Pub Grub
Word has reached us that Gordie ‘would you like a f**k with that’ Ramsey is to dip his garcic infused toe in the churning waters of gastropubbery. Britain’s drinkers, already suffering from an onslaught of ‘themed’ bars (space theme = astropub, Cuban theme = Castropub, cockney theme = rubadubdubpub) reached for their bottle openers and issued a collective shudder.
If you are a gentleman, you go to the pub to drink beer. If you are a sophisticate, you might also order a bag of pork scratchings. If you are from London, these pork scratchings will be hairless.
What the hell is wrong with just having a pub that serves beer. Is this now too outlandish a concept? Must we have tapas and tempura with out mild and bitter?
The last thing you need in a pub is somebody explaining to you that your woodcock and jabberwocky pie today has been humanly and sustainably killed with an organic sickle by the light of a full moon. This is not pub fare. If you want to make a success of food in pubs the answer is obvious - sell kebab.
Don’t mess with our pubs. So few of them are left in any kind of decent condition that they should get some sort of world heritage status. I’ve eaten in Claridge’s of course and while it was lovely it did not strike me as the sort of place where the manager would see his skills and menu transfer flawlessly to the Red Lion at 11:20 on a Friday night.
Fine dining has its place. That place is London. The rest of us know that you can get great food and you can get great beer and you can often get both at the same place - there is no crisis! Is GR styling himself as a latter day St Jamie, has he spotted a roulard of comfit shaped hole in the nation’s diet? He should think before he takes a sledgehammer to the last Victorian tile and glass boozer in the land and installs food, probably a wine list and, god help us, foreigners on the staff.
All that is good and holy and true and right is being hunted to extinction by floppy haired dilettantes trailing tee-vee crews and opinions. There is only one culinary bastion left - the caravan based layby café. No Michelin stars, two Michelin tyres and bacon butties served hot and greasy to the travelling masses. I used to think the only threat to these was the environmental health, now I suppose Marco Pierre Shite will be seeking to give them a makeover too.
If you are a gentleman, you go to the pub to drink beer. If you are a sophisticate, you might also order a bag of pork scratchings. If you are from London, these pork scratchings will be hairless.
What the hell is wrong with just having a pub that serves beer. Is this now too outlandish a concept? Must we have tapas and tempura with out mild and bitter?
The last thing you need in a pub is somebody explaining to you that your woodcock and jabberwocky pie today has been humanly and sustainably killed with an organic sickle by the light of a full moon. This is not pub fare. If you want to make a success of food in pubs the answer is obvious - sell kebab.
Don’t mess with our pubs. So few of them are left in any kind of decent condition that they should get some sort of world heritage status. I’ve eaten in Claridge’s of course and while it was lovely it did not strike me as the sort of place where the manager would see his skills and menu transfer flawlessly to the Red Lion at 11:20 on a Friday night.
Fine dining has its place. That place is London. The rest of us know that you can get great food and you can get great beer and you can often get both at the same place - there is no crisis! Is GR styling himself as a latter day St Jamie, has he spotted a roulard of comfit shaped hole in the nation’s diet? He should think before he takes a sledgehammer to the last Victorian tile and glass boozer in the land and installs food, probably a wine list and, god help us, foreigners on the staff.
All that is good and holy and true and right is being hunted to extinction by floppy haired dilettantes trailing tee-vee crews and opinions. There is only one culinary bastion left - the caravan based layby café. No Michelin stars, two Michelin tyres and bacon butties served hot and greasy to the travelling masses. I used to think the only threat to these was the environmental health, now I suppose Marco Pierre Shite will be seeking to give them a makeover too.
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