Kingshouse Hotel, Glencoe 04-2021

On the week Scotland opened up to the rest of the UK, many hospitality venues were still yet to open during the week saving themselves for the weekend or maybe even the Bank Holiday the week after. This mean a relative paucity of places to eat at and many meals instead cooked at home after buying from the local fishmonger or supermarket.

Unfortunately on this afternoon after a nice sunny, windy, cloudy and snowing hike partially up Devil's Staircase, we drove back east along the A82 to head back to our accommodation but the road was blocked and backed up. An accident had occured with severe injuries and there was no way to get through. Like many others, we turned around with no particular destination in mind. A detour around would take an extra 2h. Luckily for us Kingshouse Hotel was open and accepting visitors and not just their guests.

It's a beautiful setting across a highway, but with the mountains in the background and some unafraid deer. The seating areas outside (the only places you were allowed to drink alcohol under Scotland's rules) made for a lovely (albeit chilly) spot to watch.

Inside was nice and warm with a fireplace adding homeliness.

- Cullen skink (traditional soup of smoked haddock, potato & cream, crusty bread, butter) £8 - warm, delicious, hearty;
- Estate venison cobbler (with braised red cabbage & apple) £16 - very tender venison (interesting that we had just watched their brethren outside) with a pastry lid that was crispy but didn't have the lovely thick chewiness of proper pie pastry. Still very tasty.

Sad circumstances brought us here and we felt grateful for our lives.

Partisan, York 04-2021

Since it was the time of only outdoor dining, Partisan already had people at their two outdoor tables when they just opened at 9am. As we had a train departing around 9.20am, they were actually very nice about accepting my order by phone before they opened at 8.30 just to have it in time while we walked there. Nonetheless it still took them until about 9.10am to get us the food, but it was only a few minutes to the train so no big hurry.

When they gave us the bag they did say we've put it in a 2 paper bags as sometimes 1 paper bag breaks. Unfortunately they didn't tell us just how liquidy the Eggs in Purgatory was and  we put it in our backpack in not a flat enough position, and so unfolding it on the train discovered the liquid has torn through the bags and all throughout the backpack. Spicy tomato isn't the best thing to stain your items. I even clogged the train sink trying to wash it all out...

- Partisan Breakfast (two fried eggs, M&K herb sausage, smoked bacon and black pudding, vine tomatoes, home fries, mushroom, homemade smoky beans, sourdough toast and butter) £13 - excellent mushrooms, crisp salty bacon, sausage was fine. Bread a bit thin on the cut;
- Eggs in Purgatory (baked eggs, spicy Nduja sausage infused tomato sauce, topped with fresh parmesan and basil, served with Haxby bread) £13 - actually a really nice simmered rich tomato sauce, although not spicy. Sauce was everywhere.

The Golden Lion Hotel, Leyburn 04-2021

On a Sunday I wanted a Sunday roast. At 2pm it seemed remarkably difficult to find one - maybe because there was limited outdoor seating, reservations already on a very sunny day, and lots of places were just closed.

After lots of Google searching and driving to a few spots in despair, we eventually made it to Leyburn. There was a spare table outside and they still had roast available. Score!

When I ordered, I asked if I could have a medium-rare part. The young girl looked at me a little confused - it's all just cooked well done. Hmm my expectations plummeted. Oh well, too late to leave now.

Maybe it was the low expectations but I was pleasantly surprised by the food. Roast was cooked well done but the brisket was actually not dry and had some flavour. Yorkshire was very big and great crispness (which is hard to find) although low seasoning so needed the thick tasty gravy. Potato mash underneath, and bonus sides of pumpkin mash, caramelised red cabbage, and peas made it a better roast than usual. 

Overall very good.

The Magpie Cafe, Whitby 04-2021

Whitby fish and chips is a legendary thing, nothing of which I knew about until reading about this lovely seaside town. Despite all the travel restrictions, noone told anyone in Whitby and the streets were busy as we drove through looking for parking along the narrow streets, one very very steep street, and near the seaside.

Magpie Cafe and Trenchers seemed to be the popular options. After parking we walked past Magpie with an unclear expectation if we could eat there. Definitely not but there was an easy option to avoid the queue and order online to pickup. So we went walkabout and then ordered later while walking down from Whitby Abbey to save time. Interestingly people in the queue all seemed quite content to wait there rather than add themselves to the virtual queue instead.

Once picking up the heavy set meal, we found a nice seat on a slightly windy pier to enjoy the beach and ocean views.

Haddock and chips £8 was a bargain. The haddock was cooked perfectly, meaty and juicy with a crisp coating top and remarkably also the bottom too. No sog on these. Chips were decent. They weren't salted and a sprinkle made them great. Large mushy peas £1.4 were chunky, coloured deep and not fluorescent. Beans £1 were average like canned. Magpie Seafood Pot £12 was good with pieces of mussels, scampi, scallop and fish, and a very thick buttery white wine sauce eaten with an excellent soft bun. 

An exceptional fish especially for the price and well worth their reputation.

Florian Poirot, Malton 04-2021

I'd given up macarons for life I thought as I'd tried so many and always been disappointed. To me they all tasted like too much sugar.

Given the reviews and my travelling company, we decided to give these a go. And wow I can say these were truly excellent. Each flavour was very discernible and the texture of crisp shell interspersed with softer chew.

I'm sure I'll be disappointed again in the future because of these.

Food 2 Remember, Malton 04-2021

A little town called Malton is known as the foodie town in Yorkshire. I've been to some of these so called towns before and often wondered how special a little place can be, especially when there are large towns/cities to compare with. And in this little foodie town there is one square called Talbot Yard which hosts an excellent patisserie (for macarons), an ice cream I didn't get to try (too early in the day I think...) and a bakery/coffee place.

The bakery only had limited items by 12pm so I went to visit this odd sounding butcher called Food 2 Remember. It isn't a memorable name at all but they had a decent reputation for pies with only a limited number of reviews. The lovely staff showed me their delightful selection of pastry behind the counter.

The scotch egg was phenomenal. Simply better than any I've tried before. An egg coated in chunky pork sausage roll-filling and a super crisp and seasoned fried coat. It was perfect. The sausage roll had obviously equally excellent filling, but the crust was only ok, flaky but could have been thicker. I have a soft spot for pies although much prefer the hot variety. A cold pork pie had chunky pork, gravy and a nice jelly filling - an excellent version too. 

I actually considered driving all the way back to Malton just to get more scotch eggs. I actually looked at the closing time to see if I could pick some up on the way back from Whitby. Sadly neither of those options were feasible, but maybe one day I'll be back here...

Tricolor, York 04-2021

On a freezing York night with no indoor dining allowed, there was a pretty long line to Spark:York and it's outdoor seating formation with heating. Luckily people are let in by availability of their table size and so 2 was quite fast in the end - minimal freezing time.

All the ordering must be by phone which was a little annoying, but I suppose made necessary to stop people from walking around. 

As it was around 10pm, many places were out of food or already closed. Some weren't open at all due to the local restrictions. Tricolor or pizza were the only options and Colombian food definitely won for me. 

Nice arepa with chunks of pulled beef brisket. Hot vegetable empanadas, with a very mild filling. We ordered sweet fried plantains but they didn't have any, and so gave us plantain chips (crisp and salty, no sweetness at all) and a replacement of chilli mango chicken wings instead (some mango but no chilli).

A nice meal but nothing too special. I would go back for an arepa again though.

Ice Cream Rescue, York 04-2021

I'm unclear if this reformed old Ambulance is called Ice Cream Rescue or Ryeburn of Helmsley, but the flag saying UK Champion Diary ice cream drew me in. The menu showing which were the award winning flavours was very helpful too.

I tried mint choc chip (gold medal) and balanced it with some wild blackberry sorbet. I think they were good without being outstanding. To be fair they aren't flavours I normally choose so maybe that was part of it.

It was a little while ago and not so memorable in my mind. Would probably go for the chocolate and strawberry next time.

Stam & Maria Greek Street Food, York 04-2021

After getting a galette from Krep and with a plan to eat outside in the Museum Gardens, I couldn't resist also picking up a souvlaki from the well rated Greek food stall that reviews seem to mention lots of queues. On this bright sunny day there were only a few people in front but a lot of people sitting on the tables in front eating already.

They don't do lamb which I'm used to from Melbourne or pork that I'm used to from Greece. But chicken is always available at these places too and is the star of the show here, with the layers of meat cooked to a lovely char colour on the spit.

Chicken gyros wrap - gyros, pitta bread, tzatziki, tomato, onions, chips, signature sauce £6 is a bargain for such a large serve. The chicken was very tender and flavoursome. Wrapped in were lots of fries with paprika. Served piping hot. Absolutely delicious.