Oh dear, I’ve gone into reverse. Today’s post is about Saturday evening. Over many years I have had memorable meals in some pretty swanky restaurants, often paid for by a special friend.
I remember lunch on a foggy December day at La Tante Claire in Royal Hospital Road. As a main course I had parmentier accompanied by a very delicious Burgundy poured from a duck decanter. I hadn’t seen one of them before. Lunches at the Negresco in Nice and at the Connaught in London were disappointing, the latter because it was just before Christmas and the restaurant was so crowded that service was impaired. Sharrow Bay on Ullswater was consistently excellent as was the Ritz in London. I was disappointed by Le Gavroche … and so the list goes on.
On Saturday evening, again emphasising Witney’s links to the wool trade, we went to The Fleece for a drink before returning to St Mary’s for a concert for All Souls-Tide sung by members of Lower Windrush Choral Society and St Mary’s church choir. They kicked off with short pieces by Rutter, Tavener, Vaughan Williams, Pearsall and Brahms. After the interval they successfully tackled Fauré’s Requiem, a moving piece of which Fauré comfortingly said:
It has been said that my Requiem does not express the fear of death and someone has called it a lullaby of death. But it is thus that I see death: as a happy deliverance, an aspiration towards happiness above, rather than as a painful experience.
Then we drove to The Bell at Langford, a village pub with an unpretentious menu. They have a pizza oven and other specialities include devilled kidneys, venison, partridge and rabbit pie. Mains are priced from £9 to £16, the price of starters in London. It is a useful local gastro-pub but has become much too popular. Last year Giles Coren, restaurant reviewer for The Times, visited and raved. (He is more likely to be seen at the sort of swanky places I mentioned earlier.)
“ … I took a sliver of the fat, gamey sirloin, which was one of three roasts they had on (along with Kelmscott pork loin & apple sauce and roast chicken, pig in blanket & bread sauce), and spread it with fresh horseradish, then laid it into the garlic bread, folded it over and dipped it into a little steel pot of the sticky veal reduction they use for gravy, then bit and swallowed. Best mouthful of the year? Best mouthful of my life, more like.”
He awarded The Bell 10/10 for Cooking, Location and Service so now it’s hard to get a table especially on a Saturday night. We both had liver and it was delicious with a bottle of claret.