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Some of us complain about regional stereotypes. Others just reaffirm them.
Pizza, chips, kebab, pasty - YOU DECIDE!
You’ve been to the match, you’ve had a couple of beers and you’re on your way home…
But what do you stuff your face with before you stagger through the door and get told off by the missus?
That’s the subject of our web poll today, inspired by news that Greggs plans to open a late-night bakery in Sunderland.
Use the panel on the bottom right of this page to have your say now.
I went along to the Evolution Festival yesterday. Specifically the Baltic stage area.
All very good. Lots of very very young people in skinny jeans that made me feel old. But anyway…
What struck me most were the row of tents alongside the stages.
In order, this is what they sold: doughnuts, beer and spirits, burgers and cigarettes.
Now don’t get me wrong I had both a beer and a burger so there is no moral high ground here. But really, that was the entire choice. Nothing healthy. Nothing ethnic. Nothing veggie. Nothing spicy. No water fountain if you preferred to save your liver and your pennies.
And a cigarette counter? At an event where the average age seemed about 14? Whose idea was that?
I don’t want to be the aging grouch on this one and I know you can lead a kid to cous cous but you can’t make him eat.
But…
Oops. Not sure how I missed this in the post below but, in the Guardian article that inspired it, MasterChef winner James Nathan comments (on Delia’s cheating):
My one real comment on all this, is that not everyone lives in London, not everyone can drop into their local deli to buy fresh ingredients on their way home from work.
I’ve stayed with friends in the provinces, they both work, they both have two-hour commutes, they have two kids, they have to shop at big supermarkets and they have to buy for a month or so at a time.
You utter utter twat. Yes, head five miles out of London and all you can buy is black pudding and that’s what we stuff our fat kids with. What an absolute utter nob.
“I’ve stayed with friends in the provinces..”
Gosh, really. Have you? What it soooo awful? What were they like? Did they make you eat awful food from those nasty big supermarkets? Wow, you are sooo brave.
James Nathan - Mastertwat
More tales from the Guardian of London folk peering down their noses at the fecking “provinces”. Utter arseholes.
First off – cards on the table. I’m no foodie.
Okay let’s break that down. I like food – my generous frame alone is evidence of that.
But food is for eating – not talking about. As for TV chefs, while I can stomach old blokes like Stein and Floyd, I can’t watch mockney tosser Jamie Oliver without getting angry.
But anyway… growing up, Delia was out on her own.
At Sunday lunch if the Yorkshire puds were complimented then the cook would say: “Ahh yes..they’re Delia’s recipe”.
In the ensuing conversation my Gran would list all the Delia creations she had made that week. She adores her.
Years later I saw her, obviously in her role as Norwich City chairman, at a Newcastle United reserve game looking very cosy and flirty with Bobby Robson. I can imagine she was angling for a new centre forward while Bobby was probably dreaming of a steak and kidney pie.
Anyway, Delia, it turns out, has a new TV show. As Mockney Toss Boy fights obesity with healthy school dinners, Delia is reverting to processed food. Really. This despite writing in an earlier book:
“…my personal belief that we may be in danger of losing something very precious, and that is a reverence for natural ingredients and the joy and pleasure they can bring to real life … The sensual pleasure of eating belongs to everyday life as well, and it’s not always to be found in the vast amounts of mass-produced, easy-cook fast foods that we’re subtly persuaded to eat …”
Hmm.
Apparently it hasn’t gone down well. Alex Renton at The Guardian burnt all Delia’s books and accused her of going over to the dark side.
Later, in the same paper, a panel of the great and the good got a top chef to follow her recipes and gave their verdicts on the taste:
“This is like having a pig piss in your throat. It tastes of freezer and plastic. I don’t understand. If you can’t cook and you can’t afford to go out, eat a cheese sandwich.”
***
“This is supremely awful. Terrible beyond belief. It’s a crime against aubergines. They’re such beautiful vegetables, and to see them treated like this. It’s appalling.”
***
“Why would you eat tinned mince? It’s like a lamb shat in a tin.”
Indeed. Why>
Food columnist Giles Coren has his own theories:
I think she’s jealous of Jamie and Nigella and Hugh. It’s like old footballers who bemoan the fact there was never any money in the game when they were playing: Delia was a food star when food stars weren’t big. It’s like some old boxer coming out of retirement, Rocky Seven up for one last slugging match.
But what she doesn’t realise is that the rules have changed, that nowadays people are motivated by different things: the environment, quality ingredients, nutrition. She’s come back for her slice of the pie - that’s her motivation.
For me the best quote came from a Guardian Blog commenter:
She showed me and millions of us how to cook simply, healthily, with good fresh ingredients, and now she wants to show us how not to. What’s up? Need another football club?
Seriously, why does “Britain’s Best-Selling Cook” needs to squeeze more money out of her franchise? And she is milking it: have a look at www.deliaonline.com and you’ll see what she’ll get from this blatant advert on the BBC: there’s the book and already over 100 products in Waitrose and Sainsbury’s branded with the “A Delia Cheat! ingredient” label on them. that includes “Mr Crumb fresh breadcrumbs”, for god’s sake, and no less than six of the McCain processed potato products she plugged on TV last night.
And why - given that the BBC must have paid gazillions for the show - are the “recipes” not up on its food site, as is normal? Nor can you see the show on iPlayer. Not that you’d want to.
In it for the money. Sure. Of course. That’s why I go to work.
Can’t blame her for that.
But the loss of dignity? Following the mockney into that whole branded product horribleness? Why does everyone sell out so easy now?
Even fecking Keith Richards is doing adverts for Louis Vuitton.
And why does the BBC allow her to do this? This blatant profiteering is as sickening as it is blindingly obvious.
Meanwhile, my gran, now in her nineties, still cooks up the occasional “Delia”. No doubt we’ll catch up over a family Sunday lunch soon.
God, I hope she didn’t see the show.
Sometime, way, way, way ago – I blogged that I had quit smoking.
If the tone is somewhat smug then it shouldn’t be. The truth is it didn’t last.
On my last night in Vietnam I smoked again. Then again in Nicaragua and back in Newcastle too.
Certainly I rarely smoked again at levels close to my earlier days in Hanoi when I was sucking down well over a pack a day. In fact, half the time in Central America I didn’t smoke at all. At one point I rationalised that just one cigar a week wouldn’t be too damaging.
No real hardship there – I found I could easily make the foot-long local specials last a week.
Also as someone who’d always been on the somewhat hefty side, being overseas was at first a blessing. In Vietnam I found that an upset stomach might not be pleasant but was an effective method of weight control. Couple that with a rice-based diet and the pounds just fell away.
But then, about the same time as my belly adapted, my taste buds we’re compelling me to seek out richer food. While my initial weight loss was stalling, I didn’t worry too much about weight gain. Surely the next bout of sickness would take care of it.
Vietnam ended and Nicaragua began. Boiled rice gave way to fried rice and beans and lots and lots of cheese. I must say I didn’t really notice it but I guess the weight started to really pile on. When you’re wearing sloppy shorts and t-shirts every day you’ve some way to go before they start to feel tight.
Before too long I was back in the UK and all those comfort foods I had missed. British food might be considered comparatively bland - but have you any idea the sheer quality of the ingredients compared to those in developing countries? It all tasted so good.
I was back to Embassy Number One cigarettes too after three years on local tabs and Marlboro lights.
Then there was something of a dawning. A bit run down I went to the doc’s. Occasionally dizzy and frequently breathless, paranoia made me wonder if I had brought back some horrible tropical lurgy.
After a stack of tests the answer was much more simple - I was just very unhealthy.
Certainly a step on the surgery’s scales made my eyes pop out. In all the time I was away – nearly three years in all - I hadn’t weighed myself. Ouch.
Christmas and New Year was the cut off. I haven’t smoked since January 1st. I know I’ve said this before but I feel like I have smoking licked. While I still have occasional cravings, they’re slowly giving way to a real revulsion at tobacco.
Weight loss has been slow – my dodgy scales suggest half a stone lost but their lack of accuracy might actually mean I’ve lost half that. But my diet has changed and I am feeling better for it. More fruit and veg – no more cooked brekkies or bacon sarnies from the staff canteen.
My holiday was tricky and I was far from well behaved calorie-wise but could have been worse. I arrived back Sunday and sat down with the diet books with the aim of getting serious.
In the meantime, while I have been regularly walking home the two and a half miles from work, sport remains too scary for now. I’d like to start playing five-a-side again sometime soon though.
For the record this isn’t the start of some sort of horrible diet blog. Don’t expect any weight-loss updates – well not unless I am really successful and want to be smug about it. You won’t be seeing any pics of me demonstrating the new found roominess in my old trousers.
But, in between my rants, I also want this blog to continue to be something of a personal narrative and this feels like something I should bookmark.
And as far as life goes, mine seems to be at a crossroads healthwise. If I fail this time then it feels like I’ll shortly be too far gone to ever get it right.
Hopefully, the acceptance of this fact should be enough to ensure I succeed.
Lunch today was at Yo Sushi.
It seemed the best choice because I’ve been on a diet this past month and YS is just about the only place I can pig out without feeling guilty. There are only so many times a week that I can eat a chicken salad sandwich without sobbing in public.
So anyway, I ate sushi. So tasty. So healthy etc.
Now the place has only been open since June. Roughly around the time I returned to Newcastle. Seeing as my sushi-loving girlfriend was following me to these shores, I was delighted that the city had filled what had previously been a raw fish-free zone.
Now I don’t know if this is normal, but the YS in Newcastle is in the middle of a department store. The Fenwicks Food Hall to be precise. Sandwiched in between a Pret a Manger and various upscale delistuffs. Old people like Fenwicks.
Certainly, while various restaurants have dabbled in Japanese food, this is the first sushi restaurant, to my knowledge, that has opened in the city.
Now you Southern types might chortle in your lattes at this one (and if you do then you’re the smug tossers we always suspected you were) but this is something of a novelty for Newcastle.
There are other things we do have: fresh air, space, houses with more than one room for under half a million, no Boris Johnson, etc but this is a first.
So the triple novelty of the foodhall setting, food that moves and the whole raw fish thing, makes it something of a curiosity.
This lunchtime I was photographed eating on two occasions, had my shoulder peered over three times, but was, for the most part, just treated somewhere between an art installation and the inhabitant of a zoo.
All in all, I can never work out whether it makes me feel very cool and cosmopolitan or a bit of a prat.
A quick Google through the blogs and Meri Williams has had similar experiences:
…I evidently have a “ask me about sushi, I’ll explain” aura about me - every time we go NEAR the Yo Sushi in Newcastle I end up explaining what the food is and how the conveyor belt system works to every 50+ in Fenwicks …
Meanwhile, Jason’s been there too.
Slightly embarassing (from a North East perspective) is this picture here from Brown Brogues but I’d blame it on patronising Yo Sushi marketing people rather than Geordie ignorance.
So I go into the Peninsula on Chillingham Road. For some reason whenever I start to get better after illness I crave Chinese food.
I swear I haven’t been in there for 10 years at least. Not since I last left Heaton. Not since Vietnam. Not since Nicaragua.
I order. Sweet and sour pork and chicken chow mein.
I pay and then nip out to the DVD shop while my food is cooked.
Less than 15 minutes later I am back and a bag of food is waiting for me.
The owner hands it to me and says: “You been away then?”
Following this post the good people at Belle & Herbs have responded. For the most part it speaks for itself but you’ll find a couple of brief comments from me at the end.
Dear Ourman,
The ilovebelleandherbs gals were in at the weekend and mentioned you had been in touch, and mentioned your blog to me. so i thought i’d sniff ya out.
Thanks for taking the time to blog about us, it is always useful and stimulating to receive feedback such as this. In that I felt we had been making strides to address some of the issues you raise i thought i would write ya.
I was also resident in Heaton during the ‘no decent cafe’ days. The cafe was a response to this. It was difficult to see at the beginning that we would ever have to attempt to serve the amount of customers that we do, and thus we were fairly badly-set up to cope. We are trying to address these issues.
We are currently 7 months into a 12 month development period. We initially revamped the front of house. We made major alterations to the layout gaining more floor space, whilst not putting in any more chairs, and changed most all of our furniture stock. We feel there are very few ‘bad’ seats now. We no longer allow people to wait for tables inside the cafe - as is mentioned - so that other customers aren’t crowded.
We recently moved into our beautiful new purpose built kitchen in our basement, which was the result of a 5 month building project. We will next build loads of toilets, and by using the old kitchen space and building an extension more than double the floor space in the cafe. We will be opening the space at the side of the cafe as a pavement cafe.
When we are through this development period we will be lengthening our opening hours to open earlier and close later. We will also be furthering our agenda of being a ’social business’. We already support and train a number of people with disabilities, and will be dramatically increasing this.
We really believe the improvements wont change our essential raison d’etre, or feel. We mainly hope to improve service and the speed and quality and range of our products. We do not intend to open any more cafes. This one is the first and last.. trust me.
I believe that -notwithstanding the odd mistake- we do a pretty good job. we close 4 days a year! We work hard to source excellent ethical local ingredients, and to serve you them as quickly and attractively as we can. We believe we make a large contribution to the cultural and community fabric of Heaton. We have on numerous occasions hosted charitable and regular cultural events where our services are provided free. We will be seeking to undertake a more comprehensive programme of events when we have secured the necessary permissions.
On the whole I take the comments in a positive light, as we feel most of the same frustrations you discuss. My fragile cooks ego takes slight exception to the image you have chosen to represent ‘not exactly attractive’. This is a dish called ‘eggs BEAN-addict’, the baked beans are meant to replace the hollandaise sauce of eggs benedict. It was included as a joke on the menu, but is actually on our top 5 most sold items!
I would agree that the coffee at the sky apple is really good, as is their food, ambience and staff, I would also heartily recommend that you try it. I believe that we also serve really good coffee. We stock fairtrade only, locally roasted by the venerable Ringtons. Having sold and trialed many different coffee on the market I feel this is the best we have had.
Bearing in mind some of the comments from Ourman, I am not sure that you have visited recently? If you have the chance I would recommend that you come on a week day. Whilst we can get a little busy on weekdays during the school /college holidays, It is generally no problem immediately getting a table, and there is usually plenty of time to sit and chat or read the paper. If you would like to ring before you set off we will happily advise you of the the busy-ness of the cafe, Oh and we would also happily have breakfasts ready for takeaway at 9am.
In closing I feel I must just mention your assertion that the old WHQ was better than the hacienda! I think you must have gone post 1990 when they started asking for student i.d’s as a requirement to get in ;p
love
sam
x
p.s the ilovebelleandherbs gals have been busy getting married and globetrotting. But are still regulars when occasionally home.
* Sam - thanks for your comments.
Have I been recently? Well once this summer since my return from overseas. Many a time while I was away I had dreamt of a B&H breakfast and then I returned only to find that the experience wasn’t so much fun.
However, I’m more than impressed at all your plans. I particularly am looking forward to B&H as a night time venue. Sounds fabulous - as does the outside eating area. Can’t wait for the extra space.
Thanks so much for responding in such a constructive way - you have obviously put everything into this venture and I am not sure I would have taken criticism so well.
One further suggestion - get a blog. Your own Flickr account would be cool too. Your Myspace effort is all very well but it’s all a bit 13 year old boy, no? (Sorry). I’d love to follow your efforts as an ethical business. You have a good story to tell. Hey I’d even knock you up a couple of press releases (that’s what I do) in return for a table and a suasage and black pudding butty. Yes I am that cheap.
Oh and I wish I could visit weekdays but have a job to go to. But I do have Monday off so who knows.
Finally as regards the Hacienda. You’re 3/4 correct. I loved that place so it was high praise for WHQ rather than a slating for the Hacienda. But as regards the timing (and yes I was a student), it was 89-91 and I seem to recall 89 was more fun than 91.
But I should also admit that my favourit night was Thursday’s Temperance night (ahem… otherwise known as student night). I was always more New Order than 808 State so it all got a bit glow sticks and Vicks for me at weekends.
Picture Details:
Belle & Herbs breakfast originally uploaded by rachelandrew
When I was overseas and looking to move back to Tyneside, where exactly I would live was an easy choice.
Although it had been 10 years since I had been part of the Heaton community it was still where most of my friends lived.
It has a mix of people that, for the most part, works. The students are neither crusties nor chinless. The long (long long) term residents are friendly.
Then there are people like me and the people I count as friends who have moved there. Teachers, social workers, public sector types etc. I like to think we’re an easy going bunch.
When I first lived in Heaton there was single spot to go and get a bacon butty on a weekend morning. It wasn’t great so I won’t name it – but it’s still there. Now Heaton is something of a fast food centre but there is only one real hang out. Belle & Herbs.
In its early days it was a Godsend. Sundays you met your mates there. You read the papers and sipped your latte while you waited for your humongous, fabulous breakfast.
The décor was eclectic – junk shop in the best possible way. You even got proper sausages with your fry-up. Sausages with herbs in them – not just reconstituted meaty pinkness.
Such was its place in Heaton social life that it soon even spawned a blog. The extensive menu was worked through by reviewers.
On their FAQs they explained:
Essentially, it’s a fan site. It’s just slightly different in that the object of our obsession isn’t a celebrity or tv series or movie, but rather a place. The food at Belle & Herbs is absolutely wonderful — and we love good food.
Then something happened. The obvious phrase to use is “victims of their own success”.
Suddenly you could not get a table. Quite rightly, for a glorified greasy spoon, there was no booking system so you queued. Trouble is there is no real space for queuing so while you wait you just clutter up the space between tables. There you get in the staff’s way and very nearly literally lean on the shoulders of diners.
The uncomfortable space causes you to soon become irritated. Alternatively, if you’re lucky enough to be seated then it causes you, out of sheer guilt, to eat quicker to vacate your table. No more lazy breakfasts. No chat either. Heads down. Eat. Out.
In this slightly frazzled environment my own ability to become uber-irritated comes to the fore. Slow service. Arrrrrrgh. Cocked up orders. Arrrrgggh. Too stuffy. Arrrggghh. Too many people. Arrrrgh. Okay lets go. I want to get out. Now. Come on.
Then I need a lie down
Even that eclectic furniture starts to annoy. While you’re queuing you think: “Oh no, not the old knackered seat that’s too high/low for the table.”
The other worry is that the table that becomes available is a six-seater and there’s only two of you. That means. Worst thing ever. You have to share.
Again that wouldn’t normally matter. But it brings me to one of the most oft-repeated moans. Posh Jesmond students taking over.
On the “I Love B&H” site this comment is included:
Queuing for an hour behind inane yacht club-affiliated students in windcheaters who’ve driven over from Jesmond in their Xmas present from Daddy.
AKA. HELL IN THE ‘BURBS.
Otherwise, fine.
For the record, they’re wrong. Tesco Metro in Jesmond is the real hell. B&H is just hell lite.
I once heard a young well spoken lady in Tescos say to her friend: “Oh my God I’ve got a stalker. Honestly. This dirty, spotty Geordie asked me out”
But I digress…
Now live and let live and all that. Really. But the loud loud LOUD voices. The ear splitting barking laughs. The: “Oh but Sebastian we were soooo drunk.”.
If you have to share a table with them then you can’t compete. See the Boris-Johnson-alike with posh mates pic above.
So again, it’s heads down. Eat. Out.
There are other irritants although they are comparatively minor. First off the chef has an odd habit of occasionally just emptying his pan on your plate. Getting extra food is no real hardship but, at times, your plate is drowned under extra egg or beans and sometimes even sausages.
I wonder sometimes if this is also as a result of the whole overcrowding thing. Are we being compensated with extras? Paid off with pork?
Maybe their hearts are in the right place but with the already large portions it just makes you want to give up before you start eating. Plus it’s not exactly attractive.
And maybe it’s just me but in these days of obesity being such a hot topic I no longer feel quite so good about stuffing extra lard-based objects down my neck. (Yeah I know, if I cared that much I could just order cereal, but then again I could do that at home)
As a result of all of this everyone I know has stopped going. The B&H blog has gone silent for almost a year - although I emailed them and they said it was for no other reason than they have been busy. Though it does suggest a lack of enthusiasm for a place that once was Heaton’s favorite hangout.
It’s hard to know what to suggest to make it work again. You could certainly argue that as they are so full they don’t have to.
They certainly need more space. They need to open before 9am so you can get a breakfast earlier if you’re headed to work. They need to open later too.
While that may help stretch some of the trade it’s fair to say the effect might be limited. It might sound strange but what B&H really need is competition.
Sure they can sort out their slightly erratic service, their occasionally bizarre helpings and their queuing system but most of all they need another café (or four) nearby to take up some of the strain.
Best of all they should open another themselves in Jesmond and the Heatonians and err.. Jesmondonians can keep ourselves to ourselves and stop irritating each other.
Because the sad thing is, that the once great B&H is now no fun at all to eat at and I miss the place.
Particularly the sausages.
A few links, thank-yous etc: First off B&H’s MySpace thing is here. It includes enough to make me feel bad for complaining about a place that has obviously been lovingly created with the likes of my ungrateful self in mind. Sorry. Also some suggestion of progress on some of the issues outlined above is included.
The black and white B&H pics are from the very talented annette62. Thanks to B&H blog creator Meri for her input (Relax B&H she still loves you). Her mouth watering B&H Flickr shots are here.
A glowing food review (but a mention of the popularity problems) here.
Finally, Heaton photo group here.
