Tag Archives: salad

Dinner, Food

Meal #34: Dinner

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Steak pasty, Oriel College dinning hall, Oxford, UK

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.

Dinner, Food

Meal #33: Dinner

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Steak and mushroom pie, Oriel College dinning hall, Oxford, UK

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.

Food, Lunch

Meal #21: Lunch

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Orzo salad, Pret, Oxford, UK

I felt like something a little lighter for lunch, so I picked up this orzo salad from Pret.  It was pretty good, lots of orzo and rocket and lettuce with loads of kalamata olives and carrots and fire-roasted red peppers.  The dressing was a simple vinaigrette.  I washed it all down with a carbonated orange juice that claimed on the can to have “added no nasties, just juice and CO2.”  It was a well good lunch for takeaway.

Dinner, Food

Meal #20: Dinner

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World Cup themed dinner, Oriel College dinning hall, Oxford, UK

Because of the World Cup final, the dinning hall at the college decided to attempt to make dishes from the final two teams.  They made paella and a Spanish dessert called Pan de Calatrava, that’s Spain right?  So they were doing pretty well, but then they made ratatouille…. French, so…… weird, then there was a steak with a piece of Swiss cheese….. so, Swiss?….. weird.  And then the same old roasted potatoes and salad we always get, English I guess?  So out of all this weird combination of dishes, they had two from Spain, good start, and then a bunch of dishes from countries long ago eliminated from the tournament, and nothing Dutch at all.  Sounds like a World Cup theme fail to me.  By the way, all the food was terrible.

Special message to any of the Oriel College cooks that might stumble upon my blog: stop trying to make dishes that you have no idea how to make!  Make me some English food, you’re good at doing that!

Dinner, Food

Meal #9: Dinner

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Pork and apple pie, dinning hall, Oriel College, Oxford, UK

This was the best meal at the college so far!  The pork and apple pie was so good, I ate an extra portion.  It had big juicy chunks of pork in a lovely savory sauce.  There were mushrooms, onions, and slices of apple in with the pork, all under a crispy, flaky, perfect philo dough.  The potatoes and corn were nothing special, but the salad was very bland.  The dessert was awesome though, cream puffs floating in a dark chocolate bath!  I wish they made this for me every night!

Food, Lunch

Meal #4: Lunch

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The King's Arms, Oxford, UK

Fish and chips, a small mixed greens salad.  For my first ever fish and chips in England, this one was pretty good.  The fish was flaky and perfectly cooked inside it’s crunchy shell of fried batter.  The chips were not so good, a little dry.  But the tarter sauce was home made and awesome.  The salad was a nice touch of freshness on a plate otherwise piled high with friedness.