It seems its destiny that every aspect of the River Thames Visitor Centre should be blessed with a story, or tale. Having opened on the 15th of September 2005, my partner Marika stepped forward bringing her amazing home cooking to delight visitors.
As she was not a professional caterer, her love for food and joy for meeting new people, provided a unique experience complementing the River's atmosphere. Very quickly she realized that this was a winning combination. Collecting comments in the visitor book, it was clear that people love this approach.
In the weeks that followed, as visitor numbers grew, it became increasingly clear that success had a price. Marika was now at full stretch and had to take every opportunity to ask friends and family to help maintain this lovely blend of home cooking and hospitality. Running a kitchen open to the general public, is not for the faint hearted. There were good times and bad times in the kitchen, but the service was always superb.

After six months and having single-handedly created a delightful level of food service she had achieved her goal and completed our market research. The River Thames Visitor Centre now went on the search for professional caterers worthy of taking on this achievement.
During the summer of 2006 we meet a lovely couple of chefs, Bart & Pawel. Having taken over in October 2006, they set about making ready to open in April 2007. When I asked "what should I call you", they said Casalinga Disperata. I asked them what this meant and as shown above, they replied "the desperate housewife". Quite by accident they had captured the consequences of the exacting standards that any mother would feel trying to run a professional kitchen. And in some strange way honouring the efforts of Marika.
When I told Bart & Pawel the story they knew the name was right and everyday they put that same love, into their food.