The Best Meal I’ve Ever Had On A Scheduled Train
I’ve eaten on many trains and used to regularly enjoy breakfast on Ipswich to London in the past, when they had a dining car. In some ways the most memorable was a return from Teeside to London behind a Class 55, where the driver showed what a Deltic could do.
I’ve also travelled with C on the Eastern and Oriental Express.
But no meal on a train could compare with the one I ate going from Paddington to St. Ives in one of First Great Western’s InterCity 125s. They call it Pullman Fine Dining.
I had found out that they were serving lunch on the 11:30 from Paddington, so I booked myself on that train. There was a bit of a mix-up between the train times and the web site, but as you can see, I got my high-class lunch.
As a coeliac, what really impressed me was the professional way they dealt with allergies. In fact, if anybody wants to open a restaurant, they could do no better than copy the openness.
The two courses I ate were excellent, as was the service.
I do hope that this form of catering leads to similar offerings on other lines.
There was only two things wrong with the meal.
I had to eat it by myself and it would have been so much better with a travelling companion.
The other was that First Great Western don’t have a card, which says when this service is offered. I’m off to Cardiff on Tuesday, so could I get lunch on the way down?
Is This The Ideal Bread For A Lone Coeliac?
Yesterday, in Marks and Spencer, they had sold out of my usual bread, so I bought a pack of Brown Bloomer Slices.
There are six or so slices in the pack, which costs £3.15, and it is pretty good either fresh or as toast, as the pictures show.
I hope you don’t get the impression that I live on toast and jam, but I am partial to a cup of tea and toast in the afternoon, if I’m at home.
These slices are ideal for me, as they are good untoasted and cut in half they fit my toaster. The toast isn’t bad either!
This loaf would be good, if you’re having a coeliac friend staying for a couple of nights or just coming round for a meal, as the way it’s packed it will keep for a day or two.
But for my purposes of a coeliac living alone, it does everything I need and as a loaf seems to last about three days, that means it probably costs me around a pound a day or fifty pence a slice. As my daily State Pension is around twenty pounds a day, I think I can afford it.
One problem is that as the bread has no crusts, which might cause friction in some families.
I wonder how many cafes and restaurants will start using this bread, as it seems to be in most Marks and Spencer’s stores, except possibly those in stations. The pack size would satisfy a couple of patrons on perhaps two days.
Marks and Spencer have either designed the product and pack size very carefully or they’ve just struck lucky.
I don’t care as the product is excellent.
Food Tasting At Leon
C always used to say about me, that I couldn’t handle bones. Whereas a good part of the population like to eat spare ribs, I tried them just once and haven’t tasted them in perhaps thirty years. If we had chops for supper, she would always take mine after I’d finished , and then strip any spare meat. In fact, when I have chops now, I always buy them without the bone. I also am one of the few men, who can’t carve.
It’s not a phobia or anything like that, it’s probably down to a problem with my hand and arm.
It’s also not just meat, but I really can’t fillet fish on my plate. Although, I’m getting better at that, if someone presents me with a plaice or sole on the bone. I’ve also got form about getting bones stuck in my throat, as this post shows.
I had been asked to taste a new gluten-free chicken by Leon, so I went with a friend to their restaurant in Spitalfields.
Gluten Free Chicken At Leon
The chicken unfortunately was on the bone. It is cooked in a herb crust and is served with a dip of choice.
Despite the bones, I quite liked it, although of the dips I tried, some of them were more to my taste than others.
I might try one again, but now I know it has bones, I would probably stick to one of their bunless burgers.
I’ve asked my companion for an opinion and I’ll post it when I get it.
But you have to admire Leon for being upfront with calling a product Gluten Free Chicken. How long before this initiative is copied?
And how long before we get Gluten Free Lamb etc.?
Ten years ago, coeliacs like me had a problem finding good food in a restaurant. Now in the average town or city centre, this choice has got a lot easier in the UK. But like the Tap on the Line, there are still restaurants trying to do good food, who don’t have a clue!
Recently Carluccio’s have changed their bread from an excellent brown one, to something best described as a crap white.
Restaurants that don’t cater for coeliacs and the gluten free, now have a problem, in that there are now several restaurant chains, who take gluten free meals seriously!
I once asked Gordon Ramsey about his attitude to those who asked for gluten-free food in his restaurants. He said that if when you book, you say you’re gluten-free and they say they can’t handle it, then the establishment is not a good restaurant.
I would take this further. And restaurant that thinks it’s at the top of its class, that doesn’t say what dishes are gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, vegetarian or vegan etc., is definitely not at the top.
London’s Garden Station
With the English love of gardening, you’d think that there would be lots of railway and Underground stations in the capital, which celebrate gardens.
But there are only three; Covent Garden, Kew Gardens and Ruislip Gardens.
The first is not really a garden now and who has heard of the last, but everybody has heard of the second.
So as I had heard the station had a pub on the platform, I went to take a look.
I just had a glass of real cider, but unfortunately the pub called the Tap On The Line had one of the most coeliac-unfriendly menus I’ve found in a long time.
The piece de resistance, was that the chips were oven chips, which as any coeliac knows are enhanced with wheat, so are not gluten-free. Even McDonalds manage to make their fries gluten-free!
You would be better off bringing a picnic to eat in Kew Gardens, which is four hundred metres away.
Are These The Perfect Gluten-Free Dunking Biscuit?
Marks and Spencer have recently launched some gluten-free ginger snaps.
I don’t think I’ve found a better dunking biscuit.
I wonder if they’d pass C’s test of breaking them into pieces on her left elbow, with her right hand?
On the other hand, she wouldn’t approve of the picture on the right!
Why I Didn’t Buy An Ice Cream
The ice cream outside this restaurant on Piccadilly looked good and it probably was.
Why I Didn’t Buy An Ice Cream
But on enquiring, they had pots to serve it without the cone.
In Italy, where this type of ice cream selling is common, they’ve never not had some pot for the gluten-free!
Match Three – Birmingham 2 – Ipswich 2
Birmingham City is one of the easier away grounds to get to at a weekend, as to get to the ground it’s a ten minute walk from Bordesley station.
But yesterday, I decided to try to use the buses, so I was told to get a 17 from outside Moor Street station. I managed it easily to get there, but coming home, I would have had to wait fifteen minutes for a bus, so I virtually walked it back into the centre, before I got a taxi from the Coach Station to New Street station.
The dangerous roads were no better.
I know most away fans, these days go by coach or car, but surely, as Leeds do, they should organise a taxi queue after the match for the lost. Birmingham City might do, but the stewards had no idea.
As it was I missed my 22:10 station and had to wait for the 23:10. At least though, I was able to buy some gluten-free sandwiches and a drink in the Marks there and New Street is not the dismal, dirty and draughty station of the near past.
Late Night Sandwiches
I actually had a choice of two types. When did a coeliac last have a choice of gluten-free sandwiches at 23:00 anywhere?
The Virgin train was the pick-up-the-stragglers service from Edinburgh and made it home a few minutes early, so I was in bed at a reasonable hour.
The football was another scrappy match, but at least we scraped a draw in the last minute.
Two Coeliacs At The Football
At the football last night, the stand wasn’t full and we could sit where we liked.
I ended up sitting next to this guy about my age and as one does we got talking.
It turned out he was another coeliac, who like me bad been diagnosed in later life. In his case, it had been twelve years ago at Ipswich hospital.
We swapped stories about bread and recipes, but what surprised me was that he’d never seen or heard of Nakd bars. So I gave him a piece of my half-time snack. Quite a few of my non-gluten-free friends in London eat them, as they tick so many boxes and they are pretty easy to find in most supermarkets.
A Stroke Of Genius
As I walked through the centre of Birmingham, I came across a very crowded square.
It was Genius giving out free gluten-free toasted sandwiches.
What a good marketing idea!
I don’t actually eat Genius bread any more as my local Waitrose doesn’t stock it and I do like Marks and Spencer’s new gluten free breads. They also keep longer in the bread bin!
There’s a gluten-free bread war out thereand the only beneficiaries will be those like me, who have or wish to avoid gluten.
Is Romeo’s On The Up?
I’ve been to Romeo’s Gluten Free Bakery a few times, but last time, which was a few months ago, it wasn’t a good experience. Compared to some of the bad meals I’ve had in the past, the food was very good, but the service to say the least left a lot too be desired.
As I passed today, I noticed they had a board outside and it would appear they are selling sandwiches.
Is Romeo’s On The Up?
I think the time has come to give it another chance!
The Anonymous Widower 