Food 2018 – Bar Encore, The Rice Bowl, Towcester

Saturday, 28th July 2018 – Bar Encore, The Rice Bowl, Towcester Well, we made a second stab at Bar Encore in town, hoping to test out their food. The menu claims they do tapas, but the reality that evening turned out to be that there was some technical issue in the kitchen which meant there…

Food 2018 – Maaya, Brasserie Blanc, Milton Keynes

Wednesday, 25th July 2018 – Brasserie Blanc, Milton Keynes This was an odd one… We tried to eat out twice during the week with the intention of testing new places and ended up failing completely on both occasions and having to fall back on old favourites instead. Sometimes it just all goes awry. On the…

Food 2018 – The Oxford Kitchen, Oxford

Tuesday, 17th July 2018 – Provence Wine and Food Evening, The Oxford Kitchen, Oxford For what I think is their first ever wine and food evening, we found ourselves at the Oxford Kitchen on a school night, having finally managed to find a parking space (always problematic in Oxford) that was at least within sight…

Food 2018 – Pairings, York

Sunday, 8th July 2018 – Pairings, York For lunch on Sunday in York we took Richard’s at Rascills recommendation and sought out Pairings on Castlegate. He said we’d like it. He was absolutely right. Some of the seats looked a bit “medieval instruments of torture” but we found some chairs rather than bar stools and…

Travel/Food 2018 – York, Raskelf, Day 2

Saturday, 7th July 2018 – York, Raskelf Saturday morning was just as warm as Friday so we were quite pleased to have a variety of things indoors or at least undercover to do, starting with a visit to the Jorvik Viking Centre  that we’d pre-booked to avoid having to queue. As we were ready a…

Food 2018 – Dyls, Skosh, York

Friday, 6th July 2018 – Dyls, Skosh, York We started the evening by stopping off at Dyls to test their cocktail list. I think it’s fair to say that service is not the fastest, but what you do get for your patience are some excellent concoctions. I went for the ‘Black Bottle’ Berry Lemonade, made…

Travel 2018 – Day 1, York

Friday, 6th July 2018 – York With the lure of Europe’s first pop-up Shakespearean theatre, the Rose, to tempt us north to York, we decided it was a good excuse for a short break in a city I used to know well after numerous trips there with school or for that matter with my parents….

Food/Drink 2018 – Bar Encore, Olive Tree, Towcester

Friday, 29th June 2018 – Bar Encore, Olive Tree, Towcester Friday night after a long day in a six-hour conference call and with the weather hot and dry as it has been for the last two weeks, I really didn’t fancy cooking dinner, so we headed out on foot to test run the new bar…

Travel/Food 2018 – France and Spain (but only a little bit)!

Saturday, 5th May/Wednesday, 23rd May 2018 – Home, Hull, Rotterdam, Epernay, Etoges, Troyes, Bordeaux, Pau, Pugnac, Blaye, Saint Emilion, Bordeaux, Pau, Saint Jean Pied de Port, Bilbao Gotta love a road trip! Here’s an approximate map of where we went… I had more to say that has since been added, but there was laundry to…