Category Archives: Food

The Scone Chronicles – Number Nine

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We went to Harlow Carr garden today – the northern garden of the Royal Horticultural Society. It was a lovely spring day and the gardens were quite crowded as every pensioner in Yorkshire seemed to be having a trip out.

I’ll cover the gardens in more detail later. For now I will talk about the first scone of our day.

The queue for scones at Bettys Tea House (which is a shed in the garden rather than the posh cafe at the entrance) contained around 30 people when we joined it. Well, when Julia joined it. I have a bad knee – I can’t queue.

(Note – Bettys was originally Betty’s but they have now become Bettys. The increasingly cavalier disregard for apostrophes seems to be mirrored by a general decline in standards and I wonder if the two may be linked.)

Despite the decline in standards and the deficiency in apostophes the staff were absolutely top class. They were quick and accurate and kept smiling as they coped with a constant queue, which averaged 20 people long for at least half an hour. My research method was to count the queue three times while I was sitting there. I can be scientifically rigorous when the occasion demands.

They served Julia with two cups of tea and two scones in boxes (with the jam and cream already applied), and only took £10 off her.

The tea was excellent, despite being a teabag in a vending cup. It probably tasted better because I was drinking it outside on a sunny spring day as a robin sang from a neighbouring tree.

Tea, scones and sunshine. Bettys, Harlow Carr

Tea, scones and sunshine. Bettys, Harlow Carr

The boxed scones were convenient, though they were still rather chilly from storage. They were also, and I’m sorry I can’t come up with another description, a bit tight in texture. Fresh home made scones have a nice open, crumbly texture. Well, mostly. I have had one or two disasters in my time. Commercial scones tend to be closer in texture and come with neat, even air holes.

So, staff, tea and surroundings – excellent. Scones were good, but not as good as the rest of the meal. I felt they weren’t quite as good as some of the other scones we’ve had this year, either. They must be doing something right because they have been going for 100 years this year.

Bettys - 100 years this year

Bettys – 100 years this year

This is not a criticism of the scones, just an observation. You can’t serve thousands of scones without making some compromises.

Tea, scones and sunshine. Bettys, Harlow Carr
Tea, scones and sunshine. Bettys, Harlow Carr
Tea, scones and sunshine. Bettys, Harlow Carr

Not Quite Scones – but I’m calling it Number 8 in the series

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We had coffee with blueberry muffins in the Mencap garden this morning as part of my programme of guerrilla snacking. This came as a surprise, as until I needed a word to describe my random intake of sugary calories I didn’t know I had a programme of guerrilla snacking. The coffee came out of a flask and the muffins came from McDonalds. Consequently, I have to admit that quality wasn’t necessarily the keynote of the morning. However, real life can’t be all cappuccino and croissants. Or scones.

I’m calling it Number 8 in the series, just to add some light and shade to the Scone Chronicles. Location was good, company was excellent but muffins just aren’t scones.

Coffee and muffins in the garden
Coffee and muffins in the garden
Coffee and muffins in the garden

The flowers are doing well, though they could do with more of them. Unfortunately money is so tight that there isn’t any for fripperies like flowers. They are saving for a new cover on the second polytunnel. I’ve just ordered 100 snowdrops. I’m going to plant some at home and give Julia the rest. She’s a lucky woman – blueberry muffins and snowdrops all in one day.

Irises at Wilford
Bamboo in the Mencap garden
Daffodils in the Mencap Garden

I just mentioned this to her. She raised an eyebrow and muttered something I didn’t quite catch.

Her tolerance and my deafness are two important factors in the longevity of our marriage.

I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.

Lichen by the Trent
Catkins at Wilford
Catkins in the Mencap Garden

 

In the Mencap Garden
In the Mencap Garden
In the Mencap Garden
Great Tit at Wilford

Great Tit at Wilford

The birds, as usual, were not very cooperative, but I did get one shot.

The Scone Chronicles – Number 7 – Done as a Haibun

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As usual, there is a queue at the cafe in Sainsbury’s at Arnold. The woman behind the counter is working hard but the system is against her. So is the customer she is serving, who can’t make his mind up.

I have two scones – one cheese, one fruit. Julia sticks with a single cheese scone. We select them, then we wait in line. They are small, neat and hexagonal.

Eventually I go to find a table because my knee is playing up.

The first two tables are too dirty to clean by wiping with a paper napkin. The third is passable, but dirty underneath. They have at least four staff and I’m not impressed. I think of writing a stiffly worded letter of complaint but it won’t do any good and the insincere reply will annoy me even more.

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A dirty floor – Sainsbury’s, Arnold

The cheese scone feels hard as I slide the knife in. It is not a light and fluffy scone, though I had expected this from the small and regular shape.

There are specks of visible cheese, and it tastes good.

The fruit scone is moist inside, in a doughy way, rather than a good way. It still tastes good but looks strange in the camera viewfinder.

A slightly doughy fruit scone

A slightly doughy fruit scone

At one time we would have ordered the cream tea but we are getting too old for all the sugar and fat.

evening draws on

the rotund blogger

photographs his food

 

 

The Scone Chronicles – Number 5

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The last scone report was a bit of a cheat because it featured oatcakes rather than scones.  However, it seemed a bit of a waste not to mention oatcakes as we were in Stoke. This one, also from Wednesday, does feature scones.

After the various trials of the day we ended up at Westport Lake. It’s not very impressive at first sight – muddy surroundings, idiots with bread and lots of domestic geese.

Westport Lake, Stoke-on-Trent
Westport Lake, Stoke-on-Trent
Westport Lake, Stoke-on-Trent
Westport Lake, Stoke-on-Trent
Westport Lake, Stoke-on-Trent

It was actually quite pleasant once you started looking at the birds. I don’t need rarities, I can amuse myself with common birds, and the sight of tame geese chasing toddlers for food never loses its appeal.

The cafe is in the visitor centre, which is a wooden building that looks a bit like an ark and is mainly balanced on legs over an artificial pond. I’m not quite sure why they built it on legs, but it’s quite interesting. We ordered scones and tea and sat on the balcony. The seats are a bit tight for a man of ample posterior.

Visitor Centre, Westport Lake
Visitor Centre, Westport Lake
Visitor Centre, Westport Lake
Visitor Centre, Westport Lake
Visitor Centre, Westport Lake

The scones were too dry and crumbly for my taste, but once buttered and jammed looked OK, though one pat of butter isn’t really enough for a large scone.

The first half of my scone had a slight, though not unpleasant, tang of baking soda.  Julia confirmed that hers did too, though she thought it was a bit off-putting. By the end of my second half I was beginning to agree with her. Early in my scone baking days I made a batch where I failed to mix the baking soda in properly so I do sympathise, though it should be easy enough for a professional baker to avoid the problem.

Scones in Stoke on Trent
Scones in Stoke on Trent
Scones in Stoke on Trent
Scones in Stoke on Trent
Steelite in Stoke on Trent

I think we’ll be back – it’s a pleasant place to spend time and they have oatcakes in the cafe too.

 

The Scone Chronicles – Number 4

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Before saying anything more, I am going to confess that this isn’t about scones. We went to Stoke-on-Trent, so we had Staffordshire oat cakes at the Middleport Pottery.

That’s a lot of links for one short paragraph.

It started badly when, after parking, we found that they’d changed the way in since our last visit.  A hearty woman redirected us, which was helpful but not what you want to hear when you are twenty yards from where you want to be but are being sent an extra 200 yards. One small step for a man with good knees – not so good when you have a bad knee and a stick.

It didn’t improve when I found that they don’t do my favourite oatcake now – no black pudding and bacon for me. I settled for sausage and cheese. Not a great combination, but the best one, I thought, for brunch. With hindsight I should probably have gone for cheese, tomato and mushrooms, but, with hindsight, I should really have gone somewhere else.

Oatcake – Stoke on Trent
Menu at Middleport
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The cafe is better lit and cleaner than it used to be, so I expect they have someone new in charge. The oatcakes were a surprise. There were two of them, with salad.  That, to my mind, is how you serve trendy stuff like paninis. It’s not what I want from oatcakes, which is an old-fashioned sort of food.

To make things worse, the tomato in the salad was old and dried out, like it had been cut several days ago and stored.

The sausages were pretty average too – not actually bad, but definitely not good.

It wasn’t cheap, and, to be honest, I expect fresh salad. Mediocre sausages are, sadly, a fact of life, but there is no excuse for wilting salad.

Tea at

The tea was good, as was the pottery, which is made about 100 yards away.

 

 

 

 

The Scone Chronicles – Number 3

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On the way to Peterborough we stopped off at the Barn Garden Centre.

I’ve been there with my sister before, and they are famous for the quality of their scones. They aren’t so famous for the quality of their garden centre, but we’ll ignore that for now.

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After a cream tea, and a scone with jam, in previous reviews it was a toss up between a cherry scone or a cheese scone this time, and we decided on cheese. It turned out to be an excellent choice.

Good tea, pots that pour properly and nice light scones with good cheese flavour – a bit of a bite but not overpowering. The only thing that could have made it better was for a robin to hop along the floor picking up crumbs…

Robin in the Garden Centre cafe

Robin in the Garden Centre cafe

Sausage Roll Review and Thoughts on Being a Vegan

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On Sunday, Number Two Son emerged from work clutching sausage rolls from Gregg’s. It wasn’t quite the way I’m trying to live my life, but who’s going to look a free sausage roll in the mouth? Or is that a gift horse? I often get the two mixed up. Anyway, my new lifestyle is only a couple of weeks old and you can’t overturn sixty years of dietary abuse just like that.

It was, in the manner of these things, a bit greasy and the meat lacked a bit of texture, but I do like a sausage roll and managed every last crumb without really stretching my capability for absorbing junk food. I’ve had worse.

It turns out they were Gregg’s new vegan sausage rolls.

I hadn’t a clue, and would be happy to give them full marks for snack food.

I now have a list of “accidental” vegan snacks, though I’m not sure that I really want to start eating loads of biscuits and crisps just to save a few animals. If animals don’t want to be eaten, they shouldn’t taste so good.

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Potato & Chickpea Curry

It’s strange to think, though, that in certain respects I’ve been vegan all my life.

Pot Noodles, crisps, Mr Kipling, ginger nuts…

Who’d have thought they could all be vegan.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m not going to become a vegan, but I am making changes to my diet, and if I happen to be in Greggs I may well have a vegan sausage roll.

 

More on Scones

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This is Number Two in the series about Scone Consumption.

Julia’s brother and sister-in-law were up visiting their grandson. That’s my great-nephew. Obviously it’s a bit too soon to make a judgement but he’s shaping up nicely – decent chunky build and a tendency to eat anything left in range. I’m sixty years older than he is but we clearly share the same attitude to food.

I limited myself to a scone and jam, as we met in John Lewis. It’s convenient, but there is a tendency to need a mortgage if you get too adventurous with the menu. Plus I really don’t need the fat or the calories.

I used to shop there regularly but they aren’t really my sort of shop these days. Too old-fashioned, too drab, wrong size profile and, let’s face it, too expensive. I once asked a question about the lack of large sizes via one of their employees and the General Manager’s (uncensored) reply  was that they didn’t cater for freaks.

What with that and the store detective following me round one day and muttering “watch this one” to a member of the management team, I decided not to bother shopping there again. I’ve not missed it.

However, back to scones and jam. The scones were OK, though nothing special. The jam was OK too, made in Tiptree in Essex – well known for its jam, though still mass produced. Ditto for the coffee. I had an Americano, which is what used to be called “a coffee” in the days before coffee became pretentious. I checked it up on Wiki and they, being Wiki, have quite a bit on the subject. I’d have been happy with a nice instant coffee.

I’ve provided a link to Tiptree as I like Tiptree. I haven’t provided links to John Lewis or Americano as I don’t want to encourage them.

That’s about it – not much about scones but some days are like that.

Scones and Jam - John Lewis

Scones and Jam – John Lewis

Tearoom Tour – Number 1 – Thoresby Park

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I’ve been meaning to start a Tearoom Tour of Britain, with a target of 100 in the year. Julia has indicated disbelief in my ability to do this (citing logistical difficulties rather than my lack of capacity for cream teas).

Rather than put a number to it, I’m going to start and see where we end up.

Today we went to Thoresby in Sherwood Forest. It’s not the best of the grand houses in the forest but it’s free and the service is a lot better in the cafe than the off-hand, rude, inefficient and useless service encountered at Clumber. Clumber is a better attraction in general, though expensive if you aren’t a member of the National Trust. But the cafe at Thoresby is a lot better. You may have formed that idea after reading my comments on the disgracefully bad, lamentable, terrible, rotten service at the Clumber cafe.

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That’s why we won’t be rejoining the National Trust this year. We aren’t saying we won’t rejoin in the future, but for the next year or two their surly waiting staff will have cost them money.

Anyway, back to Thoresby. We didn’t have much time so we had a quick snack – I had the cream tea, Julia had the toasted teacake and we both had plenty of tea. Very palatable, served efficiently by pleasant staff and in nice bright surroundings, There was no time to look round the courtyard, which is partially closed for the winter, but we have done before, and it is worth a visit.

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The downside – the scones seem a bit regular and industrial, rather than home made, but they were still good.

I’m happy to recommend Thoresby to anyone. £8.90, in case you are interested.

To be fair, I’m happy to recommend Clumber to anyone who wants grudging, slow, inefficient service in a dingy room, but it’s a niche market. It’s also slightly more expensive, as I recall, but you do get a free snarl and a long wait thrown in as extras.

Cream Tea with plastic
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Some New Challenges

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Whilst shopping this afternoon I had a flick through the cookery magazines.

That’s two challenges in one. The first is to stop buying magazines. They are expensive and never as useful as you think they are going to be. I’ll only be buying magazines this year if they have enough free seeds with them to justify the price.

To reinforce the message I’m going to remind myself that it takes me half an hour to earn the money to buy an average magazine.

Second challenge is to find some new recipes.

It’s easy to get bogged down with the same old things. Traybake, pasta bake, vegetable curry, fish pie, cottage pie, stew, hash…

I could do with some new ideas.

Fortunately, I don’t need to get ideas from magazines as there are loads of new ideas on the internet. I will have to see what I can find. I also have a big stack of cookery books. They have all come from charity shops and the food looks lovely.

Time too, I think, to get the slow cooker out again.