So, I was at Newton…

There’s something in the water at places called Newton. Get this. Just when you thought The Ship Inn at Low Newton would be hard pressed to better fulfil its outward promise than with friendly fire and fresh-caught fruits de mer, the landlady goes and installs a micro-brewery in the back. The Queen’s Head at Newton, Cambs, carved its alluring, no-frills niche by half-cocking customers cold-cuts and selling soup from a slow-cooker according to what shade the most recently tossed in components have coloured it. Pull up to the The Duke of Wellington at the Newton near Stocksfield, Northumberland, and you’re so disarmed by the gorgeous, panoramic rear aspect that as you step out of your vehicle you might even neglect to notice you’ve let your car door open onto the wing of a badly parked Bentley. (Oops..) It’s beautiful here. I’m in my element. I’m home. And I haven’t even had a pint yet.

There’s been substantial investment in this place. South-facing views across undulating countryside have been enhanced by split-level terracing that was still a work in progress as we arrived. A big-arse wood-burner commands the pub area, flanked by bookshelves to one side and a dartboard to the other. Handsome, purpose-built bench seating lines the wall perpendicular to the bar itself, the lime-washed wood of either lending a modern edge to a naturally light space you can’t help feeling might benefit more from warmer tones and less intense pyrotechnics. It carries with it the stamp of quality craftsmanship, mind you – you need a solid centre of gravity to force open the heavy toilet doors – but it’s a braver man than me that risks a buggered bounce-out or missing Double Top and embedding a 24g arrow in the new tongue and groove.

The same aesthetic carries through to the restaurant. I’d say it flows through, only it doesn’t. This is an extension and although it affords fabulous views it’s too bright and feels cold. The chairs are all wrong in a faux-French style, and the tables, of a size and evidently chosen to give the room a functional flexibility, are too uniformly spaced.

The food, on the other hand, is excellent. Imaginatively served, well cooked and, in view of the modest  lunchtime tariff, gut-bustingly good value. Startlingly good, in fact, to the degree you wonder how they account for or justify the comparatively high cost of their a la carte choices. Certainly I’d expect that the extra fiver or so per dish payable of an evening (some dishes go for around £20)  to go beyond the use of more obviously expensive ingredients or toward over-filling the plates. Or else that portions at this time of day end up a tad smaller. These were vast and, at £10 apiece, Medallion of Beef Fillet with Autumn Coleslaw and Hand Cut Chips, and North Sea Cod and Chips went an awfully long way. I was surprised, if not to be asked how I’d like the beef cooked, then at least to be told how I might expect it to arrive. “Medium”, it wasn’t, but it didn’t matter a bit. It was tender and offset by the presentational flourish that is serving chips (beautiful, by the way) in ornamental chip pan baskets. The Cod, in a batter whole-heartedly endorsed by my sponsor, was enormous and came with mildly minted mushy peas.

Dessert was categorically not needed but a worthwhile luxury, even if it was complicated both in the reading and eating by an unduly flowery make-up. Sweet Potato Cake (£5.50) came with a Date Puree and a Blackberry Foam which both H and I agreed might just as well have been ice-cream. Not that its consistency belied the name, rather that ice-cream would have been a simpler, more honest (this is a pub), and fittingly robust way to round off a lunch comprised of two classics. Delicious, all the same. Coffee was accompanied by Petit-Fours – a little too perfect to be homemade but I could be wrong – and with hindsight I’d probably take the owners to task over the need actually to charge double for a Double Espresso (£3.80) where a Cappuccino, traditionally the same but with hot milk, came in at over a quid less.

The all female staff was incredibly youthful, all competent and very sweet, although one or two did lack the confidence or maturity to appreciate the selling points of a smile. While this didn’t by any means let the offer down, the sense of a senior presence was lacking – someone, for example, to notice the mustard had been sat out long enough to begin forming a crust – , as was that of a personality to give the venue a face. Two of four ales were local, Corby Ale (3.8%, Cumberland Brewery), and my eventual choice, Tyneside Blonde (3.9%, Hadrian & Border Brewery) which went down about as easily as it name suggests it might.

The absence of a variety of alternatives in the surrounding area means the Duke’s already turning mid-week custom away, and this before an on-line presence has begun to be established. Once one has, and it’s home-page provides links beyond the food, drink and function offer to details of the 4-Star letting rooms and the outlook from within, there’s every reason to believe its popularity will only grow. Good for the few local institutions that do exist to be kept on their game, I think, and I’m sure places such as the Angel at Corbridge would have said the same before they’d had half their personnel poached. The Duke isn’t perfect. It’s not finished, to be fair, but there are elements to tweak. I’d be surprised if before long a better compromise wasn’t reached between pricing and portions from afternoon to evening. Equally, it would be disappointing if something cosmetic wasn’t done to increase the ambient appeal of a pretty soulless restaurant. But this is Newton, don’t forget. They’ll get it right. They invariably do.

This one’s for you, Han. For lunch, and for letting me stay, I thank you very much xx

Draper’s Charms

The Draper’s Arms in Islington ceased trading in 2008 after an outwardly healthy administration was required to call in the receivers. At least that’s the story Hard Ons, I mean Harden’s, reported at the time. Two years on and the stately neighbourhood boozer’s back in established business with a roll-call of pub-restaurant royalty at the bridge. Driving force Nick Gibson’s business partner Ben Maschler is fire-breathing Fay’s boy, and the pair have enlisted the Standard-bearer to mentor the new Draper’s overall offer. Also in the equation is former Fergus Henderson aide, Karl Goward – previously of Clerkenwell’s St John – whose menu, on the basis of an end-of-week tweet from the owners (if you could hear yourself, LamBert…), would appear to be packing them in.

Crow’s Feet and I caught a late lunch there on Friday. I must say the 30 minutes that city serveries add to their opening beyond the traditional 2.30pm can afford one’s schedule a bizarre amount of additional flexibility. You tell me; how often have you found yourselves pushed to catch curfew based on an appointment that’s over-shot, traffic congestion, or an out-of-nowhere, ‘should have nailed more porridge’ pang? That 30 minutes is a security blanket, no? Like a well positioned price point, there’s something infinitely more pleasing about a 12-3pm window that both complements the even, archetypal 6-10pm evening slot and which, if your premises is accessible to drinkers all day anyway, makes as much commercial sense from the point of view of reeling in stragglers as letting Chef chip off half an hour early. We were delighted, anyway, to find that at twenty-to-three we were still in good time to order ahead of a relaxed afternoon crawl.

At £9.50 the Ploughman’s may or may not sound relatively steep. However, once you’ve taken delivery of a huge wedge of a Keen’s cheddar that’s almost as costly at retail prices, as well all that goes with it, you’d recognize the value too. The Hymnal’s Gammon and Tomato Chutney Sandwich (£4.50) was a steal in all its thick-cut, make-a-meal-of-yourself-as-the-generously-layered-condiment-pisses-everywhere-as-you-bite-into-it, splendour. And the chips, at £3.00, were goose-fat good, if a bit cheeky.

The Draper’s is a handsome and imposing example of local Victorian architecture with a relatively significant Political history. (Something to do with the origins of the Labour party, I think, but don’t expect me to elaborate because I don’t care). The interior’s presumably deliberate clash of colours blue and green is curious but not unattractive and there are details such as the alcove accessorised with cotton reels which give a tasteful nod to the name. It’s airy, even if a lack of in-house ’ents’ can make it feel a bit echo-ey, and nothing if not classy. Service is polite and professional – there were no questions asked when I asked for a funky Sambrook’s to be replaced by a contrastively clear Harvey’s Best – and patient when pikeys with performing dogs drop in and rudely rebuff any attempts to tailor a Bloody Mary to their distracted date’s specifications. Proof, if it were needed, that there’s no helping some people and yet there are still those who question my decision to turn it in as if all of a sudden I felt I’d lost my touch. My patience, maybe, but “oh, but you were good at it…” rather misses the mark in respect of the above.

 

It ain't supposed to look like that

 

With the exception of the dodgy pint, then – one of a salvo of shockers I’ve been served recently, an issue on which the fast growing number of micro-breweries should take landlords to task if they’re to showcase their product in the correct light – rather a success. You’d hope so, mind, what with the calibre of contributors and the serenity of the surroundings. (Michael Nyman’s a neighbour, don’t you know?) The space can rattle a bit but its presentation is immaculate. Just as, as of this morning, the website remains absolutely up to date in regard of the daily changing menu, pitched as keenly and with as much style and variety as any in its category. If you’re in N1, do one.

Peace.

Out on a Limb

I’m told The Devonshire Arms was previously a reggae venue, its club area separated from the bar by some drapes and concealed from the outside world by painted-out windows. Precisely what they were hiding doesn’t really bear thinking about, particularly once  you learn that when the pub’s new tenants locked themselves out recently the least suggestive way the neighbouring Sex Shop could assist by way of a bunk-up was to lend them a set of stilts.

This is Cambridge, believe it or not, and Milton Brewery re-launched the Devonshire, one of a bounty of terraced boozers off the city’s Mill Road, in January this year. The paintwork is so fresh it might just as well have opened yesterday, the space still retaining that hollow sense you get when you take down a room’s curtains or move the furniture out. It’s sparse and utilitarian and more about function than form, all hard wooden surfaces and high-sided booths. The warm red ceiling is hung with ornately attractive, slightly out-of-place chandeliers, there’s plenty to read, and if you enjoy a well maintained pint of the good stuff, it’s a fucking treasure trove.

I counted eight beer pumps – five serving Milton’s own, three serving guests – one carefully chosen draft English lager, and a pokey cider which, weirdly, customers seemed to be being talked out of having. The draft beer offer is backed up by a comprehensive range of bottled product, and a narrow but serviceable, shortly to be expanded wine list. I kicked things off with a pint of the brewery’s own bright, aromatic ‘Tiki’ (3.8%), before cracking into Milestone’s ‘North Rock’ (4.0%), rewardingly round by comparison and with the mouth-feel of a chocolate brazil. From here I reverted to Milton for a tried and tested Pegasus (4.1%) which, along with their Jupiter, is about as foolproof a fall-back plan as there is; it’s bitter, it’s brown and it’s ‘drinking’.

Principally, the menu looks to have been tailored perfectly, mindful of the immediate environment and its surroundings. Its prices are reserved and the content reads simply but with points of interest. Staples such as Fish Pie (£8.95) and a Burger (£7.95) made from locally reared beef are offset by Faggots with Bubble and Squeak (£8.50) and a Supreme of Chicken stuffed with smelly cheese (£9.50), any of which are sure-fire stimuli for a bit of pub purist beard-bristling. The execution, on this evidence at least, is another matter. Without a genuine appetite, but keen to partake of something, I ordered Potted Crab with Toast (£5.75) from the snack list and thought best to try the Hand Cut Chips. The food was delivered by Chef himself, which is a touch – whether it’s standard practice or not – I quite liked. He was polite, endearingly shy, and his crab, appropriately, was as dull as shit. In my experience ‘potted’ anything is cooked with sufficient butter not only to facilitate a coronary, but with enough additional flavour-giving gubbins that it at least tastes as though there’s method to the dish beyond placing its main constituent into a pot. This was plain crab meat ( plus one rogue shrimp) in a glass ramekin with an over-dressed, after-thought salad and toast. The chips were spectacularly salty. Cut long and wide, they wilted under the weight of excess oil that lent their pale colouring its unappealing sheen. 

The Devonshire Arms is a proper pub, though; brass tacks and beer, albeit for me it was a real shame the integrity of the liquid offer wasn’t matched by the strength of the scran. Perhaps if it was – and with a little application it so easily could be - I wouldn’t have been sharing what already feels a little like an empty shell with just three other punters. That said, if the place had been busier there’s the danger I wouldn’t have caught every word of one unflappable old bird’s patently private phone conversation. This was a call – God forbid any of us were faced with fielding it – that you or I would have taken outside. Let’s just say the subject was delicate, the tone ever so slightly emotional, and the upshot, as the lady relayed to her partner once she’d finally rung off, that ” he’s gonna get ‘elp with his drinkin’… “

Rest assured I need no assistance with mine.

‘Ardened Subliminals

Friday’s foray down Henley-in-Arden’s High Street was a modest triumph. For the life of me I can’t recall a provincial parade being so well stocked of locally laid-down ‘brown’ – three out of four venues visited were replete of at least one regional ale – , which is to say nothing of the range of reputable foreigners found to be on offer for those happier to drink outside the box. While this might sound unremarkable it’s quite rare. Rarer still to find they’re all in decent nick, and yet still, having taken one of these venues to task in a previous post based on its overly self-assured signage, that I was temporarily faced with eating the words that had bothered me so much about it.

I say temporarily because, having actually now tried and quite liked The Bluebell, as well had my heart broken by a member of their bar staff, I’d gone back to their website to reprehend that just how pleased they are with themselves and its content serves pretty effectively to nullify how capably they might operate. The truth is that virtually every building along this stretch of the town’s centre is possessed of such character charm that if you were lucky or canny enough to secure the lease on one for your business you’d have to try especially hard to make a horse’s arse of appointing it. Far from doing so, the Bluebell is a picture of palatial ostentatiousness. But then the proprietors’ sister company is an interior design firm whose values would appear, judging by the use of the word ‘swanky’ in the corporate copy to describe their newly refurbished ‘private’ dining area, to have been plucked from the same anatomical vicinity as the peacock feathers they’ve dotted about to bring the aesthetic home. Check out the ‘Gallery’ too. Rather than the expected virtual tour of an environment in which they take such pride, it’s a set of images revealing with which industry celebrities the owners have rubbed shoulders, and the society events they’ve got to ‘glam up’ for with their mates. That said there are some genuine touches, H was terrific to look at, and my Cuthbert’s, (Church End, 3.8%) went down all the better for it. Chugged a couple….

Prior to winding up here Benson and I had been pleasantly surprised to find that The White Swan, whose management have done their level best to balls-up a recent re-branding, isn’t entirely the batty bistro it’s been dressed up to resemble. Once past the fey glass frontage it looks and feels like a proper, if mildly poncey, pub. Of the five, yes five, beers on handpump, I overlooked the often ordinary Purity in favour of a really decent DoomBar (Sharp’s, 4%) and we talked futures on the terrace, intermittently scrutinizing the Cygnet Room signage and the fact that the hotel’s ‘Gastro Restaurant’ (what?) was stone dead at 8 o’clock on a Friday. Even if the logo does complement the feel of the place inside, one only needs to glance down the street at the numbers spilling on to the pavement outside the infinitely more modest Three Tuns to question whether, in terms of a public profile, they haven’t comprehensively ‘jeffed’ it.

Whether or not the White Swan needs the patronage of territorial twats like the one that belligerently stood between us and the Tuns’ entrance is another matter altogether. Still, once inside this presentable, unmistakably public house, there was plenty to suggest the local competition would have nothing to lose (and a few hundred quid more to gain of a weekend) if they didn’t look to appeal exclusively to demographic of customer that seems not to have come out tonight. It’s down to earth and Henley appears to dig that. Shakespeare’s County (Warwickshire Beer Co.) was tight if toothless, but then it does only pack 3.4%. Having made temporary work of that, I went back for and nailed an Old Hooky (gutsy, 4.6%) in the time Bentz had surmounted his tulip of gassy Belgian gold.

Matricardi’s is a shoddy drinking destination, its aesthetic all wrong in light of its structural framework, and even though it seemed to be relatively popular with diners – I could just about make out some people eating from one end of an inordinately long corridor – I’m not going again.

Retrospectively then, I wouldn’t say we’d been overwhelmed by any one venue. I remain unconvinced, mainly because of a series of botched frontages, any of them have a good enough handle on precisely who they’re catering to.  However, for my part, all but one redeemed themselves – The Bluebell more than most –  with a collective and common endorsement of locally manipulated malt, hops and barley. Over and above everything, though, it’s always good to get out with the family. Between us Benson and I made an admirable fist of accounting for a proposed tripod’s third leg being otherwise engaged. Best re-schedule, eh?

Season of Mists and Mellow Frugalness

No doubt this will begin to come over like part two of a one man whine about excessively Conservative journalism – and it’s probably worth mentioning, if ever I was inspired to vote, that I’d likely pin the tail on the Blue donkey – or else in the absence of the means by which to go get trousered and then eulogise about it, what I do instead is sit and read the paper in the hope that something I find in there either strikes a chord or plain pisses me off. Most of which is true. What’s special about the article this post draws on (Zoe Williams review of The Pheasant at Keyston in this Sunday’s Telegraph) in the context of previous Hymnal outbursts is that principally its ethos in regard to service is precisely in tune with mine. Where we differ, which I guess is why she’s doing it and I’m not, is that she’s able to put into a single sentence what I’ve tried and failed to succinctly say in half the entries here to date.  So, kudos, Zoe, for that if nothing else.

It’s this that provided long-overdue music to my ears; “To be honest, nice but rubbish service is infinitely preferable to mean but professional service, which you can’t even complain about”. We’ll ignore the bit that implies she’d prefer a platform on which to have a good old moan about it and focus on the rewarding, if vaguely reluctant, admission that an honest, warmly engaging ineptitude will always trump cold, indifferent proficiency. Amen, to that, because invariably it will.

What the write-up serves to blur, however, is the distinction between service from front of house and that from the kitchen. You might justifiably argue, of course, that they should amount to the same thing. They should but they don’t, necessarily. Williams’ party had been in situ for an hour before they received their starters which would, she rightly points out, be “sluggish at night” but is “totally untenable” on a Monday Lunchtime. She attributes the delay to two very different things, and it could be a lack of available column inches that meant two separate complaints being lumped into one paragraph. Certainly that’s the only reason I’ll accept for someone responsible for informed industry reporting apparently failing to acknowledge that restaurants run to a system. Admittedly, in light of the time it’s taking for them to get their food out, The Pheasant’s doesn’t seem to be functioning all that well, although I suspect our critic’s exasperation that only certain staff members are allowed to take food orders would be compounded but for a specific decision taken by the management that is designed to prevent delays rather than perpetuate them. I would imagine, as she also does, that the main reason for any hold up is that the place is heaving – which itself is a clue that things tend to run more smoothly in the main – and that being due very largely to a flurry of interest generated by recent TV exposure which, if it were me, I’d have been lamenting since The F Word was first advertised. Not because such publicity isn’t good for business, you understand – blatantly it has been, and needed to be, if the attendance last time I had a quite ordinary Sunday lunch there is anything to go by – , but because this type of coverage tends to tempt ‘experts’ out of the woodwork.

Speaking of whom, I’ll leave you with a couple of Zoe’s golden nuggets which, for my peace of mind if nothing else, reaffirm there’s still an enormous crater in this cavernous foodie forum for some straight up speculation;

i) “The bread is squidgy and seeded, with butter so creamy, distinctive and subtle it deserved a new name”.

I’m going to throw ‘Lurpak’ into the ring, probably enhanced with garlic and herbs.

ii) “There was some fandango on the back of the menu about how you could tell summer had arrived because of the abundant Jerseys; normally I hate that sort of proselytising, but it was more than warranted with these wholesome, toothsome pebbles”.

One,  I’ve neither time nor inclination to establish if proselytising is even a word, and two, give me a fucking break.

Good to see a bit of balance in an appraisal, mind you, and that places can still score 8/10 in spite of the service being adjudged to be “totally terrible”. Useful for the Hymnal, too, to be able to afford a bit of credit where it’s due, thus allowing me to appear less bitter about the thankless toil that is blogging in the blind hope a pre-eminent publisher will sooner or later stumble across my back catalogue and gift-wrap me a weekly column. With en suite accommodation thrown in.

Keep the faith.

Bullshit-Proof Fest

The eighth annual Beer Festival went down at the Cock, Hemingford Grey over the Bank Holiday. CockFest, as it has affectionately become known by, well, me, looks to bring together a portfolio of the best the surrounding area has to offer in the way of beer and cider, a sprinkling of live music, and with it the local community. Twenty five firkins were racked, vented and tapped, the sell-through about as comprehensive as normal, and what was left come Sunday night was the usual blend of the familiar – Wolf  ’Golden Jackal’, employed as contingency volume – and the dark and chewy – Milton ‘Medea’, brought in to lend variety to the line up but which you know “fo’ shizzle” will take a miracle of concentrated power-drinking to shift in more than half its entirety.

This year’s ‘tasting notes’ are listed below and, while they drew some sceptical glances from ‘beardos’ (“I’m often asked ‘What do women think of the beard?’, and I say, ‘..some are tickled by it!”) in rival Beer Festival sweatshirts, they were, as ever, a complete nonsense designed to complement a festival spirit that encourages goers to appreciate the product for exactly what it is. One red-cheeked Romeo referred to them, I’m flattered to say, as ‘bollocks’. They are. Soundbite of the weekend was provided by a rangey regular who, in round and loud tones, surmised that if the Painted Lady had indeed been a lady, she’d be the sort he’d take out on a Wednesday rather than a Saturday. He then adopted an imposing, lolling angular gait, gnashed his teeth, growled a bit, and chased his grand-kids round the car park.

Til next year….

NETHERGATE – Sudbury, Suffolk:

Umbel Magna (5.0%)- Hunkier than the humble Umbel. Dark and infused with coriander.

Lemon Head (4.0%) – A take on the Belgian staple, ‘Tete du Citron’. A glassful of Summer.

Painted Lady (4.2%)- Attractive, characterful Suffolk guest. Worth a flutter.

Orange Wheat Beer (4.0%) –  Zethty pith.

WOLF – Attleborough, Norfolk:

Straw Dog (4.5) – Light, bright and permissive Festival favourite.

Granny Wouldn’t Like It (4.8) - Strong, long, dark, and handsome? She might, you know… N/R

Norfolk Lavender Honey (3.7)- Tried and tested Norfolk nectar.

Battle of Britain (3.9) – Plane bitter. Bombed at the Great British Beer Festival.

Lupus Lupus (4.2  – Blonde) Heavily hopped and leggy blonde.

BREWSTERS – Grantham, Lincolnshire:

Hop Head (3.6%) – Fashionably full-on and hopped up, dry, pale ale.

Hop A Doodle Doo (4.2%) – Four malts and three hops blended to a cumulative copper cock-crow.

GREAT OAKLEY – Corby, Northamptonshire:

Wot’s Occurring (3.7%)- Steady session ale. Impressed at GBBF reaching the final rounds of the Champion Beer of Britain competition.

Gobble (4.5%) - Nourishing Northamptonshire four-fer. A ‘gimme’ for wags looking for a beer with mouth-feel, and barmaids that embarrass easily.

Delapre Dark (4.6%) – Malty, mahogany mouthful of chocolate and burnt spice. Apparently.

MILTON – Cambridge:

Pegasus (4.1%) – Supernatural, winged-horse piss.

Medea (5.7%) Potent, godly grog from Milton’s merkin-mushed Carrot Top.

TYDD STEAM - Wisbech, Cambridgeshire:

Roadhouse (4.3%) – Raw and rural Wisbech wallop. Still a mainstay of the Double Deuce.

Piston Bob (4.6%) – What I did after too much Roadhouse. Warning; Excessive consumption may tempt you to sleep with your own sister.

POTBELLY – Kettering, Northamptonshire:

Streaky (3.6%) – The lightest of T-Bone’s trio. Bittersweet, balanced and belting

Pigs do Fly (4.4%) – Fanciful step-up from the Streaky, similar in style but a truffle stronger.

Aisling (4.0%) – Proven porker. Hearty but not heavy and suitably round.

FELLOWS – Cottenham, Cambs:

Cambridge Fellow (3.8%) – A previously unknown quantity but a real Candidate for Head Boy.

Gulping Fellow (4.2%) – Another dandy making its debut and, despite the name, not at all difficult to swallow.