Restaurants Archives - Page 6 of 9

No 5 Bridge Street at Winchester

February 6, 2014 By All That I'm Eating 6 Comments

I love a trip to Winchester; I always forget how big and yet small it is. That sounds a bit weird but I always forget about the other smaller roads that come off the main street that house some great independent shops and restaurants. We walked past No 5 Bridge Street on our way in and I thought it looked nice and suave, we went back around lunchtime to check out the menu and it all sounded great. The kind of food I wish I could be bothered to cook at home and here it all was, ready to eat. Lots of local produce on offer it was hard to know what to order. You have to check out the below menu because it looks and sounds great. Nibbly bits, light meals, mains and grills all full of potential. I really liked the layout and decor in the restaurant; I wish I’d got a picture but there were too many people around as it was absolutely rammed. When a restaurant is full of people it’s normally a good sign. The other thing I really liked was that you could reserve a table, but, if they were all booked there were plenty of tables in the bar areas. The staff were all very nice, if not a little rushed, and we sat down to peruse the offerings. Sadly for us, and our wallets, potential was all there was. The presentation of the below bread with dukkah, olives and rapeseed oil was lovely. The experience of eating it, not so much. If you’re serving bread with thick crusts, I think the crusts have to be crusty rather than chewy. I also think the bread should be a little bit warmed. This bread was dry and chewy. The dukkah was very nice as were the olives. The falafel smelled fantastic and it looked good. Unfortunately the chickpeas were either not soaked or cooked for long enough or were too chunky because the flavour was quite raw and a bit unpleasant. The hummus was excellent.

I have a bit of an issue with barbecue sauce; I only like some of them. I love pulled pork and the sound of ‘pulled pork burger, toasted brioche bun, ranch dressed slaw, our BBQ sauce and skinny fries’ sounded right up my street. They were only too happy for me to have the sauce on the side which I know is a bit of an unusual ask. The portion size of the meal was actually quite small, maybe I’m greedy, but the other meal ordered (more on that in a minute) also seemed quite small. Maybe they just have really big plates.
The pork in my bun was actually a bit cold and the bottom of my bun really soggy. It seemed like all the pork in the kitchen is ready to go with barbecue sauce already on it (which makes sense) and when my request came in they washed it under a tap and didn’t dry it very well. The whole thing just got soggier and soggier as I ate it. I did like their barbecue sauce (I know I’m picky) so ended up putting some of it on the bun after all! Ranch dressing is one of my favourites but the ranch dressed slaw didn’t have much taste at all; even the vegetables. All in all, for something that sounded punchy and interesting it was actually a little disappointing. Maybe part of it was my fault but I think all the components of the meal should be equally as good as each other and taking just one away shouldn’t make that much of a difference.
The other meal at the table was ‘Chestnut flour suet pudding, wild mushroom stuffed, truffle mash and mushroom gravy’. You can never really make a suet pudding look good but as they go, this one looked pretty appetising. The suet pastry was overly sweet and very dry, the sweetness could have worked really well with the earthy mushrooms but it was just a bit too much. The pudding was absolutely full of mushrooms so they weren’t at all skimping on the stuffing but somehow they lacked a real depth of flavour. The mash was ok and the gravy was ultimately there to act as a lubricant because it didn’t taste of much either. We left disappointed which is not the feeling you want after a meal. read more

A Trip to Cambridge

January 2, 2014 By All That I'm Eating 14 Comments

I really rather like Cambridge. I’ve been up a few times now and I think it has to be one of my favourite cities. You’re never quite sure what is going to face you round every corner; some wonderful architecture, a cobbled street, a garden or a glimpse of the river. I think part of Cambridge’s charm is that so much has been discovered there and is still being discovered today. Behind every window you pass someone could be uncovering the answer to a question that has puzzled everyone for years. read more

A Trip to Cornwall

November 10, 2013 By All That I'm Eating 11 Comments

It’s a few hours in the car for us to get down to Cornwall. My other half’s grandmother lives there so it’s always nice to go down to see her and smell the sea air. On this particular adventure we arrived to the smell of fresh baking in the house and discovered that we were to be treated to a Cornish feast. The first evening comprised saffron buns (bready, a glorious orange and with saffron and dried fruit), figgy hobbin (sultanas wrapped in pastry coated in sugar) and sausage rolls. We were informed that the sausage rolls were a test bake to check that the pastry would be good enough for the incredible and massive pasties that we had the next day. What a welcome.

I like all the names of places you see as you drive around Cornwall. My particular favourite is the ‘Atlantic Highway’ as it conjures up such optimistic visions of an incredible road surrounded by sea but in reality it’s just like any other bit of tarmac. Still, good to say you’ve been on it. The views (as you can see) are good from wherever you are; blue skies (we were quite lucky), sea and green fields. As we were only down for a few days we tried to cram as much in as possible. We started with a trip to the Wadebridge Wine Shop which sells some amazing wines from all over the world, beers, ciders and spirits; they have two Cornish gins available there too. read more

PipsDish at Covent Garden

October 20, 2013 By All That I'm Eating 8 Comments

From the outside the PipsDish

restaurant in Covent Garden looks simple and understated, welcoming and homely. Inside is a similar story with a few wooden tables and chairs and big kitchen at the end. The kitchen gave me pretty bad kitchen envy with the piles of crockery on the huge shelves. It’s a nice place to be as there’s plenty to look at as people bustle around and you start to notice the fresh ingredients and food dotted around the place. read more

New Menu from The Rising Sun at Stockcross

October 9, 2013 By All That I'm Eating 3 Comments

I’ve not done this before but there is a first time for everything; a second review of somewhere I’ve reviewed before. The Rising Sun at Stockcross has never served me anything other than perfection so it is with great pleasure that I can share their new menu with you. I haven’t tried it yet but I plan to try each and every one of the following:

Starters
Rabbit faggots with roasted parsnip puree and pickled carrots
Home cured salmon gravadlax with grated hen’s egg, horseradish and toasted soda bread
Soup of the day with toasted sourdough bread
Warm roasted beetroot, pickled walnut and goat’s curd salad
Country terrine with sweet pickled mushrooms and toasted soda bread

Mains
Roasted monkfish tail with dill mash, crispy home cured bacon and a pea and fennel stew
Beef cheek braised in Maggs Mild with smoked mash and roasted shallots
Pheasant kiev with herby garlic butter, Jerusalem artichoke puree, roasted potatoes and wild mushrooms
Home smoked haddock with braised chicory, broken potatoes, spinach sauce and a crispy hen’s egg
Jerusalem artichoke and wild mushroom pearl barley ‘risotto’ with artichoke chips

The only problem is knowing where to start! read more

A Trip to Bruges

August 29, 2013 By All That I'm Eating 6 Comments

We sat at my laptop around two weeks ago trawling the internet for some holiday inspiration. None came and so we adopted the ‘let’s just book whatever leaves next week’ attitude; a method I will most certainly be using again. We booked a three day trip to Bruges, getting there by Eurostar with a small a bag as possible (well, I still needed everything ever) and it was fantastic. There was plenty of chocolate, beer, waffles and sightseeing.

We had a great little guide book to the city and based our trip around that. Our hotel was a five minute walk from the station and about ten minutes from the city centre; to get to the centre was either through a park or cobbled back streets, each equally as picturesque.

One of the places I really wanted to visit was Cambrinus; a wooden and stained glass window bar which serves 400 different beers. I didn’t think I liked beer, after my trip to Bruges it turns out I do. We managed to sample 20 different beers between us in three days; good for the taste buds, bad for the belly.
The picture above shows the massive beer menu (left), the Delerium tasting beer selection (middle) and a passion fruit beer (right) with cheese and meat that you can order to nibble on. read more

Malmaison Reading

July 15, 2013 By All That I'm Eating 9 Comments

This was a gifted meal.

A leisurely lunch is a very enjoyable thing. Relaxing with some food and wine watching the world go by is something that I like to do. The experience is vastly improved if you happen to be on staycation and can sit there without a care in the world. That’s what I did when I went to Malmaison for lunch; I organised it with them for a time when I knew I could sit there without any time pressure. read more

A Trip to Yorkshire

June 12, 2013 By All That I'm Eating 11 Comments

Last year I wrote about a splendid trip to Brighton that I went on; this year I ventured up to Yorkshire to see what was happening up there. Apparently I drove right through the Yorkshire rhubarb triangle; I thought there might be a signpost or flashing lights or something but sadly not! The weather was typically British with some rain, a little wind and just enough sun. We stayed near a little village called Stamford Bridge which was our base to go out and visit: Harrogate, York and Whitby. read more

The Living Room at Oxford

May 17, 2013 By All That I'm Eating 9 Comments

This was a gifted meal. I like the size and feel of The Living Room; the long bar, the different seating areas, the grand piano. It’s a nice place to relax. The idea behind the new menu is all about presentation; quirky, unexpected or grand displays of food. It’s not very often I get a menu where I just can’t choose what to have. I wanted to try everything; buttermilk chicken wings, pulled pork burger, Moroccan lamb sandwich, ricotta and potato gnocchi to name a few. I thought the menu was well laid out, easy to navigate and extremely tempting.

Whenever I go out for a meal I have two main concerns; the desire for fullness and food envy. I hate it when I’ve chosen one dish and whoever I’m dining with has got something that makes me jealous. It’s embarrassing enough dribbling at their meal and sneaking a few morsels off their plate without your eyes turning green. This rather unattractive situation normally arises if there’s a burger involved. Thank heavens then that The Living Room offer mini burgers as a sort of burger tapas (an idea I like very much) so this way I can get my burger quotient for the day but also allow myself to try some of the other items on the menu. read more

Cobbs Farm Shop

May 14, 2013 By All That I'm Eating 22 Comments

This was a gifted meal. Cobbs farm shop is somewhere I like to visit to have a good old nose around. It’s nice to go and have a look at new food brands that I haven’t heard of, see what they’ve got growing and almost always buy some of their Coronation Chicken. When I received an email from a fellow food obsessive who wanted to meet up and chin wag about all things food, breakfast at Cobbs sounded like a great idea.

I turned up at Cobbs bright and early and met up with the two managers of Cobbs Farm for breakfast. Contrary to ‘normal’ shopping habits, bread and milk are what greet you on entry to the shop. But not just any bread, lovely bread from The Fabulous Baker Brothers. I have so far tried their malt loaf and sourdough both of which were great. There’s always plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables on show too.

I didn’t realise that they make and bake their own sausage rolls and other bits (a very tempting smell), have an on-site meat hanging room for their butcher and I had no idea just how much room they had to grow their own fruit and veg. They also had an interesting blackboard outside comparing the price of their vegetables with that of some of the well-known supermarkets. Cobbs prices for everything on the board that day were the same price or cheaper. The cheese counter is something to behold; there are cheeses in there I am desperate to try so I think I’ll have to work left to right. I have been to Cobbs for Sunday lunch before (it’s lovely) but until a few weeks ago had never been for breakfast. I have been missing out. I opted for the Morning Mushroom as it sounded like a fantastic, yet guilt free, combination of textures and flavours. A lovely portobello mushroom on the bottom topped with spinach and a poached egg with grilled tomatoes on the side. It was great how they put the extra effort in by adding a little nutmeg to the spinach and a little thyme to the tomatoes; it’s exactly how I would make it. After much chin wagging and discussing food, farming and foraging we went to have a look at the farm. We were walking through the pick your own rows first looking at the berries which are all on their way. At the end of the PYO section there was the vineyard. I can’t think of a prettier place to spend a day; the flint soil, south facing slopes and terroir match almost exactly that of the Champagne region of France. And of course, they are growing Chardonnay and Pinot Noir (it would be rude not to). This is the first year they will have a harvest so I can’t wait to see what happens to it. The rhubarb patches were in full swing and I like to think I was helpful in pulling up a few stalks but in reality the much more experienced rhubarb puller-uppers did a far better job than me. I was also allowed the first spear of the year, of asparagus that is, and I ate it raw as soon as I got home. I spent a lovely morning with two people who are clearly very passionate about food and its provenance. It was really interesting to meet the people behind the farm shop and I can’t wait until their crates outside are brimming with beans, tomatoes, berries, mushrooms, asparagus and all manner of wonderful seasonal produce.

I wasn’t invited to Cobbs to review it, just to talk all things food! I learnt so many things about the farm shop that I wanted to share it. read more