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WALK TEN THOUSAND MILES
GEORGE QUINN'S REPORTS AND REFLECTIONS ON LONG-DISTANCE WALKING
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THE SOGGY CHIP AWARDS FOR BAD FOOD (APPEAL PENDING)
Posted on September 5, 2011 by George Quinn
Welcome to the Soggy Chip awards for bad food (known as “The Soggies”). This
famous award is for dodgy food served to famished Australian walkers in
restaurants and pubs across the UK. There were many nominations and the judges
have had great difficulty narrowing them down to a short list, but after
intensive discussion and very scientific scrutiny they have arrived at three
outstanding nominations.
Griddle-cooked pancakes with bacon and (in jug at top right) sweet maple sauce.
1. Griddle-cooked pancakes with bacon and sweet maple syrup, The Pancake Place,
Dumfries (Scotland).
When the judges saw this dish advertised in the window of a restaurant they were
incredulous. Could it really be true that bacon was being eaten with sweet maple
syrup? Sadly, it was true. The dish consisted of three big griddle-cooked
pancakes (known locally as pikelets) interleaved with greasy rashers of bacon. A
jug of very sweet, very dark maple syrup was also supplied to be tipped
generously over the hot bacon and pancakes. The syrup came with two small
packets of butter, though it was unclear whether the butter was to be added to
the syrup or spread on the bacon.
Aromatic belly pork on a bed of mashed potato.
2. Belly pork on a bed of mashed potato, The Crown Inn, Coniston (Cumbria).
The thick slice of belly pork was intimidating. It consisted of extremely salty,
rock-hard crackle, and several layers of glistening pork meat cooked to varying
levels of done-ness. The meat lay across a mound of mashed spud next to half a
dozen well-boiled but very emaciated runner beans. A thin gravy had been found
somewhere and splashed over the plate. A unique feature of the dish was the
farmyard smell of the pork… a whiff of… what could it be? Fodder pellets?
Diesel? Dung?
Traditional roast dinner with (top) Yorkshire pudding.
3. Traditional roast beef dinner with Yorkshire pudding, The Oddfellows Arms,
Caldbeck (Cumbria)
According to the menu the roast beef came from prime Cumbrian cattle. This may
well have been the case but it was referring to a cow that lived several decades
ago. The meat was not tender but crumbly. It disintegrated when the fork touched
it and the fragments had to be scooped up with a teaspoon. The Yorkshire pudding
was in fact a deep frozen pastry shell in disguise. It was rubbery and very
resistant to the sawing motions of a knife. The roast potatoes were fine, and so
were the boiled potatoes provided one overlooked the raw interior of the potato.
There were no greens.
And the winner is…
… the belly pork on a bed of mashed potato. An unforgettable meal, the aroma of
which clung to one’s clothes for several days afterwards.
And now for the special awards…
Dodgy beverage service. A special Soggy Chip award goes to the Maharaja Indian
Restaurant at the Volunteer Inn in Chipping Campden for its failure to
satisfactorily serve a cup of tea. Chief Soggy Chip judge George Quinn reports:
The dining room at the Volunteer Inn lies right behind the front bar. In fact
you can look from the dining room over a counter, through an archway, past
shelves crammed with bottles, into the bar. In the morning the room serves as
the Inn’s breakfast room. In the evening it becomes the Maharaja Indian
Restaurant, operated by a small squad of stony-faced Indians who put
long-stemmed glasses on the tables and carefully guard a small hoard of
laminated menus stacked on a sideboard.
Emmy and I are fond of Indian food so we were looking forward to our meal on the
evening of August 16th. Behind the counter one of the staff busied himself with
administrative matters, frowning over bills and receipts, jabbing at a
calculator, making entries in a ledger, and occasionally taking phone calls. His
associate took orders from diners and served the food. He also steered carefully
between the bar and the dining room carrying bottles of wine and glasses of
cider. Neither of the staff cracked a smile. Not once.
I ordered a hybrid Euro-Indian dish: curried lamb shanks.
“And to drink, sir?”
“Just tea, thanks.”
There was a long moment of stunned silence. Then an incredulous squeak.
“Tea?”
“Yes, tea.”
“You mean, black tea?”
“Yes please, black tea.”
Ten minutes later (I’m not exaggerating the time lapse here) a single cup of tea
arrived. It was about two thirds full of water with a tea bag drifting in it.
After I fished out the tea bag the water level dropped to less than half a cup.
At a neighbouring table wine gushed from bottles and cider twinkled in huge
glasses.
The dish of curried lamb shanks was tasty, but its gastronomic appeal was marred
by the £1.80 (about $3.00 Australian) I had to fork out for a tea bag and half a
cup of warm water.
Dodgy hygiene in the dining room. A special Soggy Chip award goes to the
Travellers Rest Restaurant in Talybont-on-Usk (Wales) for its failure to protect
diners from the restaurant’s cats. Chief Soggy Chip judge George Quinn reports:
When we were shown to our room at The Travellers Rest – a B&B cum restaurant in
the hamlet of Talybont-on-Usk – a black cat was curled up snoozing on the only
chair.
“It’s his favourite place,” said our hostess giving him an indulgent pat. So we
didn’t disturb him. We made ourselves as comfortable as we could sitting
side-by-side on the bed. We learned that in total three cats lived permanently
at The Travellers Rest. Their names were Maddie, Zuki and Quinn. Yes, I’m afraid
so… Quinn, named, I believe, after Dr Quinn Medicine Woman, an American TV show.
All three cats appeared in the dining room that evening. They stalked the floor
for a while, sharpening their claws on the rough wooden pillar that supported a
ceiling beam in the middle of the room before disappearing out the back in the
direction of the kitchen. They appeared again the following morning as we were
having breakfast. I was about to put a fatty piece of sausage into my mouth when
there was a sharp shout:
“Quinn! Stop it!”
I quickly lowered my fork and looked around. Two cats were facing each other on
the dining room floor, growling and swishing their tails. Our hostess was
looking at them fondly.
“They’re always irritable in the morning before they’ve had breakfast.”
Later there was the sound of loud hawking and retching. One of the cats coughed
up a furball on the dining room floor. The front door was propped open to clear
the sour odour and a clammy hand of morning chill reached in to touch us on the
neck as we ate.
A hungry cat joins us for dinner in the Travellers Rest Restaurant.
That evening, as we enjoyed an excellent dinner of lamb cutlets with Welsh
leeks, the cats again joined us. There was a scrabbling and hissing under the
table as they fought for position. The winner seized the right to sit on a chair
and peer up over the edge of the table. Its head nodded up and down as it
followed the transfer of lamb cutlet from plate to mouth. When dessert arrived
the cats disappeared.
“They’re not really interested in sugary food,” our hostess explained.
STOP PRESS! Appeal against Soggy Chip award
The organisers of the world famous Soggy Chip awards have received an appeal
against their decision to award a Soggy to Coniston’s “belly pork on a bed of
mashed potato”. It has come to their attention that the chief judge actually
enjoyed the meal. He was observed crunching through the crackle with special
relish. Apparently he was considering ordering a second helping. The plaintifs
are arguing that enjoyment of a meal disqualifies it from a Soggy award. The
organisers of the award are in a panic. They have now found out that the chief
judge actually enjoyed all the nominated meals (including – perhaps especially –
the griddle-cooked pancakes with bacon and maple sauce). A decision on the
appeal is pending. The awards are in disarray.
[Next up: Encounters with animals and wildflowers along the Cotswold Way.]
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This entry was posted in Food reviews and anecdotes by George Quinn. Bookmark
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1 THOUGHT ON “THE SOGGY CHIP AWARDS FOR BAD FOOD (APPEAL PENDING)”
1. loisbelton on September 5, 2011 at 11:05 pm said:
It seems you had better come to France next time. (But avoiding MacDo I
hasten to say.)
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