A hidden gem at Goldsborough

For years, my birthday treat was a day out in Helmsley and environs, including lunch at the Star in Harome. This year the visit came early, for another birthday treat, this time for a 90-year old. And excellent it was, too.

Much as I have enjoyed those stellar lunches, they may well be displaced by a new favourite. The tiny Fox and Hounds is a restaurant, despite its name, and is buried – like the treasure it is – in the aptly-named hamlet of Goldsborough, a mile or so inland from the rugged cliffs north of Whitby.

The sky was cerulean blue and the tide was out, so we donned our boots and walked from Runswick Bay. My memory of this walk was clearly faulty, or perhaps my weight has significantly increased since the last time I did it. Either way, it was uphill for almost the entire distance, and the phrase "uphill struggle" had real meaning by the time we trudged from the coastal path up yet another incline into Goldsborough. Hence, we were slightly late, but the welcome was warm and gracious.

The dining rooms are separate and small, with only three or four tables in each. There are ornaments dotted about and chairs have dinky cushions. The minimalism beloved of posh London restaurants is absent, and frankly I couldn’t care less one way or the other, but a bit of clutter does create a more comfortable atmosphere, at least to someone as untidy as I know myself to be.

Fellow diners were friendly and unstuffy, which is fortunate as mobile phones don’t work at Runswick Bay. Ten minutes after sitting down, one of ours trilled  loudly, to our great embarrassment, in response to messages left on voicemails earlier.  "Oh, can you get reception here?" commented another diner. "That’s useful to know." There is a lot about the Fox that is useful to know, in particular its existence, as well as the absolute need to book on the Friday and Saturday nights when it is open.

The menu is short, with three starters, three mains and three puddings. The wine list is much longer and features plenty of choice for those who are on a budget as well as those who like to splash out.

A kir royale came in a Yorkshire-sized glass, and had just the right amount of cassis. The French have a tendency to put too much in and create a kind of Ribena cocktail (despite the fact that they invented it), but the lighter touch of the F&H supplied the necessary hint of blackcurrant without overpowering the end result. A basket of bread, with a bowl of olive oil, was put on the table and disappeared too quickly. I tried to save a slice to eat with my first course but the competition for it was too fierce. I assume it was home-made and I forgot to get a recipe, but it was bread of the highest order and the utmost deliciousness. It wasn’t dinky, either.

Dinkiness returned in the form of a perfectly-trimmed lamb cutlet served in a small soup plate. Every scrap of fat or gristle had been meticulously cleaned from this, leaving a nugget of perfectly-cooked, succulent lamb, slightly charred on the outside, pink and juicy within. This sat happily in a nest of long beans, thankfully not al dente (aka half raw) dressed with tomato and with a slick of tapenade and other goodies which I neglected to note down as I was too busy devouring them.

The Fox obviously sets out its stall as something of a seafood establishment as fish is well-represented on its menu. So we could have had sea trout – a favourite of mine, and a fish only seasonally available in the summer. Perversely, we both went for the fillet steak, which came with chips and grilled radiccio. Normally I would eschew a fillet steak as the flavour seems to me to be inferior to that of rump, but I had heard good reports of the Fox’s steak and I was intrigued.

If this review seems hurried, it is because I have been waiting impatiently to revisit that steak. Words are poor things compared with the physical delights of flavour bursting on the tongue, and it seems to me that the words required to do justice to that piece of meat have yet to be created.

The outside of it was crusty and charred, seasoned to perfection. The knife passed through it to reveal rosiness, juiciness and the promise of succulence. The flavour was sublime, the texture tender, the skill in cooking it to the exact degree requested unquestionable. The chips were lovely as well, big fat brown ones, and the radiccio provided just the right bitter counterpoint to their crispy, starchy blandness.

Compliments proffered to restaurant staff on such (rare) occasions may be met with gratitude, smugness or sometimes just downright apathy. This time they were met with modesty – the cooking was all that could be taken credit for, the raw materials themselves were the star of the show. And the Foxy lady was happy to pass on the details.

The raw material in this case was supplied by Taste Tradition of Thirsk, who produced both the dinky lamb and the Dexter beef which was so outstanding. I have made it my business to find out how I can secure some of that material for myself – if only to ensure that less of it goes to the likes of Messrs Ramsey and his ilk, many miles to the south of where it should be rightfully consumed.

When we finally gain independence here in Yorkshire, we will slap an export levy on this beef and it will end up being smuggled out of the county as top-class contraband. I will personally volunteer to patrol the border and seize any unlawful Taste Tradition product (and eat it). I have no doubt that it would only be a matter of time before right-thinking people from the benighted South would be making applications for citizenship as a result.

But I digress: we concluded with a dense and delicious chocolate tart with espresso cream, a sliver of indulgence that provided a real chocolate hit without being overly sweet.

Now, throughout the whole dinner, there was none of your foams and smears, your plateside fripperies of sprinkles and dashes and dots and dabs of things that take forever to make and are hardly noticed. Things that are credited on the menu and gazed at, bemused, by the diner who didn’t want them there anyway. Neither were there any "foraged" pignuts or weeds or roots, or any of the other stuff that people very sensibly gave up eating a long time ago in favour of proper vegetables that haven’t been peed on by someone’s dog, covered in pesticide by the Council, or just taste plain rank.
Take note - if you want to sit in a "minimalist" dining room that looks and feels like the canteen at Pentonville, be sneered at by a supercilious and ignorant waiter, and pay over the odds for a plate of unidentifiable culinary haberdashery, this is not the place for you.

In brief: this place serves a short menu of food that you really want to eat, in portions which are adequate without being mean or overlarge, and made from ingredients that are superlative. Every course is delicious. The service is unfussy, welcoming and extremely helpful (and my only quibble with it was that I like to keep the bottle of wine on the table rather than having it poured for me, but I am aware that this is a somewhat curmudgeonly criticism). I will conclude by remarking that if I win the Euromillions rollover, I shall be making the team at the F&H an offer they can’t refuse and moving them within walking distance of where I currently reside.

I believe the bill was around the £120 mark (though I should not have asked, being the birthday girl), and included two aperitifs, three courses and a bottle of red wine.

Verdict: value for money - 10/10; service 9/10; quality of food - 10/10

Love at first sight

Clos Maggiore, Covent Garden, London

Gushing reviews about how romantic it is have been putting me off this place for a long time. As a lone female diner, being surrounded by couple gazing fondly into each other’s eyes – or even worse, engaged in suggestive arm-stroking and throaty giggles - makes  me want to get up and pour the contents of my water carafe over the lot of them. So I have walked past Clos Maggiore many times and never even looked at the menu.

On a raining night in January with the street outside dug up and blocked with wooden partitions, it looked just unromantic enough for me to swipe the very last table from under the noses of two  ladies  (possibly romantically-entangled, but probably not) who followed me in through the  cramped and cave-like doorway. I was just wishing I had borrowed a head-lamp from my own Compleat Angler back at home in the Northern wilds when a charming waitress emerged from the gloom to guide me. The tables at Clos Maggiore are draped with linen so luminously white that it almost made up for  someone having forgotten to pay the electric bill.  I’m not sure about the plastic box hedging though. When my eyes had got used to troglodyte living, I was childishly delighted by the twinkling little lights (OK, could have done with more of them),  the general air of quiet efficiency and the lovely fireplace – flames dancing – which unfortunately disappeared from view once I sat down.

The service was charming (not quite faultless as they forgot my aperitif and had to be reminded) and efficient. The bread was lovely bread , fresh-baked, moist crusty and both the focaccia and plain while roll were better than I bake at home. (What a blow.)

The set earlybird menu starter was young chicken with stuffed baby artichokes – I see that I managed to write “mushroomy, earthy, pan juices –“ and nothing else, before gobbling the whole thing up greedily. I do remember that the chicken was beautifully moist.

A main course of belly of lamb  (which looked more like breast to me) had been  rolled and almost all of the fat cooked almost out. The notes say “ unctuous, soft shreds of delicious meat, deep flavour, beautifully presented, chickpeas firm, good counterpoint to soft meat,  carrots, tomatoes, tenderstem broccoli”.  I have to admire my own self-control in managing to write that much before falling on the food.

I resisted the pudding and any extras as I wanted to see how the set two-course menu performed without any added frills, in terms of value for money. It included half a bottle of wine, and with a glass of Prosecco to start, the bill came in at £29.95 including service.  A bargain in my opinion –though I wouldn’t come on Valentine’s Night (or not without a hosepipe).

33 King Street, Covent Garden, WC2E 8JD  Tel : +44 (0)20 7379 9696

Feeling virtuous in Leeds

Create, Leeds

A Christmas dinner special and I am always a bit suspicious about these, generally preferring the usual offering - Christmas is not just a time for goodwill to all men, but to all menus. Restaurateurs take advantage of this shamelessly, it seems to me.

On this occasion I was happily surprised. I have to say that this was one of the most pleasant and enjoyable dining experiences I have had in Leeds for years.  In fact, it was one of the most enjoyable full stop – this little place would hold its own easily in the capital for the quality of its food, though perhaps it would be sneered at for its lack of sophistication. And it is none the worse for that. As a Yorkshirewoman, there is no way that I am going to pay extra for something as intangible and downright poncy as sophistication in its own right. It needs to have value added, which is to say, bells, whistles, posh décor and free stuff like amuse bouches.

The latter were in short supply at Create but the mainstream stuff on offer was just the ticket. The food was described succinctly and without frills. Five of us sat down to eat and every single one was happy – not a single complaint on the table. Soup was creamy, mushroomy, chestnutty – Christmassy! Then I had duck breast, which can be hit and miss (over or under cooked) but was pink perfection, moist, deeply flavoured, enough to make a veggie faint. But rested to a T – no tell-tale red juices (aka blood) leaking out onto the plate to soggify the wonderful fat chips, real potato crisply and perfectly cooked. Plates were beautifully dressed  and not overloaded but portions were perfect . I pigged out on the side dishes (sumptuous pureed root vegetables were irresistible) and couldn’t manage a pud on my own but extra spoons were supplied for scavengers to raid the plates of friends (who are still, amazingly, on speaking terms). The pudding plates tasted simply sooper and looked a treat, from old-fashioned ice-creamy sundaes to creamy flan - which tasted as good as it looked. 

Choices on the Christmas menu were limited but staff were happy to allow mix and match with the a la carte. We went in feeling virtuous and charitable, but came out feeling as though we had definitely had the best of the bargain.

Verdict: value for money 8/10 service 8/10 quality of food 8/10

More French leave

La Petite Auberge, Rouen

This was my first visit to Rouen and I was blown away by the medieval buildings - and the wonderful little alleyways and doorways like this one. Though true to form, most of the most impressive buildings seemed to be swathed in scaffolding and in the process of renovation. Or shut. They obviously knew I was due to arrive, possibly acting on information from Tourist Information in Rome, where we were told the Coliseum was not due to re-open until the day we had left. (Sneakily, they opened it the day before. But I had staked it out, having got the measure of the disdainful Romans and this, combined with the Lawn Ranger’s eagle eye - “there’s people in there!” he cried - ensured we were amongst the barbarian hordes invading the place yet again. But this time armed with nothing more warlike than a Roma Pass.)

La Petite Auberge initially looked unpromising, one in a row of restaurants that had a distinct feel of the tourist trap about them. But we only just managed to get a table as they were almost fully booked, and almost every other diner turned out to be a local, or French, at any rate The exception was a very nice American family sitting at the next table, who were completely bewildered by the menu. I translated and saw their looks of horror and incredulity at some of the dishes on offer (salad of duck giblets? Seriously?). Their youngest son only ate chips, or rather, French fries, to the equal incredulity of the staff. But they gave him his plate of French fries without demur.

The exterior was all ancient timbers, painted in shades of ochre and rust, and the interior was typically French, with dark beams, old wooden tables crowded together and spotless white cloths and napkins. Service was relaxed, and we had plenty of time to pore over the menu over a couple of kirs. I decided on the 20 euro offering whilst the Ex went for the 24. Both offered four courses and plenty of choice, even for the faint of heart.

My bowl of fish soup was good - OK it was probably bought in, but so what? The tiny bowl of aioli packed a garlicky punch; whatever might go wrong with the rest of the night, I wouldn’t be worrying about vampires. Croutons and grated gruyere completed the traditional ‘garniture’ and it is one that always feels deeply satisfying when it is done properly. As it was here.

On the other side, a huge plate of crevettes flambees didn’t arrive in flames and they didn’t set me on fire either – they may have been recently flambéed but they had been already cooked beforehand, and the effect was to toughen them. The shells appeared to have been stuck on with superglue, (that second cooking again) and it would have been much better to have served a smaller portion but cooked them fresh. Having said that, the sauce they were swimming in was perhaps a little over-salty, but it was satisfyingly prawny and the base of shellfish and tomato really shone through. The Ex was struggling to peel them, as his fingernails were not up to the job. This reminded me of an occasion some years before when he had been wounded by a lagoustine; the blood had spurted alarmingly out of his pierced finger in front of a dining room full of French families. None of whom seemed off-put in the slightest.

A confit of duck was full-flavoured and falling off the bone, which again, was as it should be. Pommes Sarladaise were lying limply in a visible pool of duck fat, which was not. The other side of the table had ordered entrecote grille, which was pretty ordinary and slightly tough, despite having been belted soundly with a meat tenderiser. It came with frites and a pixie-sized mound of what looked like cooked chopped tomatoes. French restaurants seem to have an antipathy to vegetables other than green salad, though every market is a cornucopia of the most wonderful fruit and veg imaginable. Where do they all go? The five-a-day thing is ignored completely and a vegan would starve, if he or she had not been stoned to death first, and put out of their misery by the carnivorous locals.

The Beaujolais Villages was slipping down nicely, and there was still a glass each left when cheese time arrived. The French habit of serving the cheese before the dessert is such a sensible idea for that very reason. The cheeseboard was excellent, with all the usual suspects available and in perfect condition. A very smelly Camembert was deliciously oozy, for example. A well-dressed green salad came as well, and then dessert was offered.

Feeling like Mr Creosote, I watched as the Ex scoffed down a gateau de riz (I always think rice pudding cake is a very odd idea but this one was said to be perfectly acceptable). I passed on coffee but had an Armagnac. The bill came in at 74 euros which was pretty staggering considering what had been consumed, and the fact that this was a restaurant in a big tourist destination, on the main drag. Not a faultless meal by any means, but a very creditable one in terms of value.

Verdict: value for money 8/10 service 8/10 quality of food 7/10



Le Cabestan, 70 Rue du Port, Granville

The day was glorious, more like May than November; it was Sunday on a bank holiday weekend, and a trip to the seaside was irresistible. In Britain, the seafront would be lined with what in Yorkshire are called ‘tat’ shops, ice cream parlours and amusement arcades, with people trailing around them like lemmings looking for a cliff. But this was France, and the restaurants down by the Granville quayside were patrolled by anxious, hungry French of all ages and sizes, all walking up and down from one to another trying to read the menus and cartes displayed outside.

There was an air of controlled panic: if we each found the one, the menu offering the perfect combination of entrée and main course, would we have left it too late and discovered that everyone else on the same mission had got there first and filled the place?

Only when safely seated at the table, stake claimed and occupied, could we all relax. Le Cabeston was chosen simply on the basis that it was the only one offering fresh mackerel as a special and that seemed particularly appealing on this particular day. This restaurant, like most on the seafront in France, survives mainly on its fishy offerings. Unlike most of the others on the same frontage, it is unashamedly modern in décor and style. But the menu was traditional. There were oysters, mussels, both brown crab and spider crab, fish and shellfish of all descriptions and huge plateaux de fruits de mer.

So of course I chose the fish soup. After all, it was a full two days since I had last eaten any and withdrawal symptoms were well developed. (In fact, I knew that I would not be back in France again for some time and needed to get my full fish soup fix.) I also wanted the mackerel and this meant ordering from the carte, rather than a fixed menu, not something I do much in France as the latter usually offers much better value for money.

The fish soup came with the usual grated cheese, croutons and a version of rouille/aioli that was less garlicky than the Rouen version but just as good. The soup itself was even better, with a definite bisque-like quality and even greater depth of flavour. (Possibly the best fish soup I have ever eaten was at Corrigan’s in Mayfair when it had only been open for a week. I went back two months later and ordered it again, only to be disappointed, as it seemed to have been watered-down. The portions on both occasions were tiny. But I digress.)

The Ex had chosen an odd-sounding starter of baked eggs with smoked fish. After talking in a saintly manner about eating lightly, the dish arrived and it was huge, with two baked eggs and a combination of smoked salmon and smoked haddock. He ate the lot, and wiped the plate with bread. I didn’t try any as I am an eggophobe, or whatever the word is. But as eggs go, it certainly went.

We had both ordered the mackerel with mustard sauce.

A whole small fish arrived, well-cooked, meaty and fresh. The mustard sauce was a little sharp and the whole was perhaps very slightly over-salted (I minimise my use of salt and accordingly am very sensitive to it). The plate was garnished with a perfectly cooked, turned saffron potato, and a little timbale of carrot topped with shredded leek, which was flavoured with a hint of curry spices. Vegetables! But not as we know them. Possibly better than we know them, if a little over-seasoned.

All the way through, service had been impeccable. A slim, energetic dark-haired waitress zipped about the room, full of cheerful energy, taking orders, serving food, checking that everyone was happy. She clearly loved her job and the whole room felt the benefit. We were in the hands of professionals who enjoyed their work.
The desserts on offer were a bit of an afterthought, being mainly ice creams, a dessert du maison and a patisserie du jour – tarte Tatin. I ordered the latter and the Ex the speciality of the house. It turned out that I had been pipped to the last slice of the tarte so was proffered a charlotte au chocolate as the booby prize. This was delicious, the rich, dark chocolate mousse encased in a sponge both moist and light at the same time. It was the work of a moment to make it disappear without trace. I was a very happy booby.

The house speciality dessert was warm caramelised fruit in a caramel sauce, served with Chantilly cream and a scoop of coffee ice cream. It met with a somewhat unenthusiastic response, though every scrap disappeared from the plate. The desserts did rather let the whole lunch down, being a bit pedestrian in terns of choice.

Two tiny coffees, aromatic and string, completed a good lunch and one that came in at around 75 euros – the set menus were better value and offered three and four courses for 20 and 24 euros, if I remember rightly.

Le Cabestan, rue du Port, Granville (no website)

Verdict: value for money 7/10 service 9/10 quality of food 7/10



Le Broche D’Argent, Ouistreham, Caen

I have eaten here before, but there were indications that it was under new ownership.

I had hopes: they were dashed. Especially when my Bearnaise sauce arrived in a little pot so frigid that it numbed my fingers. When I complained, it was borne away with an expression of distaste, microwaved and brought back without a hint of an apology. A place to avoid. Car ferry terminals generally are, but the fault of eternal optimism will prevail.

Can’t kick the habit! Pasta Plus again

Back in London, I could not resist another visit to my beloved Pasta Plus which could not have provided more of a contrast. This little gem is tucked down by the side of Euston station, in what appear to be unpromising surroundings. The proximity of ‘adult stores’ and massage parlours can be the only reason this family-run restaurant is not packed every lunchtime and evening. This may be changing now, as it was full to bursting the last time I was there. I eat here almost every time I am in the capital, though I always feel I should be trying new places. But the lure of Pasta Plus is hard to resist; it is the culinary equivalent of getting into a hot, deep bath when the rain is falling outside and the wind howling, and you have had a hard day.

To the first-time diner, the restaurant initially appears a little stark and unwelcoming, with an uncluttered interior, no tablecloths (and certainly none of the red check variety) and only a few monochrome photographs on the walls. But every surface is spotless and shining, seats are surprisingly comfortable, and in the summer the tables at the bottom end of the restaurant look down to a tiny garden bright with red geraniums. Now, after countless visits, I see the lights shining out onto the grubby pavement and hurry towards them thankfully. Once I toiled along the road, footsore and grumpy at the end of a particularly irksome day, to find the place was shut; I almost burst into tears on the pavement. (They had gone on holiday, the thoughtless creatures.)

Having pigged out on croissants and toast on the train down, I felt that a reasonably healthy starter was called for, so opted for the tomato bruschetta. The tomatoes were as tomatoey as they can possibly be in November, the crisp, freshly-toasted bread had been rubbed with garlic and liberally dribbled with good olive oil, and the portion was big enough to satisfy a Yorkshirewoman. Having now had a couple of my five-a-day (I was counting the rocket on the bruschetta) I turned to the signature Tagliatelle Zia Teresa with the appetite of the just. I was not disappointed. I have eaten this dish at least a dozen times (possibly more) but I still love the combination of the finely chopped, caramelised onion, tiny slivers of button mushroom and the saltiness of the pancetta, all embraced smoothly by the saffron cream sauce, generously anointing the pile of tagliatelle, topped off with a couple of spoons of grated parmesan. (I considered a healthy side salad but rejected it; it would have been a distraction.)

I confess to never having had a pudding at Pasta Plus. I am convinced that if I had ever eaten one, I would have been happy with it, but unless there is something really sinful on offer, I can usually resist the temptation. This is one reason why I have never looked at their dessert menu: there may well be puddings at PP requiring many hours of penance, and if I were to try one I might then be tempted eternally. So I have always thought it better not to begin. But one day when I have lost all belief in the worth of a waistline, I may well start to order a dessert.

Service was helpful, charming, friendly and efficient. Most evenings the front of house duties are divided between the mother and daughter team, but the last time I visited, both were on hand to supervise the occasionally diffident (but always friendly) young Italian waiters. Dad is in the kitchen and sends up plate after plate of unfailingly consistent food.

With a glass of Prosecco and two of the house wine, and including the service charge, the bill came in at just over thirty quid. Two restaurants in two capital cities within the same fortnight, but what a difference in atmosphere and quality of service. I have only one problem with this little place, as I have said already - I can’t tear myself away as it is a real home from home. One last point to mention – as a lone female diner (often), I always feel welcome here, unlike some much more expensive and pretentious outfits where I have sometimes felt like a carrier of bubonic plague.

Verdict: value for money 8/10 service 9/10 quality of food 9/10

Roman Holiday

We flew into Leonardo da Vinci airport (aka Fiumicino) on the tail of a terrific thunderstorm, and arrived in the city to find shopkeepers sweeping water out of their doorways. The Coliseum was flooded, and a small, lopsided handwritten notice on the entrance declared that it was “closed, due to unforeseen circumstances”. I had a temper tantrum and felt like biffing one of the centurions hanging around the place (trying to persuade everyone to have their photos taken with one of the Ninth Legion – one had a bit of orange feather boa on top of his helmet). The Lawn Ranger was calm as always, and said it all looked in very good nick considering how old it was, and he was sure there wasn’t much inside anyway.

Fortunately for us, the apartment we had rented was on the third floor and not in a basement. Unfortunately for us, the word “apartment” was not an accurate description, as it consisted in total of an en-suite bedroom and a balcony. The “kitchen” was a fridge in a cupboard with a two-burner gas ring on top and a sink next to it. The bathroom was bizarre, almost the same size as the bedroom with a huge washbasin big enough to wash a ten-year old in, a loo and bidet, and a miniscule shower that dribbled tepid water one minute, scalding the next, and then an ice-cold jet. As it turned out, the weather was so warm that we spent most of our time there worn out from sight-seeing, and sitting on the balcony overlooking the neighbours’ gardens.

When in Rome...so we tried to do as the Romans do, eating in a local restaurant in a residential area rather than a tourist trap. As the apartment happened to be in a residential area, the one we were told was the best turned out to be literally round the corner. La Carbonara (no, not the one in Campo de’ Fiori) was tucked away on the Via Panisperna, its modest frontage belying the size of the interior, which stretched back deep inside the building. Inside it was traditional, with a lot of dark wood, and not very comfortable chairs. The walls were literally covered with handwritten comments, cartoons and signatures – a very good excuse for never decorating again. (Might try it at home, if I can ever get the anaglypta off the walls.)

After too much breakfast, we had been careful about lunch and just eaten paninis, but we failed to resist the lures of the gelateria and overdosed on triple scoops (yummy, but surprisingly filling). So neither of us could manage an antipasti. The menu featured dishes that never appear on your friendly neighbouring trattoria in Torquay, and there was no English translation. Neither was there time for speculation or, it appeared, explanation, as the staff did not regard patience as a virtue. After agonising over a whole section of apparently interesting main courses, only to discover from the stern-faced servitor from hell that they all featured tripe, we both opted for pasta.

I went for the eponymous carbonara as it seemed the obvious choice, and the Lawn Ranger went for a shape of pasta I had never seen before with a sauce of tomato, Italian sausage and peppers, which he said was delicious. In the interests of accuracy, I checked out his assessment with a forkful, and I can vouch for its veracity. The carbonara was good but not a million miles better than some I have had in the UK, which was a disappointment, but maybe I have just been eating in all the right Italian restaurants.

Couple of cowards that we were, we bottled out on the tripe and ordered scallopine with a Marsala sauce. The veal was tender enough, but its flavour was indeterminate; the lake of sauce which smothered it was over-seasoned and acidic, tasting as though white wine had been added as well as the Marsala and then not sufficiently cooked off. A shared Tiramisu (OK, a cliché but almost unavoidable in this situation) was again, perfectly acceptable, and with a good espresso kick, but was otherwise unremarkable.

Inoffensive if not memorable food, and the bill was very reasonable (for a capital city) at about 65 euros for two of us, including a bottle of Montepulciano (not the wine already place on the table, which the sommelier was trying to bully us into having). But the whole experience was let down by service that was impatient and peremptory. It was a Saturday night and the place was packed with regulars (we had booked a table the night before) so one could understand that they would want to have a second (or at this rate, even a third) sitting, but we definitely felt rushed and not particularly welcome.

The pressure to order meant that there was no chance of a leisurely aperitif, let alone a thorough study of the menu. We were in at 7 pm but out in the street well before 8.30, feeling a sense of anti-climax. A couple of Aussies at the next table (the only non-Italians in the place apart from us) were clearly terrified of the waiters, especially the dominatrix of a sommelier, and scuttled out into the night, puddingless, even earlier than we did.

Verdict: value for money 8/10 service 3/10 quality of food 7/10

La Carbonara, Via Panisperna 214, 00184 Roma.
Tel: 06 482 5176

North of the border - Glasgow and Edinburgh

I was looking forward to a nice cosy dinner chez Fat Ladies with a friend on my last trip to Glasgow, but it was not to be. For reasons too complicated to explain, I found myself eating alone in the restaurant of the Malmaison. This is not usually a hardship, but this particular night proved to be an exception.

The trip had got off to a bad start when I checked in and was told I had been upgraded to a posher room. Naive enough to be delighted by this, my face fell when I opened the (as usual, funereal) curtains to discover that the posh windows of the posh room looked out onto the much less posh headquarters of Strathclyde police. Who entertained guests all night but not of the posh variety.

Worse was to come. Said friend and I were booted out of the Malmaison bar as the hotel had been booked for a wedding and the bride, groom and assembled party obviously took precedence over us mere hotel guests. This would account for the paucity of waiting staff in the dining room and the fact that those of us eating there – those idiots who should have known better – were pretty much treated like leftovers on the plate of life.

A couple next to me had ordered some food which took so long to arrive (I am talking beefburgers here) that they asked if they might just be allowed to leave without bothering. Certainly not, the food was coming at any minute. And it did, and so did mine, which was inexplicably cold. Or lukewarm if I am to be accurate. I can only assume it had been left on the pass whilst the waiting staff were otherwise engaged with the wedding party.

I have to confess that I was fascinated by the sartorial mix of this bunch, especially the small boys, who wore kilts teamed up with black trainers. One little carrot-top glared about him every time he ascended (or descended for that matter) the spiral staircase by the bar, holding down his kilt and shooting venomous looks at those below.

But I digress. I ate a steak at the Mal and very good it would have been if a bit warmer. It was perfectly cooked and very tender. But not cheap. In fact, the hotel itself is not cheap and I used to be happy with this as it was still a pleasant experience. Now the rooms seem run-down, the service is sloppy and a TV that doesn’t even have Freeview channels in 2011 - for a room price well in excess of £100 - is just bonkers.

Two weeks later I found myself at the Royal Scots Club in Edinburgh. Arriving at lunchtime, I found that my room wasn’t ready so I waited in the very clubbish lounge. A upright Scottish lady sat on a large sofa opposite me, waiting for her husband to return from the bar with their drinks. An elderly gentleman made his way haltingly round another (empty sofa), and lowered himself down next to her – on top of her handbag. She leaped up, tugging the bag out from under him, and flew off towards the bar, looking back over her shoulder in horror. After he had cleared his throat a few times and smacked his lips (inexplicably), pebble-dashing everything in the vicinity with undigested matter (including me), I got up and moved with all my baggage – there was a lot of it, as it included work-related gubbins of various kinds.

Eventually the room was ready and it turned out to be at the furthest extremity of the building, in a labyrinth of doors, corridors and turnings. It was dark, dismal, smelled unbearably of stale cooking fat and the window wouldn’t open more than a crack. The bathroom had been designed for either a small child or a dwarf, so that I had to bend down to wash my hands (from the dizzy height of 5’ 2”). The corner bath was actually a slight depression, to accommodate a corner puddle. Was this some kind of water-saving exercise? If so, it was entirely successful as no-one three-dimensional would have attempted to bathe in the thing.

It took several attempts to find my way out and after walking round the city in the pouring rain for an hour, I returned to the Chip-fat Suite and rang reception. The large and lovely, softly-spoken man who had just taken over said he quite understood and would I like a room in the basement? – the only one left. By this time I would have been happy with an oubliette that didn’t smell like Harry Ramsden’s. I lugged everything out and down the stairs (unable to find the lift apart from the first time I went up in it – perhaps after that, it dematerialised?) and down to reception. The room in the basement was perfect, bright, airy, beautifully furnished and with a real bathroom and a real bath. Oh joy!

This travel lark is not what it is cracked up to be.

Having left North Yorkshire in a heatwave, I was unprepared for the Scottish weather having come without my waders and thermals. Nevertheless, I struggled out to find a watering-hole and had actually intended to eat at La Garrigue in the New Town. I stopped at ask directions from a lady in a frock shop who said, “Oh, I it’s round the corner if you want to go there.” The implication being that she would not. Could she recommend anywhere nicer? She could indeed, The Saint on St Stephen’s Street.

Congratulating myself on finding a hidden gem, I went in search of The Saint. I found it eventually, though its signage was so low-key that one would suspect it didn’t want to be found at all.

What can I say other than the reason some restaurants get awards is because they are better than others? The Saint had a lovely fire (which I am pretty sure was gas but a good imitation) and a lovely Australian waitress, but the food was mediocre. A soup that I think was said to be butternut squash, just tasted very sweet and was far too thick. Venison stew on mash with persillade was not quite what it said on the tin as the persillade was more like a small puddle of parsley-infused oil. The mash was all right, the stew was all right (though slightly over-seasoned), but you could eat better at home any night of the week. And the point of going out is that you eat better than you would at home, surely? The whole thing was just underwhelming, so I felt obliged to have another glass of wine to cheer me up. The bill was £33.80 for two courses and three glasses of wine.
Verdict: value for money - 7/10; service - 8/10; quality of food - 5/10.

On the train home, I was delighted to find that the all-day menu did not include the horrible Onion Bhaji Sandwiches. The staff tell me that these are “very popular” but I can only assume that a particularly high proportion of East Coast travellers are masochists. Or do the East Coast management have shares in drugs for diabetes treatment? Perhaps they are aliens who are attempting the downfall of the human race? There must be some explanation for the presence on the menu of these hideous comestibles. The whole idea of a sandwich made from cold fried batter with a bit of onion in it is not only bizarre and unhealthy but an insult to those of us who want a bit of value for money – who came up with this wheeze? They should be made to eat Onion Bhaji Sandwiches and nothing else for a week.

They’ve got guts, these Loiners….(but are they eating them?)

Red Chilli, Leeds

A Loiner is someone from Leeds. Bet you didn’t know that! And if you don’t know about the small but growing restaurant chain that is Red Chilli, now is the time to find out.

Red Chilli is a Chinese restaurants full of Chinese people so you know it’s the real thing. You also know it’s the real thing when you read the menu and it makes the exponents of “nose to tail eating” look like a bunch of wusses.

Forget kidneys or pig’s trotters - this is the real, real thing. Stir-fried pig’s intestine? How many would you like? Five-spice pig’s head is another option, or if you are a fan of surf and turf, you could go for the shredded chicken with jellyfish and spring onion.

For red meat eaters, there’s a stew of sliced ox heart, ox tongue, ox tripe, and “Pork’s Blood” (sic) with beansprouts. So there’s one of your five a day. And four of your worst nightmares. I’m never quite sure whether frog’s legs count as meat or fish but Big Grandma might know – her chilli sauce is all over them on the “home-style” dishes section. There’s not much for vegetarians on the menu but they could try the black fungus with spring onion and garlic. (They could, but I doubt that they will.)

I’m a bit worried about Big Grandma now that I’ve taken her name in vain but at least she won’t know who I am – there were seven of us eating there on Saturday evening and the place was buzzing. We had the crispy duck with pancakes for starters along with some very slippery pork dumplings which were gingery and moreish.

For the mains, we all failed to go the whole hog and copped out by ordering the less scary stuff. Sliced pork belly with chilli was paper-thin pork, all the fat rendered out, deliciously spicy and not at all what we expected – I had imagined an unctuous mass of braised belly in a soupy sauce, but this was even better. A bowl of sliced beef fillet crispy fried in Cantonese sauce was possibly the best dish on the table, the texture of the meat satisfyingly crunchy, with slices of red and green pepper providing a counterpoint. Stir-fried mutton with spring onion was tender and with a depth of flavour which stood up well to the robust saucing.

A bowl of sliced duck with sliced leeks in hoisin sauce was good but not up to the standard of the other dishes (and we chose badly in ordering it, having had the hoisin with duck for a starter) whilst another of chicken was unremarkable.

Portions were generous, even for side dishes such as the soft noodles with beansprouts, and a dish of bok choy (which was slippery enough for a piece to shoot out of the grip of my chopsticks and fly sideways to the floor).

Utterly sated, we passed on the offer of pudding but some of us descended like locusts on the plate of orange segments offered as a (free) palate-cleanser.

Abstention from alcohol is always rewarded by a surprisingly small bill, and tonight was no exception. After several pints of beer in a couple of Leeds city centre pubs, we were all happy to stick with either Chinese tea or water. Consequently, the bill came in at just under £100 for six adults and a very well-behaved child, excluding the tip. Which was generous, like the portions....

Verdict: value for money - 10/10; service - 8/10; quality of food - 8/10.

A weekend on Holy Island - Eric the Lead and friends.

The attraction, I assured my bemused companion, was that when the tide went out, we would be virtually alone on the island. Free to wander the seashore watching the sun descend into the sea behind the castle on the headland, against a sky of apricot and gold. Free to wander into one of the pubs in the village for a quiet pint and a chat with the locals. Free to listen to birdsong and the plaintive cry of seals massed out on the sandbanks….

So it was that we drove north, and further north, and turned right just before we got to Scotland.

And it could have been like that.

Indeed, it would have been like that if there hadn’t been several hundred Vikings camped out there, intent on pillaging and (dare we say it post-Tottenham?) looting, courtesy of English Heritage. Viking men, Viking women and Viking children (the latter clearly wishing they had been allowed to bring their Playstations) – and even the occasional Viking dog.

And with the Vikings came the spectators, their cars clogging up every little road, path and layby, their children shrieking and begging for ice-creams.

During the daytime, when the causeway was open, the Vikings did their Viking thing. They invaded the priory just like they did in AD 793 (when they must have been a lot thinner and consequently faster, or the monks would have had time to get away – even if it meant waiting for the tide to go out). They roared around fighting each other inside - admission charges applying, so that the massed ranks of spectators simply crossed to the opposite hill where they could get a free viewpoint. They set up a camp within the walls, cooking Viking food and making Viking artefacts. (I can’t vouch for the authenticity of these things as (a) I was too tight to pay to get in and (b) don’t remember my previous life as Pollyanna the Berserker.) Then, when the place was an island again, they were off-duty and did what they wanted. Which for most of them meant continuing to be Vikings, even though some of them (the thinner ones) had pink hair and the odd piercing.

There was no getting away from them. All day, their bellows drowned out the seals who gave up plaintively crying and shut up completely, their little faces glumly turning away from the racket. At night, they invaded the pubs so that almost every seat was filled, and amply filled, with a great big wobbly Viking arse. They used up nearly every glass in the bar – though some had brought their own drinking horns, which was obviously a point-scoring exercise.

Point-scoring and the odd bit of gentle pillaging was clearly the only exercise they ever got. Only the children and the younger ones seemed to be of normal size. The rest were not just clinically obese, they were so whale-like that one could not imagine the size of the loom used to spin their authentic garments. A loom that big would have to be housed in an aircraft hanger – one normally used for Jumbo jets.

Their desire for authenticity did not extent to food. Almost without exception, they opted for chips and I saw one (a Vegan Viking?) eat an aubergine. Had they no shame? Surely they should have brought plentiful supplies of sheeps’ stomachs and oatmeal with them?

But I digress. We ate two dinners on Holy Island, fortunately not in the company of Vikings, and both were memorable. Both were also very fishy, and none the worse for that.

The first dinner was at Café Beangoose, a tiny restaurant run by what I imagine to be enthusiastic amateurs rather than professional caterers. The service was a little nervous, the prices were confident – in fact, over-confident. We both had the same thing, a crab salad followed by sea trout. The crab salad was sublime; quenelle-shaped mounds of sparklingly fresh crabmeat, beautifully and simply dressed, with a few segments of pink grapefruit being its only adornment, and a leaf or two of greenery which was frankly superfluous.

The sea trout was fresh and well-cooked, though perhaps had been allowed half a minute too long in the pan. However, whoever plated it up either had a weird sense of humour or disliked me on sight. The piece of fish was placed on top of a heap of sweet pickled cucumber and then surmounted by three cylindrical dark brown shapes which would be instantly recognisable to any dog owner or street cleaner. Fortunately, they turned out on closer inspection to be potatoes (Pink Fir Apple, perhaps?) cooked in their skins and left whole. (Were there no knives in the kitchen?) But it was a nasty shock. The combination of textures and flavours did not delight – the sweet-sour cucumber pickle dominated the dish, and the sea trout and potatoes cried out for a sauce of some kind.

One of us had a pudding – the chocolate brownie - and it was OK. With two glasses of wine and a bottle of beer, the bill came in at £67. At least the place was Viking-free.

The following night we ate at the Manor House Hotel. We had crab again, and perhaps here the Beangoose had the edge; the mixed salad plonked on the side of the plate suggested that little or no thought had been given to how the flavour of the beautifully-fresh crustacean could be best enhanced. But it was nevertheless delicious. And the smiling Czech waitress was efficient and relaxed at the same time.

The fish and chips that followed were superb, though it was a pity that the chips were frozen. But the freshness of the fish and the lightness of the batter made up for this. And the fact that there was a decent pint of beer on handpump was a real advantage. The damage was a full twenty quid less than the previous night with the same drinks, so that was cheering too. And again, the dining room was full of normal-sized people (if the word “normal” is still allowed) who were not wearing homespun and brandishing drinking horns. Best of all was a truly breath-taking view of the castle and the sea. With not a longship in sight.

Verdict:

Café Beangoose
value for money - 6/10; service - 7/10; quality of food - 7/10.

Manor House Hotel
value for money - 9/10; service - 8/10; quality of food - 7/10.

A problem shared.....

Brio, Hornbeam Park, Harrogate

Hornbeam Park is a business park on the outskirts of Harrogate and the unlikely setting for a buzzing (perhaps too buzzing?) Italian restaurant of the kind beloved by families with young children. Lots of young children. You have been warned. If you are a primary school teacher, avoid this place like your would avoid the Early Learning Centre. If you are a Grumpy Old Woman (and I confess to having tendencies in this line myself) be sure to take a double dose of tolerance tablets before leaving home and a deep breath before opening the car-showroom style glass doors and submerging yourself in decibel hell.

In fairness, some of the families do demonstrate a vague awareness that other people are present as well as their own little darlings, though they make few concessions for these unfortunates. A few are downright boorish and inconsiderate. On one earlier occasion, I witnessed a family group of three generations create such a mess that once they had left, the staff had to move the table and get out a sweeping brush and a dustpan. The two children had also climbed over adjoining chairs and left the dirty marks of their adorable little feet, clad in designer trainers, all over the surfaces.

Waiters seem to take it all in their stride and are unfailingly charming, friendly and show no sign of gritted teeth. Unlike some customers, like me, who would happily have battered the whole family to death with a cold calzone.

The food is what you would expect of an Italian restaurant of this kind. There is pasta, pizza, a reasonable range of daily specials and a choice of puddings. But so far I have not had a bad meal (and I have been there on perhaps five occasions) nor met a surly waiter. The service is not always completely efficient but it slips only rarely. But what prompted me to write this review was the last experience I had there, in the company of an old friend who is not quite a vegetarian (she eats fish) but might as well be.

We both fancied pizza but we both hankered after pasta as well. Not hungry enough for a starter after a very late lunch of home-smoked trout, home-grown tomatoes and cucumber and some very dense chocolate cake, we thought a shared main course would do the trick. After a fair bit of bickering, we settled on a dish of Pasta al Sugo Piccante (pasta quills, tomato sauce, peppers, black olives, touch of chilli) and a pizza Margherita with ham and artichokes – the ham on one side, the artichokes on the other.

The waiter had obviously arrived in time to hear some of these deliberations and asked if we intended to share. Yes, definitely.

We had been tucking in to the bread and olives, with some not-too-salty tapenade whilst the discussion had been going on, and glugging some very reasonable Montepulciano d’Abruzzo.

Then two bowls of pasta arrived and the offer of plenty of parmesan. Had they got it wrong? No, because immediately afterwards the pizza appeared, neatly sliced , on two plates. The pasta was neither swamped in sauce, nor insufficiently dressed with it. The sauce was zinging with tomatoey flavour and a chilli punch. The pizza was thin, light and crisp.

We were happy. Even the commotion at the next table seemed more bearable than previously; the small boy sitting in the middle of it squirmed in embarrassment as his friends sang Happy Birthday, and we laughed. We laughed even more when the waiters started another chorus, to embarrass him all over again.

So they do get their own back occasionally…..though the cold Calzone would still be my preferred option.

Verdict: value for money - 8/10; service - 8/10; quality of food - 8/10.
Ambience: 5/10

Oh, I do like to be beside....

Pier 17
St Peter Port, Guernsey

I spent the previous night in Paignton at a hotel straight out of a sitcom, where the average age of the clientele made me feel more like a teenager than a woman looking forward to the imminent arrival of her bus pass. There I ordered scallops as a starter but without the advertised chorizo. Once the plate arrived, the overpowering taste and aroma of paprika and the residue of orange oil immediately betrayed the fact that said chorizo has simply been removed from the dish. When I tasted it, I wished I had told them to keep the chorizo and get rid of the scallops. Or at least, just get rid of those grey, bouncy bits of rubber. The menu did not state that they were diver-caught but any diver attempting such a catch would need one of those American baseball gloves and a firm grip. They defied chewing and ricocheted around the mouth like sandy, sea-flavoured midget gems, reminiscent of the sweets beloved of Harry Potter and his classmates.

I came out of the restaurant shuddering, and then started back in horror to see a miniature baby elephant writhing in its death-throes in the foyer, bizarrely displayed on an enormous glass coffee table. It was horridly realistic and its position just outside the bar was obviously designed to make guests feel the need for a stiff drink. Or several.

So it was with a rush of optimism that I ordered scallops again the very next night at Pier 17, a crab and scallop Thermidor, to be exact. Though the crab was largely conspicuous by its absence, the glistening little scallops were a joy. Pearly and succulent, they were cooked just enough to render them opaquely toothsome but without any hint of that toughness which is the penalty of a moment too long in the pan. The sauce was creamy, unctuous, with a hint of marine saltiness and the faintest suggestion of parmesan. I mopped it all up with some very moreish bread.

Honey roasted duck with roasted vegetables followed and was devoured with appreciation. The duck was perfectly pink, and the vegetables cooked to complement the meat which perched on them, rather than the usual hideous microwaved side-dish of tasteless boiled rabbit food. I don’t remember what I paid but it wasn’t extortionately expensive. I would have had a pudding but I ate too much lovely bread with the irresistible sauce on my starter.

Service was helpful and smiling without being sycophantic, and efficient. What more could you want? A view of the sea. I didn’t get one of those but I did get the very last table on a walk-in at 7 in the evening midweek. Well done, Pier 17.

Verdict: value for money - 7/10; service - 9/10; quality of food - 8/10.

Great building – shame about the food!

Piazza by Anthony, the Corn Exchange, Leeds

A few years ago young Anthony Flinn came home to his Northern roots after a stint at El Bulli and opened a restaurant in the centre of the city. Praises were heaped upon him and before you could say “langoustine foam”, Leeds was riddled with Anthony outlets. Now he retains the original restaurant and operates a brasserie-style eating outlet on the lower level of the old Corn Exchange, flanked by delis selling cheese and charcuterie, chocolate and baked goods. There is a patisserie café in the Victoria Quarter and he will cater for your wedding as well. So I was intrigued to sample some of his grub and recently spent an evening at Piazza by Anthony.

Which brings me to my first gripe. Why “piazza”? The basement of a building, even one open to a glass roof on a sunny evening, isn’t a piazza. A piazza is a square where the buzz of urban life is all around you and to be pedantic, it’s in Italy. A cavernous, empty restaurant, silent apart from the hushed whispers of diners reeling in shock at the bill, just doesn’t cut it. The food isn’t Italian either. The whole thing is a mystery.

The other mystery is why the place is still open. The night we ate there it was like the Marie Celeste but without the added interest of being on a boat. One other table was occupied and I really don’t know why, unless it was their first time as well.

Let’s start with the positives. Firstly, the venue itself is fantastic – light, spacious, and with a vaulted transparent roof above which has the feel of a cathedral – and it’s round. I’m not sure why I said “firstly” because there isn’t a secondly. Everything else goes downhill after that.

I will list the negatives in brief, because thinking about how much I paid makes me depressed, so I don’t want to linger on it. The menu is boring. There is hardly anything on it that you want to eat. This is probably a good thing, because when two of us found something we wanted to eat, they only had one of it. The waiter also began by telling us what they didn’t have, which is pretty unusual at six o’ clock in the evening in an empty restaurant. Service is terrible, though the waiters have a kind of jolliness that smacks of desperation – or farce. The prices are too high for what arrives on the plate. And the food is mediocre. (I have never been to El Bulli but I know bull when I am paying for it.)

A couple of us started off by sharing the charcuterie and cheese platter (“with bread baked in our bakery”) and at £8.95 I expected something fairly substantial. The words “charcuterie” and “platter” used in conjunction (along with the price) conjure up a feeling of generosity, an expectation of heaped servings of porky deliciousness to share out and gloat over. What arrived was a small plate with three slices of somewhat dry posh bread, three slivers of cheese and an artfully arranged fan of cold meat and salami on one side, filled out with rabbit food on the other. I think the meat might have been lovely but the wisps provided were just enough to suggest this without being able to confirm it. We had to cut the bread in half, ditto the cheese and meats, and I was so hungry afterwards that I was looking speculatively at the waiter’s leg.

Main courses sounded anything but interesting so I asked said waiter (leg intact) what he could recommend. He told me that he couldn’t recommend anything as waiters weren’t allowed to taste the food. We all looked gobsmacked at this and my jaw actually dropped. Two of us then opted for the pork chop with apple dauphinoise (£11.95), for the waiter to then return with the news that only one pork chop remained in the kitchen. So I switched to a sirloin steak for £15.95, which came with four tiny roasted cherry tomatoes. And nothing else. So I was glad I had ordered chips even though they cost an extra three quid. The steak was well-done and I had asked for it medium rare. I didn’t send it back in case they didn’t have another. I didn’t manage to taste the ham hock risotto to my right, but it looked watery and unpleasant and the person eating it was unimpressed. The pork chop across the table looked all right but uninspiring.

By this time I was exhausted at having to track down a waiter every time we wanted anything. They were all lurking in the bar area, laughing and joking, which reminded me of the nurses chattering at the nursing station in the hospital whilst my mother was dying alone on a side ward. We didn’t order a pudding as we had come to our senses by then, and I was looking forward to going home and making cheese on toast.

Verdict: value for money - 0/10; service - 2/10; quality of food - 2/10.

French leave – or is that leftovers?

The Marquis de Tomberlaine, Champeaux

I have eaten here before, with friends, and enjoyed the food though we had been disappointed that the mist had spoiled the wonderful view of the bay of Mont St Michel. So on a beautifully sunny Sunday lunchtime it seemed the perfect weather to have a meal overlooking the bay. But as a friend of mine is fond of remarking, that was another frog kissed. Or another Frog kissed, given the location.

The restaurant was packed, which is usually a good sign. No-one had any food, which was not. Especially as it was 1 p.m. Normally I find the service in France to be efficient but we sat for ten minutes without the offer of a drink or being given a menu. (We should have left then whilst we were winning.) Finally I managed to bring down a passing waitress with a tackle and we got a couple of kirs. Then we managed to get a menu by much the same means. At the table next to us on my right were a pair of formidable French ladies of a certain age who did not have a menu and had been there longer than us. There was much tutting from mesdames, which sounds a lot more condemnatory when done in French, which had the desired effect of making menus appear.

The windows were wide open to let in some fresh air and the deafening noise and fumes from many passing motorbikes thundering by on the coast road outside. Mont St Michel was invisible behind a haze of what appeared to be smog. The lovely old dining room had been redecorated so as to strip out any vestige of its history apart from the massive fireplace, which looked to be holding up the end wall and had been grudgingly retained.

There was a lot of flitting around of waitresses in an ineffectual way, up and down the packed tables. They brought cutlery of different kinds, then changed plates and place settings, and generally looked very active and stressed whilst not achieving very much. Finally we managed to get one to take the order. After a good twenty minutes, a starter appeared on the other side of the table from me which looked OK (but which was so unmemorable that I can’t remember it) but made me feel glad that I had chosen the fish soup. Which did not arrive. Eventually a large lady in very tight trousers emerged from the direction of the kitchen, breathing heavily and bearing a large copper pan with a ladle sticking out of it. She stopped at my side and grabbed the handle of the ladle purposefully, then looked at my place setting. No bowl. There was another barrage of tutting from my right and mesdames and I exchanged shakes of the head. They still had no food.

Finally I had fish soup. It was good, but not great, and barely hot. The rouille was fine, but unremarkable, as was the gruyere. What a palaver for not very much. Next door’s food had arrived but it was tasted and then tutted at. We all gobbled up our starters and tried to fill up on bread, which was a good thing as it was nearly an hour before any of us got any more food.

My main course was lamb cooked two ways – which turned out to mean, both badly. A couple of tiny cutlets were flanked by some messy bits of leg steak, thrown onto the plate anyhow. It looked like roadkill but roadkill would have been a lot cheaper and probably not as salty. Though come to think of it, winter roadkill would have grit salt on it. Maybe it was roadkill after all. At any rate, some of it was completely raw in the middle and bloody, and other bits were grey and overcooked. It was greasy and pretty much inedible. Served with it, and with all the main courses, was a horrible concoction of mashed potatoes wrapped in overcooked courgette slices. This looked and tasted like leftovers that someone had made a valiant attempt to disguise.

Mesdames had ordered the same main course as me. This time the tutting reached a crescendo and the waitress was called. The ladies gesticulated at their plates, where the roadkill was congealing slowly. This was not restaurant food, they would never serve such bad food at home, it was a disgrace, far too salty, badly cooked. They spoke sadly, with shaking heads, taking it in turns – one would explain the horridness of the food whilst the other would tut. The waitress stood miserably in front of them, muttering apologies. I left almost all of my plateful and told the waitress that it was inedible and oversalted. Mesdames tutted in agreement. The large lady in the tight trousers could be seen to glance nervously at our little corner as she puffed about the room.

Mesdames had chocolate mousse for pudding, and cleared the plate with a minimum of tutting. I had ice cream, based on the assumption that it would be bought in and therefore edible.

It was almost 4 pm when we left and we passed on coffee, having neglected to bring any pyjamas. I paid the bill with my Marks and Spencer credit card to get a few points on it and at least make myself feel that the experience was not entirely negative – at the equivalent of over 80 quid, I might be able to buy some French knickers to remind me never to go there again. There was no apology or offer of discount.

Verdict: value for money - 0/10; service - 0/10; quality of food - 1/10.

Recent roundup

Time to catch up....April 2011

It seems like a very long time since I updated this blog and I have eaten an awful lot of meals since then. I have also been working like a maniac, which has stopped me from writing them up. So here is a quick update….

Cibo, Summertown, Oxford

I ate here on a rainy night in what should have been early spring, but was more like late winter. It was early evening but there was a buzzy atmosphere and a few diners who were obviously regulars. My table had an excellent view of the pizza oven and what came out of it looked pretty good, so I opted for that and a glass of the house red. The pizza was as good as I have had anywhere (including Italy) – crisp thin base, well-flavoured tomato sauce and generous shavings of prosciutto, with a scattering of artichokes. The salad I ordered would have been lovely of someone had remembered to dry the leaves before putting them in the bowl – there was a pool of water in the bottom. I don’t remember what I paid but it seemed very reasonable.

The following night I went into town and ate the Dine with Wine menu at Brasserie Blanc. This was phenomenal value for money, especially as I ordered a glass of champagne for a miniscule extra amount, then topped it off with a glass of house red. Lovely well-flavoured broth, chunky vegetables and fresh bread a butter, followed by meltingly tender casseroled beef with an extra portion of (rather boring) creamed leeks. This little lot came to less than twenty-five quid and I left a happy woman.

The third night I didn’t fare so well – it was back to Summertown (I was staying there and my feet were sore by the end of the third day!) where I went into Portobello just because I liked the look of it. I had a perfectly respectable slice of terrine which would have been fine if there had been another two slices of it. Then I opted for the steak, with bearnaise sauce. This too a while coming and when it arrived, it was perfectly cooked (medium rare) but was cold – in contrast to the bowl of fries, which were hot. It was so cold, in fact, that I sent it back. The fresh steak came and was fine – but by then I had lost my fries, having piled most of them onto the previous plate, which had been whisked away. Did I want more? You bet I did – but did I want to wait while they were cooked, by which time the steak would be cold again. I left feeling disgruntled, especially as the bill was considerably more than I had paid at M. Blanc’s place.

Over the past couple of months I have dropped in on the Bistrot Pierre in Harrogate a few times, not least because the staff are cheery and helpful and the early bird menu is good value. But regretfully I shan’t be dropping in any more mainly because the place is so inconsistent in the quality of its meat. Now, Desperate Dan I ain’t, but I am an unrepentant carnivore and these days there is no excuse for poor quality beef, in particular. The first time I went to BP I had the steak and my companion, as they say in the ghastly local newspaper food reviews, had the same. His bit of beef was lovely – tender, perfectly cooked, a toothsome morsel all round. Mine was supposed to be the same (we had ordered identically) but looked totally different – a thick lump of what looked like topside rather than rump, which the knife simply made no impression on. I wrestled with it until I managed to saw through a piece and found it was impossible to chew. I sent it back and got a new one that was the real thing.

I assumed that there had been a mix-up in the kitchen and someone had mistaken the beef for the bourguignon for a bit of steak (OK, no chef worth his salt would do that, but let’s given them the benefit). A fortnight later, we go again and this time I had the bourguignon itself –and lurking amongst the tender chunks of succulent beef was another slab of dry, tough shoe leather. How bizarre. The third time, I was the lucky one but my poor friend had a piece of steak that was tender at one end and tough at the other. So we have called it a day….I have no idea what is going on in the kitchen there, but perhaps they are recycling the sous chef’s trainers when they get low on beef.

Tourist trap on the Cote du Nacre?

Hotel St George, Ouistreham Riva Bella, France

Ferryports are one of the most depressing places in the world. Before the Pope had second thoughts about limbo, and declared that his predecessor had been wrong to assume its existence, I was convinced that the Afterlife's eternal waiting room was like nothing so much as a cross-channel ferryport. Hours of waiting on plastic chairs inside a comfortless and barren hanger of a building, or squirming on the car seat in the dark as everyone else's line of cars moves and yours stays put - that's being in limbo, without a doubt.

So everyone who is consigned to this not-quite purgatorial experience on a regular basis searches for a crumb or two of comfort, by way of some gastronomic compensation. After trying all of the sad and pallid excuses for restaurants clustered round the main car park just before the Brittany Ferries terminal, Pollyanna ventured slightly further into Riva Bella-land and tried the St George.

The night was cold, rainy and Riva Bella itself - the little resort that seems to be invisible to Brits but well-patronised by the French - shuts early. So well before the 7.15 p.m. restaurant opening time, we were huddled in the hotel's tiny bar, squinting at French fashion magazines in the semi-darkness and listening to the screeching of the St George aviary. Roast parrokeet anyone? Yes, please, served 'a point' and silent if possible. A white powder puff was hurtling across the floor and occasionally yapping at the birds, clearly of the mind that saignant or even bleu would do, if only for a bit of peace and quiet.

A member of staff in some form of fancy dress commented gaily - in French - that it was "Noah's Ark in here". Which reminded me of the episode of Fawlty Towers where the hamster beloved by the kitchen staff turns out to be a large and well-fed rat....

Finally allowed into the restaurant, I discover it to be quite empty and utterly silent. An amuse bouche of slivers of what appeared to be gravadlax was delicious, though it would have been nice to have had the wine served with it, and not to have had to wait for a small bread roll until I had almost expired with hunger....though I must admit that it was freshly baked and delicious.

A starter of fish soup was adequate but served lukewarm and the pitiful portion of rouille and cheese - shared between two as well - was a disappointment.

The piece of beef I had chosen as a main course was perfectly cooked (by which I mean it was 'a point' French-style, i.e., medium rare to a Brit). It was tender, flavoursome, everything a piece of beef should be...but it cried out for a more suitable friend on the plate that a large and rather stodgy disc of mashed potato. (In fact, closer scrutiny of them menu revealed several other mains served "Parmentier" i.e., with some mashed spud. Easy on the kitchen, not great on the plate.) There were no other vegetables, and indeed one begins to believe that the mounds of fresh produce piled high in the markets every day are being somehow transformed into something quite different to food....models of Tracy Island perhaps, or the Palace of Versailles made entirely out of root veg.? Has no-one told them about five portions a day? Anyone eating out on a regular basis in France would be lucky to manage five portions in a fortnight.

Come back, haricots verts, all is forgiven. At one point you were ubiquitous, now you are conspicuous by your absence.

I should have mentioned earlier that the staff at the St George speak no English but that the menu is in French with English translations. So when I had ordered the Fondant au Chocolat I had glanced at the translation, as a fondant in France used to be something quite different from the hot pudding which is now almost a cliche in England. (Though the first time I ever ate one, was at the now-defunct and much-mourned Auberge du Pont au Bray, and extremely good it was too.)

I was reassured to see the English words "molten chocolate cake" and ordered it accordingly. I was also heartened by the insistence of the staff that we ordered our desserts at the start of the meal, as a hot chocolate fondant is obviously cooked to order. When it arrived, however, it was the disappointing but traditionally cold (as in icy cold, bring out the Sensodyne) slab of solid mousse. What a blow! And a swizz as well, so that I was at pains to point out to the staff that using words like "molten" of an extremely cold pud might led to heated arguments, or even worse.

They reacted with supercilious sneers - this was a fondant, Madame, no doubt about it, whatever drivel had been written en Anglais, not their responsibility at all.
Fuming, I ate it, feeling like bursting into tears.

The total bill, for two people, including two Kirs and a bottle of Beaujolias Villages, came to 107 euros. (Earlier in the week the ever-reliable Relais de la Poste at St Hilaire du Harcouet has produced another exceptional lunch with a plat du jour of succulent roast smoked pork, as part of the set three-course meal for 14 euros.)

Verdict: value for money - 3/10 service - 2/10 quality of food - 4/10 (for the beef)

Put that in your snap tin? No thanks!

September 2009

The George and Dragon, Wentworth, South Yorkshire

This is a smashing little pub in an historic estate village (the estate in question belonging to the Wentworth family) but unfortunately whoever is responsible for the catering has decided to embrace the kind of pretentiousness that makes Polyanna's blood boil (and perfectly illustrates that fine word butter no parsnips). I make no attempt to reproduce the descriptions of the food (written up on blackboards above the bar) but if I say that someone had clearly decided to have a go at South Yorkshire 'fusion' it may give some indication of what was to come.

I had lunch here with a couple of friends, one of whom happened to be out celebrating his 90th birthday. Not having an enormous appetite, he passed on the starters but I decided I could manage a bowl of vegetable soup and his son could not resist the lure of wild mushrooms in a creamy sauce on toasted brioche. The soup came with some kind of dark brown slobber running in zigzags across the top, and was thick enough to use as wallpaper paste. Which it largely resembled. Or rather, wallpaper paste with salt in it. If I had been a vegetarian I would have worried about the dark brown stuff as well, but as it was, I just worried that I would have to eat some of the enormous bowlful, if only to show willing.

The wild mushrooms were said to be excellent. As we had waited over half an hour for them and the soup, I was glad, but Birthday Boy was ready to eat a scabby donkey by this time. When the mains finally came (and only after I pursued the waitress to ask where they were), we had been waiting for an hour and fifteen minutes and Son of Birthday Boy was driving and could not have another pint. Which was a problem as he had ordered pork medallions on Thai potato salad (no, seriously) with a sweet chilli sauce. And the chilli sauce was hot. Even the dragon would have thought it was hot. It was light-blue-touchpaper-and-retire hot. Which would have been nice to know for those who are of faint heart when it comes to chilli. What the potato salad idea was all about was a mystery, especially as the spuds in question were also hot (by which I mean not cold, as in 'salad').

BB had gammon and egg, which arrived with the egg sitting on top of "pea puree" which in turn completely covered the (gristly) piece of gammon. We had seen this on the menu and thought it was a joke, but someone in the kitchen must have had a warped sense of humour. There was a bowl of chips that would have fed St George for a week, even after a particularly hard stint of slaying.

My beer-battered fish was so ordinary that it made me wish I had opted for one of the other jokes on the blackboards, just to have a laugh, but by now we were all desperate to get home before Son of BB spontaneously combusted. We could not have ordered a pudding in any case, as we had not brought our pyjamas.

I wanted to go into the kitchen and say, "Look here, this is a pub. A pub, right? So whose idea is it to serve up fourth-rate restaurant food of the weirdest kind, and muck up pub standards like gammon and egg? Not to mention make the punters wait this length of time for it." But anyone who could devise that menu and put posh mushy peas under a fried egg has got to be too bonkers to approach, especially as there would have been sharp implements about.
The bill came to over fifty quid, with three glasses of wine, and two pints of beer.

Verdict: value for money - 3/10 service - 0/10 quality of food - 2/10 (for the mushrooms)

Catching up time....

August 2009

A miscellany

It's been a long time since I had time to think about eating - or rather, write about it. Moving house is not only stressful but it's time-consuming and leaves no room for anything else. The dust still hasn't settled: I have one slipper, the pyjamas are in a box I haven't unpacked yet and most of my cookery books are yet to be located. The plumbers have left, and I now have hot water, but they will be back in a week (and then I will have no loo!). The electrician will be in residence after that. So in the meantime, I will do a quick roundup of meals eaten - usually in haste - over recent months.

The southernmost reaches of God's Own Country provided a couple of surprises. The George and Dragon, in Mexborough of all places, is a lovely homely pub with a friendly landlord, charming bar staff, good beer and a very acceptable pub food menu with real chips, proper shortcrust pastry pies (and a gravyboat) and a steak that is worth eating. Five minutes up the road in the oddly-spelt Cinamon restaurant in Swinton I ate a surprisingly good Lamb Haandi, which was tender, well-spiced and succulent. The Royal Electric Theatre (a former cinema unpromisingly grim from the outside but light, airy and modern within) offered the golden oldies of the Chinese restaurant world - crispy duck, beef with ginger and spring onions and honey roast pork - cooked and served competently.

Further North, the Black Horse at Asquith also offered proper chips. But their steak and kidney pie was almost inedible, with dry, tough, gristly meat, in gravy so salty that I could feel my blood pressure spiralling upwards with every mouthful. Waiting 35 minutes for a puff-pastry topping on a pre-cooked pie filling was not acceptable either. The sad little side dish of tasteless vegetables had clearly been reheated, and there was not a single spud. The excellent chips, strangely, came with the sandwich ordered by my mother-in-law (who kindly donated them to me). The waitress who served us was clearly trained in the Genghis Khan School of Charm. Definitely one to drive past in future, which is a pity as the views are spectacular and in days past it was a hostelry worth making a detour for.

After years of rural living, the idea of having a restaurant on the doors is a novelty. Brio's at Hornbeam Park, on the outskirts of Harrogate, was a Godsend after a stressful stint of unpacking boxes the day after the move. I had an excellent pizza (with my favourite toppings of ham and artichoke obligingly supplied), some good house wine and swift, friendly service. But how much pleasanter it would have been without the horrible brats at the next table! The father and doting grandparents of these spoilt little horrors allowed them to run amok noisily, climb on the comfy seats in a side area with their dirty feet, and throw food onto the floor, entirely unrebuked. In fact, the whole party simply ignored the hideous children as though they were not their responsibility.

After they had left, the poor waiter had to move the table and chairs to clear up the mess, using a dustpan and brush, and then clean the floor as well. When I commented, he said that they were regular customers who behaved like that on every visit. Come on, restaurant managers, put your collective feet down and refuse to put up with this! Customers like me are going to stop going to restaurants when other people's children make eating out a misery.

Further south, an evening flight meant a late arrival at the Premier Inn in Southampton in the pouring rain. With no desire to get wet feet again (and wearing my only pair of dry socks), I broke the habit of a lifetime and ate in the hotel restaurant. The very helpful waitress assured me that the dauphinois potatoes had been made that very day. Who could resist? (The alternative was boiled new potatoes, presumably cooked by Sir Walter Raleigh, and chips frozen at the last ice age.) Indeed, the dauphinois quite possibly had been made within the past 24 hours, but unfortunately with freshly-prepared wallpaper paste. After possibly the worst steak I have ever attempted to eat, I left a plate that looked as though it had received the loaves and fishes treatment - i.e., there was more left on it than when I started.

Breakfast was a more pleasant experience, which was fortunate as I was so hungry that - as one of my cousins used to say - I could have eaten a scabby donkey. Probably the one I pushed round my plate the night before. The croissants were fresh, crisp and I managed three, though I mourned the lack of anything resembling real jam.

That night it poured with rain again and after plodding round Southampton in search of anything more appealing than a kebab shop, a helpful passer-by told me that something resembling a restaurant quarter could be found on Oxford Street, and gave me directions. And so it proved, as the street concerned was almost continental in its dedication to food. After much indecision, I ate at Oxfords - which seemed to be buzzing with happy diners and had a jolly, bistro-type atmosphere.

As usual, when the starter arrived I felt that an invisible short straw had somehow been shoved into my soggy little hand. Surely anyone can produce a decent bruschetta which after all, is little more than tomatoes on toast? These tomatoes were lava-hot and soggy, with that total absence of flavour that only the British seem to be able to achieve. The belly pork that followed was reasonable enough, being tender and moist, with a genuinely crispy layer of cracking on top. But what idiot decided that it should be served on a mound of potatoes and cabbage, with not a drop of gravy or any other kind of lubrication to help it down? The glass of wine I had ordered had to be re-ordered, twice. It only arrived finally after I had almost brought the waitress down with a flying tackle as she passed my table, en route to flirting with the party of blokes at the next one.

The next morning, I looked forward to breakfast only to find that the croissants were dry, hard and were obviously left over from the day before.

Sometimes it's hard to be Pollyanna.

Mayfair madness

Corrigan's, Mayfair - a wet Wednesday night in January

I have to confess that I lurked outside the door of Corrigan's for several minutes feeling like a fourth-former waiting outside the head's office for a bollocking. Perhaps it was the carpet on the steps leading up to the restaurant (does someone actually hoover it?), or maybe it was just that the place looked generally too posh and intimidating for a nondescript female of slender means (but not personage).
I took courage from the fact that the night was young (just after 6.30 pm to be precise) and the place deserted, and that in the midst of a credit crunch, surely a few bob would be welcome even from the likes of Wurzel Gummidge. So I sidled in as unobtrusively as possible and requested "a table for one". (I always attempt to utter these words in a tone of ringing confidence, but they invariably seem to emerge in a craven whisper that suggests I am terribly sorry to put them out, and do feel free to sit me down next to the gents' toilet, and prop the door open with the bog brush whilst they are at it.)
The impossibly glamorous blonde girl with the pen and the Bob Cratchit ledger studied the latter gravely and then told me that as long as I was out by nine I could be accommodated. I sneaked a look round the cavernous interior, as yet entirely deserted, and assured her that by 9 p.m. I would be tucked up in bed watching the telly. She tried not to laugh and handed me over to another sublimely soigné individual, who seated me at a perfectly nice table nowhere near a toilet, but next to a lamp with ostrich legs and feathers but no head. I wondered if ostrich featured on the menu.
Numerous waiters wandered round looking supremely efficient and starched to the eyeballs. You only had to glance at the entire staff to know, with certainly, that there was not a single of flake of dandruff between the lot of them. A lovely young French lad made an appearance, all smiles, and I felt I would have been quite happy to adopt him or failing that, coat him in thyme and breadcrumbs and serve him pink.
Just as I began to think I had been transported to Stepford, a few reassuring little cracks appeared. Human beings did work here after all! I had ordered fish soup, and it arrived followed by a plate of undistinguished amuse bouches. When my bouche was already giddy with enjoyment. And when I had almost finished, bread, with some creamy, luscious unsalted butter. Heavenly bread, which was said to be soda bread by one of the Stepford brigade, but was totally unlike the putty-coloured doorstop dished up by my Aunt Julia in County Mayo. This was dark brown and speckled, moist, moreish and possibly more addictive than the stuff people pay good money to shove up their noses. But it should have come earlier. Much earlier.
The fish soup itself was quite simply the best I have ever had, better than the many bowlsful I have polished off in St Malo, Cancale, and various parts of the Brittany coast. It came in a plain white bowl, a rusty-coloured pool of fishy intensity with a depth of crustacean flavours, a crabby, shellfishy concoction to make one give thanks for living on an island. Every spoonful sang in the mouth. With it there was a bowl of garlic mayonnaise and a couple of perfectly golden, crisp slices of toasted French bread (three would have been better). I tried to make it last, I resisted the urge to lift the whole bowl up to mouth level and slurp it down, and I even managed to swallow the shrieks of delight that threatened to emerge after each spoonful. But I failed to curb the idiot grin that spread across my face, a grin that I was completely unaware of until the couple at the next table started to look at me nervously and mutter. In fact, if the Stepfords had carried in George Clooney reclining on a silver salver and clad only in a strategically-placed crouton, I am afraid I would have reached for the crouton and slathered on the last spoonful of mayonnaise.
At this point the man himself (Corrigan, not Clooney) emerged from the kitchen and sat down with a group of people at the table across the room, a picture of bonhomie. Here was the creator of this paragon of soups, a soup I would gladly eat every day of my life and never tire of. I briefly contemplated making an offer of marriage, discounted it immediately and then weighed up the possibility of kidnapping. With a smaller, lighter chef it might have been an option but this man clearly enjoyed his food - as who would not?
The smiling French lad appeared and enquired if everything was all right. I told him that should I ever be on Death Row, this would be my last order the night before the needle. He looked mystified, as well he might, not being aware that plans had almost been afoot to incarcerate his boss and force him to produce fish soup for all eternity to satisfy the appetites of a crazed Polyanna.
With reluctance I turned to my game suet pudding. Not because it was a disappointment but because the fish soup was now but a memory. The pudding was actually a thing of beauty in its own right, but compared with the soup it was like following Jane Austen with Bridget Jones. It was light, and the thin but plump little mound of suet pastry - full of tender morsels of game - sat in a bowl of rich brown gravy. Very nice. The buttered kale was fine. But the urge to sandbag the chef and drag him back to a hidden lair equipped with a fully-fitted kitchen (and an endless supply of conical sieves) was fading. And a good job too. If I had been able to afford the partridge, it might have been next stop Holloway.
I passed on the desserts, fearing not just the calorie content but the possibility of a life of crime.
I drank a glass of Chablis with the soup and one of Minervois with the game pudding.
The bill came to fifty quid, which seemed quite a lot (but then I am a Yorkshirewoman).
Verdict: value for money - 8/10 service - 7/10 (marked down for the bizarre mix-up over the amuse bouches and the bread) quality of food - 9/10 overall (15/10 for the soup or up there with the angels)

Le Boudin Blanc, Shepherd Market - the following night

Busy, buzzing and much less formal than Corrigan's, this place was full to bursting by 7 pm on the Thursday night I ate there. They managed to squeeze me in and I ordered, guess what, fish soup, more to simply reassure myself that the sublime concoction of the previous night really had been that good.
This time the bread arrived smartly, and the soup followed without much of a delay. With it was some not very gutsy rouille, some rather bland gruyere and some croutons, and it was all perfectly OK. The soup was fine, exactly the same standard as I last had in Granville in a restaurant overlooking the harbour. But it did not make me want to jump on the table and do a song and dance routine.
The confit of duck with a chorizo cassoulet was also pretty good, the skin crispy, the duck meltingly tender. There was possibly a little too much of the cassoulet and the beans could have done with an extra half an hour of cooking, but overall it was a toothsome plateful. With a side order of spinach, and a couple of glasses of wine, I ended up with a bill of forty quid, which is probably good value for Mayfair. And the place itself was jolly, with bags of atmosphere and a buzz.
Verdict: value for money - 8/10 service - 9/10 quality of food - 8/10

Christmas 2008

Roast at Borough Market

There were a lot of happy, smiling Christmas revellers at Roast on the day of my visit and it wasn't long before I was one of them. As a fully paid-up carnivore, there was nothing not to like about the place, and plenty of lovely meaty choices to go at. Though I did start with crabcakes and squid, and jolly nice they were too, the squid being very rapidly cooked in a crunchy, crispy coating so that it was perfectly tender. I hate the overcooked rings of inner tube normally dished up as squid but this was the real deal and the crabcakes were yummy little morsels too.
I am happy to say that the belly pork (yes, how predictable I am) was pretty much up to my own standard, tender, moist and rich, cooked so that the fat had melted away and the crackling was, well, cracking. I can also report that the partridges were perfectly cooked as colleague to the left of me ordered them and was somewhat overfaced by the two that appeared so I helped out. There is nothing quite like gnawing on a partridge leg to get one in a Christmassy mood, not a pear tree in sight and a bloody good job too.

Side dishes of veg were universally liked, the red cabbage being a particular favourite. When it came to puddings most of us were too stuffed to even contemplate the menu but I managed a few darkly degenerate spoonfuls of chocolate pot, again to help out a work colleague (I call it teambuilding myself - and now have the waistband to prove it) and it packed enough of a cocoa punch to satisfy even me.

I didn't pay or even see the bill so it would be unfair to give marks out of ten, but I will simply conclude by saying that if anyone out there is going to Roast and wants an extra body to make up the numbers, GET IN TOUCH NOW.

And the view from the windows, no matter where you sit, is great.