Crazy Yorkshires dominate lunch
‘LESS is more’ has never been a mantra in the Eats household – and certainly not in the Eatsmobile after a Sunday lunch feast.
But then we’d never been confronted with the Yorkshire puddings at the Rose and Crown in Slaley.
The one that came with Mrs E’s meal was of such monster proportions that I wouldn’t have been surprised to be told the pub was hosting a ‘largest Yorkshire pudding’ contest – and my own wasn’t much smaller.
But other than the visual novelty they didn’t add much to our dining experience.
For every mouthful of delicious turkey crown, potatoes and vegetables I enjoyed, I felt obliged to have a mouthful of my giant, burnt-tasting Yorkshire pudding just to be in with a chance of getting through it. Fortunately our starters had been just the right size, so I was up for the challenge. I’d enjoyed a prawn cocktail dressed with a sauce that looked gloopy but turned out to be beautifully light. Mrs Eats had plumped for tomato and chive soup, which she described as “not as expected, but not unpleasant”. It was creamy, r a t he r Car park................................... Kids allowed................................ Real ale............................................ Wine by the bottle.......................... Credit cards...................................... Vegetarian food.............................. Disabled toilets.............................. then bursting with tomatoes, with an unusual bitterness to it but a new twist on an old favourite can’t be a bad thing. Despite having the lighter starter, Mrs Eats was defeated by said Yorkshire pudding, eating the middle section, but not the blackened sides. She added she’d have preferred not to have so much food piled on the plate as it took away some of the visual enjoyment of the dining experience. With much of her slowcooked lamb shoulder obscured by the gimmicky Yorkshire, I could see what she meant. Perhaps larger plates might be the answer if they insist on comically-oversized Yorkshires. But no tweaks are needed to the meat or vegetables. Added to the parsnips and roast and mashed potatoes on each plate, we received a dish of carrots, broccoli, creamed leeks, and cauliflower, all of which went down a treat. We also made good use of the gravy boat which came without having to ask for extra.
With two courses for £13.25 and three £17 (one course is £9), it wasn’t hard to persuade ourselves to have sweets.
My white chocolate and dark chocolate cheesecake was pleasant enough, but would have benefited from a stronger dose of the dark stuff.
Mrs Eats, meanwhile, found her apple, bramble and blueberry crumble to be on the heavy side. “It’s almost like hard porridge,” she said.
It’s fair to say we had a few quibbles about the food, and we found the layout of the dining area to be less than ideal, too.
Although the room offers pleasant views of fields and Slaley Forest, I’m not sure that justifies cramming nine or so square tables into the place. I had to move our table away from a wall to get into my seat comfortably.
Service-wise, the pub is a big winner. It’s a community-owned and run venue, and it showed.
Everyone who served us was warm without being intrusive, and everyone we’d had any dealings with in the course of our meal made a point of saying goodbye to us as we left.
Admittedly, we’d been ready for our bill for quite a while after finishing our meal and cups of good strong tea before we secured it, but I can think of much worse places to linger.