Tag: gammon steak

Posted on

Ultimate Grill

When staying away I sometimes go out to eat and sometimes eat in the hotel. If it is a place like Drayton Court where the bar and restaurant are quite busy, then the place has atmosphere, making it a nice place to eat. Sometimes though the hotel restaurant can be empty, cold, and uninviting. This was certainly the case when staying at the Link Hotel in Loughborough. The restaurant was empty. I was charging my car, so looked locally for a place to eat, next door was a Harvester. Now I have never been to a Harvester before, so this was going to be an interesting experience.

Compared to the hotel this restaurant was bustling and busy. They however found me a table and I sat down and looked over the menu.

I wasn’t sure what to have, but looked over the different dishes. I was feeling quite hungry, so I decided to be greedy and went with the Ultimate Mixed Grill.

This was a quarter portion of rotisserie chicken, 8oz rump steak, a half rack of BBQ-glazed ribs, 7oz gammon, two pork sausages, two fried free-range eggs and two black pudding slices, chips, garden peas, tomato and onion rings.

I will be honest this was one big plate of food, and I thought I had made a mistake in ordering it.

I did make a visit to the salad bar, for my free salad bowl. I didn’t get a huge salad, as I knew I was getting a lot of food with the grill. There was a lot in there and I quite liked what I ate. Most of it was nice. The chicken was a little dry, but I have found that  rotisserie chicken can be quite dry anyhow. The gammon was nice, as was the steak. The BBQ-glazed ribs were very tender and the meat fell off the bones. Wasn’t that enamoured with the sausages, and though I like black pudding, I felt that it wasn’t needed on the plate. I liked the addition of the chips and onion rings, the chips were cooked, and I enjoyed the three crispy battered onion rings.

In the end I did eat a lot, but I didn’t finish the plate. It was an interesting experience, and I did like the food, but I am not sure I would order that dish again, it was way too much food.

Would I visit a Harvester again, not sure. If I didn’t have anywhere else to go, and the only other choice was an empty hotel restaurant, then I think I would go back to the Harvester.

Posted on

Dinner at 125mph

Though I have eaten on trains before, on a recent journey from London to Edinburgh was the first time I have been served a proper chef cooked dinner on a train. 

Most of my train travel is with GWR in and around Bristol and into London. Catering on those trains is either non-existent, or through a trolley service. 

Back in the day when GWR was First Great Western, and they used the classic HST trains to London, I do remember that you could get a cooked breakfast from the buffet car, but that was back in 2007.

LNER essentially use the same Hitachi trains that GWR use but do make more use of the onboard kitchens. Some services provide hot food, but on the odd service you get the chef, who will cook you a meal.

When I was travelling the chef cooked meal was gammon, mash and savoy cabbage with a cider sauce.

This was gammon steak from Taste Tradition served with chive mashed potatoes, savoy cabbage and a creamy cider sauce. 

When you consider this was prepared at 125mph and served on a train, it was a nice meal. The gammon was gammon, but it was tender and not too salty. I liked the mash and the cabbage. The cider sauce was okay, but to be honest I couldn’t taste much cider.

This certainly isn’t a meal I would order in a pub or a restaurant, but as the only real option on a late (but fast) train to Edinburgh from London, it was nice to have a proper plate of food instead of a sandwich and a packet of crisps.

I was going to have dessert, the vanilla sponge with raspberry jam centre served with custard. However, they ran out before I could have some, so I never got to try that.