Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Category: UK

  • London – Islington (Borough of) – Cinnamon Tree (Exmouth Market)

    London – Islington (Borough of) – Cinnamon Tree (Exmouth Market)

    What an appalling photo, but it’s what I have of the exterior of the Cinnamon Tree and so I’ll have to go with it. Richard was on one of his decadent business weekends to London, so we popped to Mikkeller at Exmouth Market as not enough people take me there and it’s one of my favourite bars. We had thought about eating there, but that plan fell apart as they weren’t serving food. I found that on TheFork (TripAdvisor’s booking system which keeps annoying me) the Indian restaurant over the road had 20% off food, so that seemed as good an option as any other.

    We made the 30 second walk to the restaurant and there was a friendly welcome from the staff. It isn’t the largest Indian restaurant, but they had a couple of tables free. Richard is still wearing his Christmas jumper, even though it’s mid-January, but I didn’t say anything. We limited ourselves to just two poppadoms each instead of our usual three as it’s important to eat healthily. The quality was fine, nothing exceptional, but they met my expectations.

    I’ve decided that any Indian restaurant that doesn’t serve a mango lassi is probably going to be disappoint me in general. The one here was a little expensive, but suitably rich. Richard went for a white wine which he didn’t think was exceptional, but I’m not a wine person so I wasn’t really that engaged with worrying about that. I noted the beer menu was generic though, they could just walk over the road to buy some cans from Mikkeller to give more options but I accept that it’s not always about the beer. Actually, I don’t accept that, it’s like an apology from Boris Johnson, a fake comment. Anyway, I mustn’t get engaged with politics on this blog, that’s not my aim…..

    Another inadequate photo, this isn’t ideal. Richard had the salmon mach bahja which he was content with, whilst I had the chicken bhutako. I had never heard of that dish, but it transpires nor has Google, as my searches simply found the menu for this restaurant. It was similar in taste to jalfrezi and the chicken was tender, the sauce had a depth of taste to it and I thought it was perfectly decent. We shared a coconut rice that was acceptable, but not as deep in flavour as I’ve had before. The peshwari naan was suitably almondy, I enjoyed that. Everything was also at the appropriate hot temperature and it took around 12 minutes to be served after ordering. But, the food wasn’t as complex in flavour as I’d ideally like, there was a touch of the generic about it, although it was sufficiently tasty for me not to be disappointed.

    The service was always timely and efficient, so the welcome felt authentic. Although three different people served us, there was no duplication of service, so everything felt well managed. I liked that they just lifted off the white tablecloth to reveal another white tablecloth underneath, which Richard had managed to stain as well. The staff didn’t say anything though….. I wonder why Indian restaurants bother with all this linen, it must be a bloody nuisance to keep sending off to be cleaned.

    One review I noted, although it’s from 2016, is from a customer who went as a single diner and wasn’t welcomed. This is now incredibly rare, but I hate hearing about it (and hate how TheFork often don’t offer discounts for single diners) and hopefully that’s not their practice now. The review was titled about being an unhappy solo diner, noting:

    “Despite restaurant being nearly empty insisted on seating me on a table next to door and at top of stairs by toilet. No sooner had fork touched the table each side dish mid meal was literally whisked away. Clearly just wanted you fed, paid up and out the door to clear the way for bigger parties.”

    The 20% off food was taken off the bill, although a 10% service charge put on and the whole bill was hazy in its adding up so it was difficult to check. It came out at £20 each, which seems to be the fairly average price for a meal at an Indian restaurant, so that was fine. I’m not sure that I’d head here again as there was nothing exceptional here that I could think to mention. There was nothing wrong, but it just felt like so many run of the mill Indian restaurants about, and they need something to lift the experience. On the bright side though, we did get a chocolate each with the bill.

  • Warwick – Holiday Inn Express Warwick and Stratford-Upon-Avon

    Warwick – Holiday Inn Express Warwick and Stratford-Upon-Avon

    Located near to the motorway and about a 40 minute walk from the town centre of Warwick is this IHG hotel. Visible in the photo to the right is what was until relatively recently a large Harvester restaurant, but it’s now been turned into a McDonald’s.

    The check-in process was all efficient although there was a weird set-up where the cheapest room rate was only available for twin rooms. I asked about that at reception and they didn’t know what had caused that, but just changed the room booking to a double. I might as well have the extra space….

    And the room, all to brand standard as usual. It was clean enough, with the exception of the “rest assured” cleanliness card to show that the room was clean, which itself was dirty. That’s not an ideal situation, they’d be better off dumping the cards or at least putting new ones into the room each time. Anyway, all else was well and I had my usual room location of on an upper floor and nearly as far away from the lift as possible.

    The welcome drink selection was as dreadful as ever for an IHG hotel. In what seems to be some form of brand standard, Holiday Inn Express hotels offer Stella on tap which is a completely dreadful choice as the sole beer, alongside Bud, Corona and Peroni in the fridges, all what I consider to be generic rubbish.

    The breakfast area, which was never that busy, although I did go down every morning nearly as soon as it opened which is usually the quietest time.

    The drinks section on the left, toast and muffins in the middle. What amused me about the set-up is that they’ve hidden all of the plates around the corner. There’s some logic here, that they’ve tried to create a customer flow and they think that the plates are easily noticed. I watched one morning as all eight guests struggled to find the plates, and add to that me the morning before. I accept that it’s not grand entertainment, but there’s a limited amount of other exciting things to watch at 07:00 in the morning.

    The hot food selection on the right, consisting of the minimum brand standard of sausages, bacon, baked beans and scrambled egg. There were also croissants, muffins, cereals, yoghurts and the like, all included in the room rate.

    The selection of teas on the left, orange juices on the right.

    Not entirely healthy perhaps, bacon and sausages, alongside a croissant. The food was the usual basic brand standard from Holiday Inn Express, nothing there beyond the minimum. The coffee cups weren’t the cleanest which wasn’t ideal and I had to pick out the crispiest bits of bacon amidst the rest which looked like it had vaguely been wafted over a naked flame for a few seconds.

    I have no idea what this was in the gardens of the hotel. I couldn’t work out whether it’s a small folly to add excitement to the gardens, or whether there was some building here before. I’m fairly sure it’s a a miniature folly as some sort of homage to Warwick Castle just down the road, but I have no idea.

    For the price of just over £30 per night including breakfast, this was a rather agreeable set-up, even though it was a slight traipse into the town centre every day. But walking is healthy and all that, but I was particularly pleased that there was a pavement all the way given that the road was quite busy. The staff were friendly, the room was clean and there were minimal noise disturbances. There’s a charge for the car park which annoyed at least one customer, but since I didn’t drive there, I decided not to let that worry me.

    There’s further information about the hotel here.

  • Warwick – Warwick Museum (Sheldon Tapestry)

    Warwick – Warwick Museum (Sheldon Tapestry)

    I thought that this was the highlight of the collections in Warwick Museum, the Sheldon Tapestry which dates to the 1580s. There were four tapestries commissioned by Ralph Sheldon (1537-1613) to hang at his grand house in Weston and they were based on the surveys of Christopher Saxton. The four tapestries were of Gloucestershire, Warwickshire, Worcestershire and Oxfordshire, with substantial sections of three of them remaining, but only the Warwickshire one still being intact. The map is sizeable, six metres wide and four metres tall, and it’s in good condition, although was subject to a major conservation effort about ten years ago.

    There’s Warwick in the centre, and it’s noticeable that there are a fair few liberties taken with where places actually are on the map. Warwick Castle is visible on the tapestry, as are the town’s two churches. The whole set-up is a bit more confusing as it isn’t a north to south matter, the original tapestry makers must have felt that the county fitted in best on its side.

    The area around Solihull, known at the time as Solyhill.

    And what is now Stratford, known at the time (or on this tapestry at least) as Stretford, particularly interesting perhaps as this is the town as William Shakespeare (1564-1616) would have seen.

    All very interesting, and a remarkable survival through the centuries, especially given its size and the material from which it was made.

  • Royal Leamington Spa – Dwarakamai

    Royal Leamington Spa – Dwarakamai

    Around ten years ago I had a plan to visit an Indian restaurant in every country that I went to. This plan is failing since I keep going back to the same countries, so I’ve widened it to visiting an Indian in every county that I go to in the UK. I accept that I should probably get out more than have little targets like this, but there we go…. This restaurant doesn’t perhaps look particularly exciting from the exterior, but it is the best rated one (Indian, not exterior) in Royal Leamington Spa, so I went with it. Listed building status means they can’t have a menu board outside, they have no web-site or social media presence, but they do offer deliveries and takeaways at least.

    I arrived at 16:30 on a Friday afternoon in a bid to miss the crowds. I entirely managed this attempt to avoid the crowds as I was the only customer for the entire time that I was there. The service was very friendly although it’s inevitably a little hard as the sole customer to judge the general atmosphere. The server was pro-active and mentioned that the restaurant’s speciality dish is butter chicken, which suits me, as that’s one of my favourites. Sometimes I wonder about recommendations like that in restaurants as I suspect they’re trying to get rid of stuff, but I was confident here that this was just their best dish.

    Mango lassi and I’ve discovered there’s a correlation between how good an Indian restaurant is and whether or not they serve these. This one was excellent in terms of the taste and texture.

    The wide angle of the photo has rather distorted this, as the portion size was much more generous that it looks here, although the plate wasn’t as large as it looks. The butter chicken was served as a reasonable portion and it had large pieces of chicken which were moist and tender. The sauce was rich and had a pleasant taste, a very good dish. It wasn’t spicy, which is as I would expect, although there was a depth of flavour, which puzzled me since the server had earlier asked if I wanted a recommendation of a spicy dish. The rice was served as a portion that was a bit big for me on my own, but such is the difficulty of being a sole diner and I did manage it all…..

    The peshwari naan, this was very moreish being thin and having almond flavour riven through it.

    I liked this venue, although it was quiet and that did mean the atmosphere wasn’t quite as exciting as I would have liked. The pricing was average, perhaps slightly on the expensive side, but the quality met my expectations. Overall, I’d say that it was nice enough, but the menu didn’t have anything overly exciting listed on it terms of authentic Indian cuisine, there was a touch of the generic about the options. I think I would have preferred something with a little more depth of spice as well, but I’m still glad I went, all perfectly agreeable.

  • Royal Leamington Spa – Clarendon

    Royal Leamington Spa – Clarendon

    This is the only verified venue on Untappd in Royal Leamington Spa, with the beer selection looking to be sufficiently interesting and it was also up-to-date. As an aside, there are a fair few venues which are verified and which promptly haven’t bothered to update their beer list in months, which isn’t an ideal situation. It’s a Victorian pub which seems to have grown in size over the years as it’s quite substantial now, and according to CAMRA it has recently gone through a series of pub names including the Jekyll and Hyde, Winstons and Oxygen.

    Some interesting external decoration.

    The beer options at the bar, there were a suitable range of styles available, along with some rather more mainstream products.

    There’s a nice retro theme going on here in terms of the design.

    The venue is spacious and has a number of different areas, including an area with pool tables. Sport is clearly important to the pub and I think that they have a younger demographic in general, so this probably fits the description of a sports bar.

    A slightly bland choice of crisps, but these sufficed me. The beer is the Cafe Racer from Fierce Beer from Aberdeen, an interesting and rich porter that had rich coffee flavours. Smooth and with a suitable depth of taste.

    This is a nice idea, for £10 someone can get unlimited hot and soft drinks, a lunch and access to power points, with an optional alcoholic drink upgrade as well. This is similar in concept from Desk Dog from Brewdog, a concept I think will continue to expand in pubs that would otherwise ne nearly empty during the day.

    This pub isn’t listed in CAMRA’s Good Beer Guide, perhaps because they’re not content with the real ale options here, but I liked the selection of craft beer and there’s been some thought put into that. Clean, welcoming and reasonably priced, I’d happily recommend the pub although I imagine that it can get quite loud on weekend evenings and when sport is showing.

  • Royal Leamington Spa – The Boiler Room

    Royal Leamington Spa – The Boiler Room

    This looked like an interesting venue on-line, a mixture of craft beer and sausage rolls. I had checked the beer list on Untappd before going and there were numerous interesting options that seemed to be available on tap.

    The open nature of the pub, which has an industrial design and numerous power points (I have been commenting on this a lot recently) and was clean and organised.

    The interesting little set-up behind the bar added to the character of the venue. The staff member was friendly and helpful, politely pointing out where the list of beers was located as I had managed to miss it.

    The keg and cask list is chalked up on a large board (the one I missed until it was pointed out), with this can and bottle selection also available on tables. There were a range of beer styles available, it all felt well curated.

    The barman couldn’t get my half pint of Honeycomb Chocolate Stout from Vocation Brewery into one glass, but he did ask permission to pour it across two different glasses so I can’t really complain. This was beautifully decadent, although it didn’t seem quite as rich and glamorous as when I had it before at Vocation’s brewery tap in Hebden Bridge. I think beer nearly always tastes just that little bit better at its source, but it was still absolutely fine here.

    The pub has a reputation for its pork pies and sausage rolls, but these have, currently at least, disappeared, leaving these as the sole food option. There is also pizza available later on in the day which they get sent in from a local supplier. I was a little disappointed with the lack of pork pies and sausage rolls, but the crisps were rather lovely.

    The reviews are nearly all positive, although there are some such as:

    “Expensive for what it was. 5 pounds for a pint? Get out of town!”

    I can understand the annoyance of the venue at reviews like this, they sell craft beer and decent real ale, which is inevitably not going to be £2 a pint.

    “Do you like being judged by entitled bar staff and have snarky comments made about you whilst having a good time?”

    I can’t judge (although I’ll have a go) but these reviews seem to nearly always be written by people who were having a good time that was disturbing everyone else. So I consider this a positive that the staff didn’t like it.

    Anyway, I’ve digressed again. A perfectly nice venue, clean, welcoming and with a decent selection of beers. Although no sausage rolls or pork pies…..

  • Chiltern Railways : Warwick to Royal Leamington Spa

    Chiltern Railways : Warwick to Royal Leamington Spa

    Off on a little day trip to Royal Leamington Spa, which cost just over £2 return, which seemed a fair price for the rail journey. This is Warwick railway station, opened in October 1852 on the Oxford to Birmingham rail line, which is a surprisingly basic and tatty arrangement at the moment (the station, not the rail line). The railway station isn’t a listed building and there’s little to excite anyone in terms of the architecture.

    Not much has changed in the area over the last 120 years, although the footpath that meandered across the railway tracks has now been replaced by a tunnel.

    The delightful (well sort of) tunnel under the railway track.

    This is the main set of buildings on the Birmingham side, but there were once station buildings on the London platform side as well, but these have been demolished for customer comfort (or whatever excuse they used) and replaced by a rickety old outdoor waiting room area. The buildings on the Birmingham side are reduced from when the railway station was reconstructed after a fire in 1894. That fire was substantial and had been caused by the overheating of a stove in the booking office, with the fire brigade being able to save some of the structure. The staff were able to smash down some of the internal wooden partitions in a bid to save paperwork and a large stock of railway tickets. The local press noted:

    “During the time that the fire was raging, Police Inspector Hall and a staff of constables preserved admirable order, and effectively prevented the quickly gathering crowd from interfering with the efforts of the Fire Brigade and station officials”.

    I slightly wonder what they through the crowd were going to do. The press also added that the debris was quickly removed and that:

    “The old station was built from designs by Brunel and was principally of wood. It is is hoped by the townspeople that the Railway Company will now take the opportunity of erecting a handsome station, with every convenience for the travelling public”.

    They did get a new station, but I’m not sure it had every convenience….

    Welcome to Warwick for a great day out.

    It’s about a ten minute walk into the Warwick town centre.

    An old milestone noting that it was 108 miles to London Paddington, although this is a little irrelevant now as the trains don’t go to Paddington.

    There are nearly no facilities at this station, there’s a taxi office, a very small waiting room and not much else, with no proper shelter on this side of the lines. There are no toilets either, which seems an omission for what should be a relatively important station.

    A Great Western Railways bench, probably from the 1930s.

    The train came creeping into the station on time.

    The train was comfortable for the four minute journey…. There’s little of note really about this service, other than the train was clean, there were plenty of seats and there was power available (I managed to get my phone charge up by 2%). Everything was on time, although I didn’t see any staff during my four mintes.

    And after my long four minute journey, here’s Royal Leamington Spa, or just Leamington Spa in the eyes of the railway network.

    One of the waiting rooms at the station, this was restored in 2011 and is a useful space, with power, heat and doors that keep opening randomly. Unlike Warwick, there are toilet facilities at this station.

    It’s fair to say that Royal Leamington Spa railway station is much more architecturally impressive than the one that Warwick has. The first station here was also built in 1852, at the same time as the one at Warwick was constructed, but this grand Art Deco construction dates from between 1937 and 1939. But more on this another time as I’m back in Royal Leamington Spa in a few weeks for the LDWA AGM weekend.

    As a rail service, all was well and everything ran on time. I wonder though about what they can do with Warwick railway station, as the facilities are very poor compared to Leamington Spa. I know that Leamington Spa gets nearly five times as many passengers as Warwick, but something a little more exciting would be nice here. Anyway, I was once again entirely satisified with Chiltern Railways.

  • Royal Leamington Spa – Benjamin Satchwell Pub

    Royal Leamington Spa – Benjamin Satchwell Pub

    I don’t bother writing any many of my visits to JD Wetherspoon outlets as that would get repetitive (even more so than I usually am), but this one is listed in the Good Beer Guide and so I’ll write about it for completeness. It is named after the man who is effectively the father of Royal Leamington Spa, who in 1784 discovered natural spring water that wasn’t controlled by the Lord of the Manor. That mean a spa town which soon received royal interest and it grew from a small village into the substantial town that it is today.

    The pub was busy and it was difficult to get many photos without people in, so here’s one of the photos that I took for Untappd and that’ll have to do. The beer selection was above average, six different real ale options and these were well balanced across the various beer styles. I went for half a pint of Novus Dry Hopped Porter and half a pint of Xk Strong, both from Byatt’s Brewery of Coventry. The pub is made up of two former shops and it goes back a long way, with a lengthy bar to one side.

    This is the Xk Strong and both beers were very drinkable, well kept and at the appropriate temperature. They also cost the ridiculous sum of £1 each, so I was entirely happy with the value that I received. Especially since I used Wetherspoon’s electricity to charge my devices up and there were plenty of plugs dotted around.

    The pub was relatively clean and tidy throughout, so it felt comfortable enough. The staff were friendly and everything felt competently managed and run. There’s nothing here for me to complain about with this beer selection, beer pricing and beer quality. However, I went to look for reviews on-line to see what other people were complaining about….

    The reviews are about average for a JD Wetherspoon outlet, which is mostly positive with a smattering of constant whinging and moaning. I like reviews such as:

    “Staff were very ignorant.”

    As that tells me all that I need to know about the reviewer. I also liked the 1/5 review which noted:

    “Never again will I eat in a green king discussing..”

    Assuming that meant Greene King and disgusting, that seems a bit harsh, although Greene King venues are usually, well, not ideal. But this isn’t even one of their pubs…..

    “Didn’t manage to get a drink, too many people crammed around the bar and not enough staff?”

    I have sympathy here, there can be a pub that’s quiet and about 50 people standing at the bar blocking it. Fortunately, I avoid such things with the app, but some pubs still haven’t mastered how to deal with this problem.

    Anyway, I’m digressing again and reading reviews from years ago, so I’ve probably reached the end of what I need to write here. I’m content that this is a perfectly decent entry into the Good Beer Guide, with friendly staff, plenty of decent beers and a cleanish environment. All quite lovely.

  • Royal Leamington Spa – Library

    Royal Leamington Spa – Library

    I visited Warwick library yesterday and it’s fair to say that that wasn’t the most memorable of visits. But I’ll moan about that another time. I was much more engaged with the public library at Royal Leamington Spa, which is located in what was the swimming pool of the Royal Pump Rooms. The building has thoughtfully been turned into something of a complex which has numerous functions, including an art gallery, museum, library, cafe and tourist information office.

    The upstairs area of the library, with plenty of seating and also a substantial collection of local history books, something which I very much approve of. With a little imagination I can see this as a swimming pool and it has retained its light and bright feel. Here’s a photo of what it looked like not that long ago as it only became a library in 1999 (it was in use as a swimming pool between 1890 and 1989) – https://www.ourwarwickshire.org.uk/content/catalogue_wow/leamington-spa-swimming-baths. Apparently the old steps into the swimming pool are still there, they just go into the basement of the library now where the stores are.

    The library has Pevsner, a key measure of a competent library as far as I’m concerned. Indeed, the selection of books was broad and I was quite impressed by how everything had been set-out, this felt like a well managed library. The staff seemed to spend nearly all of their time dealing with questions about why the printer didn’t work, but they remained helpful and engaged by the whole thing. Incidentally, I liked that all of the tables have readily accessible power points, that’s a useful touch for how people use libraries today.

    All really rather lovely, delightful to find a library which has plenty of seating space, wi-fi, power, lots of local history books and an environment which isn’t stupidly loud.

  • Warwick – The Wild Boar

    Warwick – The Wild Boar

    This is another of those pubs that I probably wouldn’t think to visit if it wasn’t listed in the Good Beer Guide, even though it’s only about a two minute walk from Warwick railway station.

    There’s a large blackboard near the entrance (not the one in the above photo as that’s their bar snacks and wi-fi board) which has the cask and keg options listed on it. I hadn’t realised at the time, but this pub is also the home of the Slaughterhouse Brewery and they had a few beers on that they’d produced. The descriptions on the board for the keg options were minimal, which gave me a slight problem in knowing what to order as I was going to resort to the tactic that my friend Liam has of picking the one with the most interesting name. I mentioned to the staff member that I’d have half a pint of the Wet Leg, even though I wasn’t sure what it was. She was polite, but she didn’t tell me anything more about it, but I like the jeopardy element sometimes so all was well.

    It transpired that the beer wasn’t listed on Untappd, although it is now since I listed it (apologies to the brewery if they now need to edit what I have typed in). It was a perfectly good hazy session IPA, quite citrusy and very drinkable. The member of staff mentioned that I had been the only customer in so far, and since it was nearly 14:00 and I had only ordered half a pint, I’m sure that they didn’t find this ideal. It’s hard to judge the atmosphere of a pub when I’m the only customer, but I liked it at the staff members were friendly and engaging, it felt a warm and inviting place. My often talked about measure of “would someone new to the area feel welcome here and meet people?” would be met here I think, it’s a very decent pub.

    The reviews of the pub are positive, which isn’t really surprising, there was an air of competence about the venue. One happy soul complained that “Got 1 beer and 1 wine £13. Will never go again” but that really needs a little more, such as what beer and wine had they ordered? Yes, that’s a rip off if they got half a pint of IPA and a Blue Nun (not that I’m suggesting that they sell Blue Nun here), but if it’s a pint of decadent beer then they’d have got themselves a bargain.

    Anyway, another pub that I was very pleased with and absolutely rightly in the Good Beer Guide. Very nice.