COOK: Rice?
ME: Yes please.
COOK: Taco?
ME: Yes please.
COOK: Chilli?
ME: Wirp? …. oh, ah, yes please?
And he put the taco shell on the rice and filled it completely with beef and bean chilli. I guess that’s an English taco. It really wasn’t bad, the chilli was pretty tasty and the cheesecake was great. No complaints.
This was a very special dinner for Charity and me, as it was our 6th wedding anniversary. We booked at Fifteen in London, one of Jamie Oliver’s restaurants.
We’re experiencing some technical difficulties, so I’m going to talk about the olives and the bruschetta here 🙂 The olives were fresh, that’s right, not cured! We had never had fresh olives before so we were very surprised by their creamy texture – similar to an avocado, but firmer- and their sweet, mildly fruity flavor. They were a great way to start an awesome dinner!
The brushcetta pretty much blew our minds! Our mouths were salivating with delight and the excitement of the totally unique flavor combination peaches and sardines?! So weird, so delicious. The charred exterior of the bread added smokey flavor as well as crunchy texture. It was perfectly dressed with a really nice, fruity olive oil. We could have eaten at least 3 plates of this awesome dish!!!
Whoa baby this was good! By this point in the meal, we were stuffed, but we had just enough room for some stinky cheese and thinly sliced honey-wheat bread. There were two cheeses, a pleasantly stinky Roquefort and a lovely aged English Cheddar, served with a sweet and spicy apple cinnamon chutney and succulent Madjool dried dates. The waiter suggested a complex Bordeaux to complement all the cheesy, fruity goodness- Heaven!
We started with this salted beef and caramelized pearl onions, it was lovely, though not in great abundance. The beef was salty and tender, the onions had a crunch, but also brought a punch of sugar to the plate.
The stew was okay, but nothing amazing. A standard stew gravy, chunks of lamb and potato and carrots. The soda bread was very dry, I couldn’t eat it without soaking it in the stew. I hope this is not a good representation of all Irish food.
This was one of the best dinners at the college so far. It wasn’t very English, but it was simple and well prepared. The pork cutlets were breaded and then baked, they were crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside. The cous cous was wonderful with bits of onion, and peppers. The green beans were not over cooked, which is a big win for the college dining hall. Overall, a good home cooked meal, nothing amazing, but everything was well executed.
My first trip to the famous Pizza Express! While the name sounds like it would be a hole-in-the-wall take-away place, it’s actually a nice sit-down restaurant. I had half of a three-mushroom and ham pizza. The crust was thin and crispy with small charred patches that were a small burst of flavour. The sauce and cheese were thin, which was good because it left the focus on the three types of mushroom and the thin slices of salty ham. The Caesar salad was great, with a smooth and creamy homemade dressing and thin slices of anchovy. A very good pizza dinner right before Comedy of Errors at The Globe.
This was an example of a not so good pasty, but that’s college food for you. The carrots were okay tasting, after I got over my phobia of disc shaped carrots, which I’ve always had bad luck with. The inside of the pasty was dry and paste-like. Note the packets of mint sauce on my tray, those are for the salad. I learned that the mint sauce was the best option for a salad dressing. They always had mint sauce available for us, but we’re never given any lamb to put it on. The peach crumble was okay, not great.
I’m always glad to turn up for dinner at the college and see traditional English dishes; it gives me hope that the food will actually be tasty. Although this steak pie was not quite as good as the pork pie, it was still really tasty. The chunks of steak were tender, the mushrooms were small and nice, and the gravy was thick and savory. The crust on the top seemed like it was just too thick, and not flaky enough for my liking. The potatoes were so-so, as always, and the veg was not too good. The dessert was whipped cream with a very small amount of lemon custard mixed in randomly. The salad was bad, and made worse by my mistake of trying the salad cream, yuck. But the steak and mushroom pie was pretty tasty, so it wasn’t a total loss.
Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. 