Day Two began with breakfast which was available from 0745 and it was a very substantial buffet laid out in the dining room. There was a table with large glass bowls of cereals (about twenty), different nuts, seeds and dried fruits to enable people to build their own choices and on the side were full fat, semi skimmed, skimmed and soya milks all clearly labelled. This table also had bowls of canned figs, prunes, grapefruit sections and the thickest, creamiest yoghurt I have ever come across. There was another table with large dispensers of grapefruit, orange and apple juices. A third table of cold stuff had fresh fruit - watermelon, charentais, grapes, strawberries, raspberries - all piled high. There were plates of cold meats and cheeses and a basket of mixed warm breakfast rolls. The fourth table had a hot plate with bacon, sausages, baked beans, mushrooms, tomatoes, fried eggs and black pudding keeping hot for people to help themselves. I am a fruit and yoghurt girl myself and really have low tastes - I love the canned figs and really enjoyed them. The waiting staff brought large pots of coffee and tea to the tables and left them there and every few minutes brought fresh toast. Marmalade and jams were already on the tables in little dishes. The Scandinavians really loved the cooked breakfasts and raved about them. It is apparently always the highlight of their Symposia.
I was joined at breakfast by a fortyish Australian called Jo Curtis who works in the film world as an executive producer. She lives half the time in Sydney and the other half in Soho and was really interesting. She confided that she had stayed up late the previous night and at midnight was swigging pints of Guinness and smoking roll ups with a young man whose name she could not remember. She gave up smoking twenty years ago. Apparently. She was eating a massive cooked breakfast to soak up some of the previous night's excesses. We went off to the first lecture together but she only lasted half the morning and had to return to bed long before lunch.
The first paper was given by Jane Kramer who lives in New York most of the time and writes for The New Yorker. She spends quite a lot of time in France and was awarded the Legion d'Honneur for services to gastronomy. The theme of her paper was "Celebrating!" and two of her comments were very interesting. She said that the preparation of food for a celebration feast becomes ritualised and that somehow it always tastes better. That really made me think of Christmases past and despite forgetting the sausage and bacon rolls the food was delicious. I also have my rituals but had never really thought about it before as a ritual - I just always do things the same way at the same time of year. The cherries in brandy are made in July (note to self, buy some cherries today), the cake is made in October, the pudding on Stir Up Sunday and Christmas Eve finds me, the vegetables and the service of lessons and carols from Kings in perfect harmony. Her second comment that really made me think was that "celebration is one of the great civilising rituals of humanity" which when you think about it is so obvious as to go without saying. To actually hear it put into words brings it into consciousness rather than unconsciousness.
The next paper was delivered by Joelle Balhoul and was entitled "Judeo-Muslim Exchanges in Religious Celebrations" and was really interesting. Joelle is a professor at Indiana State University and a world expert on the co-existence of Jewish and Muslim communities. She concentrated on North Africa and we heard all about the period 1880-1970 when there was much Jewish migration of the lower class because of persecution but the remaining higher class Jews assimilated into the Muslim communities. Muslim women have always dominated domestically but their men would actually acquire the food, once it was given to the woman she would take over and decide what would be done with it. Muslim women would assist their Jewish counterparts at times like Shabbat and Passover but the Jewish women remained the principals in the acquisition and ritual preparation of their food.
We then were shown a short film about the Mexican Day of The Dead and Bruce Kraig and Jan Thompson explained the rituals and the food preparation which was taking place ready for our dinner that evening.
I then went off to another room because the papers I wanted to hear were on the theme "Alone, sad and no food: Anti-Celebrations" The other choices for the next hour and a half were "Celebration around the Mediterranean in Classical Times" and "Sweets in Celebrations". I would have loved to go to all of them but these were called Parallel Sessions and I had to make a choice.
The first paper was given by Anthony Buccini and his theme was "The Relationship between Fasting and Feasting" and he was very knowledgeable about the medieval church and its rituals. He is an academic at the University of Chicago and that evening I was able to point him in the direction of those wonderful drawings at The Walker Gallery in Liverpool showing the monks feasting and fasting - he had heard of them but did not know where they were. I felt like a proper grown up at this point, being able to give information to someone of his status does not happen to me very often.
The second paper was given by Robert Appelbaum and the subject was "Celebrating Solitude: MFK Fisher on Dining Alone". I am very familiar with the texts he used and understood everything he said. Robert is presently at Lancaster University but is moving to Uppsala in Sweden this summer.
He admitted that he never "dines" alone because he finds the experience uncomfortable. If he has to eat out alone he tends to go to Wetherspoons!
The final paper in this session was given by Jane Levi who is the Symposium's treasurer. That really was a collection of pictures illustrating the theme "Melancholy and Mourning: Black Banquets and Funerary Feasts". One interesting thought came from this which had certainly never occurred to me was that the funeral feast was a way of introducing the new heir to the community at large. There was much discussion about black foods.
After this it was time to go off to lunch. What a lunch we had too - all the food and drink were provided by different Italian regions and the theme of the lunch was to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Unification of Italy. The antipasti were laid out on large platters and consisted of three different sorts of olives, four different salamis, roasted peppers, aubergines and artichokes and large baskets of warm focaccia bread. After about ten minutes large bowls of ravioli with ricotta and spinach dressed with lemon oil appeared. We then were given huge portions of chicken cooked with rosemary and white wine. This was followed by platters of Grana Padano accompanied by bowls of fabulously juicy cherries and dishes of cold zabaglione. The wines were Gigliotto Nero D'Avola, Perticato I Quadri, Perticato Valandrea amd Spumante Dolce Perini & Perini. There was no shortage of either food or drink. I had sat down at the far end of the room so that I could observe the entire proceedings and Paul Levy came and sat opposite me and introduced himself. I had stopped gibbering by this time and we had quite a sensible conversation, he gave me the true stories on Elizabeth David and Anne Barr and The Foodie book.
I shall have to return to this later since I need to dress up and go out for my birthday lunch.
Tuesday, 12 July 2011
Monday, 11 July 2011
The Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery - 8-10 July 2011
I have wanted to go to this for years but have never managed to do it before so was really thrilled when I received an email advising me that I could do so this year. My life long greed and passion for all things culinary has made me aware that this particular conference is the most important and prestigious in the entire world. I had never really felt as though I was up to the standard required and went with no great expectations of being included in all the activities. I thought all the serious foodie world would spot that I am a complete fraud blagging my way around the world of food in total ignorance of the real requirements to join their club.
Reader, I was so, so, wrong.
I took the train down to Oxford, it is only an hour on the train from where I live and with my senior railcard the return fare is only thirteen quid, less than the cost of the fuel and I had a suspicion that I would not need the car once there. The train times were not exactly convenient - there is a gap from Pershore to Oxford during the week - which meant that I arrived in Oxford at 1230 but could not book in at St Catherine's College until 1500 so I nipped over to The Jam Factory near the station for a light lunch. If anyone needs a decent simple light meal within five minutes of Oxford Station it is highly recommended - a sort of arts centre and cafe/bistro where a lovely baguette or wrap and a bowl of delicious crispy chips costs a fiver. By Oxford standards that is excellent value.
I then went off to St Catherines (known as Catz) by taxi, a young American couple in the queue were carrying "foodie" type hessian bags so I asked if they were going to the Symposium, they were so we shared a taxi. He turned out to be an employee of Goldman Sachs in London and she was a professor (what we call a lecturer) at Yale. They had met at Harvard. All this Ivy League stuff did nothing to increase my confidence, but the taxi only cost us three quid each when we split it so it was worth doing. I walked into the Porter's Lodge to register and there before me was Elisabeth Luard who gave me a huge smile of welcome and introduced herself. As if I did not know who she is - every single word she has ever written is on my shelves. I started stammering and stuttering - totally star struck - and telling her that two of her books had reduced me to tears (Still Life and My Life as a Wife), that her Andalusian patatas bravas is the best in the world, that I loved her illustrations in the Waitrose magazine and that I wanted her to adopt me. All without drawing breath. She carried on smiling and led me across to the registration desk and handed me over to Patsy Iddison who is the Registrar and gave me my conference pack. Complete with a name badge with my name on it, exactly the same as the one Elisabeth Luard and Patsy were wearing. Not one with "fraud" after my name or in a different colour so the in crowd would know I was masquerading as someone who deserved to be there. I was then led to the Porter's desk where I was allocated a room - my name was on his computer too - given a key, given a map of the campus and all the different places I needed to be were marked for me. I went across to my allocated room and unpacked - a very simple basic room with an en-suite loo and shower. I practically had to stand in the shower to use the washbasin, I certainly needed the shower door open in order to accommodate my substantial rear end when cleaning my teeth and bending over to rinse afterwards.
By this time it was about1630 and the first session was to be at 1700 in the form of The Jane Grigson Memorial Lecture by Professor Richard Wrangham in the Bernard Sunley Lecture Theatre. Richard Wrangham is a Biological Anthropologist at Harvard. I wandered across there clutching my orange folder (everyone else had the same colour) and sat in the middle row towards the centre and was soon joined by two women and a man, all of whom had been to previous Symposia. One of the women was truly terrifying, if I dared to open my mouth she contradicted me but the other two were charming and backed me up. The terrifying one was from New Zealand, the nice lady from Australia and the nice man from Canada.
Professor Wrangham started by saying that he was delighted to be asked to give the most important lecture at the epicentre of food interest in the world and thanked the audience for deigning to listen to him because we were all more important than him. Moi? I don't think so but it was nice to be included in that welcome. The lecture was given from a rostrum to the right of the stage, on the stage were sitting Paul Levy, Claudia Roden and Elisabeth Luard. The lecture itself was absolutely fascinating and the basic theme was about the discovery of fire and the rise of cooked food throughout history. We heard that animals seem to prefer cooked food and he demolished the Levi-Strauss theory of the 1960's saying that food should be eaten raw and was only cooked for symbolic reasons. Apparently all animals will choose cooked over raw food and there is evidence to show that in humans a totally raw diet leads to amenorrhea in women. He said that the human race has grown larger with an increased brain size because we learned to cook our foods and this puts us at the top of the chain. We also have smaller digestive systems and teeth than other animals because they have adapted over the years to cope with a cooked and not a raw diet. Starch is gelatinized by cooking and protein denatured. This means that more of the calories of cooked food are absorbed by the body. The learned Professor also thinks the Atwater Convention (the system used to show the food values on labels) needs to be rethought since it does not take account of the extra calories the body takes in from cooked food as opposed to raw food. We are being misled. By this time I was seriously considering going on a raw food diet for the rest of the summer in order to lose a bit (OK then - a lot) of weight. We were all given a handout about the Jane Grigson Trust and Library and because were all (well, all but one) obviously learned scholars invited to take advantage of the contents for our research.
We then went on to watch a DVD made by Barbara and Joe Wheaten on the theme of "Celebrations" which had loads of clips from paintings and stained glass windows on the subject. This went very fast and the images were no sooner half registered on my brain than they were replaced by something else. This was accompanied by very loud music. I found it a bit confusing and distracting but sat quietly (yes, me) and waited for it to finish.
We now had a half hour break before a champagne reception (Lanson) before supper so I nipped up to change from my travel clothes into a simple white tshirt and linen trousers dressed up with a bit of bling. I had been unsure about a dress code so played safe, travelled in jeans (about half the people at the first lecture were also wearing jeans) and packed black, white and grey linen slacks and matching tshirts. There were exactly right - smart casual was the order of the evenings.
I went down to the Junior Common Room and was immediately accosted by Phil Iddison (a former Trustee and husband of Patsy), given a glass of champagne and chatted to for ten minutes. It was very hot in the room so I sidled out and headed for the dining room which was much larger and airy and cooled down. There were a couple of women sitting at the end of the first table and chatting casually so I asked if I might join them and was greeted enthusiastically and beckoned to sit down next to one of them. They were really lovely, Virginia Hill introduced herself as an Australian food writer and Lidia Bastianich said that she had a restaurant in New York and specialised in Italian food. We were soon joined by Julie Friedman, a retired lecturer from Wisconsin and Janine Kalowski who I think was her daughter but I might be wrong about that. We settled down as a nice little manageable coven with the assistance of Alice Mullen whose poor husband Bob (they were from New Jersey) looked on happily and just listened with interest to our conversation - adding an odd nod.
A chap called Jake Tilson makes menus for all the meals at the Symposia and they are real collectors' items. I shall treasure all mine. Forever. Friday's Dinner was cooked by my old mate Shaun Hill (we did get together) with the generosity and assistance of Tim Kelsey and the staff of St Catz. Tim Kelsey is the head chef at Catz and extremely co-operative with the Trustees when organising the Symposia. The actual menu started with Seared Monkfish with Mustard and Cucumber Sauce, was followed by Roast Rack of Lamb with Summer Vegetables and Lamb Shoulder Stew and finished with a Buttermilk pudding with Summer Berries and Cardomom Honey Syrup. The monkfish was fabulous, a creamy mustard grain sauce with ribbons of steamed cucumber. The lamb racks were perfectly cooked and had already been cut in the kitchen, they were placed on top of a delicious lamb stew made with flagelot and broad beans with whole baby carrots. The buttermilk pudding was a sort of light and luscious pannacotta. So much for my raw food diet. The summer berries were all uncooked so I think that will do for a start. The accompanying wines were a 2008 Eroica Chateau Ste Michelle & Ernst Loosen from Washington Sate USA, A 2008 Pinot Noir Wittman from Rheinhessen and a 2002 Riesling Erdener Treppchen Dr Loosen from the Mosel.
We lingered for a while over coffee and then all went our separate ways. I found out the following day that Lidia is very famous in America, she has a television programme, was a judge on American Masterchef and has several restaurants and cookbooks published. None of which I was told by her, we just had a lovely chat about our grandchildren and the importance of teaching them to cook. We were pulling out the photographs, laughing about the mess they make in the kitchen and generally getting on very well. I never saw her at breakfast, apparently she would slip off to The Randolph after dinner and sleep in luxury. I slept in a student bed, very badly, but with a massive grin on my face and dreamt of buttermilk puddings and grandchildren.
I think that is enough for now.
I will return.
Reader, I was so, so, wrong.
I took the train down to Oxford, it is only an hour on the train from where I live and with my senior railcard the return fare is only thirteen quid, less than the cost of the fuel and I had a suspicion that I would not need the car once there. The train times were not exactly convenient - there is a gap from Pershore to Oxford during the week - which meant that I arrived in Oxford at 1230 but could not book in at St Catherine's College until 1500 so I nipped over to The Jam Factory near the station for a light lunch. If anyone needs a decent simple light meal within five minutes of Oxford Station it is highly recommended - a sort of arts centre and cafe/bistro where a lovely baguette or wrap and a bowl of delicious crispy chips costs a fiver. By Oxford standards that is excellent value.
I then went off to St Catherines (known as Catz) by taxi, a young American couple in the queue were carrying "foodie" type hessian bags so I asked if they were going to the Symposium, they were so we shared a taxi. He turned out to be an employee of Goldman Sachs in London and she was a professor (what we call a lecturer) at Yale. They had met at Harvard. All this Ivy League stuff did nothing to increase my confidence, but the taxi only cost us three quid each when we split it so it was worth doing. I walked into the Porter's Lodge to register and there before me was Elisabeth Luard who gave me a huge smile of welcome and introduced herself. As if I did not know who she is - every single word she has ever written is on my shelves. I started stammering and stuttering - totally star struck - and telling her that two of her books had reduced me to tears (Still Life and My Life as a Wife), that her Andalusian patatas bravas is the best in the world, that I loved her illustrations in the Waitrose magazine and that I wanted her to adopt me. All without drawing breath. She carried on smiling and led me across to the registration desk and handed me over to Patsy Iddison who is the Registrar and gave me my conference pack. Complete with a name badge with my name on it, exactly the same as the one Elisabeth Luard and Patsy were wearing. Not one with "fraud" after my name or in a different colour so the in crowd would know I was masquerading as someone who deserved to be there. I was then led to the Porter's desk where I was allocated a room - my name was on his computer too - given a key, given a map of the campus and all the different places I needed to be were marked for me. I went across to my allocated room and unpacked - a very simple basic room with an en-suite loo and shower. I practically had to stand in the shower to use the washbasin, I certainly needed the shower door open in order to accommodate my substantial rear end when cleaning my teeth and bending over to rinse afterwards.
By this time it was about1630 and the first session was to be at 1700 in the form of The Jane Grigson Memorial Lecture by Professor Richard Wrangham in the Bernard Sunley Lecture Theatre. Richard Wrangham is a Biological Anthropologist at Harvard. I wandered across there clutching my orange folder (everyone else had the same colour) and sat in the middle row towards the centre and was soon joined by two women and a man, all of whom had been to previous Symposia. One of the women was truly terrifying, if I dared to open my mouth she contradicted me but the other two were charming and backed me up. The terrifying one was from New Zealand, the nice lady from Australia and the nice man from Canada.
Professor Wrangham started by saying that he was delighted to be asked to give the most important lecture at the epicentre of food interest in the world and thanked the audience for deigning to listen to him because we were all more important than him. Moi? I don't think so but it was nice to be included in that welcome. The lecture was given from a rostrum to the right of the stage, on the stage were sitting Paul Levy, Claudia Roden and Elisabeth Luard. The lecture itself was absolutely fascinating and the basic theme was about the discovery of fire and the rise of cooked food throughout history. We heard that animals seem to prefer cooked food and he demolished the Levi-Strauss theory of the 1960's saying that food should be eaten raw and was only cooked for symbolic reasons. Apparently all animals will choose cooked over raw food and there is evidence to show that in humans a totally raw diet leads to amenorrhea in women. He said that the human race has grown larger with an increased brain size because we learned to cook our foods and this puts us at the top of the chain. We also have smaller digestive systems and teeth than other animals because they have adapted over the years to cope with a cooked and not a raw diet. Starch is gelatinized by cooking and protein denatured. This means that more of the calories of cooked food are absorbed by the body. The learned Professor also thinks the Atwater Convention (the system used to show the food values on labels) needs to be rethought since it does not take account of the extra calories the body takes in from cooked food as opposed to raw food. We are being misled. By this time I was seriously considering going on a raw food diet for the rest of the summer in order to lose a bit (OK then - a lot) of weight. We were all given a handout about the Jane Grigson Trust and Library and because were all (well, all but one) obviously learned scholars invited to take advantage of the contents for our research.
We then went on to watch a DVD made by Barbara and Joe Wheaten on the theme of "Celebrations" which had loads of clips from paintings and stained glass windows on the subject. This went very fast and the images were no sooner half registered on my brain than they were replaced by something else. This was accompanied by very loud music. I found it a bit confusing and distracting but sat quietly (yes, me) and waited for it to finish.
We now had a half hour break before a champagne reception (Lanson) before supper so I nipped up to change from my travel clothes into a simple white tshirt and linen trousers dressed up with a bit of bling. I had been unsure about a dress code so played safe, travelled in jeans (about half the people at the first lecture were also wearing jeans) and packed black, white and grey linen slacks and matching tshirts. There were exactly right - smart casual was the order of the evenings.
I went down to the Junior Common Room and was immediately accosted by Phil Iddison (a former Trustee and husband of Patsy), given a glass of champagne and chatted to for ten minutes. It was very hot in the room so I sidled out and headed for the dining room which was much larger and airy and cooled down. There were a couple of women sitting at the end of the first table and chatting casually so I asked if I might join them and was greeted enthusiastically and beckoned to sit down next to one of them. They were really lovely, Virginia Hill introduced herself as an Australian food writer and Lidia Bastianich said that she had a restaurant in New York and specialised in Italian food. We were soon joined by Julie Friedman, a retired lecturer from Wisconsin and Janine Kalowski who I think was her daughter but I might be wrong about that. We settled down as a nice little manageable coven with the assistance of Alice Mullen whose poor husband Bob (they were from New Jersey) looked on happily and just listened with interest to our conversation - adding an odd nod.
A chap called Jake Tilson makes menus for all the meals at the Symposia and they are real collectors' items. I shall treasure all mine. Forever. Friday's Dinner was cooked by my old mate Shaun Hill (we did get together) with the generosity and assistance of Tim Kelsey and the staff of St Catz. Tim Kelsey is the head chef at Catz and extremely co-operative with the Trustees when organising the Symposia. The actual menu started with Seared Monkfish with Mustard and Cucumber Sauce, was followed by Roast Rack of Lamb with Summer Vegetables and Lamb Shoulder Stew and finished with a Buttermilk pudding with Summer Berries and Cardomom Honey Syrup. The monkfish was fabulous, a creamy mustard grain sauce with ribbons of steamed cucumber. The lamb racks were perfectly cooked and had already been cut in the kitchen, they were placed on top of a delicious lamb stew made with flagelot and broad beans with whole baby carrots. The buttermilk pudding was a sort of light and luscious pannacotta. So much for my raw food diet. The summer berries were all uncooked so I think that will do for a start. The accompanying wines were a 2008 Eroica Chateau Ste Michelle & Ernst Loosen from Washington Sate USA, A 2008 Pinot Noir Wittman from Rheinhessen and a 2002 Riesling Erdener Treppchen Dr Loosen from the Mosel.
We lingered for a while over coffee and then all went our separate ways. I found out the following day that Lidia is very famous in America, she has a television programme, was a judge on American Masterchef and has several restaurants and cookbooks published. None of which I was told by her, we just had a lovely chat about our grandchildren and the importance of teaching them to cook. We were pulling out the photographs, laughing about the mess they make in the kitchen and generally getting on very well. I never saw her at breakfast, apparently she would slip off to The Randolph after dinner and sleep in luxury. I slept in a student bed, very badly, but with a massive grin on my face and dreamt of buttermilk puddings and grandchildren.
I think that is enough for now.
I will return.
Doncaster
I was actually born in Doncaster but left when my parents divorced shortly before my seventh birthday. My father still lives there and since he will be 86 in September I feel I cannot be in the area without visiting him and always do so. My much loved aunt also lives there and she is 79 so I try to see her too. We spent two nights staying at the guest accommodation (£5 a night for both of us) our housing association has just round the corner and so remained independent whilst enjoying seeing the relatives for an hour or two.
We went into Donny on the bus and had a good mooch around the shops. There was a wonderful photographic exhibition of "old" Doncaster displayed in the shopping mall and I had a lovely time identifying places I remember which have all been razed to the ground since the 1960's. Donny looks very prosperous these days, people seem to be smarter, plenty of expensive cars on the road and a generally upbeat atmosphere. I also bought myself a very pretty art deco sapphire and diamond ring from a pawnshop which was most reasonably priced. I have decided that my holiday souvenirs will take the form of jewellery in the future - I get to enjoy it now and my grand-daughters will enjoy it when I die.
We returned home on the Wednesday having been away seventeen nights - Onslow was whinging for the last couple so I suspect I may be limited to a fortnight in the future!
We went into Donny on the bus and had a good mooch around the shops. There was a wonderful photographic exhibition of "old" Doncaster displayed in the shopping mall and I had a lovely time identifying places I remember which have all been razed to the ground since the 1960's. Donny looks very prosperous these days, people seem to be smarter, plenty of expensive cars on the road and a generally upbeat atmosphere. I also bought myself a very pretty art deco sapphire and diamond ring from a pawnshop which was most reasonably priced. I have decided that my holiday souvenirs will take the form of jewellery in the future - I get to enjoy it now and my grand-daughters will enjoy it when I die.
We returned home on the Wednesday having been away seventeen nights - Onslow was whinging for the last couple so I suspect I may be limited to a fortnight in the future!
York and Beverley and The Humber Bridge
We could not book into the hotel until after 2pm so abandoned the car and went off to the Railway Museum. Not our first visit there but it is always such an absolute joy that no opportunity to visit is ever neglected. It is one of the best free attractions in Britain and to a railway enthusiast absolute heaven. Once booked into the hotel I went down to the basement swimming pool and had a good hour in there to make up for the exercise missed whilst travelling. I do find that if I go two or three days without exercise then my body siezes up and all my joints stiffen. One of the joys of being in my 60s I suppose.
Our room was very large and well furnished with extremely comfortable beds, we had a view over the gardens to the Minster and it was lovely to sit and watch the sun setting through the enormous window. It being Thursday evening we wandered off to the local Wetherspoons for the curry night and Onslow was very happy to be back eating the sort of food he likes rather than the poncey stuff I favour. Friday dawned a bit grey with intermittent rain so after my morning swim we donned our waterproofs and went walking around York. There was a wonderful farmers' market on in Parliament Square and since the sun broke out at lunchtime I shopped for a picnic lunch and we sat on a bench eating it and watching the world go by. We then continued to wander around the city admiring the architecture generally and browsing in the bookshops. Saturday dawned a bit brighter and we went to the William Etty exhibition in the art gallery in the morning and then met up with some internet friends for a picnic in the park. It was lovely to meet people I have only "talked" to via a message board - most of them had travelled some distance and brought foodie treats for the picnic which they had made at home. We had a lovely couple of hours together and then we went off to the Cycle Touring Club annual rally which was being held in the middle of York Racecourse. Onslow is the proud owner of a recumbent tricycle and he had a whale of a time buying lovely presents for himself and the trike whilst I followed and produced the pennies. We actually got sunburned that day, despite me having factor 30 lotion on my arms I really picked up the rays and so am glad that I had anointed myself before leaving the hotel. We were too tired to bother much about supper so just shared a platter back at Wetherspoons with a drink before falling exhaustedly into bed.
Sunday we were up early and checked out to head for Caistor in Lincolnshire and went via Beverley because I have always wanted to see the Minster there. Beverley is a delightful market town with a good selection of shops, a fine square, some interesting architechture and the wonderful Minster. We spent about four hours there and then headed off to stay with my brother who has moved to Caistor in Lincolnshire since I last saw him. The drive over the Humber Bridge was well worth the toll fee, the views were interesting, the bridge itself is worth looking at and it was very quiet. Possibly it is much busier during the week but on an early Sunday afternoon there were very few vehicles using it. Caistor was a real surprise, I had always assumed that Lincolnshire was flat fen country but Caistor is set among rolling hills and my brother lives on top of one with fabulous views which reminded me of the Golden Valley in Herefordshire. The weather was glorious so we sat outside drinking wine and eating a barbecue followed by a huge dish of fruit. Lovely.
Our room was very large and well furnished with extremely comfortable beds, we had a view over the gardens to the Minster and it was lovely to sit and watch the sun setting through the enormous window. It being Thursday evening we wandered off to the local Wetherspoons for the curry night and Onslow was very happy to be back eating the sort of food he likes rather than the poncey stuff I favour. Friday dawned a bit grey with intermittent rain so after my morning swim we donned our waterproofs and went walking around York. There was a wonderful farmers' market on in Parliament Square and since the sun broke out at lunchtime I shopped for a picnic lunch and we sat on a bench eating it and watching the world go by. We then continued to wander around the city admiring the architecture generally and browsing in the bookshops. Saturday dawned a bit brighter and we went to the William Etty exhibition in the art gallery in the morning and then met up with some internet friends for a picnic in the park. It was lovely to meet people I have only "talked" to via a message board - most of them had travelled some distance and brought foodie treats for the picnic which they had made at home. We had a lovely couple of hours together and then we went off to the Cycle Touring Club annual rally which was being held in the middle of York Racecourse. Onslow is the proud owner of a recumbent tricycle and he had a whale of a time buying lovely presents for himself and the trike whilst I followed and produced the pennies. We actually got sunburned that day, despite me having factor 30 lotion on my arms I really picked up the rays and so am glad that I had anointed myself before leaving the hotel. We were too tired to bother much about supper so just shared a platter back at Wetherspoons with a drink before falling exhaustedly into bed.
Sunday we were up early and checked out to head for Caistor in Lincolnshire and went via Beverley because I have always wanted to see the Minster there. Beverley is a delightful market town with a good selection of shops, a fine square, some interesting architechture and the wonderful Minster. We spent about four hours there and then headed off to stay with my brother who has moved to Caistor in Lincolnshire since I last saw him. The drive over the Humber Bridge was well worth the toll fee, the views were interesting, the bridge itself is worth looking at and it was very quiet. Possibly it is much busier during the week but on an early Sunday afternoon there were very few vehicles using it. Caistor was a real surprise, I had always assumed that Lincolnshire was flat fen country but Caistor is set among rolling hills and my brother lives on top of one with fabulous views which reminded me of the Golden Valley in Herefordshire. The weather was glorious so we sat outside drinking wine and eating a barbecue followed by a huge dish of fruit. Lovely.
Sunday, 3 July 2011
York
We left the M6 and crossed the country via Sedbergh and Aysgarth. I had not seen Aysgarth since the late 60's and was glad to see that the Falls were as lovely as I remembered. We stopped at Masham for a light lunch and had a desultory wander around the town centre but noticed nothing of real interest. We then went to Ripon and had a bit of a mooch around for an hour, the cathedral has the most stunning pulpit I have ever seen. Totally incongrously in a Gothic building it has a beautiful Art Nouveau pulpit made from bronze and copper - it is worth going to Ripon for that alone. There are some lovely windy streets with very interesting architecture and an imposing main square.
We then went to Fountains Abbey and had a good walk around the grounds. I particularly wanted to see the stained glass window which is a memorial to the Vyner daughter who was killed whilst serving in the WRNS during the second world war. I last saw it when I was doing my army trade training at Catterick in 1968, a nasty cold Wednesday afternoon was too bad for any sports so we were all piled into a bus and taken to Fountains. At that time I became very emotional - I suppose because I was seventeen (she was eighteen) and in uniform and I could identify with her. I still felt the same way over forty years later. I got quite choked up.
We then headed for York and found a Travelodge on the Tadcaster Road which could fit us in for one night - we had reservations from the following day at a posh hotel. The Travelodge was fine, clean and basic as usual. However, the adjoining Little Chef was a revelation, it was brilliant. I ordered steak and chips with no great anticipation but it was extraordinarily good by any standard. The steak was perfectly rare, the chips were crisp and hot, the wine (a Chardonnay) was delicious and the salad dressing perfect. The following morning's coffee, toast and marmalade were also perfect. I have not been in a Little Chef for years but will certainly try them again after this experience.
We drove into York proper and straight into the car park of our hotel, The Royal York which is right next to the station. The car remained parked for the next three days and we walked everywhere.
We then went to Fountains Abbey and had a good walk around the grounds. I particularly wanted to see the stained glass window which is a memorial to the Vyner daughter who was killed whilst serving in the WRNS during the second world war. I last saw it when I was doing my army trade training at Catterick in 1968, a nasty cold Wednesday afternoon was too bad for any sports so we were all piled into a bus and taken to Fountains. At that time I became very emotional - I suppose because I was seventeen (she was eighteen) and in uniform and I could identify with her. I still felt the same way over forty years later. I got quite choked up.
We then headed for York and found a Travelodge on the Tadcaster Road which could fit us in for one night - we had reservations from the following day at a posh hotel. The Travelodge was fine, clean and basic as usual. However, the adjoining Little Chef was a revelation, it was brilliant. I ordered steak and chips with no great anticipation but it was extraordinarily good by any standard. The steak was perfectly rare, the chips were crisp and hot, the wine (a Chardonnay) was delicious and the salad dressing perfect. The following morning's coffee, toast and marmalade were also perfect. I have not been in a Little Chef for years but will certainly try them again after this experience.
We drove into York proper and straight into the car park of our hotel, The Royal York which is right next to the station. The car remained parked for the next three days and we walked everywhere.
Saturday, 2 July 2011
The Hill House
I have wanted to go to The Hill House at Helensburgh for about twenty years and this trip built in a day to ensure that I got there. It was well worth the effort. I am a big fan of Charles Rennie Mackintosh and have seen most of his major commissions already but The Hill House has eluded me. It is furnished in typical Mackintosh detail with some beautiful glass and light fittings, pale plain walls with the odd frieze of stylized roses and fantastic wooden floors. As a contrast to the overwhelming sumptuousness of late Victoriana it is absolutely brilliant.
We had seen enough by about 1530 so instead of looking for a hotel for the night we decided to push on down the M74 until we were tired and ended up staying at a Days Inn just north of Carlisle. The first Days Inn we have ever stayed at and I was very impressed.
We had seen enough by about 1530 so instead of looking for a hotel for the night we decided to push on down the M74 until we were tired and ended up staying at a Days Inn just north of Carlisle. The first Days Inn we have ever stayed at and I was very impressed.
Skye
We left Aviemore on Saturday morning and took a very leisurely drive via Inverness, Strathpeffer and Achnasheen to the Kyle of Lochalsh and crossed to Skye over the bridge. We had not actually booked any accommodation in Skye but were reassured by many guest house signs showing "Vacancies" on the road from Kyeleakin up to Portree and did not doubt that we would find somewhere to sleep for the next four nights. I had previously established that Portree has a municipal swimming pool and it seemed to be the only one on the island so I wanted to stay in Portree in order to keep up my early morning swim. We found a twin en suite room at The Portree Hotel in the main square just a ten minute walk to the pool and it was excellent value. Basic, but clean and with comfortable beds and a good full breakfast. We just pottered around Portree on the Saturday afternoon and had a very good fish and chip lunch on the harbour.
Someone obviously had vandalised the parking meters in Portree so we ended up with free parking for our entire stay. All the ticket machines had signs on them saying "Out of Order" so we parked right outside our hotel within view of the Police Station without problems.
On the Sunday I booked a boat trip out into Raasay Sound to see some wildlife and it was absolutely brilliant. We saw both sea and golden eagles, seals and a porpoise. We went past some salmon farm pens and the salmon were leaping in them, they were round pens instead of the early rectangular ones and it seems this enables the fish to swim better and results in more exercise and therefore less flabby flesh. Apparently the fish are not fed for the last seven days which ensures a lot of the fat is lost naturally. We went to The Prince of India for supper and had excellent popadums followed by decent curries and rather nice Peshwari naan bread. The portions were much smaller than our local Indian restaurant, but adequate, and on reflection we could probably have managed a starter too.
Monday dawned bright and sunny and we went off early to visit Dunvegan Castle which has the chattiest guides I have ever come across. Every single one wanted to be my new best friend and it was one of the most interesting castle tours I have ever done (being married to Onslow who is a castle nut means I have done hundreds) and gave a really good insight into the Maclean clan and Scottish history generally. We left and went off to do what for me was to be the highlight of the trip, lunch at The Three Chimneys. The last five miles or so are done on a single track road with passing places, truly destination dining, you don't pass it on the way to anywhere else. We started with the most fantastic bread, I chose rosemary and sea salt which tasted superb. The texture of the bread was almost cake like, very soft and dense but light as a feather. Questioning revealed that the rosemary is pounded in a pestle and mortar and olive oil added, this is then left to steep before being strained into the bread dough so you get all the flavour and none of the woody bits. Malden type salt was evident on the crust. It was worth going there for the bread alone and I did an Oliver Twist and requested more. The waitress proudly told us that the butter was churned on the premises - the implication being that it was local produce. However, I had not seen any cows on Skye so being awkward I asked where the cream came from. She returned from the kitchen and said "Scotland" so that was that. I felt it a bit unnecessary and the butter was not that good, certainly not on a par with Lescure or Echire. I had braised blade of beef as a starter which was served with a side dish of very finely sliced cauliflower (I suspect with a mandoline) mixed with pickled onion. The pickled onion was not the usual small onions we see but about the size of an apple - it had been sliced into long thin shards and mixed with the califlower, it was lovely. Onslow had what was described as fish soup which was more like a stew with a deliciously flavoured broth with huge chunks of monkfish and langoustine in there. We both had the seafood platter which was in the main lovely but neither of us was very keen on the mussels which had been marinated in a tomatoey vinegary oniony cold sauce. The potted crab was fabulous, the oysters and scallops fantastic, the winkles superb but the langoustine had not been deveined - quite a failing in my eyes. Mind you, it did not stop me eating them, I just deveined at the table. I ordered the cheese board which was excellent, my first crowdie but I knew the Dunsyre Blue, the Mull cheddar and the camembert type . The oatcakes were made in the kitchen and were the best I have ever tasted. Onslow was driving but I had a glass of Chilean Rose with the starter, a French Sancerre with the main and a Banyuls with the cheese. All perfect. Onslow had a coffee and was brought with it a plate of petits fours which neither of us had room for. They were put into a little box for us to take away and eat later. At £109 for the two of I did not think it bad value at all.
On Tuesday we had a nice drive around the rest of the island, some fantastic views and I quite see why Onslow wanted to go there. We ate that night at the Bosville and had really gorgeous mussels in a cream and garlic sauce with good bread.
And the following morning was dull and dreich and we did not mind leaving for our next stop at Helensburgh.
Someone obviously had vandalised the parking meters in Portree so we ended up with free parking for our entire stay. All the ticket machines had signs on them saying "Out of Order" so we parked right outside our hotel within view of the Police Station without problems.
On the Sunday I booked a boat trip out into Raasay Sound to see some wildlife and it was absolutely brilliant. We saw both sea and golden eagles, seals and a porpoise. We went past some salmon farm pens and the salmon were leaping in them, they were round pens instead of the early rectangular ones and it seems this enables the fish to swim better and results in more exercise and therefore less flabby flesh. Apparently the fish are not fed for the last seven days which ensures a lot of the fat is lost naturally. We went to The Prince of India for supper and had excellent popadums followed by decent curries and rather nice Peshwari naan bread. The portions were much smaller than our local Indian restaurant, but adequate, and on reflection we could probably have managed a starter too.
Monday dawned bright and sunny and we went off early to visit Dunvegan Castle which has the chattiest guides I have ever come across. Every single one wanted to be my new best friend and it was one of the most interesting castle tours I have ever done (being married to Onslow who is a castle nut means I have done hundreds) and gave a really good insight into the Maclean clan and Scottish history generally. We left and went off to do what for me was to be the highlight of the trip, lunch at The Three Chimneys. The last five miles or so are done on a single track road with passing places, truly destination dining, you don't pass it on the way to anywhere else. We started with the most fantastic bread, I chose rosemary and sea salt which tasted superb. The texture of the bread was almost cake like, very soft and dense but light as a feather. Questioning revealed that the rosemary is pounded in a pestle and mortar and olive oil added, this is then left to steep before being strained into the bread dough so you get all the flavour and none of the woody bits. Malden type salt was evident on the crust. It was worth going there for the bread alone and I did an Oliver Twist and requested more. The waitress proudly told us that the butter was churned on the premises - the implication being that it was local produce. However, I had not seen any cows on Skye so being awkward I asked where the cream came from. She returned from the kitchen and said "Scotland" so that was that. I felt it a bit unnecessary and the butter was not that good, certainly not on a par with Lescure or Echire. I had braised blade of beef as a starter which was served with a side dish of very finely sliced cauliflower (I suspect with a mandoline) mixed with pickled onion. The pickled onion was not the usual small onions we see but about the size of an apple - it had been sliced into long thin shards and mixed with the califlower, it was lovely. Onslow had what was described as fish soup which was more like a stew with a deliciously flavoured broth with huge chunks of monkfish and langoustine in there. We both had the seafood platter which was in the main lovely but neither of us was very keen on the mussels which had been marinated in a tomatoey vinegary oniony cold sauce. The potted crab was fabulous, the oysters and scallops fantastic, the winkles superb but the langoustine had not been deveined - quite a failing in my eyes. Mind you, it did not stop me eating them, I just deveined at the table. I ordered the cheese board which was excellent, my first crowdie but I knew the Dunsyre Blue, the Mull cheddar and the camembert type . The oatcakes were made in the kitchen and were the best I have ever tasted. Onslow was driving but I had a glass of Chilean Rose with the starter, a French Sancerre with the main and a Banyuls with the cheese. All perfect. Onslow had a coffee and was brought with it a plate of petits fours which neither of us had room for. They were put into a little box for us to take away and eat later. At £109 for the two of I did not think it bad value at all.
On Tuesday we had a nice drive around the rest of the island, some fantastic views and I quite see why Onslow wanted to go there. We ate that night at the Bosville and had really gorgeous mussels in a cream and garlic sauce with good bread.
And the following morning was dull and dreich and we did not mind leaving for our next stop at Helensburgh.
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