Cennin, Beaumaris

We were on Anglesey visiting my family for Christmas and as my parents’ favourite place to eat, the Bull in Beaumaris, was full we decided to try the Cennin. The restaurant – its Welsh name means ‘leek’ in English – is the creation of chef Aled Williams and is a reflection of his passion to bring creativity and great Welsh ingredients together.

‘Fish in Chip’ was a starter on the menu and met most of the criteria of what I think of as a good fish and chips. It was defined as crispy Plaice and potato ballotine with crushed peas, lemon confit and tartare butter sauce and at £8.45 for a starter it needed to be pretty good.

The plaice was wrapped inside the potato to create the sausage ballotine shape and was then battered and deep fried. The crispy batter was very, very light in taste and texture and was easy to cut through to get at the soft mashed potato filling and the light delicate plaice in the centre. The potato was fluffy and delicious and didn’t dominate the sliver of plaice it surrounded. The meal was topped off by cress-like material which, of course, was discarded.

Yet the stars of the meal were everything else on the plate. The crushed peas were out of this world with a vibrant, intense taste which was beautifully balanced by the lemon confit and tartare butter sauce. The tartare was just the right consistency and supported rather than fought against the other flavours on the plate. This was important due to the subtle flavour of the fish and potato. The depth of flavour in the tartare was amazing and the use of the lemon, which had had time to develop an intense flavour, added a fresh zesty acidity that was a genuine pleasure.

There was no need for a lemon wedge, salt, vinegar or other sauces as the kitchen staff had got it all spot on.

It was washed down with a bottle of Snowdonia Ale from Bragdy Mws Piws / ThePurple Moose Brewery which was the perfect accompaniment to a superb and innovative dish.

The Clive, Bromfield

The Clive is a posh bar and restaurant just outside Ludlow. We were in Ludlow for a gig by the magnificent Lau and The Clive was recommended so we gave it a go. Unfortunately, some poor bus research meant we had to get a taxi at a handsome £11.50.

I went for lightly battered cod fillet, home cut chips, mushy peas and home-made tartare sauce, which, just like the taxi, cost £11.50. Many things in and around Ludlow seem unreassuringly expensive.

The cod didn’t have much taste and was a surprisingly thin piece of fish. The batter was light, had a very good flavour and wasn’t in the slightest oily. It formed a great crispy accompaniment to the fish.

The chips were outstanding. They weren’t trying to be anything but proper chips. Not too big, not too small with a beautifully crisp golden exterior and a big potato flavour on the inside.

The mushy peas were stunning and had an incredibly clean, deep, intense pea flavour.

Now, the tartare. It did say ‘home-made’ tartare but I wasn’t expecting it to actually mean that you had to take it home and make it yourself. On the plate were three gherkins and two caper berries which were sitting on a dollop of mayonnaise. So, along with the traditional lemon, for squeezing on the fish, I was pretty much all the way there with the ingredients. A sharp knife and a small mixing bowl were the only things they forgot to bring out. It was a classic case of unadulterated, deconstructed nonsense.

The aforementioned lemon was a good size and had perfected squeezability and naturally, as it was a posh place, I had to ask for the vinegar.

Overall, a perfectly OK fish and chips, with the chips and peas being the standout elements, with Hobson’s Best Bitter being a good beer to go with the food.

Getting back to Ludlow proved a bit of a pain: there were no taxis for two hours so a three-mile hike by the side of a busy road was the only solution.

The madness of the deconstructed tartare still makes me wonder how a good restaurant can get it so wrong.

Grandma Pollards, Walsden

I had annual leave to take before the end of the year, which allowed me to take lunch at a local institution. The beauty of going to Grandma Pollards is that it’s ten minutes on the train from Hebden Bridge and the train drops you off at their doorstep.

The takeaway and restaurant is presided over by a larger-than-life character who’s been serving up good honest northern food since 1957 with tremendous joviality. Fabulously, it’s closed on a Saturday and Sunday as he and his staff, like many of us, need to have the weekend off. As the owner rightly says: "Tony's little legs need a rest."

For the uninitiated it can be a little confusing.

1.      Don’t go and sit down in the choice of eating areas. Go to the takeaway section, order your food, indicate you’re eating in, which decides which colour pad your order is written down on, and take your laminated number back to the seating area to find somewhere to sit

2.      There are two seating areas:

a.      The main seating area is a plastic sheeting covered area where the sound of the rain on the roof in a downpour is something to hear.

b.      The bus – yes, a mini bus converted with tables and chairs for about 20 people, which can be reserved if you wish.

3.      Wait for your food to arrive.

4.      Enjoy!

I went for the haddock and small chips at £4.45 with a portion of mushy peas for 95p.

The quality of the fish and chips was excellent. The fish was a good honest haddock that had plenty of flavour and a good texture. The batter was well cooked and had a flavour that only fresh oil can achieve. I should mention that Grandma Pollards is immaculately clean.

The chips had a tasty soft middle and a gorgeous crispy exterior and they were the highlight of the meal.

The mushy peas were very traditional with plenty of flavour and a high level of runniness.

No lemon, but oddly a sprig of parsley which seems over the top for decoration.

The other extra you have at Pollards is a small scallop, which is a deep fried thin slice of battered potato. It was too oily for me as the batter had soaked up all the cooking oil and the potato taste was completely lost.

The salt and vinegar came in huge dispensers on the table and the tartare came from a very flash, hi-tech Heinz packed sauce. It was the most disgusting, sickly and acidic bitterness I’d ever tasted. I have no idea how it got out of the factory gates, let alone onto the table of a chip shop.

The meal was washed down with a can of traditional lemonade and in the background was a stream of 1950s ukulele music.

All in all a really good old-fashioned chippy which should be celebrated and enjoyed for lunch if you’re in the area – between Monday and Friday, that is.

The Hub, Liverpool

Photo by deltrems

We were over in Liverpool meeting up with family who were visiting and needed somewhere child-friendly to eat.

We stumbled on The Hub when wandering in town and I realised that I had seen it in the Good Beer Guide. It was therefore essential I popped in to have a look. It defines itself as an Alehouse & Kitchen, which is a pub that does food to you and me. When you enter you’re met by someone desperate to take money from you for food and seemed mildly disappointed when we asked if it was OK to sit on the very high chairs at the extremely high bar to have a couple of drinks. It’s a big noisy room but the atmosphere was friendly.

They have a couple of house beers, made by local a local brewery and others from local craft breweries and the ones we tried were excellent.

As time was pushing on we agreed to meet the rest of the family in the pub for lunch. The lunch menu looked good and there was a children’s menu as well which would hopefully keep them happy.

Naturally, I went for the ‘cask ale battered haddock, proper chips, mushy peas, tartare sauce’ for £9.95.

The fish was fresh, clean tasting and flavoursome but unfortunately the batter was too gloopy in texture and not crisp enough, although the taste was good.

The chips were proper and oddly too crisp as they’d been overcooked and had a very ordinary taste. The children loved them though. In contrast, the mushy peas had a good depth of flavour, good deep green colour and my only problem was that I wished I’d had a bigger portion.

In terms of the extras, I did have a good wedge of lemon and a swish, or should it be a swoosh, of tartare. I don’t mind fancy things but if you’re trying to do proper fish and chips then the addition of a tartare swoosh seems like stuff and nonsense.

We were sitting right in the middle of the restaurant with loud conversation all around us and the waiting staff had to struggle past us to get to other tables with food. They managed to make a mess of all the other meals that were brought to the table e.g. a children’s pasta with tomato sauce that was too peppery for almost any human being and staff  just didn’t care in the slightest how bad it was. Some of the most uncaring staff I’ve ever come across in an ‘alehouse & kitchen’. I wasn’t in an alehouse or a kitchen. Just a noisy pub which isn’t as good as they think it is.

I won’t be rushing back.

Fish Hut, Hornbaek

As part of an early Autumn holiday in Denmark we visited one of the famous fish-huts of the coastal towns and villages along the Northern Zealand coast – an outstandingly beautiful area known to many as the Danish Riviera.

Lonely Planet recommended the Fish Hut in Hornbaek and so we took the very slow train round the coast from Helsingør to Hornbaek and walked down to the harbour.

The fish and chips came with mayonnaise and a salad (I say salad when what I really mean is a lettuce leaf, a slice of cucumber and a cherry tomato) all for the equivalent of about £6. This is very cheap for Denmark, very cheap indeed.

I didn’t know what the fish was but it was fresh, as you’d hope, and it tasted OK, but was certainly nothing to write home about. Maybe nothing to write a blog about either.

The batter was a thick greasy nonsense with a slightly sweet taste and was highly reminiscent of a Findus Fish and Chips ready meal from the 1970s.

We found out through accidental detective work near the bins that the chips were fried in soya oil and were definitely just from a frozen packet. A superior frozen thin chip but as they’d be smothered in rock salt it was difficult to truly enjoy their taste.

The lemon was impossible to squeeze as it was too small and had actually been stuffed into the blob of mayonnaise. The mayo itself was OK but just lacked oomph.

The meal was washed down with a very average bottle of white wine – the Torre Mayor variety.

What makes the whole thing stand out is the view. You sit outside on metal chairs at metal tables overlooking the stunning little harbour. You order your food at a hatch, you are given a metal disc and when your disc vibrates it’s time to go and get the food. It was a shame there was cloud cover, which was moving very, very slowly and we sat and waited for the sunshine.

We left before it arrived.

© All Rights Reserved Ole Jais

 

The Town Hall Tavern, Leeds

 

© Copyright Bill Henderson and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

It was the perfect storm.

Nearby beer festival + a rained-off game at Headingly + business lunches = a very, very noisy pub.

The noisy pub in question was the Town Hall Tavern on Leeds’ Headrow, which describes itself as an eclectic gastropub. I couldn’t imagine what they meant by this, so I took a trip to Leeds to find out.

 

Despite the noise, I decided to go for the non-eclectic crunchy East Coast haddock, dripping cooked chips, tartare sauce and crushed peas at £9.95.

 

The meal came on a plate. Unfortunately the plate had a piece of ‘newspaper’ on it called ‘The Daily Catch’ which actually stated to fall apart because of the combined weakening effect of the heat of the fish and the oil from the batter. What utter nonsense!

The fish was an OK chunk with the skin off and the batter was light, with good colour, plenty of flavour and it had been really well cooked. The chips had good taste and texture and a great mid-brown colour.

 

The peas were of the petit pois variety and had quite a soft, slightly buttery flavour.

Then the tartare disaster. It looked good with a bright mayo and well-chopped pieces of veg. However, once tasted it quickly became very clear that one of those vegetables was cucumber. And I hate cucumber. Cucumber is tartare? Not on my watch.

 

The chunk of lemon was full of pips and it was a genuine struggle to get any of the juice out. The salt cellar didn’t actually crush the salt, rather it just dispensed whole crystals from the cellar onto the chips. The vinegar was a slightly indulgent, and unnecessary, Aspall Golden Malt Vinegar.

 

Although the staff were charming, it was difficult to enjoy the meal in such a noisy, claustrophobic pub and I wouldn’t do it again. After the meal we headed to the wonderful Friends of Ham, which was blissful by comparison – but they don’t do fish and chips!

The Kinmel Arms, Llansansior/St George

 

On the way to see mother and father we stopped off for posh fish and chips at the Kinmel Arms.

The Kinmel Arms has popped up on a number of ‘best of’ lists over the last few years so it was great to be able to try it finally. Fish and chips were on the menu, handsomely priced at £13.95.

The fish itself was incredibly fresh, perhaps even the freshest I can remember tasting, and it came without its skin. The flakes were both big in size and in flavour. Very enjoyable.

The batter was very light in texture and had a very good crispy outer. It was a deep brown colour and an excellent taste which was subtle enough not to overpower the fish.

Crisp would be the only way to describe the chips. They were incredibly crisp. So much so that it actually took a big of effort to bite into them. Luckily the inside was a beautiful soft potato with a glorious taste. Clearly they’d been cooked more than once to get the crispiness – the colour of them was a lovely deep brown.

The peas were of the crushed variety and were simply superb. They had an intense flavour with just a hint of mint and a very good consistency.

Big chunky bits of vegetables had gone into the tartare and mixed with the light mayo (which was very good in itself) to make for a very enjoyable accompaniment. The lemon was OK and had had the pips removed.

I had to ask for salt and vinegar.  The vinegar came in a container that when using it even the most dextrous couldn’t avoid delivering anything short of a torrent of vinegar onto the fish. I didn’t try it a second time.

Oddly the meal came with a green leaf side salad. I did look at it and wonder what business a green salad had with fish and chips, and decided that the best strategy was to leave it untouched on its plate.  If I had wanted a salad I’d have probably asked for one.

Great food but just a shame about the vinegar disaster and the green leaf conundrum.

Colemans, South Shields

Colemans is an award-winning chippy. It wins awards not only for the quality of its food but also for the sustainable way in which it sources its raw materials. And it’s a Tyneside institution with a proud tradition of quality going back to 1926. Although South Shields is a slightly depressing, post-industrial seaside town, the reputation of the restaurant made the visit a necessity.

I went for line-caught haddock and chips at £8.50 with mushy peas an extra £1.20.

The haddock had a clean, fresh taste and the soft big flakes of fish made it a pleasure to eat. The batter was well-cooked with a good flavour and not a hint of oiliness. You had the feeling that the oil was probably fresh that morning as the taste was so clean.

The chips were again very well cooked and all their creamy Maris Piper qualities were on show.

The peas, on the other hand, were a disappointment – an overly thick consistency detracted from a decent flavour that didn’t manage to match the quality of the rest of the fish and chips. The meal came with a big piece of lemon that had too many pips. Adorning the plate were two sprigs of flat leaf parsley intended to add an additional aesthetic element – they didn’t add to my enjoyment of the meal and were surplus to requirements.

The tartare was all wrong for me. It came in a small plastic pot, which was clearly designed to manage portion size and offer consistency of presentation, but it just looked ugly. A small white ramekin would have been much more appropriate for an establishment aspiring to high standards. To add to this it was too thick and was therefore more a mustard than a sauce. It was clearly homemade and had a reasonably good flavour balance but for me its inelegance, in texture and presentation, spoilt it.

The meal was washed down with a 7up and a glass of water where the water came in a charming bottle of H₂OUSEWATER.

It was a pleasure to go and the fish and chips were fantastic but just need more effort on the extras.

Colemans popularity was evident: as we left the queue waiting patiently to be seated stretched out of the door and beyond.

I’m looking forward to going back when they celebrate their centenary – only 13 years to go.

The Angel Inn, Corbridge

Corbridge is a well-to-do small village in Northumberland which lies along the Tyne Valley. The town currently boasts two of the top ten most expensive streets in the region by average house price. This explains why, along with tourism, it supports such an amazing range of shops, pubs, cafes and restaurants.

One of the gems of Corbridge is the Angel Inn, branded the Angel of Corbridge, which is a great big traditional inn with rooms, a restaurant and a bar. We went to the bar.

I went for the Wylam Beer battered Cod fillet, hand cut chips and mushy peas at £11.95.

The fish was tasty without being anything special and I did need to remove the skin before I could enjoy its flavour. The Wylam Brewery batter was very good. It was crisp, a golden brown colour and had a taste that was fulfilling without being overpowering. It also had some bit crispy bits hanging off it, which went down a treat.

The chips were hand cut by someone who had a very limited amount of time in which to cut chips. They therefore decided that instead of aiming for a traditional chipped potato they would use scaling as a time-saving device. They were huge. Huge, long, wide rectangles of chips and although they did have a good flavour they should have been in the fryer for a couple of minutes longer. But at least they brought back a reminder of childhood songs.

 

There were chips, chips as big as battle ships,

In the store, in the store,

There were chips, chips as big as battle ships,

In the quartermaster’s store.

The peas were excellent. They had a deep, intense colour which was matched by the flavour and they were probably the highlight of the meal.

I did have to ask for the salt and vinegar but this wasn’t a problem as the staff were friendly, helpful and attentive, without being too interested in upselling you more drinks. The lemon was very clever. It was tall and had been cut in such a way as you could hold it in one hand by the skin and get an efficient squeeze out with no pips. The tartare was fine, in both quality and density, with a blend of gherkin and caper tang.

The meal was washed down with a cold pint of Tyneside Blonde. Sadly the temperature killed much of the flavour of this normally fine beer, but all in all it was a good meal, in good company in a charming pub, in a delightful Northumbrian location.

Aragon Fisheries, Knaresborough

NADV 1307302AM1 Brian and Sally Cunningham of the award winning Aragon Fisheries. Picture : Adrian Murray. (1307302AM1)

Another break with the blog's focus on sit-down fish and chips is this trip to the rather wonderful Aragon.

Run by a charming couple, this back-street sensation was recently listed in Fry Magazine's top 50 chip shops in the country - and deservedly so. Aragon was immaculate and had a straightforward menu cooked on a standard range and delivered through a small serving area. The couple spent about 10 minutes chatting about all sorts of subjects and the welcome and goodbye seemed very genuine and warm.

Fish and chips was £4.40, 60p for mushy peas and 20p for a big sachet of tartare.

As with all great fish and chip shops, the fish was cooked to order whilst me and some friends engaged in a friendly chat with the owners. Locals popped in on a regular basis and many of their orders were pre-prepared - they had clearly phoned ahead and had probably been doing so for many years.

The meal then technically became a sit-down experience as two friends and I, who had come to Knaresborough to visit some hostelries, sat on a council bench on a T junction in the town and managed a decent impression of Compo, Foggy and Clegg. I'll let you choose who's who.

 

Courtesy of the BBC

The fish was excellent. A fabulously white piece of haddock with a fresh, clean taste and a tender texture. The batter was a little oily but well-cooked and had just the right amount of crispiness. The chips looked underdone, but were in fact perfectly done and had one of the most satisfying potato tastes I've had in some time.

I didn't have any mushy peas but one of my friends did and said they were very good. The tartare was a very pleasant surprise as I've been consistently disappointed with packet sauces. However, this one had a really good taste and texture and beat many restaurant-made versions into a cocked hat.

We ate from the biodegradable trays provided and were mostly successful in the act of eating, apart from the 'Forkgate' incident. One of our group was overly enthusiastic with his white plastic fork and unbeknownst to him he had dislodged a prong. Luckily, as he continued to eat, the prong appeared on a batter background and not a fish background, which would have made it invisible to the human eye. Had he not seen it the trip might have been a bloody disaster.

As it was we had a fantastic start to the day at a stand-out chippy.

Old Gate, Hebden Bridge

 

 

 

The Old Gate is an old favourite even though it’s only been open since last October. Since the demise of Moyles bar, restaurant and hotel in the floods of 2012, the Old Gate has cornered the market for quality beer in Hebden town centre with a serious approach to sourcing an intelligent selection. They have also built their reputation on good food. It’s not cheap pub food but it seems to be well cooked and it was therefore inevitable that I would review their fish and chips at some point.

It’s a big old pub. The pub which was previously on the site, which had gone through many unsuccessful reincarnations since being converted from two houses many years ago, was rumoured to have been built on an Indian burial grave and therefore this new venture was never going to be a success. However, the new owners ripped out the old pub and started afresh with a long bar in the back of the pub and big open-plan L shaped drinking area with a mix of bench and more traditional pub seating including the obligatory sofas. I have a problem with sofas in pubs. As it’s so open-plan and so busy it can get incredibly loud downstairs but at least this is a catalyst to get me to go home! 

Upstairs is given over to eating most of the time and there is an event space for comedy nights etc. the space is well set out into a mix of table sizes and has its own dedicated staff to get your food and your beer. On the first weekend of the Hebden Bridge’s arts festival we had friends from Manchester along with their two children along with a mutual friend from Blackpool and by far the easiest place to accommodate 7 of us for lunch was around one of the tables upstairs. The space is quite quiet at lunchtimes and therefore ideal for the children to be children and space enough so that no one was shoved into a corner as can be the case in some many pub-restaurants.

 I went for the beer battered haddock, twice fried chips and mushy peas at £11.

The presentation was interesting as the battered fish sat on top of the chips, the mushy peas came in a mini saucepan and the tartare in a small shallow dish not too dissimilar from a ceramic dipping dish . I don’t agree with fish being on top of the chips as it just makes the chips sweat but this does seem to be the norm. Normally I wouldn’t like the gimmick of the iddy biddy saucepan but for some reason I quite liked its cuteness. However, I did have a downer on the dipping dish as it just didn’t sit right with the other elements – and the colour was wrong as well.

The fish was excellent. Big chunks, great flavour and well cooked. The batter was delicious and crisp and the various light and dark brown hues of the batter was appealing.  The chips were clearly twice cooked. They looked a fantastic deep brown, had a crispy outer and a soft scrumptiousness inside.

The cute saucepan contained some really well seasoned mushy peas which packed a really good flavour punch. The tartare was the only disappointment of the meal, and not just because I had clearly taken issue with its container. The mixture was too fine and green and had an overly acidic taste to it. Not pleasant at all and a shame in the context of the quality that came from the rest of the dish.

The meal came with a good chunk of lemon, a salt cellar and a good vinegar dispenser. The whole thing was washed down with a pint, or two, of Magic Rock’s excellent Curious .

 

 

 

 

 

The Market Place, Todmorden

Copyright – The Local Data Company

 

The Market Place in Tod is an excellent traditional fish and chip shop which does exactly what it says on the sign –no chance then that anyone will take them to court for misrepresentation in the eyes of the Trade Descriptions Act. Except they sell more than just fish and chips – other dinners do exist.

The entrance in the photograph is from Halifax Road in Todmorden and have an entrance at the back that is only a few yards away from one of the great markets in these parts.

The shop is about 40% seating, 40 % take-away counter and cooking area and the remaining 20% is storage and prep. The seating area is made up of a set of booths with Formica table tops that took me back to the 1970s. On each table sat huge amounts of sugar sachets that no-one would ever put a dent in along with the usual selection of salt, vinegar and tomato ketchup.

Although our welcome from the person serving was warm and helpful it was interesting to see the dynamics of what looked like a family working behind the servery. Tensions looked close to bubbling over at any point. As we took our seats the shouty chatter of three children with their parents became very apparent but they were soon to be fed and silence would resume as they tucked into their meals. For a while at least.

I went for the fish, chips and peas which was a very reasonable £5.10. I loved the fact that as standard we were given a knife, fork and spoon as it is perfectly normal to stir vast amounts of sugar into a big mug of tea, which is exactly what a very tired construction worker, who took a seat opposite us, did.  

The fish was wet. And I do mean very wet such that pressing down fish brought forth water. Something may have gone wrong with fish storage or prep of the fish to cause this, but needless to say it didn’t help the texture or the flavour, which was mushy and bland. The batter was light and crispy but had more than a hint of old oil to it.

The chips were great. As so often, in my opinion, they could have done with a minute longer but were crispy and tasted like good chippy chips should.

The peas were big and very, very hot. Once they cooled they had a perfectly pleasant gentle pea flavour.

No tartare but it did come with a little wedge of lemon. The meal was washed down with a glass of corporation pop.

It was great to get to a new, local, basic sit-down fish and chip shop which was the motivation for starting the blog. Unfortunately, the mushy fish was unforgivable. That said, others meals looked slightly better so maybe it was just old-fashioned bad luck.