The Smokehouse, Folkestone

On a whim we motored down to the coast today for a wander round Folkestone and, if we could get in, a bite to eat at a new place called Rock Salt. Unfortunately things conspired against us in a big way, as not only was the restaurant fully booked but the fishing boats had not been out yesterday so there was very limited availability anyway! However, their fish & chip shop over the road was open and serving a reduced menu.

The building is a modern conversion of a typical south coast dock building, complete with double hight ceiling dining room and a little take away area. The decor is very inviting, lots of stylish pale blues and greys, and some great steel fish sculptures hanging from the roof add interest. We sat on benches at wooden tables and perused the menus printed printed on the place mats. Apparently a fishing boat had come into Hythe and unloaded a cargo of cod (amongst other things) so there was some fresh fish available. We shared a starter of mussels popcorn, which turned out to be surprisingly tasty lightly battered mussels served with a lemon wedge. Not being huge fans of deep fried things, Dee chose baked lemon sole, while I went for baked mackerel. Both came with a good helping of very nice chips, and both came in cardboard boxes, which made eating with proper knives and forks feel a bit odd. Oh, and yes, there were scallops on the menu, but no, I didn't have them! It's a first, I know....and perhaps if they'd actually had any I might have been more tempted...

The lemon sole was very nice, still on the bone and tail on, but well enough cooked that the meat came away from the bones very easily. The mackerel was very tasty indeed, skin and tail on, but no bones, delicious. There was a good selection of drinks available, including a choice of beers, soft drinks etc. but as the weather was very wintry and the on-shore wind bitterly cold, we went for mugs of hot tea. What we actually got were mugs of hot brown. Shame, because the rest of the meal was really very good and reasonably priced. We will definitely go back, but we'll book in advance at Rock Salt next time. If you fancy a box of fish and chips while you stroll along the front, I'd certainly recommend The Smokehouse though.

After our lunch we went for a good walk round Folkestone, starting on the front and ending up at the newly established Creative Quarter. Here we found a strange mixture of art galleries, shops selling militaria, pop-up clothes shops and trendy looking bars. At the top of the hill was a cosy looking café where we stopped for a decent cuppa and a cake. Fresh & Easy turned out to be a real find, with a huge choice of teas, homemade cakes and tarts, and the best cup of café mocha I've ever had! We shared a strawberry jam tart made on cinnamon pastry and a chocolate ganache tart made on pistachio pastry, both of which were spot on. Dee had a little pot of English breakfast tea, which came with a very cute little milk jug in the shape of a cow.

Folkestone is one of the forgotten places of the south east, but there is much to recommend it. The town is working very hard to drag itself back up to the dizzy heights it once enjoyed, although the High Street is a clone of every other in the country. There are some nice looking bars (a special mention for Googies is in order, beer, coffee, regular live acoustic music, homemade speciality burgers....worth a look!) and restaurants of the quality of The Smokehouse and Rock Salt can only help. So next time you're at a bit of a loose end, drive down to the harbour area and go for a stroll, you might be pleasantly surprised with what you find.

Imperial Dynasty, West Malling

Arguably the best Chinese restaurant in Kent, possibly the south east of England. Ok, so you pay a bit more for it, but believe me it's worth every every penny. West Malling is a nice market town just off the A20 between Maidstone and Wrotham. There are a number of good places to eat, including The Swan and The Farmhouse (see earlier review), as well as several cafés and bars. The High Street has a mixture of old buildings, many of which date from the seventeenth century, there are some interesting little shops too so it's a nice place to visit all round.

I.D. (as it is known) is at the bottom end of the High Street in a charming old building, the dining room features a large inglenook fireplace in which stand three half-sized terracotta warrior statues and in spite of an up to date feel there are still many original features and beams in place. The menu is a mixture of traditional and contemporary dishes, with a number of set menus on offer. Dishes start from around £4.50 and go up to about £9.50, with seasonal specials like lobster and oysters often available at reasonable prices.

We ordered the mixed hors d'oeuvres and Mongolian lamb to start, which arrived quickly and were nicely presented. The lamb came with all the usual accompaniments you expect with crispy duck...the cucumber and spring onion, pancakes and hoisin sauce...lovely! We decided to go with a seafood theme for the main course, huge tiger prawns in a mandarin sauce and a fantastic sizzling dish of scallops (Yes, I know...scallops again!) and king prawns in ginger and sesame with a bowl of special fried rice. Unsurprisingly after all that we had no room for desert, so I can't comment on them I'm afraid. The staff were attentive and friendly, the dining room was nicely decorated in creams and cappuccino tones, a few nods to the festive season without being over the top, all in all a very pleasant place to be. We have eaten here three or four times over the last few years and the whole experience has always been consistently good. There are enough unusual dishes to keep you coming back to try new things, all in all it has to be highly recommended!

Product sites

A few people have asked where they can buy some of the food I mentioned in my last blog, so here's a short list of their websites -

www.coffeelate.co.uk - delicious blend of coffee, Caribbean spices & chocolate.

www.britishsausages.co.uk - I particularly recommend the Churchill and the Knebworth.

www.backyardcompany.co.uk - great jerk sauces, great for warming you up in this awful weather!

Bluewater Glow Food Festival

We went to the first Bluewater Glow food festival on the way to visit Dee's mum down in Devon. The festival was a bit disappointing but there were several highlights. The guys from Coffeelate were there again (see my previous entry on the Ideal Home Christmas Show), so I bought a few more bars...yes Mel, one is for you...The Great British Sausage Co, The Backyard Co and a few others are worthy of mention.

The Great British Sausage Co make really tasty, fairly big sausages. The signature dish is The Churchill, made with pork shoulder meat, black pepper & white pepper. They were giving out samples, freshly grilled, juicy & delicious. They also had venison & port, pork & leak and pork, apple & cider amongst others. When I say they're fairly big, I mean you only get four sausages in a one pound pack!

The Backyard Co make Jamaican jerk sauces, and to showcase them at their best they were griddling a huge stack of jerk chicken breast, offering small free tastes, or a big slab in a bun for a fiver. Guess which I went for? It was fantastic! Just hot and spicy enough to get your lips and tongue tingling but not so hot it wasn't enjoyable. Well worth a look if fruity, spicy sauces are your thing, or you love barbequeing. I didn't get to try any of the hot versions as they'd sold out, but I bet they're worth trying.

There were a few other good ideas, a lady who made biscuits and hand iced each one. She had boxes of Christmas themed ones, clothes and shoes, all sorts! (picture below). Also there was a wonderful chocolate producer that offered single plantation South American cocoa chocolate bars, blends, beautiful looking gift boxes and some really clever chocolate sculptures & figures. Apparently the high heeled shoes (pictured below) are their most popular product!

The Neville Bull in Birling

We went in search of a new country pub to try at lunchtime today and stumbled across a potential winner! Birling village looks like a typical Kentish village, and the Neville Bull looks like a typical Kentish pub, until you get inside. I've never seen a more eclectic mixture of flags, pictures, ornaments, samplers, bits & bobs and goodness only knows what in one place before!

The bar is filled with a variety of furniture, including a big green leather sofa and a mixture of old dining tables, chairs and benches. Every surface is covered with nick-nacks and every flat wall has a picture or two on it. It could be overwhelming but is actually very charming. There is a real focus on local produce, even behind the bar. There was Kentish cider, wine and beer on offer, including a pale ale brewed in Birling village itself. It doesn't get much more local than that! Unfortunately I didn't discover until we were leaving that they offer a "beer bat", a third of a pint of each of the real ales on offer for those who have trouble choosing. Even the fruit juices we're Kentish.

As well as the main menu there was a fairly large selection of specials written on blackboards in the bar. We ordered two starters to share between the three of us, and it's a good job we didn't choose one each because the portion sizes were very generous indeed. We shared a whole baked Camembert with a basket of about half a loaf of hand cut fresh bread (a starter for one person? A whole cheese! Really???) and a portion of eight large tempura prawns with soy and chilli dips. The prawns were delicious, hot and crispy, but the Camembert was a bit disappointing to be honest. It hadn't been baked enough, so it wasn't runny enough to dip the bread in so we asked them to put it back in again for a while. Unfortunately whatever they did to it made it hotter also changed the texture to something akin to an omelette.

Mum and I both chose the steak & kidney pudding from the specials board, while Dee chose the chicken pie from the main menu. Both came with vegetables and chips, which turned out to be a huge dish of cabbage with bacon and cream sauce, a second huge dish of carrots and peas, and a third huge dish of thick, crispy chips. Probably enough of six, and we certainly came nowhere near finishing them. The puddings were fantastic...about a pound of steak and kidney in a shell of suet pudding that was just the right mixture of light & soft on the inside and lightly crisp on the outside. Ridiculously too much for one person, and again, neither of us managed to finish ours. Dee's chicken pie was not really a pie, in that it was actually a bowl of chicken stew with a puff pastry lid. This seems to be the norm for pub pies at the moment, and it's a great shame because you can't beat a real pie.

Unfortunately I can't tell you about the deserts because we were so full we didn't come very close to finishing the main course. What we had was delicious, traditional pub food in a friendly pub with an open fire and a warm welcome, but like the ornaments there was far too much of it. I'm certain we'll go back there, but we won't eat for a couple of days in preparation!

Ideal Home Christmas Show taste tests

Dee and I went up to Earls Court to have a mooch round the Ideal Home Christmas Show last weekend.  The show itself was split fairly evenly into demonstrations, sales booths and show areas.  Needless to say we tried just about everything anyone offered us, and in the process discovered a few little gems!

The highlights for me were -

A coffee / chocolate bar called "Coffeelate" which is a lovely crumbly mixture of real coffee and darkish chocolate.  Deeply satisfying on a number of levels.  The stand selling it was generous with their samples and was only selling this one product.  It was nice to be able to meet the man behind the idea too, he is rightfully very proud of it.

A bit of a left-field choice, but next in line for a re-positioning in the market place (following the huge success Magners have had in marketing the cider and ice idea) is Harvey's Bristol Cream Sherry.  They were there in force, with cute little stands like gardens complete with astro-turf and garden furniture.  The generous samples they were handing out were shot glasses of sherry with a slice of orange and a chunk of ice.  Not much of a departure from the traditional glass of sherry, perhaps, but then neither was adding ice to cider!  It certainly made it a much more appealing drink, and if you've got a bottle tucked away at the back of your drinks cupboard I'd recommend trying it that way.

Debbie & Andrew's sausages were handing out chunks of their fantastic sausages, sizzling away on a row of George Foreman grills on their little stand.  We know their products of old and always look out for them at shows as there are often deals to be had.  The traditional Lincolnshire pork sausages, pork and apple, and Toulouse varieties are our favourites.  They are meaty and low in fat (for a sausage!) and taste just as good cold the next day.

My personal favourite was a great drink called "Fireball".  I went to visit their stand to try the bourbon (which was very good!) but then the guy asked if I like cinnamon.  As some of you may already know, I'd eat a toadstool if it had enough cinnamon on it, so I jumped in.  He poured me the smallest thimble full of whisky I've ever seen, but that turned out to be enough.  It is well named indeed!  A blend of cinnamon and Canadian whisky, the feeling of warmth that spreads out as it sinks down has to be experienced to be believed.  It's fairly strong, at 33% it's not full strength but you'd never know it.  The highlight, though, was trying it again but mixed with apple juice....like a good apple pie in a glass!  What a stunning drink, delicious!

Amongst the better food stands was a butcher who had brought a griddle plate and was selling steak sandwiches the like of which you've never seen as well as joints, steaks, various cuts of fantastic looking meat.  Not what I expected to see at an Ideal Home Show, but he clearly knew his stuff.

There were a vast number of stands selling flavoured vodka of one type or another, toffee or fruit flavours, but they were all missing something.  An original idea perhaps?

The champagne and oyster bar next to the fashion catwalk was fun too, with a choice of oysters with tabasco, lemon, salt & pepper or au natural and a selection of champagnes.  Dee had a glass of Laurent Perrier Premier Cru, while I went a little up-market and opted for the Grand Cru to see if we could honestly tell the difference.  Well, we certainly could!  The Premier Cru was very good indeed, light and refreshing, but the Grand Cru was as smooth as silk and absolutely delicious.

All in all it was a good show, lots of new products being showcased and plenty to look at, try on, taste or just stand and watch.  Worth the trip up to London, without a doubt.

Loch Fyne update

Just a quick update to my earlier review of the Bluewater restaurant....it is absolutely unforgivable to put a slice of mouldy lemon on a seafood platter.  It wasn't just a bit manky, it was actually white with green patches.  On a slightly less foul note, it is also ridiculous to provide three slices of bread with a sharing platter for two people.  And while I'm being critical, my monkfish and chirizo risotto was so salty I couldn't taste the fish at all.  I suspect it will be a while before I come back for another visit.

The café right outside Loch Fyne didn't cover itself with glory either!  After a few hours of shopping we stopped for coffee there because the cakes looked lovely, but after several minutes of standing aimlessly at the counter, and then several more sitting at a table after being directed there by a waitress, we gave up waiting to order and went upstairs to Costa Coffee instead.  I'm glad to say that Costa did us proud.

Sotirio's in Hythe

Friday night a bunch of us from work trooped off to Hythe for dinner to celebrate the retirement of our Inspector for East Kent, John Conway. After 42 years in the industry we thought he'd earned a bit of a rest! We met up in The White Heart pub in Hythe High Street, had a swift pint of excellent beer called "Number 5", then headed for the restaurant.

Although I was reminded of a rather old fashioned hotel dining room, the atmosphere in Sotirio's was comfortable and the food was very good. We all ordered from the £20 for three courses menu, which offered enough variety to ensure something for everyone. My duck liver & orange pâté starter was clearly home made, very rich and as smooth as silk. I took a bit of a chance, ordering the lamb knuckle for main course. Who knew lamb had knuckles? Well, it was tender and tasty, the meat just fell off the bone, cooked long, low & slow. The only slight disappointment was the veg, and I'm really being picky here because the mange-tout and sauté potatoes were very good (there were sliced courgettes as well), but that was it for veg. Had there been some carrots or something with a little more colour & texture it would have been spot on.

Deserts were chosen from a large trolley (further enhancing the old fashioned hotel feel) and all looked superb. The banoffee pie was in no way, shape or form a pie, but who cares. It was fresh, home made, light and delicious, and there was plenty of it.

It is not easy to get all the food out to a large table all at the same time, but the kitchen managed it very well. Particularly given that as well as our table of 16 there was another group of a similar size in at the same time.

There was live music while we dined, a very pregnant singer gave good renditions of classic songs. I was a bit concerned at first that this would mean conversation might be difficult but actually it was just loud enough, but not intrusive. Later on, the owner "treated" us to a few songs if his own, which were....different. The food was very good and reasonably priced, this is definitely one to come back to next time we're in the area.

The Red Lion, Milstead

We consulted the Michelin Guide to see what other recommended pubs were within easy reach, it's been a looooong week and neither of us fancied the formality of a restaurant so this seemed a good compromise.  We both liked the look of The Red Lion in Milstead, just south of Sittingbourne, a very short distance from the middle of nowhere.  The Guide says "Simple, cosy country pub, ever changing blackboard menu offers French influenced country cooking" amongst other things....sounded ideal.

From the outside the pub is nothing to look at, screened from the road as it is by bushes and trees.  The flat brick side that greets you from the car park isn't particularly inspiring, but that soon changes as you walk through the door into the small bar area that felt immediately warm and comfortable, despite there only being two other customers there when we arrived.   The only draught ale on offer was Wells Bombardier, which was very good indeed.

The Michelin Guide isn't joking when it says "blackboard menu", there is one fairly large blackboard at the end of the bar, from which you choose starters and main courses.  We were seated quite close to it, so we had little difficulty, but every other group that came in had to sort of mill around between it and our table while they decided what to have (which became a real drag when a relatively elderly group of four came in and struggled to make decisions!).

Dee chose goats cheese on rustic bread with air cured ham and salad to start, while I opted for Coquilles St. Jacques (scallops & prawns in mashed potato served in a scallop shell, in case you were wondering).  Yes, I know....scallops again!  What can I tell you, I love them.  After a very short wait the starters arrived and they were both nice enough, but that's about all we could find to say about them.

I had high hopes that the main courses would blow us away though, so with great enthusiasm I tucked into my bowl of bouillabaisse.  It lacked nothing for ingredients, at least three different types of white fish, scallops, king prawns, huge mussels, assorted unidentifiable shell fish and a rich, smokey soup/sauce.  It was very good, but no better than the bouillabaisse I had recently at The Horseshoes (see a previous blog entry) which was almost exactly half the price.  I still think I came out ahead of Dee though, her smoked haddock fish cakes weren't up to much at all.  Barely browned in the pan, more fish stodge than fish cakes, which is a shame because they were clearly home made and actually quite tasty.  I'm not sure who thought serving them with mashed potato was a good idea, given that the majority of a fish cake is already mashed potato, but there you go.

Never mind, though.  We're two courses in, both of which were nice enough, even if they weren't staggeringly good.  Still searching for whatever it was the Michelin researchers saw in the place, we soldiered on to the desert course, purely for research purposes you understand!  Dee ordered her favourite pud, apple and red berry crumble with vanilla ice-cream, while I forced down a slice of home made amoretto baked cheesecake with toffee sauce.  Once again, I think I won this course too!  My cheesecake was a little overpowered by the toffee sauce, but the texture was good and the whole thing was a nice rich finish to the meal.  The crumble, on the other hand, was certainly not a crumble.  It was more like a bowl of very sweet fruit with a sweet crust that had been welded together with a blow-torch just prior to serving.  Such a shame.

So we leave, slightly disappointed and seventy quid poorer, feeling that while it was nice, it wasn't quite nice enough for the money.  I don't think we'll hurry back, although I'm open to suggestions that we caught them on an off night.

The Three Chimneys, Sissinghurst / Biddenden

Having seen The Three Chimneys listed in the Michelin Guide as "recommended" we thought we'd better go see if it was worth our seal of approval as well.  The Chimneys is a picturesque country pub in the middle of nowhere, just off the road between Biddenden and Sissinghurst.  Rumour has it that French prisoners were kept nearby during the Napoleonic war, they were told that although they were more or less free to roam they should not go further than the three-way junction or "trios chemins" as they called it.  The pub building pre-dates the Napoleonic war by several hundred years and certainly plays to its strengths inside.

 Ales are served straight from the barrel, tonight there was a New Zealand Pale Ale, Adnams Best and Tribute available.  The pale ale was a little too bitter for my liking, but the Tribute was very good indeed.  It's always nice when beer comes in the correct branded glass, I know it shouldn't matter but it's interesting that so many pubs (and presumably breweries) have cottoned on to this fact.

There are two bars, a bar food area and the restaurant.  The restaurant itself is split into various small niches and groups of two or three tables which gives the place a cozy, intimate feel.  There is also a large orangery which looked comfortable and inviting, I'll bet it's a delightful place to eat in the summer too.  The beams are decorated with hop bines, the walls are thick with wine labels and brewery mementos.  We sat next to a roaring wood-burning stove that proved so effective we had to switch places, a sort of turn and baste every 15 minutes exercise!  Fortunately our waiter was able to turn it down for us, it was gas powered and not a wood burner at all.  Fooled me.  (Not too difficult, i hear you cry!)

The menu changes very often, it seems.  So much so that there are no printed copies, just a large blackboard with that days offerings listed on it in chalk.  All the meat is sourced locally, as is as much of the other ingredients as possible.  We chose quite different starters, a large flat mushroom stuffed with caramelised red onion and goats cheese for Dee and deep fried brie with home made fruit sauce for me.  We were astonished at the size of the portions, given that these were only starters they were massive!  I've bought smaller chunks of brie from the supermarket, I'm sure.  Both plates were well presented and both dishes delicious, just far too big.  Never thought you'd hear me say that, did you?  No, me neither.

We both chose the braised shoulder of venison as our main course, although if I had known the portions would be so large I would have gone for the scallops.  The venison comes from a deer park near Sevenoaks, it was served on a bed of parsnip mash with cabbage and carrot, all with a splash of a rich gravy.  The meat was so tender it just fell apart.  You could cut it with the handle of your knife with little or no difficulty if you chose to.  A plate packed full of big, rich flavours indeed, but again there was simply too much of it.  I was determined to make it to the homemade deserts, so I'm ashamed to admit that the venison beat both of us.  It was that or go without the amoretto parfait, after all!

A short list of homemade deserts on another blackboard gave rise to the next tough decision of the night.  For Dee it was simple, she was beaten by the sheer volume of dinner and couldn't even be tempted to have the apple and plum crumble, so I knew she was serious.  For me though, there were a few serious contenders, but the parfait won in the end and I'm glad it did because it was fantastic.  For once the portion size was perfect.  It was smooth, creamy, tasty, and perfectly accompanied by a generous pile of griottines (small red cherries soaked in kirsch) and a few raspberries.

It certainly wasn't a cheap meal, but it was all beautifully cooked and presented.  Starters were between £6.50 and £9 and most main courses were £16 - £20.  I am sure we'll come back here again, but perhaps we won't eat for a day or so either side of our visit.  All in all a lovely place with friendly staff, great atmosphere, good food and excellent beer.  Well worth the trouble of finding it, wear trousers with an elasticated waist though!  The highly sought after Fatfoodie seal of approval is indeed awarded.

Shameless attempt to get votes in the Dorset Cereals competition!

The lovely people at Dorset Cereals are having a "Little Blog" competition and I'm in it! If you've enjoyed reading my meandering entries please take a moment to vote for me by visiting www.dorsetcereals.co.uk/fun-stuff/little-blog-awards
and choosing the food and drink category, then searching for Fatfoodie and clicking the vote button. Who knows, you might even win a case of Dorset Cereals for your trouble!

Hopefully there will be two new reviews posted this weekend or soon after, so watch this space!

Return to The Horseshoes, and new owners at The Bull

Just for a change we had dinner at The Horseshoes a couple of Fridays ago.  I was glad to see that the guest beer (Brains SA Gold) was still on, and still delicious.  I noted with great interest that the second pint was just as delicious as the first.....and the third.

Our timing was good, the new autumn menu had just been produced and for the most part the changes look positive.  I was a bit sad to see the fillet steak on a toasted brioche with duck pate removed, but some of the new dishes could well make up for it.  I like the idea of a scallop dish and a mussel dish of the day, plenty of scope for the chef to do something a bit unusual if the mood takes him.  Of course I had the scallops, which came with chorizo and lentils (one of my favourite combinations) and aside from requiring a tiny bit of seasoning they were splendid.  Dee opted for deep fried brie (always one for the healthy option!) which actually turned out to be very good indeed.

For main course I had one of the new dishes, slow cooked belly of pork with mashed potato and braised red cabbage.  Great autumnal dish, warming and filling.  The pork had been cooked long and low, so it was tender and moist.  Some home made onion rings gave it all that bit of texture that would otherwise have been missing, good addition.  Dee had the mussels of the day, a huge bowl filled to the brim with mussels in a basic cream and white wine sauce that needed nothing more added to it.  A little bowl of thin chips on the side and Dee was in her element.  The only thing lacking was a chunk of bread to soak up the sauce!

 A little individual lemon meringue pie for me (delicious!  Sharp lemon and sweet meringue) and summer berry and lemon sponge with custard for Dee just rounded off another comfortable evening nicely.

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Last weekend we wandered into what I guess could be considered our "local", The Bull in Barming.  Again, our timing was good!  We only really popped in to see if they were planning to do a quiz night soon, but the barmaid said they had only taken the place over a week earlier and were still deciding things like that.  She also told us that the kitchen was being refitted and if we came back the next night they would be doing food for the first time.  The same people also own the Redstart (see earlier blog post) and the Fox and Goose on Weavering Street in Maidstone which is apparently well known for its food.

After an encouraging start the next night (pint of Doombar for me, one of my favourites and very well presented it was too) and a chat with the chef and new landlady who were enjoying a glass of wine in the bar, we had a look through the menu.  Now, even taking into account that it was the first day the kitchen had been open and presumably they'd had to cobble the menu together a bit, it wasn't what you'd call inspiring.  We asked if the steak and ale pie was actually a pie, or one of those bowl-of-stew-with-a-flakey-pastry-lid efforts that you see so often, and were told it was a real bona fide pie.  Faced with options such as a burger, hunters chicken or sausage and mash, we both went for the pie.

It was massive!  It came with chips, peas and carrots and I suspect all came out of the microwave, but it was cheap enough and certainly filled a hole.  It's a bit of a shame though, because as we have already seen, it isn't that hard to do pub food really well.  This felt like pub food of the late 80's and might explain why we were one of only two tables dining on the opening night.  It's a particular shame, because the beer was excellent and it's a nice enough pub, but slightly sticky tables and below average food make it hard to recommend it.  We'll give them a while to settle in and try again, but if there's even a hint of scampi in a basket.......  On the plus side....the quiz starts next week!

Fatfoodie adventures in Stoke!

Yes, I know it's not in Kent.  Again.  But there was good food to be had in Stoke!  Well....I say "in" Stoke, obviously I don't actually mean "in Stoke"....I mean near Stoke.  Alright, so not in Stoke at all, in Trentham and in Stone....but they're close enough, ok?

Anyway....the food.  Dee and I took the last few bits Josie needed for the start of her last year at Staffordshire University last weekend.  We stayed in the Travelodge (don't ask, and certainly don't go there!) at Trentham on the outskirts of Stoke-on-Trent.  Trentham Gardens is home to a great little place called The Pie Minister, a sort of modern take on the old pie and mash shops of my youth!  It was a light, airy, log cabin type unit with brightly coloured posters and info about their pies around the walls.

For a very reasonable price (about a fiver) they do a home cooked pie of your choice from a list of about a dozen with mash and red wine gravy.  For about £7.20 they do something called "The Mothership".  To my surprise Josie (who hasn't got the largest appetite) opted for the Mothership with a Thai Chook pie.  This comprised a lovely thai chicken green curry pie, a double helping of mash, a dollop of minted mushy peas, red wine gravy and sprinkles of crispy fried onions and grated cheddar.  Quite a plate-full.  I was even more surprised when she came very close indeed to finishing off the lot!  I opted for a PM pie mothership, but with a single helping of mash.  The PM pie is their signature dish, it's a sort of cross between steak and kidney and beef and veg pie.  Good decision to go for single mash, I can tell you.  There was still plenty of it.  Dee wasn't all that hungry, but she still managed to put away a large sausage roll with mash and gravy.

They sell t-shirts with "Keep Calm & Eat More Pies" on the front, and all the staff wear them as uniform.  I would have bought one, but they were so flimsy I didn't feel they were worth the tenner asking price.  All in all, very good quality and fantastic value food.  An ideal lunch stop on an autumn shopping day, hot and filling, lots of choice, worth a visit!

I've done this in the wrong order really, because Pie Minister was Sunday lunch, but dinner Saturday night turned out to be pretty good too.  We went to a village a few miles outside Stoke called Stone to revisit a pub / steakhouse that Ben and Jen took us to on our last visit.  Sadly for them, the ovens weren't working on that occasion so the menu choice was seriously limited.  Not so this time!

 The pub is in two halves with a large central bar area.  To one side is a very modern feeling disco type pub, complete with bar stocked with several fruit flavoured ciders, alcopops and any number of fizzy beers.  The other side though is a rather nice, modern feeling restaurant which feels much more like a wine bar than a pub.  Fortunately for me, there were a couple of good real ales on, Marsden's Pedigree and Jenning's Cocker Hoop (which I felt it was in the interest of my loyal readers to try).

The menu was also in two halves.  On one side was a selection of fish dishes, ribs, and the usual gastro-pub type offerings, and on the back was a grill and hot-stones menu.  As you'd expect, prices ranged from
around £7 to £16 for main courses.  We dispensed with starters in the vain hope that we might have room for a desert, and dived straight in to the main courses.  Our waiter and waitress were friendly, chatty, and knowledgeable.  They explained the menu and the three steak specials on offer.  We could have chosen an ostrich steak, a buffalo steak or something called a bistro steak.  Dee opted for the latter, which turned out to be a nice thick beef rump steak cut from a particular part of the rump that makes it almost as tender as fillet but with all the meaty flavour of rump.  This came topped with a fried duck egg, chips and mushrooms.  Josie and I weren't in the mood to be refined, so we both chose the rack of pork ribs, but with different sauces.  I went for Jack Daniels BBQ, while Josie chose hoi-sin.  I have to admit, although they were both good, her sauce was better.

It's hard to do anything too imaginative with ribs, but putting a good sauce on them is a great start!  If there's one thing I love it's slow cooked ribs where the meat just falls off the bone.  I cut the end one off the rack, picked up the end of the rib itself, and by the time I'd got it to my mouth the meat was back on the plate leaving just the clean bone in my hand!  Spot on.  The coleslaw was very good too, high quality supplier or home made, I'm not sure which.  I've never been a big fan of the whole hot stones idea, I'm not sure I want to pay extra for the joy of still having to cook my own dinner.  I want chef to cook it for me please, I'm sure he'll do a better job of it.

In spite of a good choice of deserts, we only had room to share one between the three of us.  We had the house speciality, a hot baked cookie still in the iron skillet it was cooked in with a dollop of vanilla ice-cream.  The waitress warned us that the skillet was still very hot indeed, but both the girls still managed to burn themselves on it!  They both agreed it was worth it though.

Next time we visit Stoke we will probably revisit both the Steakhouse and the Pie Minister again.  If you're in the area and hungry you could do worse than do the same.