August 17, 2017

Notts Station Street Food Market – featuring Rubys Street Kitchen and Smiffy’s Smoke Shack

This week I was back up at Station Street, trying out some more stalls at the Street Food Market set up by Wolf Down Pop ups this week on Thursday it was Ruby’s Street Kitchen and Smiffy’s Smoke Shack, so Indian and BBQ for lunch? tasty!

First up was the Sheffield based “Ruby’s Street Kitchen” selling their take on Mumbai Street Food.

I had seen on Twitter that they were going to be here and I was keen to see what they had to give us. I have spent some time living and working in India and they were always telling us not to eat the food off the streets (we paid no attention) so I was kind of really interested to see what these guys were going to have.

The first impressions were good as that sign on their stall was so reminiscent of the signage and advertising I was used to seeing in India, this was going to be good!

XL Veg Samosa with Chickpea Chat

I wanted to try food from both stalls at the market so I decided to just have one of the smaller sized dishes that they had on offer.

I had the XL Veg Samosa with Chickpea Chat and salad. I really like the Chickpea Chat which had a nice medium spice, the salad seemed to be red onion and coriander.

The Samosa was pretty tasty and quite light. It was filled with peas, onion, carrot, potato, broad bean, and randomly some sweetcorn. It was also pretty good value for just £4

Ruby’s Mumbai Street Food Menu

Now on their Facebook Page I read that “We don’t just do Indian Street Food…we are in love with many of the best foods in the world! We strive to reflect the flavours and just make food that makes you go mmmm”.

When I took a look at their menu board and saw that they had so much great stuff on offer, well I could see where they were coming from.

I hope that they come back again as I really want to try so much of their fare! Top of that list is their ‘Award Winning Mumbai Vad Burger”. I saw a picture 🙂

 

Smiffy’s Smoke Shack

Next up was a Pit Chilli-Cheese Dog from Smiffy’s Smoke Shack. I saw these guys here last week and so this week I was making sure that I tried something from their stall.

Those of you who know me, know that I am kind of sceptical about the whole English USA BBQ scene, but you also know that I am game to give everyone who tries a go 🙂

I saw a picture of some ribs on Twitter and that was enough to make me think, plus the guy behind the counter looks like someone who cooks BBQ and might have a Pit 🙂

Pit Chilli-Cheese Dog

The Chili Cheese Dog had a lot going for it, the toppings of Pit Chilli and melted cheese sauce were both really good. The chili was quite thick, a bit smoky and a little bit sweet. It actually was a very meaty topping which I quite liked. More often than not your traditional BBQ chili topping is more of a meat gravy, so it was interesting to get this served this way.

The Dog was tasty, but it wasn’t quite the right beast for this job, it didn’t quite have that ‘snap’ to the bite that you need with a truly great hot dog. I was talking to the guy running the show and he told me that they have a lot of other sausages on offer back at the shack so maybe I will try one of those next time I visit.

At the time in a tweet I described it as ‘yummy, messy and fun’ and it was, I liked it even though most of it seemed to end up smeared across my face!

After ordering I had chatted to them and found out they are currently a pop-up at the Last Chance Saloon up on Stoney Street in the Creative Quarter.

It was enough to get me thinking that I really needed to get my ass up to the Last Chance Saloon to give them another go 🙂

I checked out the menu and see that they have ‘burnt ends’. I love burnt ends so guess what I will be looking for? 🙂

_____________________

The Street Food Market is located underneath the arches of the bridge that the Trams run over next to Nottingham Train Station.

The street is called Station Street and the market is open on Thursdays and Fridays.

Check out other posts on the Nottingham Food Blog – “Notts Station Street Food Market – The Gravy Train Street Food stall serving up some Classic Poutine at Wolf Down Pop-Ups”

Posted by on August 17, 2017 in 2. Nottinghamshire, Nottingham City Centre and tagged , , , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment

August 15, 2017

Tasty Taco’s and Tiny Rebel Brew at the Junkyard Pour House and Bottle Shop

Junkyard ‘Bottle Shop and Pour House’ on Bridlesmith Walk is one of my favourite watering holes in the city. This last Tuesday I took a stroll up there for a bite to eat and a beer.

When I first started visiting the place back in 2015 I was looking for some of the tastes from the States where I had been living for a number of years. Recently I had been back living over in North Carolina which had a really amazing craft beer and brewery scene, and also a lot of these bottles shops and pour houses.

I had finally found out what it was really based on. Junkyard has a very similar vibe, ok so it is a little bit more ‘Nottingham’ and has maybe too many of the beautiful people strutting their stuff on a Friday night for my comfort. But, If you hit the place up midweek or mid afternoon when it is quieter, well then it is my kind of drinking den!

Taco Tuesday

As it was a Tuesday and they had a little chalkboard advertising a couple of Taco specials, I decided that it must be Taco Tuesday! I really am not sure why I though that 🙂 Somewhat Super Subliminal!

Grazin Smalls – Taco Menu

The daily offer here at Junkyard is two taco for £8, so I picked the “Texas Brisket Chili” taco from the specials board, and the “Beef Cheek with Mojo Marinade” off the ‘Grazin Smalls’ menu.

I did like the sound of a lot of the other combinations, the ‘Seabass with chimichurri’ intrigues me, as does the ‘Shredded duck leg with kecap manis and pickled cucumber’.

If this all played out as I hoped then I could invisage another Taco Tuesday stroll back here soon #anyexcuse 🙂

The Taco Arrived

Both Tacos looked very similar when they arrived at the bar in their box. It would have been nice and helpful if someone told me which one was which. Luckily I have eaten food before so I worked it out 🙂

The Beef Cheek was excellent, it was very tender almost ‘melt in your mouth tender’. It was packed with rich beefy flavour, which played off well with the toppings that had a sweet pickle tang with a nice crunch. There was a gentle yet well intentioned level of spice,  and lots of freshness from the cilantro.

There was a nice citric note too which was probably from the mojo marinade. Mojo sauce typically being a mix of juices such and lemon, ornage, and lime, mixed up with garlic, onion and usually oregano. As this place is an American joint in inspiration I am guessing that this was a nod to a Miami Cuban style of cooking.

All in all it was a great Taco, great flavour, great texture. Perhaps it was not your everyday or run of the mill choice, but I would say that you miss this one at your food peril, it was excellent

The Beef Brisket Chili Taco

The Texas chili was not a bad effort, although I would describe it as more like a shredded beef, sort of like pulled pork. It was a nice and gentle affair, perhaps I should have gambled on the green chilli pork carnitas instead?

Drinks wise I was in for a treat as they had just had a Tiny Rebel Brewery Takeover.

There was a great selection on offer pouring all the way from a ‘Bohemian Lager’ to a ‘Marshmellow Porter’

I had my eyes peeled looking for a sour or a saison, I was to be in luck as they had one of each. Guess what happened next?

Tiny Rebel Mojito Sour

The Mojito Sour was a fantastic drink, lighter in alcohol and very refreshing. It even smelled nice, hints of mint and some gentle sour. It was probably the most enjoyable one that I have had in the UK. It was quite light alcohol wise too at just a mere 3.8% ABV. It was so good that I popped back in again later in the week just to try it again!

It is one of the limited releases that they have brewed so I might have been lucky to get my hands on one! On the Tiny Rebel Brewery website they describe this brew as

“Mojito Sour – we’ve taken the classic cocktail and beer-ified it! Kaffir Lime and Peppermint leaves in the boil gives this ale a citrusy, minty flavour which is given the signature zing of fresh citrus by kettle souring’

I am not sure I have had a mojito before, I might be tempted now 🙂

The Super Saison was also very drinkable, a little stronger in alcohol content, and a little hint of hoppiness. Some thoughts of lime in the palate was a nice touch too.

The Tiny Rebel guys describe it a bit better as “A classic Wallonian saison develops earthy peppery notes in fermentation. Kaffir lime leaves and Lemon verbena give the beer a big whack of citrus, which is supercharged by three mega-citrusy hops. A truly super saison”

____________________________

Next time I am here at Junkyard I will probably have to try some different beers which is one of the joys of coming up here as they have an ever changing list to choose from.

This Cranberry Saison I found a couple of weeks back was just one of the joyous finds I have had.

I might have to try some of those other tacos too 🙂 Just because I can!

 

Junkyard Menu, Reviews, Photos, Location and Info - Zomato

Junkyard is located at 12 Bridlesmith Walk, Nottingham, UK NG1 2HA

It is down a little alley next to the Ibis Hotel

Check them out as well on Facebook and on Twitter

Other posts on the blog about the Junkyard include:

Junkyard Bottle Shop and Beer House – Elevated Bar Food and some Fantastic Beers

The Burger Special at Junkyard

Posted by on August 15, 2017 in Uncategorized and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment

August 11, 2017

Notts Station Street Food Market – The Gravy Train Street Food stall serving up some Classic Poutine at Wolf Down Pop-Ups

Today I stopped off the tram for lunch at the new pop-up Street Food market by Nottingham Train Station. It is being organised by Wolf Down Pop Ups and will be there on Thursdays and Fridays underneath the Tram Bridge on Station Street.

The Gravy Train were there today serving up their take on the Canadian classic Poutine. So I made a beeline for their stall to see what they were all about

What is Poutine?

I could spend ages trying to explain what Poutine is, but they had put a very helpful sign up to explain the concept to the hungry passers by.

I do like Poutine and always describe it as like chips and gravy with cheese, only a lot posher and with much better ingredients.

Menu

The Gravy Train Menu was offering the Montreal which was a Classic Poutine with a choice of beer or mushroom gravy for £5 and a big upgrade version called the Pioneer which was the classic poutine with BBQ shredded chicken, maple bacon and sour cream for £6.50.

It all looks good but I suppose possibly a bit pricy for some? I heard one couple, who walked by, mutter ‘6 quid for chips and gravy?’ Oh if only they stopped and tasted it 😦

The Frenchie

I went in the middle of the range and ordered The Frenchie, mainly because it had a lot of toppings that I like 🙂

The Gravy Train version of this dish is the Classic Poutine, which was your ‘crispy rustic french fries’, ‘squeaky cheese curds’, and gravy topped off with Mapled Bacon, Sauteed mushrooms, and red onion marmalade.

The gravy was money, it had a kind of rosemary and garlic flavour, or maybe that was my taste imagination? I liked the mushrooms and there was a lot of that slightly sweet and smokey maple bacon. It was plentiful.

Loved the cheese curds they were salty and tangy and are the item alongside the gravy that really brings a Poutine to life.

I quite liked the very crispy chips or fries as they call them. They had a real good crunch to them and a lot of places could learn a thing or two about how to cook a french fry from these guys! 🙂

You certainly did great a big portion so it was probably worth the price and the poutine itself was actually not a bad rendition at all.

I would come back and eat another one, so lets leave that as the summary 🙂

____________________________________________

The Gravy Train can be found on Twitter and on Facebook and all over the place selling their Poutine

The Street Food Market will be here under the bridge on Station Street every Thursday and Friday check out Wolf Down Pop Ups to see who, what , and when on their Twitter Feed and Facebook Page

 

Posted by on August 11, 2017 in 01. Nottingham Station, 01. Nottingham Station (South), Nottingham City Centre and tagged , , , , , , , .

1 Comment

August 8, 2017

The Tea Cosy Cafe in Edwalton – Cakes, Sandwiches, and Breakfasts ‘thanks very much’

The Tea Cosy Café in Edwalton is located alongside and kind of inside the post office on Earlswood Drive. They have a Facebook Page and a website too.

The last time I blogged about a café in the post office it was called the Chai ‘n’ Coffee House and was a café with an Indian twist (read more).

I understand though that now it has been taken on by the Tea Cosy people and has been running well for the last few months. On an earlier visit I overhead them talking about how well it had been going, so that sounds like great news as this is a really great spot for a café!

Today I was on a bit of a bimble and a bit of a mission, I had persuaded my mate Antony that we really needed to check the new place out and so he came on a 30 min stroll with me down from the business park to get a spot of lunch, or as it happens a bit of a breakfast.

As we sat and put the worlds to rights, the Tea Cosy people looked after the more important part of feeding our souls and our stomachs. It was a fair trade in the MyFoodHunt Life.

Lets do this 🙂

Menu Inside

The Tea Cosy Café Chalkboard Menu inside gave much food for thought. I suppose we could have just had a sandwich for £2 or a Toastie for £2.25, but what fun would that have been on a MyFoodHunt? 😉

Oh no, I am pretty sure by now that you all know that I was going all in, guns a blazing and would have my stomach set and eyes fixed on the English breakfast 🙂 A large one at that for £5.50!

Classic Breakfast Situation

So we find ourselves once more in a classic ‘Breakfast situation’. It was a jolly big affair too as we took over the whole table surface with our breakfast plate, toast, and tea pots!

Lets get to the detail! 🙂

Large English Breakfast

The ‘Large’ English breakfast was filling our plates and if I am honest just for once I was slightly overwhelmed! The lady behind the counter had done us proud, we asked if we could have our bacon nice and crispy and our sausage well done. That was what we got too! The bacon was super crispy and really well cooked. The sausages were also crisp, perhaps not the most gourmet, but cooked very well.

There were two really well cooked fried eggs, looking all bubbled from where they had been rolling around the oil in that frying pan. They both had lovely runny yolks as well, nice and yellow and prepared just right for me.

I am usually not that bothered about the beans or the tomatoes on my all-day breakfast plate, but I have to say that I quite liked these beans as they had made the effort to heat them up properly in a pan. Trust me we can tell when someone takes the microwave shortcut and I did appreciate the extra thought.

The tomatoes were those big tinned plum ones that come in quite a thick tomato sauce. I didn’t eat them all, there was too much to be honest and I think if and when I come back I will probably decline the offer of tomato.

I liked that I also had two nice slices of warm toast, one used for dipping in my egg yolks and the second one turned into a ‘beans on toast’ situation. ‘Lovely Jubbly’ 🙂

Tea for Two

We had Tea for Two which was £3 and came in a big pot. This was excellent value as we squeezed two cups each out of that pot, and I even managed to get a third cup out for myself!

The Tea Cosy Café Chalk Board outside was offering ‘milkshakes’ for £1.50 and a ‘meal deal’ of £3 for a sandwich, crisps and a drink. That is not bad these days!

The board splashes all sorts of thoughts with not so subliminal words popping up ‘Homemade Cakes, ‘Breakfast Cobs’, ‘Panini’, ‘Toasties’. They also purvey the same message on their Facebook page where they even post picture of those cakes!

Maybe if I had only come to post a letter? and then I am thinking of food? True story! 🙂

I came in the week before after a gentle bimble to post a letter and did indeed succumb to temptation by stopping off for a Latté and a slice of some sort of millionaire slice.

The coffee was excellent and that slice of gooey chocolate and treacle on a shortbread base was very and I mean very rich and decadent. Nice!

The Tea Cosy Café is located at
38 Earlswood Drive (next to the Post Office)
Edwalton
NG12 4AZ

Check out their Facebook Page

 

 

Posted by on August 8, 2017 in 2. Nottinghamshire, Edwalton and tagged , , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment

August 2, 2017

The Humble Cat in Radcliffe on Trent – Super Friendly and Quaint Tea Shop

The Humble Cat in Radcliffe on Trent is a very homely little café. the day we went in it was packed out, almost every table was full with the blue rinsed ‘ladies wot lunch’ and a number of families all taking in luncheon and tea.

I last wrote about this place back in 2013 when I posted “The Humble Cat in Radcliffe on Trent – Good Food and Friendly People” and it seems as true today as it was back then. As people walked in the girls behind the counter seemed to know everyone’s name and what they probably wanted. I love places like this 🙂

The last time I was here I recall having a rather lovely coronation chicken roll, but today I was in the mood for something in the genre of brunch, and something slightly more elevated than a bacon and egg cob. So it came to pass that I was perusing my options from the ‘light bites’ menu

Light Bites Menu

The Humble Cat Light Bites menu has a lot of grown up stuff on it. I could not cater for my ‘greasy spoon cravings in this establishment 🙂

I had to suck it up and turn up the dial to ‘marginally respectful diner’. In the past, when in this situation I tend to gravitate towards the benedict end of the breakfast scale. what I would call ‘posh eggs on toast with other stuff’ 🙂

My options were Eggs Benedict with mushrooms, ham, or salmon. I went for the classic deli staple – ‘Smoked Salmon’

Eggs Benedict with Smoked Salmon

The Eggs Benedict with Salmon was a jolly decent affair, not the sort of holiday romance affair that one may have on a tourist beach on a Greek island, perhaps more like an illicit encounter with that posh girl from accounts who liked Pino Grigio and probably owned a pony.

The toasted bun was jolly well done, nice and crisp. The sliced smoked salmon was plentiful and covered every inch of the bread and more. The eggs were poached to perfection and yielded a nice burst of runny egg yolk when one cut into them. There was a fair dollop of hollandaise sauce on top which was a bit sharp and vinegary. Perhaps that was needed to cut through the rich yolk and the smoky fish?

Cheese and Onion and Tomato sandwich

 

My lunchtime partner-in-crime Alison asked for one of the Humble Cat Sandwiches, the option on the menu was ‘Cheese and Onion’ or ‘Cheese and Tomato’. I am not sure if she had her glasses with her as she requested ‘Cheese and Tomato and Onion’, that was fine though the lovely girls behind the counter just brushed off this eccentric request and it was ordered with no extra cost. I reckon we could have got away with some lettuce too 🙂 or maybe that technically could have been a ‘cheese salad’ sandwich 😉

OMG such digression, It looked pretty good when it arrived, a great big stack of sandwich cut in triangles that made it look like you were getting loads more food! It also came with a side salad with lettuce, tomato and onion plus some crisps! *Note to Alison, next time just order a cheese sandwich, and we can make our own cheese variety pack sarnie 🙂

Lots of Posh Tea

We were loving the pots of Tea here at the Humble Cat! Lots of colourful chintzy tea pots, cups and saucers abounded the place. I like that we had such a random mismatch, my cup went with Alison teapot. It was good value, I had proper tea and my pot had at least 3 cups in!

Alison had Earl Grey, which apparently comes with fruit, just like Gin and Tonic only a bit hotter! 🙂

Cake

 

I am denying eating any Cake. This picture of a slice of Victoria sponge was purely a record of a slice of cake placed on our table, I have no information as to what happened to it after that 🙂

Apparently this happens a lot here, cake just goes missing in action and people just pay hush money to keep the story quiet 🙂

The work on the street is that these homemade cakes magically reappear the next day, just as if someone had freshly baked a fresh one to cover up the Bermuda triangle type cake rumours!

Breakfast (and early lunchtime brekkie) Menu

I admit that I missed reading this section of the menu until after I had ordered.

The idea of a Full English served up in such a quaint little tea room is almost enough to have be running for my blazer and tie 🙂

Those magic words ‘Bacon, Sausage, Fried Egg, Tomato, Mushrooms, Baked Beans, and Toast’, well they get me everytime.

The Humble Cat is located in Radcliffe on Trent at

11 Shelford Road
NG12 2 Radcliffe on Trent

Posted by on August 2, 2017 in 2. Nottinghamshire, Radcliffe on Trent and tagged , , , , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment

July 30, 2017

Grillish on Mansfield Road – Tasty and Excellent Scratch made curries and more

Grillish on Mansfield Road was an excellent find this week. We popped in after a few beers on Mansfield Road for a little bit of sustenance and ended up staying for an hour to chow down on a quite delightful scratch made curry.

The Charcoal Grill was in full flow as we walked in cooking up some lamp chops for another fellow diner. This kind of got me hungry as I pondered my options.

As you would expect this place was offering a lot of kebab type fare. Those lamb chops were looking and smelling pretty good, but I wasn’t sure if I really wanted a kebab type situation. I know you are wondering why I came into a kebab shop then?

Well it was a recommendation from my mate Antony who just dragged me in here on the way back from the excellent Lincolnshire Poacher, he said it was really good, but then again he did say it was called Istanbul 🙂

Anyway I just asked the chap behind the grill what he recommended and he said the mixed meat curry, so we both ordered that. That is how easy we roll here at MyFoodHunt these days 🙂

Mixed Meat Skewers for our Curry

The meat for our curry was cooked on the kebab skewer over the Tandoor. Fair play to the guys for letting me pop out back to take some photos. While the chap up top was grilling the meat, some other guy downstairs or down in some basement kitchen was cooking up the sauce or gravy as they say for the curry.

Mixed Meat Curry

This Mixed Meat Curry at Grillish was honestly one of the nicest that I have eaten for a while. I asked our ‘host’ what was in it and he told me:  ‘Haldi (turmeric), cumin, black pepper, tomato, onion, and gravy’. That kind of oversimplified the whole bowl, this was a seriously tasty curry.

Curry with Naan

We were mopping up our Mixed Meat Curry with a rather large plain Naan Bread. This was and is always a much better choice for me that having rice as that just swells up in my belly and makes me feel over full.

No honestly this curry was so fresh and light, packed with sweet and savoury flavours, it was better than many I have paid a lot more for up on Maid Marian way. I think that what really makes it was that it was cooked from scratch, to order, right in front of us, so we felt special and it was special. No mass catering or using the same basic sauce for 10 different curries here at Grillish.

I am often walking up (and down) Mansfield Road on a bit of pub crawl, and there are a lot of takeaways, chicken shops and kebab joints plying away for our trade.

I can thoroughly recommend trying out Grillish,

As they say themselves ‘Fresh, Healthy, Quality’. Ok I’ll go with that 🙂

Located at

69 Mansfield Road, Nottingham, NG1 3FN

Check them out on Facebook

 

Sizzler Menu at Grillish

Mains at Grillish

 

Posted by on July 30, 2017 in 2. Nottinghamshire, Nottingham City Centre and tagged , , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment

July 27, 2017

Harringtons Fine Foods in West Bridgford for a Beef Cob – Rare Roast Topside, an excellent fresh made deli sandwich

Harringtons Fine Foods at Hilton Crescent in West Bridgford is a fantastic deli selling meats, pies, sandwiches, cheeses, jams and ‘jars of all sorts’. It has been a while since I drove down to the precinct to see what was going on.

The last time I was checking out the food here was back in 2013 this place was David & Angie Nicholls – “Traditional Butcher and Deli” ‘purveyors of fine foods’.

I had some pretty good well made sandwiches back then and so today when I was driving down past the playing fields on Alford Road, I remembered that there was a place, so I veered off to see if it was still there. It was, kind of..

As we now know that place is now called Harringtons Fine Foods, and as I said I popped in 🙂

I was mainly checking out the Sandwich and Cob Menu

So as a Nottinghamian by dwelling, I have to question the use of the word ‘roll’ and not ‘cob’, but then when I saw that it was actually served in a roll I was forgiving 🙂 . The chalkboard menu is simple, yet grown up. They have a lot of well to do fillings here, the sort that are perfect for the West Bridfordians and the Edwalton fringe.

They also have a lot of my favorites, so even after this post, I will probably pop back in from time to time in between MyFoodHunts for a snack. I really fancy the sound of the ‘Black Peppered Haslet’ and the ‘Shredded Chicken Tikka’ both well priced at £2.45. I also was pleased to see the excellent priced classics of a ‘Free Range Egg Mayo’ and a ‘Cheddar Cheese’ at just £1.95. Excellent value!

 

Rare Roast Topside Beef filled cob with salad

I picked out one filled with the “Rare Roast Topside Beef” for £2.45, and then I added the salad option of ‘Lettuce, Tomato, Cucumber, and Red Onion’ for another 45p. There was butter and mayo, but that was for the love of the sandwich and at no extra cost 🙂

What I really like about the filled rolls here is the filling to bread ratio. It is at least equal which pleases me no end, far too often places seem to think that they can get away with selling you a lot of bread with very little in it. Here at Harrington’s they had packed my roll out so that it was bursting the seams with a lot of sliced beef topside and just enough salad to make my stomach feel slightly smug.

The sliced beef was as promised on the ‘rare’ side and it had a great sweet meaty flavour, a nice bit of seasoning and that soft tender bite made this heaven in a bun 🙂

Got to get me a Pork Pie!

I was unable to resist the temptation of the pork pie 🙂 It just looked so beautiful and perfect sitting their in the cool counter cabinet alongside all of it’s other deli friends.

It was a fairly excellent pie as well, the filling was meaty and solid, with a nice bit of peppery seasoning. The bit I love the most though is that jelly in all the cracks. I know that is the bit that puts some people off a pork pie, but for me it is the best bit that makes the whole pie divine! 🙂 The hot water crust was a bit solid to be honest, but it was very well made and I would get another one like a shot! 🙂

I have plans though to come back for one of their Breakfast Rolls. It is sort of on my way to work and I want it all, homemade sausage for £3.20 and Dry Cured Plain Bacon for £3.20 oh but I would be adding a local free range egg for that 60p. I will bring my own brown sauce 🙂

________________

Harringtons Fine Foods is

Located at

24 Hilton Crescent
NG2 6HT West Bridgford

Check them out on Facebook and

Posted by on July 27, 2017 in 2. Nottinghamshire, West Bridgford and tagged , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment

July 15, 2017

The Boathouse Cafe at Beeston Marina – BLT and a Toasted tea cake … nice!

The BoatHouse café at Beeston Marina is one great spot to find if you have been on a big bimble along the River from Bridgford to Attenborough Nature Reserve.

On their website they say that it is:

“Run by Sandie and the (completely!) irrepressible Tony, the Boathouse Café offers 
a great place to stop and refuel! Try one of their full breakfasts & you’ll be back!”

Sadly though we arrived a bit late in the day so we could only get something from the Bagels / Sandwich menu and / or some chips. Fair enough it was about 3.45pm and they were closing at 4.30pm. We had thought that there were open later, but I think that was just walkers hopeful imagination.

I really wanted a breakfast so I will be back to try one of those for sure, especially when I saw you could get a small one of ‘Egg, Bacon, Sausage, Beans, Tomato, Toast or Fried Bread AND a free drink refill ( I assume a mug of Tea) for £5. I might mention it later down the bottom of the post, but you know I have my eye on bigger plates than that 🙂

Anyway we picked ourselves up and chose some stuff from what we could. That was a BLT sandwich and a mug of tea for me, and a Toasted Teacake and a mug of Coffee for Mum. All in this came to the bargain price of £5. Maybe Sandie and Tony did my wallet a right good favour here 🙂

BLT sandwich

So as I said I had the Bacon. Lettuce and Tomato sandwich or the BLT or as we like to say these days. I was pleasantly surprised as I really was not expecting too much perhaps just a sandwich made up with pre-prepared stuff from out back?

Oh no, I was very wrong, it was some nice white sliced bread filled with freshly cooked hot bacon, some freshly chopped up tomato, and some chopped up lettuce. It looked like someone had just made it up quickly all rustic like and that was probably what had happened.

I really liked it and not just because I was hungry from that walk along the river to get here. It really hit the spot, so much so that I didn’t miss my dream choice of the breakfast.

The mug of tea was spot on too, so refreshing, I like this sort of place where they give you the mug with the tea bag in, hand you a bottle of milk and just let you get on with it. Just as if you were at home in your own kitchen

Toasted Tea Cake

The Toasted tea cake looked good too all smothered in plenty of butter, or butter like spread. It was looking even better when you know that it was just a quid 🙂 I should have had one for my pudding after the BLT! 🙂

They had other cake type stuff on the counter as well, so plenty of options if you fancy something sweet with your hot drink!

Other Menus

So as I said up top the Breakfast sounds good, I am most certainly coming back to eat and  post about this. If you check out the website they have a picture of what this is all about and it makes me hungry just looking at it! I think the picture might be of the bigger breakfasts as I can see large hash browns and doubled up bacon, eggs and sausage. I’ll be back for that!

Boathouse Classics

There are Lots of café classics on offer too! I can imagine living down here on a boat and popping in for some regular stuff. I saw a boat advertised for £900 on the river nearby and reckoned I could just live here and munch my way through the menu this summer 🙂

I can also see why my Mum’s walking pals like it here too as OAPs get these classics for just 4 quid!

I have my eye and my belly has it’s eyes too on the ‘Gammon, Egg and Chips’ in the warmer weather and the Sausage, mash and gravy if its a colder day! 🙂

But first order of business is to come back for one of the breakfasts!

________________________

The BoatHouse Café is located at

1A The Quay
Riverside Road,

Beeston

Nottingham

NG9 1NA

Tel: 01159 223 168

Check out the deets on their Website

 

 

Posted by on July 15, 2017 in 2. Nottinghamshire, Attenborough, Beeston and tagged , , , , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment

July 13, 2017

All Day Breakfast at Cafe Victoria in the Victoria Centre Market

Café Victoria is one of several cafés in the Victoria Centre Market up on the top level of the intu centre. There are several other greasy spoon type establishments in the market that all seem to have similar menus with lots of daily specials. I am going to try and work my way through them all, but today I picked Victoria Café as this seemed to be the brightest and most spacious of them all.

The had some classic café daily specials like Cottage Pie which was pretty tempting, but I was in the mood for breakfast. I know I am always in the mood for breakfast, just let me roll with it 🙂

The All Day Breakfast

I ordered the All Day Breakfast for £4 and a mug of tea brought my total up to £5.10. Now considering at the time that I was dining in a market café that had seemed a lot, but then I considered that I went on to pay £5.20 for a craft beer at a city centre pub so it wasn’t that expensive after all 🙂

It was all very much as expected, cheap and cheerful, but not as cheap as I had hoped. Ingredients wise though I think we are on the budget end of stuff, which is fine with me, sometimes a good all day breakfast is better when it does not try to be posh and clever.

The sausages looked and tasted fine, but they were those less solid slightly mushy ones, probably not as much meat in these ones. The bacon was ok too, it could have been crispier, but I didnt ask for crispy so I got what I got. There were two fried eggs, one slightly broken, the other one I broke myself moments later 🙂

There was plenty of juice with my beans, and some of that tinned tomato that I am not so keen on, but that I know many people love, I use mine as ‘rustic’ ketchup.

Breakfast Menu (part of)

Officially my All Day Breakfast was described as being “2 bacon, 2 Sausage, 1 Egg, Tomatoes, Beans, 2 Breads and Butter” so it looks like I did well for myself as I got two eggs!

Maybe they gave me an extra one as one was slightly broken, if so then that was jolly nice of them! I like to think that is what happened so thank you very much! 🙂

I got the most value that I could out of my breakfast plateful by making two small egg and bacon sandwiches with my bits of bread and butter. As a bacon and egg butty seemed to be about £2 – £2.50, I like to think I broke the breakfast system there 🙂

All in all it was kind of what I was expecting so I was fairly happy with my lot and was glad that I ventured up to the market to sample.

 

Location

The Victoria Cafe can be found at 42-43 215B Victoria Market

It is right at the back of the market and overlooks the road that leads to the car park, so the views are spectacular if you like traffic 🙂

Although because there are lots of windows it is very bright and airy and you can actually see quite a bit of nottigham from the window 🙂

______________________

There are several other cafés in the market and I kind of feel the need to try them all out for comparison and not just because I like a greasy spoon breakfast 🙂

I will report back to y’all when I do

Posted by on July 13, 2017 in 2. Nottinghamshire, Nottingham, Nottingham City Centre and tagged , , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment

July 12, 2017

The Purist Burger at Bunkers Hill in the Lace Market

Bunkers Hill in Nottingham is one of those city centre pubs that is just far enough away from the main drag to feel like a local. Not too many of the gobshites bother to walk down the hill through Hockley to drink in this place, so you end up with a pretty relaxed but also vibrant feel. You get the guys out for a ‘decent pint’, the music lovers coming to see the bands and the singers, and when the Ice Hockey is on, well then you get the Panthers fans in.

The place has been done up a bit recently and a lot of the hockey memorabilia has gone which is a bit of a shame, they do have a big net up in the ceiling filled with Hockey shirts though which tickled me a bit.

They also have one of those big white boards now with all the beer listed as if they were the latest movie releases. I kind of liked that 🙂 I also like that they are doing tap takeovers, and promoting craft beer from all over. I know that is the ‘trend’ these days, but you get the feeling that these guys really are teaming up with the ‘guys who have the beer’

Last time I was down here they had this massive burger menu and I was like ‘come on now, how many burgers does one man need to think about?‘ These days though they have cleaned it up and you have a menu with most of the hits on it and just a couple of burgers to think about. My mind is less cluttered now and I was able to keep my choices simple, so thanks for that 🙂

Burger and Fries

We checked out the Bunkers Hill Menu and both ordered The Purist with chips which was billed as being “Two 3oz Beef Patties, Cheddar, Lettuce, Tomato, Onion, Homemade Burger Relish and Onion Rings”. The suggestion of adding smoked streaky bacon for £1 extra was heeded and the upgrade to a meal with chips took the pricepoint up to £8.75.

In the world of pub burgers this creation has a fair bit going for it. The actual flavour of the chargrilled burgers was very good, they were well seasoned and meaty. Sadly as they are so thin, they were a bit overcooked for my personal taste and they were somewhat on the solid side of well done.

The added crispy bacon was just as promised, a lovely bit of smoke, nice and salty, and some good crunch in the bite. You know what I wouldn’t mind just getting great big bacon cob filled with some more of this streaky perfection (put that on the menu 🙂 ).

I really liked that we had cheese on both the top and bottom bun, and the homemade burger sauce was fairly well received.

I would have preferred it if the onion rings were on the plate alongside the burger, instead of being deep within the tower. It seemed strange to have raw red onion and then deep fried battered onion in the same mouthful, that didn’t really work for me

Close-Up on the Purist

Construction wise we are looking at a dangerous game of burger Jenga! Even in this pre-munch close-up you can see that this stack is on shaky plate. Once the supporting wooden skewer was removed so that you could actually eat it, it was a toppling baby. This is one of those burgers that you almost end up needed a knife and fork for.

I like to be able to just pick my burger up in one hand and take a great big bite without the whole thing falling apart and tumbling back down onto my plate.

I did like that burger flavour as you felt that you could just eat the meat patty on it’s own, you didn’t to disguise it with lots of fancy toppings. Apparently the burgers come from Owen Taylor, one of our excellent local butchers from just over the border, and they are made from a mix of ‘rump cap, short rib, and chuck steak’. All they need to do now is cook them just a little more gently 🙂 or get thicker burgers. I like mine pink 🙂

If I am totally honest I would love a burger called the Purist to just be a simple affair of a good well cooked burger in a nice soft bun with perhaps just some cheese and maybe some bacon. Pure and Simple is what I really want, and that is not just hearsay 🙂

Some other stuff 🙂

Menu

I like that they have condensed the menu at Bunkers Hill, and I like that the prices are fair and reasonable.

I could imagine myself popping down for a Fish and Chips Friday to try out their “Cod and Chips” for just £8.50 the menu say that it has a ‘Guinness batter’.

Burger Sandwich Stuff

I kind of fancy trying the “Chilli Beef Burger” just to try the ‘smoked beef brisket chilli’ and the ‘chorizo relish’. If I do though I will ask them to take it a bit easier on my beef patties; just show them the grill and then put them in my bun 😉

That XXL Pork Belly Slider sounds good too, I can just imagine some crisp or maybe soft juicy pork belly coated with or dripping with ginger garlic, soy, chilli and honey. Damn I am really hungry now, why do I write about eating food?

So anyway Bunker’s Hill is located all the way down the hill from Hockley, just across from the Sneinton Market and pretty close to the Ice Stadium where those Panthers Play

Officially they are in the Lace Market at

BUNKERS HILL

36-38 HOCKLEY

LACE MARKET
NOTTINGHAM
NOTTINGHAMSHIRE
NG1 1FP

 

Posted by on July 12, 2017 in 2. Nottinghamshire, hockley, Nottingham City Centre and tagged , , , , , , , .

Leave a comment