All posts tagged: Sunday

The Railway, Lowdham

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The Railway (formerly the Railway Inn) has had some serious money thrown at it and it shows.  A once tired local pub is now a really rather cool, contemporary pub/restaurant with some great nods in the decor to its railway heritage, a wood burning stove and an open pass to the kitchen as well as some brilliant space outside, including a raised deck. And, it feels great when you walk in. On my continued quest for a decent pub Sunday lunch it seemed worth a punt. I know I get a bit tiresome on the old Sunday Lunch theme, but as I hadn’t eat a Sunday roast in a pub for about 20 years as they had become so bloody awful and my own were so much better, I am now on something of a mission, and I always have the beef – even if the non-traditional Sunday menu looks more inviting, because beef is the hardest to cook well and keep and because its a fairer comparison (I know there is no real science …

Spare me your side of despair. Sunday Lunch in Shelford.

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The Earl of Chesterfield in Shelford is an odd sort of pub. For a start it doesn’t look like a pub, it looks like a house with bits added. Secondly, it has had an odd couple of years, being a pub then closing then being bought by the village as a community owned asset and then latterly by a partnership that includes the ex England cricketer Chris Board. It is a fairly popular place – particularly good for dog walking and horse-riding types who can get straight to the door from the surrounding fields and down a quick half before ambling, or trotting, off. But how is its Sunday Lunch? I wish you hadn’t asked, because I really, really wanted to like this odd little place. I’ll keep it brief. Service was fine, although there seemed to be too many staff for the number of customers and we were asked perhaps 5 times by different people if wanted a bottle of wine with our meal – even while we examined the wine menu. One poor …

A Proper Sunday Lunch

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I have a confession to make, I make a damn decent Sunday lunch. Yep, even if I do say so myself. Such has been my disappointment with the traditional pub Sunday Lunch that I can honestly say it must be upwards of 5 years since I last forced myself through the ritual of eating tough beef, dry chicken and a plate loaded with steamed and tasteless veg (or worse a melange of boiled, unseasoned veg served alongside in ceramic bowl which will inevitably be returned to the kitchen, untouched, in exactly the same state as it arrived) swamped in gravy and with a Yorkshire Pudding plopped on top, regardless of the meat below. No, I don’t like pub Sunday Lunches. Love the idea of them, but the reality is usually a huge  disappointment. Well, I am here to report that a couple of weeks ago, I decided to tip my toe in the “Traditional Sunday Lunch in a pub is Never as Good as I Make at Home” club again, and venture to our Local, fairly recently under new ownership and …

Bit of a Street-Food vibe in Sneinton

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We spent a a couple of hours enjoying the spring sunshine in Sneinton a few weekends ago, not something I usually do. Sneinton hasn’t really been a “go to”  destination for many years, not since the old market traders’ pub, the Peggars Inn, stopped opening at 4am. However, the old market place and its buildings have recently been renovated and absorbed into the City’s “Cultural Quarter”, the sun was out and the Travelling Gastronomers’ pop-up street food market had arrived.     The Travelling Gastronomers is the brainchild of two friends from London (see my chat with them on the Great Food Club website greatfoodclub.co.uk) whose ambition is to recreate the London street-food vibe in smaller towns and cities across England.     There were 17 traders at the event – which is free (it is a market and not a food festival…) as well as a pop-up stage with live music and a bar selling local beers and ciders. Stall holders were still setting up when we arrived and, as we had deliberately avoided …

Sunday morning coffee…maybe!

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I was, once upon a time, a confirmed coffee drinker, I rarely touched tea, except possibly a mug of Builder’s with a fish supper but after a reaction to some medicine I was on a year ago, I lost my taste for coffee and now go weeks or months without touching a drop, incidently saving a small fortune on Nespresso capsules. Well, following this admission, the lovely people at PerkuLatte, offered to try to persuade me to revisit coffee. PerkuLatte deliver Artisan coffees by mail order, and when this arrived the aroma was wonderful even before I opened the pack. Beautifully packaged in a robust, reseable, packet with a little widget inside to keep the coffee fresh & dry and lots of information about the bean, blend and origins. The smell was wonderful and the flavour smooth & comforting, and brought back memories of coffees lost. I enjoyed my first cafetière of coffee in months  (retrieved from the dusty recesses of the kitchen cupboard) and it made a proper Sunday. I think this may become …