Author: jamesclay

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Pretentious Cortado

I went out for a walk and decided to try the new coffee place on Victoria Street, in Bristol. It is called Origin. I wanted to try it, partly as it was new, and partly as that as I was using their app, I could get a free coffee.

Inside the clean, bright minimalist space, there was the serving counter and some tables and chairs. Not so sure about the environment. I think it needs some more tables and chairs. 

The choice of pastries was limited but the barista did say that would expand at a later date.

I ordered a Cortado. I wasn’t hungry, so didn’t order anything to eat. I took a seat and they bought my coffee over.

It was a beautifully made Cortado, in a lovely ceramic cup. It was a little pretentious, but I kind of expected this kind of coffee when I walked in.

It was a nice coffee, not my favourite flavour of coffee, but I enjoyed it. I certainly would consider going again.

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Time for another Fiorentina

I was up in York for a few days and I was looking for a place for lunch, where I could sit down for a while and check work stuff and do emails and the suchlike.

I had a notification from the Pizza Express app that they had a £7.99 deal for a classic pizza, so I thought, that’s good value and I will be able to sit for a while. I’ve done this deal before at the Pizza Express in Ealing.

I headed to the branch of Pizza Express in York by the River Ouse. There was lots of room, so I chose a table by the window. I looked over the menu and looked at the classic pizza, as this what was on offer with the app. I went with the Classic Fiorentina Pizza.

The one with the ‘egg and spinach’, plus mozzarella, tomato, Gran Milano cheese, black olives and garlic oil. 

The egg was slightly overdone for my liking, but not by much. I’ve had this pizza many times and this was a nice pizza. It’s quite a simple pizza, but I like it.

I did feel that the service was a little over-attentive, but it wasn’t that intrusive.

This was a nice place to eat, the offer made it good value, and I had a tasty pizza.

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Not quite my usual bento box

It was a Friday, the sun was shining, it wasn’t raining, there was no wind, which meant that the Finzel Reach street food market was running. They had cancelled Wednesday’s market due to the weather.

My usual choice when having a bento box from the She Sells Sushi stall is to have the beef donburi and a crispy chicken hirata bao bun. I decided I would still go for the beef donburi, but I would have the sweet potato hirata bun instead of my usual chicken one.

The beef was delicious as usual. It is tasty tender beef rib on a bed of sushi rice and served with pickle and crispy onion.

This a street food dish I have had many times, as this was as good as I’ve had on previous visits. The beef was full of flavour and the garnishes added to the dish.

The hirata bun was nice, but to be honest the sweet potato was just slices of cooked sweet potato. These were inside a charcoal bao bun with some lettuce, pickles and sauce. Not sure that added much, I think I would have preferred the crunchy texture of the chicken.

Overall though, I did like my lunch and it was very tasty.

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Small cod, well that was what I ordered

As I was just going to call the title of this blog, Small Cod I realised that people may think that this was a criticism, actually I ordered small cod and chips, so that is what I got.

We were on a day out to Minehead, travelling their on the excellent West Somerset Railway. I had planned to go somewhere for lunch, didn’t do too much planning, but had a few ideas.

Despite a lovely sunny morning, the clouds looked menacing, so the idea of fish and chips on the beach was looking like a no.

Walking up down The Avenue, there were a few choices, but in the end we went to The Cod Shop.

It would have been nice to sit outside, but it had started to rain, so we sat inside.

It was a really nice decor inside, there was a blue and white seaside theme throughout the restaurant. I thought it was really nice calming environment.

Took a table and looked over the menu. It was lunchtime, and I wasn’t overtly hungry (having just spent two hours sitting on a train) I went with the small cod special. This was a small cod, chips, a side, a dip, and a drink. I had mushy peas and mayonnaise with my cod. It wasn’t long before our food arrived.

The cod had a lovely crisp batter, and the fish was well cooked. The chips were a little underdone for me. The cod was a rather small portion, but that is what I ordered, why should I be surprised that the fish was on the small side. I did though enjoy the fish and chips.

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cha han shichimi tofu

The Wagamama at Cribbs Causeway has been extended and expanded since I last went there. It is now much bigger, but it is just as popular.

With no system for booking a table, we queued, waiting for table to be free. The queue moved quite quickly.

We were shown to a table and I looked over the menu. I have had yasai yaki soba quite a few times recently so decided to go with something different. I had the cha han shichimi tofu. This was  stir fried brown rice cooked in a sweet and sticky sauce with shichimi tofu, mushrooms, red onion, red pepper, cucumber, sweetcorn and edamame beans. topped with coriander cress, crispy fried onions and Japanese pickles.

I really enjoyed the dish. This was a vegan dish, and over the last few years when eating at Wagamama I have usually picked the vegan dishes. I think part of the reason is that the “meat” option is not very inspiring, usually chicken, but in the main the vegan options are really tasty, and cheaper! You could have had this dish with chicken, but the tofu option was £1.50 cheaper, and in my opinion the shichimi tofu was really good. The crisp outside was nice and crunchy with some spice, the soft tofu was a lovely contrasting texture. The rice and sauce was delicious, and actually the tofu in this case was more of a garnish than a core component of the dish. I would like to have had more mushrooms, actually I think their new crispy mushrooms would be a great option on this dish.

I was a little disappointed that our food didn’t arrive at the same time, I know that is the operating model for Wagamama, but even so the delay between our dishes was quite lengthy. My son had his dish for quite a while before my food arrived, and then there was a further delay before the final three dishes arrived. Not as bad as another table, where their side dish arrived well after they had finished their main courses. So much so they had to take it home.

I think part of the issue was that the restaurant had a lot of Deliveroo type orders so was busy cooking those. Similar experience I guess to when we went to Edinburgh.

Overall we had a nice meal, the place was busy, but the service was attentive. It was noticeable though how the number of takeaway and delivery orders were impacting on the service to the customers who were actually sitting down in the restaurant. We know that there has been a huge growth in the demand for these services during the pandemic, but I am not so sure that restaurants have worked out how to manage the whole process, especially now that there are more people going out to eat in the actual restaurant.

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Why the slice of orange?

I was staying in York and was thinking about where to eat. I had seen La Terrazzina when out walking on previous evenings and I had been intrigued by the menu.

They describe themselves as

Welcome to La Terrazzina, the best Italian, Mediterranean & Asian restaurant in York! Our restaurant offers a unique and exciting dining experience that combines the flavors and aromas of Italian, Mediterranean, and Asian cuisine.

This was intriguing.

So I walked from my hotel down to the restaurant and I went to read the menu outside, at which point one of the waiting staff came outside and invited me in. This is something that I had seen in Portugal, Spain, and other places where I had been on holiday, not something I have seen very often in the UK. As I was pretty much made up in my mind that I was going to eat there, I went in and sat down.

One of the reasons I liked the idea of eating here was they had rack of lamb on the menu, so I was pretty much happy to order that.

I was given some bread and butter, which I had to return as the butter had mould on it. Well it looked like mould. It was replaced with some fresh bread and butter.

My lamb arrived.

This wasn’t though a rack of lamb, these were grilled lamb cutlets.  The lamb came with vegetables and potatoes, gravy, and a slice of orange. Not sure what the orange was about. I’ve had orange with duck, but never with lamb! The vegetables were al dente, and it was a good sized portion.

The lamb was cooked, slightly overdone for me. I think I would have preferred a “proper” rack of lamb that had been browned in a pan and then finished off by being roasted in the oven. Then carved into cutlets. The other option would have been to describe the dish as lamb cutlets.

Overall it was a nice dish.

Service was attentive and polite. The place doesn’t have an alcohol licence, but there is a Sainsburys Local next door, so you can pop there for wine or beer.

Still not sure about the orange slice.

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Quick Cortado

cup of coffee

Sometimes I feel a flat white can be a bit rich for me, I do like having a Cortado. Reminds me of the flat white coffee I had in Auckland back when I visited there in 2009.

As it is a smaller coffee , this makes it a great choice when making a quick break on a journey. I had this Cortado at the Costa at Ferrybridge Services. It was actually quite good. I have in the past had some poor coffee experiences at motorway services, so it was nice to have a decent coffee, while I took a break.

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Retro Ice Cream

Seeing this vintage ice cream poster reminded me of the ice creams I would have back then.

Retro Ice Cream poster

My overriding memory was having the rectangular cornet. Probably because it was 5p and was one of the cheapest ice creams from the van or the fridge. I do recall thinking how nice it would be to have a round cornet with a scoop of ice cream. Of course today that is the norm.

The other thing I don’t see today very often is the choc ice.

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Which of these are Italian?

So I got a marketing email from Bella Italia. Now my experience of Bella Italia is that this is a chain restaurant serving Italian food, in the main pizza and pasta.

So I was a little surprised to see these options promoted on their new menu.

Nachos, well not quite, but pretty much nachos and salsa.

BBQ ribs with fries, no attempt here to even Italianise the dish!

Hickory or Buffalo chicken wings, with pecorino cheese.

I kind of understand that they want to widen the appeal of the menu, but I personally don’t think this is the way. They already have burgers on the menu, so these add to the non-Italian choices available.

I guess they did some marketing, and people were saying (or complaining) about the limited menu choices for those that don’t like pizza or pasta. Though if I was going out to eat and I didn’t want pizza or pasta, I wouldn’t go to Bella Italia.

I also think there are lots of Italian dishes which aren’t pizza or pasta which could be on the menu. For example there is only one fish dish on the menu, there are lots of Italian fish dishes out there. I guess, knowing how these chains operate that cooking Italian dishes fresh to order isn’t how the kitchen process works. 

I was just a little surprised to see American dishes such as wings and ribs on the new menu.

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An unplanned fish finger sandwich

I never planned to visit The Red Lion in Alvechurch in northeast Worcestershire. It was one of those unplanned journeys that arose due to a range of circumstances.

My original plan had been quite simple. I was on my way back from York and was travelling south on the motorway network. I had planned to stop at the Hopwood services on the M42, have an online call, grab something to eat, and charge my electric car, before heading home.

However due to earlier traffic issues on the A1(M) and some other reasons I was running later than planned. As a result I ended up at Tamworth Services. Alas the charger was in use. So I couldn’t charge my car while I had my online call. After finishing my meeting the charger was still in use so I headed back down on the M42. 

I knew the Hopwood Services were about twenty miles further down the M42, so would stop there to charge and grab some lunch. I stopped off at Hopwood services and was frustrated to see their charger was also in use. I had planned to charge the car and grab some lunch. 

Needing a charge I used the built-in sat nav to give me directions to the nearest charger. This was just over two miles away, there was a charger at The Red Lion in Alvechurch. So off I drove to the pub. The charger was available, so after connecting the car and setting it to charge I went into the pub. This was a lovely pub, with lots of wooden beams, comfy chairs.

I found a menu on a table and looked it over. They had quite an extensive choice. There was lots of things I was tempted by.  The seared fillets of sea bass with a pea & crispy bacon velouté, steamed broccoli and spring onion mash sounded delicious. I also liked the sound of the Duo of Lamb, tender lamb rump served medium and a hearty shepherd’s pie, with Tenderstem® broccoli and a red wine & rosemary jus. 

However I didn’t want to spend a fortune, I wasn’t that hungry, and I only really wanted something light. In the end I went with the Fish Finger Bap. Beer-battered fish goujons and tartare sauce on a rustic roll. I also ordered a ginger beer.

I had excellent service at the bar and after paying I sat down.

It wasn’t long and my plate of food arrived.

This was an excellent looking plate of food. The roll was warm and fresh. The beer-battered fish goujons were crisp on the outside, the fish was succulent and tasty. I also enjoyed the fries that came with the sandwich. I would say that the pea shoots which came as a garnish, didn’t look exactly fresh, they were a little tired and yellow. Kind of glad I didn’t for for the salad instead of fries. Despite the pea shots, I really enjoyed the food, it was tasty and delicious. 

Having charged the car, it was then back on my drive home. I often stop at the Hopwood services for a break when travelling, I think in future I will make the relative short detour to Alvechurch and visit The Red Lion again.