Tag: london

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Artisan Coffee

Artisan Coffee

I was in Ealing and decided to have a coffee. There are quite a few places to get a coffee, both the big chains and independents. I had originally gone to Caffe Nero, but there was a big queue and only one barista making coffee. I then remembered across the road was an independent coffee place, Artisan Ealing.

It was quite busy, but there wasn’t much of a queue, so I didn’t have long to wait. I was quite tempted by the cakes, but in the end I went with a cortado.

After getting my coffee I took a seat. I liked the environment with the wooden floors and furniture. The paintings added to the ambience, and I liked the paper bag lights.

The coffee was excellent.

This was a really nice place for coffee. Good service, great coffee, relaxing environment, and a nice selection of cakes.

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Back to Master Bao

It had been a while since I had eaten at Master Bao. I really do enjoy a good bao bun and my first encounter with the Master Bao eatery at Westfield was back in December 2019 and a return visit in January 2020. I then made a visit back in September 2021.

So on a recent trip to London and needing some lunch I headed to the Westfield Shopping Centre. I did look around, but in the end headed to Master Bao.

I went with the meal deal of two bao buns and a side. I ordered the Prawn Bao and the Shiitake Mushroom Bao. The side I chose was fried vegetable dumplings.

The Prawn Bao contained marinated king prawns, fried, pickled mooli, spiced spring onions.

The prawns were nice and crispy, I liked the additions, and the bun was soft and fluffy. A really lovely bao bun.

Whilst the Shiitake Mushroom Bao had teriyaki shiitake mushrooms, pickled onions, miso.

Really nice mushrooms, with a strong savoury flavour, which contrasted with the soft fluffy bao.

I’ve had both these bao before and these were just as good, nice and tasty.

The vegetable dumplings had been fried.

I think they would have been better steamed, and then potentially fried in a pan. They were a little too crispy for me, I mainly prefer my dumplings steamed.

Nice lunch.

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Pan-Fried Lemon Pepper Chicken Breast

I had been staying at Drayton Court and had wanted the pan-fried lemon pepper chicken breast, but they had run out, so had gone with the Norfolk chicken schnitzel with Caesar salad. 

So on a later visit it was nice to see the pan-fried lemon pepper chicken breast still on the menu and it was available, so I ordered this as my main course. It was described on the menu as pan-fried lemon pepper chicken breast with courgette Parmesan fritters, prosciutto crisps and warm garlic slaw.

Pan-Fried Lemon Pepper Chicken Breast

It was a beautifully presented plate of food and I was really impressed.

The chicken was cooked perfectly and was full of flavour. I liked the warm garlic slaw. The prosciutto crisps were interesting and added texture and an element of saltiness to the food. I have to say though I was less impressed with the courgette Parmesan fritter. Mine was not crisp and felt laden with grease, so much so I didn’t actually finish it. However, apart from the fritter, I did enjoy the dish.

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South Coast Pork Chop

Fox and Goose

I was in London and staying at the Fox and Goose close to Hangar Lane. The restaurant is in the older part of the hotel, as the hotel part is now a new build at the back.

The menu changes every so often, and they always seem to have a range of choices, that means it can be difficult to choose what to have. Having looked over the menu I went with the South Coast pork chop, served with smoked mushroom, grilled tomato, onion rings and triple cooked chips.

The pork chop was cooked well, it was seasoned, and grilled to my liking. It was tender and moist. I couldn’t taste any smoke on the mushroom, but that and the tomato were nice. The chips were crispy on the outside and fluffy in the inside. The batter on the onion rings was nice crispy, but I felt they were a little on the greasy side. The pork was served with a small saucepan of gravy (or was it a sauce). Not sure it added much to the dish.

I enjoyed the food.

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Lemon and Thyme Roast Chicken

I was in London and staying at the Fox and Goose close to Hangar Lane. This is a Fullers Hotel and is part of the same chain at Drayton Court, which I have also stayed at.  The restaurant is in the older part of the hotel, as the hotel part is now a new build at the back. Despite being part of the same chain, they do have different menus. Their version of chicken was different to Drayton Court. So after having had my prawn cocktail starter I had the lemon and thyme roast chicken.

This was lemon and thyme roast chicken served on chorizo, courgettes, red onion and cannellini beans.

lemon and thyme roast chicken served on chorizo, courgettes, red onion and cannellini beans

The chicken was really good, full of flavour, moist and tender. You could taste the chicken, and the lemon and thyme enhanced the flavour.

The chicken was served on a bed of chorizo, courgettes, red onion and cannellini beans. The beans were a little overcooked, but the chorizo was excellent, large chunks of soft spicy chorizo.

Overall I really enjoyed this dish and would certainly order it again.

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Smoked Salmon and Prawn Cocktail

When I go somewhere to eat and if there is a specials board, I do like to try something from the board, as if I go again, it probably won’t be on the menu again. Not all places have a specials board, and most chains don’t. Of course you then have something like Bills where the menu changes on a regular basis, they probably don’t need a specials board.

I am a semi-regular visitor to a couple of Fullers’ hotels in London, Drayton Court and the Fox and Goose. Now and again they will have a specials board (or menu). On a recent visit to the Fox and Goose they had their specials board and I had a look over it. 

Specials board

Two of the items on the board were standard menu items, they were just telling punters what the soup was and what the pie was.

The chicken shnitzel (sic) was something I had before at Drayton Court. I did though quite like the sound of the starter on the specials board. 

Fullers’ London porter smoked salmon & prawn cocktail with Bloody Mary sauce and sourdough. So I went with that.

Smoked Salmon and Prawn Cocktail

The dish arrived, without the bread! So I asked and out it came. It was a large sized starter, bigger than I thought it would be.

I did think that the smoked salmon was more like smoked mackerel. This wasn’t slices of smoked salmon, more chunks of salmon.

The prawns were plentiful and good. I did wonder about the sauce, I didn’t really taste the vodka in there, and I felt there needed to be more sauce. I did like the addition of the cucumber and the tomato.

I think the sourdough could have benefited from being toasted, it felt slightly stale and dry.

Overall it was an interesting dish and an interesting interpretation of a prawn cocktail. I think though it could have been a much better dish with a few tweaks.

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Chicken Schnitzel Caesar Salad

I was staying over at the Drayton Court Hotel in West Ealing. This is a place I stay regularly when working away in London.

For my starter I had gone with the Beef Short Rib Bao Buns and had wanted the pan-fried lemon pepper chicken breast for my main course, but they had run out, so I went with the Norfolk chicken schnitzel with Caesar salad, anchovies and Parmesan.

It wasn’t my first choice because I didn’t really want a schnitzel. I thought it might be quite dry.

When the dish arrived it did look rather good.

Chicken Schnitzel Caesar Salad

The chicken schnitzel was on the bottom of the plate and placed on top was some baby gem lettuce, croutons, anchovies, and dressed with a Caesar salad dressing.

I really enjoyed the Caesar salad aspect of the dish, but the chicken schnitzel really let the dish down, it was slightly overcooked and as a result was quite dry. I think the dish would have worked better with a chargrilled chicken breast rather than the chicken schnitzel.

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Ô Craquelin Pâtisserie

As I walk around London there are quite a few posh looking pâtisserie shops selling exquisite cakes and pâtisserie. I might look in the window, but I rarely spend my pennies (well pounds) in there.

I was having a look around the TooGoodToGo app and saw that Ô Craquelin Pâtisserie had a magic bag. £18 of cakes for £6. I checked their website and quite liked the look of their offerings. I saw this magic bag as an opportunity to try out the cakes without spending a large amount of money.

Ô Craquelin Pâtisserie is a specialist pâtisserie close to Covent Garden. It describes itself as a micro-pâtisserie offering modern, hand-crafted desserts.

I had to wait around a bit to pick it up after work, but it was a nice sunny day.

I was given a warm welcome and went inside and told them I had a TooGoodToGo deal. After tapping and swiping, they popped into the fridge for a box, for a second I thought that was all I was going to get, then they picked up another box. I got a bag and placed them both in there.

Overall I got four cakes. Two chilled fresh cakes and two ambient cakes.

Now I actually have no idea what I actually got, as there were no labels. Now checking their website I can check what I had.

This was the Matcha Orange canapé.

Orange Madeleine enclosed within matcha mousse with white chocolate sable. It was quite nice, and you could taste the orange.

This was the 100% Pistachio canapé.

Pistachio Financier, pistachio cream and pistachio sable. This one I did guess as pistachio and was similar to the Matcha Orange canapé. I didn’t feel it had that intensity of pistachio flavour I would expect from pistachio pâtisserie.

I also got these two pâtisserie, which I have no idea what they were.

This was very nutty.

This had nuts and ganache.

Both were very nice.

I did enjoy the pâtisserie, but I am not sure I would go out of my way to get them again. They were good, but maybe I had high expectations, I was expecting excellence, what I got was delicious, great looking pâtisserie. What I didn’t get was an amazing pâtisserie experience. Maybe it might have been different if I went to the cafe there and had the pâtisserie with coffee, soaking in the atmosphere and the ambiance.

I quite like TooGoodToGo as a mechanism to try places out, see what they sell and how good it is. So in this instance, yes I felt I got a good deal, nice cakes, but would I go back, probably not.

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Ye Olde London

This was not a planned meal, I had been attending a training course in London and a few of us decided to head out for a beer and a meal.

We ended up at Ye Olde London, a Greene King pub situated on Ludgate Hill in the City of London close to the spectacular St Paul’s cathedral.

We went downstairs and I looked over the menu, lots of pub food. I chose the 28-day aged flat iron steak served with rosemary & sea-salted fries, blistered vine tomatoes and salsa verde.

The steak was pre-sliced and was was cooked well. I quite like a flat iron steak. Not sure if there was any rosemary on the fries, but they were nice and crisp. The salsa verde was fresh and zingy.

Overall I liked the plate of food and we had excellent service.

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So, no fish on the menu then!

I was staying over at the Drayton Court Hotel in West Ealing. This is a place I stay regularly when working away in London.

Went down for dinner, the menu changes regularly, and the sea bass had been recently added. I was going to have the fish tacos followed by the sea bass. However, both weren’t available. So, I had steak and chips instead.

This was described on the menu as Owton’s dry-aged 8oz rib eye steak with triple-cooked chips, grilled tomato, baked field mushroom and peppercorn sauce.

Owton's dry-aged 8oz rib eye steak with triple-cooked chips, grilled tomato, baked field mushroom and peppercorn sauce.

The plate looked good with the sauce coming separately in a miniature saucepan. The steak was excellent, and much better than some of the steaks I have had at Drayton Court Hotel. It was cooked well and reasonably well seasoned, I did add a little more seasoning. I liked the chips, tomato, and mushroom as well.

Overall it was a really nice plate of food.