sites in the City of London into a whole new, you know, light.

It’s all part of the Let’s Do London programme coming from the Mayor of London and it’s basically a free – hooray! – and family-friendly trail of five world-class interactive light and sound artworks that you can explore every evening until February 20, which is Sunday.

An interactive piano, a rotating sculpture, light-responsive projections… all beautiful and sometimes even educational (one is about mapping your brain patterns or something). And did we mention free?

You might as well, either on purpose or on your way somewhere.

From 5.30-10pm, various locations

What a hoot

Life is a cabaret, old chum, come to the cabaret. We don’t mind if we do! Especially seeing as it’s a brand new underground monthly cabaret called Lines, which launches tomorrow in Hackney Wick.

And being in Hackney Wick might tip you off that this is not your usual cabaret show but something altogether more edgy with comedy, music, burlesque, everything you would expect from a cabaret.

Comedienne Gabby Killick is in charge – the Emcee, if you like – and she will oversee what is intended to be a thorough reinvention of the whole concept of cabaret with instrumental group New Car Smell, sensory burlesque artist Aya Love and Frankie Boyle-favourite Arielle on comedy. Prepare to be dazzled.

Tomorrow (Thursday), Studio 9294, Wallis Road, E9

Spud-tacular

Well, the humble hash brown has been accorded its rightful place at the centre of everything down at BOXPARK Croydon thanks to Hash Hut, a brand new concept dedicated to *checks notes* the hash brown!

Well, we say humble, these are actually Michelin-quality hash browns, which have been crafted to be dippable or infused with roast garlic mayo, parmesan or fresh truffle, curried, served with bangers to make bangers and hash… all thanks to British chef James Sharp, whom we salute with all our hearts and bellies. Hash-tag Hash Hut.

99 George Street, Croydon

Kerb appeal

Down in Shoreditch, experiments are being carried out. Experiments in food. It’s all going on at KERB Counter, a bar and test kitchen that collaborates with various new food concepts to see which ones catch the imagination of the fickle palettes of the east London set.

And right now, to launch the place, it is the turn of From the Ashes, a ‘nose-to-tail’ (which is a bit graphic!) barbecue outfit with Mexican influences, which means your meats are served with tortillas, pico de gallo and house-made pickles.

And let’s keep our peepers on KERB Counter and see what other strange delights they have to wash down with Husain Mapara’s creative cocktails.

Until April 2, 1 Bath Place, EC2

Beers up

Won’t you take us to… Beavertown (sung to the tune of Funkytown by Lipps Inc, obviously), the newly opened – hooray! – totally biggened – hooray! – north London taproom with indoor seating, outdoor seating, upstairs seating with views across the whole brewery and no fewer than eleven taps so you can sample the entire Beavertown range (perhaps not all on the same night though, eh?)

Add screenings of Six Nations fixtures, a full programme of live music and totally bookable tables and it has your name all over it.

We just worry that with so much choice at the bar, getting served is going to take ages. Let’s not worry. They have that covered.

Unit 17, Lockwood Industrial Park, N17

Do you have a story to share?

Get in touch by emailing [email protected].

MORE : Headteacher who banned punishments and shouting takes meat off school menu

MORE : McDonald’s is launching new crème brûlée desserts – and they look really fancy