Recent Food Outings

Well, a pub and resto really; I've been eating my way through the contents of the cupboards and freezer, and have only really gone out socially lately.

The restaurant: Chez Gerard in Guildford. Lovely; attentive non-servile staff who know how to keep just the right amount of attention going; good steak served in gorgeous slices with a decently firey pepper sauce, and a little pot of yummy anchovy butter with the bread (and a second pot delivered after we devoured the first one). Credible wine and a 'licious tarte citron to finish; all in all a most civilised experience, marred only by the difficulty of finding a pub in the centre of Guildford afterwards (we eventually found a really local local which itself would have been acceptable to eat at with a pint or two of beer, and warmed outselves with JDs before heading back out into the night. It can be cold out there without one's shoes on - high shoes, cobbles, tired feet, bad combination, especially when we headed back and found a disguised-in-black good-looking pub just down the high street from Chez Gerard).

Finding a pub was no problem the day after though; my friend S and I postponed a wild trip to Brighton (she was still tired from a wild trip to London; I was virtuous and had been pointed towards the train before 10pm in Guildford) in favour of a late working session and dinner at the Gatwick Manor. Now I know this is part of a big chain (Chef & Brewer) and the menus are meant to be the same everywhere etc etc but it's really not true: the GM kitchen staff turn out some damn fine meat courses, and the service is much better and friendlier than you'd expect from a pub of this size (it's huge). Mine was Pork Chops; fatless but succulent chops on a big bed of non-fatty bubble-n-squeak (delicious); S had the sausages and mash ('comfort food' said the girl with the hangover bigger than herself). I don't think I'll be trying that week's special beer again though. Now, if I could just remember what it was called...

Pub, chinese and a decent-sized nightcap

Ah, the mutation into an eating blog continues apace: fridge still full, social life still active... Usual day routine of cereal soup and bag of something horrid but low-cal (quavers this time) yesterday, then out in town with Hwsgo, for a pleasant change. A pint of Spitfire at the seriously difficult to find Cock and Woolpack (pleasant wood-panelled pub with decent beers, down Finch Lane, between Cornhill and Threadneedle Street, but the buildings are so tall and close together that you can't see it from Cornhill), then dinner at Imperial City.

The online reviews for Imperial City weren't great, but Hwsgo usually knows what he's doing, and as usual was right about this one. The restaurant is in a basement, and has that lovely Victorian sewer architectural style of arching handmade bricks twinned with discreet good taste, which also pretty well describes the waiters (waitpeople? Has that term made it over the pond yet?). We started with seaweed and eel as suggested by Hwsgo because they go well together. They did: the eel was plump inside with a suitably dry edge to it, and the seaweed was, well, chinese seaweed (i.e. cabbage), done well (i.e. inoffensively). I had crispy duck for main course (goes well with the beer I'd had earlier) and Hwsgo sea bass; both cooked well, and the sea bass plump and fresh. The wine was a little punchy with apricots but calmed down after an eel-based talking-to: all-in-all, an elegant dinner in a place that allowed us the priviledge of relaxed conversation (sometimes a rare commodity in an English restaurant). Then off to the Counting House for some well-deserved whisky and people-watching. Although someone who won't be mentioned (but ratted on my chocolate frenzy earlier in the week) did manage to snaffle some chocolatebars on the way home...

Today I am mostly not hungover (unexpectedly) and 166.4lbs. Tonight I am planning another outing to the gym, this time combined with some plodging up and down the pool. One day I shall be thin...ner...ish... Scrub that plan: some of the livelier types from work dragged me (kicking and screaming honest) off to Ceroc tonight. Lots of fun, but it will take quite some time for me to stop looking like an engineer remembering how to count to four...