Pandaberry, North Finchley. Authentic Caribbean, but avoid Monday Nights

26th October, 2015
I have been looking at this place for years, and at last our more adventurous friends wanted to try it: most of our friends are a bit on the cautious side when it comes to food.
The restaurant is tucked off the main road in North Finchley, opposite the Arts Depot and bus station, so you have to know about it as you won't spot it from the street.  It has rather strange opening hours, closing at 9pm on Sunday to Wednesday, but later for the rest of the week. It is also open for lunch and particularly, as they say, takeaway. They have a pretty comprehensive web presence on http://pandaberryjerk.co.uk/index.html which suggests they have a cheap lunch trade and a big restaurant menu.
The restaurant is attractive and looks as if it has been renovated recently. The counter with food is just by the entrance, and I suppose I should have paid more attention to that. Our friends had been to Jamaica, and said the menu was pretty authentic, and made some suggestions. The menu is visible on the web site.
For starter, my wife and I ordered Jerk Chicken wings and fish cakes. By 7.30 on Monday, a number of items on the menu were no long available and the nearest substitutes were suggested. So no chicken wings, but we could have jerk chicken, and there was no prawn curry

The food was all hot in temperature, scoring about an 8.9 on the CHOF scale, but contrary to other reviews, the quality left something to be desired. The fishcakes seemed to have just come out of microwave and were a bit heavy. The jerk chicken was very hot in spices and dry. One serving to our friend was reported as being pink in the middle, but mine was the opposite seemingly overcooked by any standards, possibly as the consequence of microwaves. I had my back to the cooking counter, so I might just be mistaken here, but the speed of serving suggests I was right.

For main, I ordered the ox tail with butter beans with a side of dumpling and we shared some plantain

The reason you cannot see the plantain is that it was served up well before the main course, and of course I would not let it get cold. I have to admit that my experience of Caribbean food is minimal and I have to accept the comments of other reviewers on TripAdviser that this is the genuine McCoy. To me, who has eaten plenty of Ox tail in the past in the days before BSE, this seemed to be far too fatty, and you can see that it is swimming in oil. This might be what it is supposed to be. The dumplings were a bit heavy and dry and I used them to mop up the gravy/fat. I should have accepted the offer of rice, which was said to come with every meal. Again the temperature was not an issue but it was very spicy. I had a bit of a cold on the day we went, and the spices really cleared out my tubes (but might possibly have affected the taste), but my wife reported that her goat curry was spice and not taste.

There is no wine list and you can bring your own at £2 corkage, which was a very good thing.

By the time our meal was served, which was about 7.50, the staff made it clear by actions that we were their only customers and they wanted us to go. Service was a bit haphazard with items being brought together and out of sequence. We were not offered a desert, and by 8.45, we were shown the door. I have to give them the benefit of the doubt that this might have been a Monday night effect, because there were never more than three tables occupied. I would need to come back and see what it is like at weekends when they have longer opening hours and lunchtime, where I suspect they do a takeaway trade with the ex-pats and school kids.

The reviews on other web sites do not match our experience and I am prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt that Monday night was the worst time to go. But a customer is a customer and is entitled to a consistent level of service and eating options even on a slack day, but maybe we simply do not understand how Caribbean restaurants work and maybe our expectations were too European.

Istanbul, North Finchley: Another superior end Turkish eating establishment for our area.

14th October 2015
Istanbul is the rebirth of the previously successful Meze Meze on the High Road in North Finchley. I have no idea what happened to the previous (acceptable) incarnation, but I have now eaten here twice, and have a very positive view. Slightly cosmetic Turkish food, but stylishly presented, and popular with the locals.
For your edification, there is an informative web site on http://www.istanbulfinchley.co.uk/ but on the 'about us' tab, the information is superficial information about the city and not the restaurant. I guess the thing that the two have in common is the splitting and very sensibly the ockabasi part of the restaurant where you can see the grill type cooking and the ingredients has been physically partitioned from the eating seated part of the restaurant. This is quite a positive move as many of the other local Turkish establishments, some very good, keep the front of house like a kebab takeaway which can be a bit off-putting especially on a Saturday night near pub closing times. The fare is pretty standard stuff for this style of restaurant and priced just slightly above middle of the road, but not excessively so. The interior of the restaurant is clean and modern and clearly reflects the European side of Istanbul.
For starter, we shared lambs liver, and haloumi+spicy sausage.

This seemed to have been freshly prepared and was tasty and hot scoring an 8.9 on the CHOF scale. The starter came with a basket of fresh flatbread, and there was also olives and tsatsiki on the table. Very good.

For main course I had Sarma Beyti which was grilled spicy minced lamb, red pepper, parsley and garlic wrapped in a homemade bread with special tomato sauce served with yoghourt, couscous and salad.

You might be able to tell that mine came with bulgar wheat rather than couscous, but no matter.

This looks great and tasted good, but displays a great truth about the hotness of food: if you have food served with chilled yoghourt, it is never going to be hot, and thus this scored only a 7.2 on the CHOF scale: pity because otherwise it was great, and was rather like eating a sliced up wrap. I will stick with the more predictable next time or tell them I want it really hot. You can also see my wife's stuffed aubergine, which was deemed to be good.

For desert, we shared a semolina cake and I had some Turkish Coffee which came in a very attractive cup holder with a glass of cold water and some Turkish Delights.

I am not a big fan of Turkish deserts and this semolina cake was a bit heavy for me. The coffee was good.

So, altogether, this is a good place, but with the caveat of the yoghourt. A meal for two, sharing a desert, with drinks and service came to £55.

The Olive Grove, Cambridge. Satisfactory Greek lunch in quiet surroundings

30th July 2015
A trip to visit our friends in Cambridge included a lunch stop at this recommended Greek Restaurant. It is a short walk off the main college/museum drag of Cambridge, near the town shopping centre, and is an unassuming sort of place which on the day we went, in the middle of the tourist season only had a few lunch clients. It may get busy at nights, and there are lots of reviews on TripAdvisor.
They have a web site on http://the-olivegrove.co.uk/ which explains that they have been a finalist in a food awards competition. This is very definitely Greek rather than Cypriot or Turkish and is reflected in the food and decor. When we were there, we witnessed a consignment of kitchen supplies arrive, and it confirmed that they are using imported or locally Greek produced ingredients. Who would have thought that haloumi comes in a big tin?
We decided to opt for the set two course lunch menu at £12.95. I had a look at the main menu, and think that it is a bit more expensive than I would expect to pay in a local north London Cypriot restaurant, but may be they cannot be compared. I cannot speak as to the authenticity of the cuisine, but it seemed Greek enough.
For starter I chose Tigania (spicy pork bites,onions,oregano,peppers & white wine)

This was a bit like a mini pork stew, and I would not rate it as particularly spicy, but it was tasty and hot enough scoring an 8.1 on the CHOF scale. I would guess that there is no such thing as really hot food in Greece, so that may have been a very authentic part of the experience.

For main I chose Kontosouvli 

(hand made pork neck skewer, pitta nest served with  fresh chips & tzatziki)

As you can see this is not exactly as described on the menu in that there is no pitta nest and the fresh chips were sauté potatoes and there appears to be some bulgar under the salad. It was hot enough also at about an 8 and tasted fine, but the meat was a bit fatty and gristly and not everything was edible. As you can see the portion size is adequate, but not generous. There is a lot of attention to appearance which you do not get in Cypriot restaurants typically.

The restaurant was mildly pretentious making a big thing out of being a finalist is in the food competition (but not revealing the final placing). It was the better side of ok, but I am a tough judge of this kind of food having been the victim of some mega meze's

Broughton Arms, Balterley; traditional inn serving standard pub dinners in good style.

Wednesday, 22nd July 2015
I put the day in my header, because for a mid-week local inn-turned-restaurant, this was packed with enthusiastic locals. I did not get the chance to look in at lunchtime to find out if it was more like a pub, but this was so packed with diners at tables in the evening, that there was no room for drinkers, and no where I could see where they might be hidden. So my first word of advice is if you want to go there, book a table (which being foreigners to the area, we had).
According to the web site on https://broughtonarmsatbalterley.wordpress.com/about/ (not sure why it is an https address) it is on the Cheshire/Staffordshire border near the village of Weston. There is little local competition except for a hotel conference center and another pub about two or three miles away. The web site is a little strange as the home page is the set menus for functions, but if you dig, all the information is there. I chose this place on the basis of good tripadvisor reviews, which by and large were supported by my visit.
The place looks half traditional, half country pub restaurant cliche. Whilst this is not intended to be a negative comment, it is exactly what you would expect except for the lack of locals drinking at night. Food service stops at 2100, so do not go there late.
The menu for the restaurant is shown on the web site under the heading 'bar menu', presumably because seating is in the bar, and you order your meal at the bar. Drink also comes from the bar at pub prices. The menu is pretty predictable and fairly extensive.
For starter I had the garlic mushrooms.

I am guessing based on their uniformity, that they were not hand made on the premises. Nevertheless, they were numerous, fairly tasty, hot at at CHOF of 8.2 and came with a tartare sauce.

For main course I had steak and kidney pie.

As you can see this is a big portion with chips, and could have been home made. There was probably more steak than kidney and it was a hearty meal at a superlative temperature scoring a 9.5 on the scale. There were also accompanying vegetables which are out of shot.

For desert, I shared a creme brulee

This tasted very eggy and as if it had not been prepared in a big batch for consumption over a period of time. The top had been flamed recently.

There is no pretention factor for this establishment. It appears to be very popular with the older generation of locals and is clearly the place to come. It is exactly what it says on the box, and there were absolutely no surprises. It was middle of the road pricing, and a meal for two with a small cider and glass of wine came to about £50. Things shut down early, and by about 9 the place was emptying out. This is an ideal place to come if you are at the Wychwood Park Venue and want to eat somewhere else.

Steam Bake and Grill at Wychwood Park DeVere Resort, near Crewe: surprisingly good

21st July 2015
We had booked a bargain midweek break through TravelZoo. Amazing value - £99 for two for B and B for two nights, and one three course meal. This is one of a number of resort venues more geared up to conferences and training meeting, and I can only presume they sell off their spare capacity when there is not enough conference trade. I guess July is not a big conference month to spend in Crewe. Crewe is pretty well located for the pottery attractions of Stoke on Trent, and Ironbridge museums.
The restaurant is pretty minimalist, with no table cloths, no bread and I am guessing that all the food is pre-prepared, but I could not say where. The limited menu appearance and speed of service suggests that it is not cooked to order. Nevertheless, it turned out to be the star of this venue in my opinion. I thought I was only getting a two course meal, but it turned out to be three. You can find out more at http://www.deverevenues.co.uk/en/venues/wychwood-park/food-and-drink/ . There is a sort of open plan kitchen to see where the finishing touches are put to dishes. These were clearly the cooks that the management were happy for people to see.

For starter, I had garlic prawns

The dish was served on a weird pice of fake facsimile newspaper. It was well cooked, tasty and scored a 9 on the CHOF scale. A good start.

For main, I had a steak pie with mash, which looks a bit like a self assembly kit. There is a boat of gravy. You get the idea. This again was pretty good and also an 8.5 to 9 on the CHOF scale.

For desert, I chose the mixed chocolate roulade.

A tiny bit mass produced, but good nevertheless.

All in all this was a surprisingly good meal, at a good temperature. It has a minor pretention factor based on the over attention to appearance, but the surroundings and service negated that. We ordered a bottle of wine, but were provided with something other than what we ordered, and were told that this was what they decided to serve instead. I guess the customer is not always right. I gather that the rack rate for this meal without drink and service is £25/head. This is probably a bit overpriced for a TDH meal, but was a good deal as part of our package.

Sunday lunch at Vanbrugh pub restaurant, 91 Colomb St, London SE10 9EZ. Mod satis but only just

28th June 2015
Friends who had been at the Fleetwood Mac concert at the Dome (I still call it that) suggested we meet up for lunch in Greenwich on Sunday. Knowing that the area on Sunday in the summer would be awash with visitors, it was decided to book something. With my list of suggestions rejected, the Vanbrugh was selected on the basis of location and other reviews, which for the most part, excepting Christmas, are favourable. It is a pub restaurant of the current breed, but serves nothing clever, and only mildly pretentious. (I have decided to add in a pretention score to my ratings as pretentious eating is infecting the world in a way less controllable than Ebola).
The place sells itself as a 'local' pub, and in fact based on its location up a side street, you would never pass it unless you meant to. Thus starts part of the conundrum of how do you price food and drink for locals? There is a fairly comprehensive web site at http://thevanbrugh.co.uk/ and the menus are there to see. Interestingly although the web site looks a little old, the menus are still current.
The place is fairly attractive by pub standards with tables to sit at, a restaurant area, and a softer area with big settees and low tables. The restaurant is fairly small, and on Sunday, the food spills out to all available space. The menu and prices are the same inside or without the restaurant. The kitchen looks pretty small, and I guess they did well to cope with the number of covers on Sunday lunchtime (40+, possibly 50) all things considered.

The menu for main roast Sunday lunch is simple with all the usual meats and fried fish and a vegetarian option. Orders are taken at the bar, and paid for in advance (I find that this reduces your leverage if anything goes wrong).

I ordered the roasted pork loin with black pudding, apple sauce and pork jus. I requested that the black pudding be replaced by pork stuffing, which was no problem to them.

As you can see, the pork was a loin chop (note the bone). This has confused people in the past who thought this might be a pork chop, but the bone was a rib. It is difficult to tell if this was pork jus, as the gravy/sauce was quite a dark colour. As there was a bed of red cabbage, it could have gone either way, but others have noted that there is cook confusion about which sauce/gravy/jus to put on. By the time this arrived, I found it unacceptable in temperature, scoring a 6.7 on the CHOF scale in some parts. I am guessing that the 7 meals between us were plated out in the kitchen during a time period, and what ever went on first got cold. Not good. I rejected the meal, and some time late a replacement came (not a reheat), but minus the stuffing. A bit better, at an 8.

My wife wanted two starters rather than a roast main. She ordered the curried mussels and the thai beef salad. Only the latter made it to the table, and when asked we were told that as the mussels were a new menu item, they had not made it from the epos system to the kitchen. However, they managed to make it on to the bill, so I think this was so much BS. In the event, the starter salad was so large, that another dish was not needed. We did get our money back, reluctantly.

So all in all, whilst the food was fine once we had it the way we wanted it, it was all a bit slapdash, in that my food was not hot enough for me (I guess the locals are not so fussy), and the ordering was too chaotic considering the shortness of the menu and that we ordered before it got busy. For the prices they charge for a straightforward Sunday Roast, this should have been better. It was expensive, with main course roast costing between £13 to £18.  This is a back street in Greenwich, not a tourist hot spot, and the cooking and food are run of the mill.

The drinks were also a bit on the expensive side for a pub. A large glass of house white wine was £8 and my half of (very nice draft Suffolk) cider was £3.50. Just as well there was no service charge in the pub, but there is 10% if you eat the same meal in the restaurant.

So not pub grub as we know it, and it is lucky that most of their clients are local and tolerate the slap dash approach.

New Curry Centre, Station Road, Barnet. Competent Local Curry House but not a treat.

22nd May 2015
A mate wanted to go out with us for a cheap and cheerful meal on a Friday night. Nothing special, and rather than go back to the Shapla in Barnet, I thought we would try something new, based on reviews from TripAdvisor. There is no web site, but several reviews on local eating sites. The New Curry Centre, despite its somewhat banal name, ticks the boxes, and most of the reviews are better than ok, and it seems to have a fan club.
It is located down a main road off the Great North Road near the Barnet Odeon. In the evening, it is possible to park near, but the Fire Station opposite means that some of the road must be kept clear. There is a somewhat intriguing takeaway menu claiming that the place is top rated by Barnet Council, but from the graphics I think this is the food hygiene rather than the culinary opinions of the council. There is no apparent regional specialisation and the place is a jack of all trades with a comprehensive menu.
The interior is unremarkable, and while some of commented that the seating is uncomfortable, I cannot say we had any problems.
For starter I had the Shamee Kebab which is the flat fried version of the sheek kebab.

Whilst it might have a slightly uninspiring appearance, it was hot at an 8.7 on the CHOF scale and very tasty. Substantial portion.

For main I had the tandoori mixed grill

This was also fresh and hot, and entirely competent. The food was good but probably the best that can be said is that it is competent local curry at a fair price. One of us was underwhelmed by the cooking and indicated that he would not be making this the curry house of choice, but I found absolutely no fault, but on the other hand there was nothing special. Service was competent and the bill was very fair. A meal for two including beer would probably come to about £35 or less depending on how much you splashed out. They charged for poppadoms, and half the price of the Bayleaf. 

I would go back there again, but more for a routine meal than a treat.