Category: restaurant review

Restaurant review: Chez Lindsay, Richmond

Leave a comment

For my husband’s birthday, we went to Chez Lindsay in Richmond for some delicious crepes at the weekend! Unfortunately, we were running very late because of motorway traffic, so by the time we arrived I was feeling pretty tense – as you can see from my strained expression!

Untitled

I was wearing my Cezanne Paintbox pleated dress in Destiny from Great Plains – I bagged it in the sale for £15, so I was pretty pleased with the purchase! We didn’t really take any better photos of this outfit, but I did pose with a dragonfly I rescued from a Starbucks!

Untitled

When we got to Chez Lindsay, we realised my great plan of finding a car park, which was ‘I saw a big car park on the map nearby, it’s fine’ was actually very flawed in reality. What we did instead of finding one, was drive around Richmond in a circular fashion until we hated each other and wanted to murder everyone. Eventually we rang the restaurant and found the car park they advised (thank you, helpful restaurant folk!), which could only be reached by driving in more circles down very unpromising residential roads. So, by the time we arrived we had driven for around two and a half hours to get there, and were on the verge of minor nervous breakdowns.

Untitled

Luckily, the food was amazing, and a real trip down memory lane for both of us! My husband lived in Cherbourg for nine months at university, so I visited him often and we had a favourite creperie we went to all the time. These crepes were not only delicious, but a real blast from the past and very comforting to boot.

First of all, though, check out this awesome butter knife:

Untitled

I ordered the super complete, which is a buckwheat pancake (or, galette) with egg, cheese, ham, onions, tomatoes and mushrooms. If you’ve never had a buckwheat pancake before, you really should try them – you can get buckwheat flour from lots of supermarkets these days, and the texture and nutty taste is so much better than plain flour pancakes – and makes a great match for savoury flavours. These galettes are very traditional in Normandy and Brittany and you can find creperies all over the place in these regions selling these delicious dishes.

Untitled

The galettes are always served like this, with the corners turned up, containing all the delicious toppings underneath.

Untitled

My husband had the same as me, except no mushrooms, because he has a challenging palette (ha – he drives me nuts!). Would you like to know how it was?

Untitled

Superb, of course! The restaurant was very pretty too – light and airy with a great atmosphere, even though it was fairly quiet when we went in.

Untitled

And the waitress and hostess (who I presume was the owner, possibly Lindsay herself!) were charming and helpful, despite our probably incredibly frazzled expressions!

If you love Bretonne cuisine and buckwheat style pancakes or French food in general, I’d definitely recommend a trip there – and visit Richmond and Kew Gardens whilst you’re there, too! On a sunny day I can’t think of many things more pleasant.

The website with menus can be found here. The restaurant is located on 11 Hill Rise, Richmond upon Thames.

Save

Hawksmoor Air Street

Leave a comment

For my husband’s 30th birthday, we visited Hawksmoor on Air Street, just off Regents Street. I’d heard this was one of the best places in London for steak, and I was certainly not disappointed.

The real stand out for the whole meal was actually totally unexpected and a real treat – cornflake milkshake!

IMG_0208

We totally ordered this by chance but I’m so glad we did – it was delicious and incredibly unique. It was super sweet with a hint of malt to it, and the cornflakes on the top added a great texture.

Plus, gotta love those classic milkshake glasses!

IMG_0209

At first, we just ordered one to taste, but when it came I insisted on getting my own!

 IMG_0212

If there’s a meal worth getting fat for, it would surely include at least one cornflake milkshake…

IMG_0215

This was my husband’s starter – Doddington Caesar salad. It’s a bit of a running joke between us as the cheese also sounds a bit like his surname… It was pretty unusual to have cheddar on a Caesar salad, and it wasn’t until I tasted it myself that I appreciated the difference in texture – the waxy feel of cheddar is very different to the drier, textured feel of Parmesan.

IMG_0221

I had the Tamworth belly ribs – I did want the potted beef and bacon with Yorkshires, but the waiter told us the chef wasn’t happy with the quality and asked us to select something else. To be honest, they were slightly dry in places, but very rich and great with the red cabbage. As usual, when serving salad and a meat dish to a table seated with a man and a woman, the waiter tried to give me the salad – this always happens when we go out together and perhaps I should take the hint and start ordering lighter options!

We opted for the express menu, which I think is excellent value, but does limit your choice of main course steak cut to just the rib eye. No matter, that’s my favourite! Here’s the piece de resistance:

IMG_0222

Two gorgeous rib eyes, two sides of triple cooked chips, and a dish of Stilton hollandaise.

Without doubt, this was the best steak I have ever had. Meaty, beefy, robust – it was everything a steak should be. Tender in all the right places, cooked perfectly as a medium rare. If you ever wondered what aged beef tasted like, or why it was so much better than regular steak, I invite you to go to Hawksmoor and discover it for yourself. Absolutely phenomenal. It totally blew the steak I had at the Hind’s Head last month out of the water.

One aspect in which Hawksmoor couldn’t compete with Heston was on the triple cooked chips front. They certainly looked the part, but there was a suspicious taste about them which made me wonder whether they were yesterday’s batch… Anyone brought up with thrifty parents can recognise the taste of reheated potato, and that’s the taste I was getting from these. Unfortunate if they weren’t just reheated, unfortunate if they were – no win either way! But they were beautifully crunchy and did the job of soaking up the juices well.

IMG_0226

The Stilton hollandaise was delicious – but just as with bernaise sauce, I found myself feeling stuffed after a few swipes at it – there’s something about an egg based sauce with steak that sits just on the wrong side of richness for me. Next time I’ll try the bone marrow gravy, but to be honest, I’d literally only eaten this exact same dish at the Hind’s Head two weeks’ before, so I thought I should at least chance the sauce!

I definitely recommend a visit to Hawksmoor Air Street – the express menu is just £23 for two courses, available between 12-18.30 and after 22.00. As a steak-hound, I thought it couldn’t get any better… but I was wrong. The best steak in London (so far!). http://thehawksmoor.com/

Save

The Fat Fig: An Epic Greek Feast!

1 Comment

On Saturday, some of my friends and I went to The Fat Fig, a Greek restaurant in Southampton. I’d noticed it during a walk to check out a new ice cream parlour called Tooti’s and after researching it online, I found mostly glowing reviews. They offer an option on their menu called the ‘Fat Fig Meze Banquet’, which is decribed as ‘a feast, comprising of all dips, starters, a seafood course, finished with a meat platter’, priced at £18.95 per person. That seemed pretty good to me, so I booked the table and along we went! Inside, the restaurant’s decor is minimal, and the chairs and tables are canteen style – but the food, I assure you, is fantastic. Here’s what we had!

Untitled

We started with some amazing houmous, tzatziki with fat chunks of cucumber and laced with mint, taramasalata, skorthalia – cold mashed potato with garlic, olive oil and lemon juice, olives, and tabouleh – a zesty, juicy salad made of bulgar wheat, tomatoes and parsley, all accompanied by fluffy hot pitta bread.

Untitled

Following that was haloumi and lounza, a grilled, supersalty cheese with a rubbery texture (actually, incredibly delicious despite it sounding like polystyrene) and griddled pork loin that tasted like smoked ham.

Untitled

Then we had falafels – these, as I assume, most of the dishes, were homemade – piping hot and crispy with a spicy parsley and onion studded chickpea mash inside, accompanied by what I think was a tahini dip.

Following that came dolmathes and melinzanes together:

Untitled

The dolmathes were vine leaves stuffed with rice, pork, herbs and spices, and topped with a fresh tomato sauce.

Untitled

The melinzanes were possibly my favourite part of the meal, fried, smokey aubergine medallions topped with tomatoes, with a soft, rich interior surrounded by a crispy outer skin. I have a weakness for aubergine dishes!

Untitled

Then came the chicken liver – cooked in onions with lemon and parsley. I did try this, and it was tasty, but unfortunately the smell reminded me too much of the food we gave our dogs when I was a kid, so I squeamishly skipped this one!

That was the starters dealt with, so then we moved onto the fish course. First up was a plate of hot calamari:

Untitled

Then some fat king prawns covered with garlic butter, olive oil and parsley:

Untitled

And finally maritha, breaded, deep fried white bait:

Untitled

I’d never had white bait before, so I tried it out – it was incredibly delicious, although I do admit I removed the heads and scraped out the insides, which is not really proper white bait etiquette!

The second to last course was called Greek Village Salad – a classic Greek salad with the inclusion of iceberg lettuce. I’d never had it with lettuce before, and it had been wilted in the dressing which actually gave it an amazing texture and bags of flavour:

Untitled

The chunks of Feta were generous, flaky and delicious, as was the dressing and the oregano sprinkled on the top.

The final course was souvlakia, meat skewers:

Untitled

We had pork, chicken and sheftalies, homemade pork sausage. Honestly, the pork was slightly overcooked, but by this point we were pretty full and past caring!

The entire meal took around an hour and a half to eat, and we enjoyed everything with the exception of the chicken liver. Considering the price of most main courses at the restaurant is £10, our feast was very reasonably priced and I would love to go again some day! I highly recommend this for a special occasion if you’re on a budget and don’t want to go to a super fancy place – it has a sense of celebration and will certainly get you talking over the table!

Visit the Fat Fig’s website here, or call them on 02380 21 21 11. They are located at 5 Bedford Place, Southampton, SO15 2DB.

Afternoon Tea at The Rubens

3 Comments

At the weekend, my friends and I went to London for afternoon tea at The Rubens At The Palace!

Afternoon Tea at The Rubens

My friend had bought some vouchers so it ended up costing us £16.50 per person, which was pretty reasonable.

The room we ate in was beautiful, and although our table was pretty low, it made it easier to take photos!

Afternoon tea at The Rubens Afternoon tea at The Rubens Afternoon tea at The Rubens Afternoon tea at The Rubens

I wore my Hush leopard print scarf, and a wine coloured skater dress from ASOS (saw it on The Lilac Pages and fell in love, it’s such a great shape!).

Afternoon tea at The Rubens

Our sandwiches were delicious – the chicken bun was particularly good, with flaked almonds giving it a great texture. There wasn’t really enough cream to go around on the scones, and the jam was weirdly runny, but to be honest, we enjoyed the scones anyway. They were light inside but slightly crisp on the outside, which was tasty indeed!

Afternoon tea at The Rubens

The cakes were slightly hit or miss – I had a try of everything except the banoffee cupcake, and some of them were very good, but the layer cake was a tiny bit stale… But, hey – there was plenty of tea! I much preferred the Assam to the English blend they had, which is uncharacteristic. Usually I’m completely the opposite of a tea connoisseur.

Afternoon tea at The Rubens Afternoon tea at The Rubens

The great thing about The Rubens is that it’s so close to Buckingham Palace, so we popped on over when we’d had our fill (and yes, we were stuffed at the end!).

Buckingham Palace

All in all, I wouldn’t pick The Rubens over the other places I’ve been for afternoon tea in London (hey, The Ritz is pretty darn snazzy, y’hear?) but it was lovely to try somewhere new. The voucher price (through Virgin) was decent enough for four people, although the current deal isn’t too much of a saving on their listed price!

(Psst, don’t forget, UK readers can enter my competition to win 12 share bags of Popchips here!)

Related articles

Restaurant Review: Graze, Brighton

Leave a comment

I love me a fancy restaurant, and the last time I visited Brighton (way back in April), I decided to book a table at Graze, a place I’d heard some pretty good things about! Their lunch time tasting menu is actually really reasonable for a restaurant of their quality, so I was really excited to visit – and I wasn’t disappointed at all!

Untitled

Before we even began on our starters, we were brought some delicious soup shots, and some bread with different kinds of butter (you guys know how much I love bread and butter!). This was a really nice touch, because the different flavoured butters really added a different dimension to this restaurant table staple. My favourite was the one flavoured with a hint of lemon.

Untitled

Now, the menu above isn’t actually the one we picked from, as they had changed the starters and puddings and forgotten to swap the new menu in (we were the first customers of the day!). So, for my starter, I had pigeon salad, which was very nice indeed.

Untitled

The salad and the peas were delicious, and the meat was smoky and gamey without being overpowering – and cooked to perfection!

Untitled

The Mr. had a gorgeous wild garlic risotto, and loved every scrap of it – it was really tasty, and inspired me to try a similar dish when I got some wild garlic in my Riverford veg box (although it didn’t come out as bright green as this did!).

Untitled

My main was the gorgeous braised pork belly, and it was velvety and delicious on its bed of celariac puree – I never thought of preparing celariac like this, but it was so smooth and creamy I might have to give it a try!

Totally unexpectedly, before our pudding we were treated to a palette cleanser!

IMG_1718

For pudding, I had a really light and refreshing pineapple dish with Malibu ice-cream – the pineapple was cut so finely that it actually gave it a really interesting texture, much different to the usual chunky cut pineapple I usually eat.

IMG_1719

The Mr. had a selection of ice creams and sorbets, which were all delicious, especially the ice cream – which I suspect was cardamom, but we never actually found out…

IMG_1720

I was really surprised to be offered so many tasty and thoughtful extras with such a reasonably priced set menu, and I wasn’t disappointed by a single course. I came away feeling satisfied, but not full, and as though I had had a really excellent meal – sadly, not something you can say after every restaurant visit, especially not at this price…

Graze is currently taking bookings for their Christmas parties, and it looks as though the cheaper lunch tasting menu has been replaced with a more expensive dinner tasting menu, but you can also try their new British menu, or pop in for a Sunday roast!

Save

Hind’s Head

Leave a comment

What better place to go after a good day of racing than The Hind’s Head in Bray? The Hind’s Head is Heston Blumenthal’s pub, so when I realised how close it is to Ascot, I suggested a trip there! Luckily, we were able to get a reservation, and arrived a little early to wander over the road and check out The Fat Duck, Heston’s more famous restaurant.

IMG_3041

It looks incredibly unassuming from the outside! You can’t peer in through the windows, which is great news for the diners, but not as fun for us gawking tourists. IMG_3043

This sign doesn’t really give much away… IMG_3046

But this one doesn’t need a lot of fancy detective work to figure out! IMG_3050

Here is the famous Fat Duck sign, and in the background is The Hind’s Head! IMG_3058

The first thing we did went we got in was order a drink from the amazing menu while we waited for our table to be ready. IMG_3063

They were hugely expensive, but I spent my returned stake money on the strawberry sweetshop, and I don’t regret a thing! IMG_3061

Delicious! I would also have really like to have tried out some of the historical punches… but, a girl’s gotta eat, too. IMG_3064

We supped our drinks, and by this point had removed our hats – not really pub wear, even in Bray! IMG_3067

This was the menu: IMG_3068

It was hard to decide against the steak, but I already know what steak tastes like, and wanted to try something different! For starters, it was scotch eggs all round: IMG_3070

I had to try these as everyone was raving about them, and they were delicious (and cheap, too *ahem*…). The quail’s egg in the centre was still runny, and the pork was incredibly rich. The coating was deliciously crisp. There was certainly more than enough, even though the portion was small. IMG_3076

For my main, I had the steak and kidney pie (with triple fried chips, because. Chips). It was tender, delicious, and very, very rich and savoury. Yes, I know I decided against the steak because it was a familiar thing, and so is steak and kidney pie, but I wanted to see what Heston would do with the traditional recipe.IMG_3077

I HAD to have the chips with it, mostly because I’d heard so much raving about them… IMG_3075

Needless to say, they were great – crispy to the point of being crunchy! IMG_3081

Rachel and Lorraine both had the mushroom macaroni with ‘slow cooked hen’s egg’. I was pretty jealous because it was delicious! The slow-cooked part for the hen’s egg put me off – I definitely wasn’t expecting it to be soft. But the deep, meaty, mushroom flavour of the macaroni, and the gorgeous runny yolk was a match made in heaven!

Lorraine tried one of the specialities for her dessert – the quaking pudding! IMG_3083

It came with a little piece of card explaining the history of the pudding, which was very light – like a hot panna cotta. The caramelised banana was a great touch. IMG_3082

My pudding was called ‘English strawberries, soup and sorbet’, and I partly ordered it because I had no idea what it was going to be! IMG_3084

It was a nice mix of strawberry syrup, white soft cheese, sorbet, and the fresh strawberries. A refreshing end to the meal! Actually, no – it wasn’t quite the end, because I ordered a coffee afterwards! It came with an incredibly strong-tasting block of jelly – I think it was passionfruit, but I’m not sure… IMG_3086

One bite was enough, it flooded your mouth with flavour. Delicious!

All in all, our trip was very enjoyable. The food was very rich and full of flavour. It was expensive, but it was worth it for the novelty value! If I went again, it would be to share the experience with other friends and family, because the food, although fantastic, is not fantastic enough for me to justify the price again, nor the journey. But I would still recommend it to anyone who wants to try Heston’s food without shelling out Fat Duck prices.

Save