We Venture Across the Border

I spent the last few days in Devon with my mum, who was 80 this year but still very spry with all her marbles.

I didn't take J. My view is, if a husband's natural habitat is not a garden centre or tearoom, it will only cause misery to inflict it on them. Plus I would hate to be in one of those joined-at-the-hip couples. As would J. 

When I'm staying with Mum, or Giz, there's a certain ritual to our day trips. We like tradition and continuity. The most popular are:
1) Otter Nurseries for plant buying and lunch followed by either Endsleigh garden centre  (to find  something Otter didn't have) or Buckfast Abbey, where you can get a very fine treacle pudding;
2) Exmouth and Sidmouth and maybe Budleigh Salterton. I lived near the seafront in Exmouth for a short time and love the unspoilt splendour of the beach and the ramshackle nature of the town;
3) Roadford Lake, on the Devon/Cornwall border, preceded by a visit to the Devon Paperweight Centre at the superbly named Leg O'Mutton Corner, Yelverton;
4) Goodrington, Paignton, where we spent many summer days on the red sands, watching the steam train go by (the driver was straight out of Central Casting with a flowing red beard and cheery wave);
5) Totnes for a mooch around gentrified shops selling organic this and that, and strange shops full of arty tourist tat/tut.

But this year, reader, we threw something different into the mix. A coach trip! Now Giz does these quite often. She has a social life that would put Prince Andrew to shame.When I was a teenager we often did coach trips because it was impossible to get Stamps to take us anywhere. There were two memorable trips to Newquay where we didn't even get out of the car because he couldn't find anywhere to park. He refused to pay to go in a car park so unless we could find street parking.

Boscastle

The coach trip was to Boscastle, Tintagel and Padstow.My first time at all three!

It took about an hour to do all the pick ups around Plymouth. Interminable, thanks to roadworks at Laira. Giz and I were the first to board. By the time we got to Boscastle, ostensibly for coffee, the fellow travellers were straining for pasties and many were indulging before we had chance to get our bearings.

Giz feeling the nip

It was very cold. Very very cold. A few people had been caught out and were wearing only short sleeves.

Boscastle was fairly brief. Just fifteen minutes later we were in Tintagel, for an hour and half. We had a below average, "give the emmets any old rubbish, they won't come back" type of lunch in a shabby restaurant and then wandered round trying to find a sheltered spot. Giz inevitably got talking to some of the people on the coach, including a bloke on his own - we named him "Pasty Pete," with a huge stomach and a short sleeved top. He'd been on 12 coach trips last year, he told us, and Badger's Holt for Christmas lunch can't be beaten.

Padstow

Everyone was back on board with minutes to spare; a reflection on the charms of Tintagel. I've never seen a castle so bashful or so many shops full of useless "tut:" piskeys, fairies, things connected with King Arthur, etc.

Thence to Padstow, or as it is now known, Padstein. The influence of the TV chef hangs heavy. As you arrive, sweeping into an unprepossessing car park with views of diggers and trucks, you walk past three buildings forming part of the Rick Stein empire: a wet fish shop, fish and chip shop and deli. The unsuspecting emmet is lured into buying unnecessary jars of chutney, cookery books and things labelled with the name Chalkie, the chef's late dog.

Padstow itself is a harbour with a cluster of shops, mostly selling pasties, fish and chips and tut. On a sunny day it would be glorious to sit and watch boats and people. On a cold, windy day, with two and a half hours to spare, it was teeth clenchingly awful.

Pasty Pete had his third pasty of the day. I had my first  (had to be done). We both had a pleasingly large bakewell tart in a cafe which failed the old fat test.


Back on the coach and Pasty Pete's luck had changed by the time we reached Plymstock. He had struck up conversation with a woman at the back. Regaling her with his 12 coach trips last year and the splendours of Badger's Holt, she remarked that they ought to go on trips together. "Oh yes, I am single," he declared, before adding suspiciously, "But aren't you married?"  "Yes but we don't get on," she said dismissively, before sweeping off the coach with her entourage and leaving us all dangling as to the outcome. Will there be tinsel and turkey for the two of them? A pasty a deux at Mevagissey? I don't think we'll ever know, because Giz has decided her coach trip days are behind her.

Which TV chef are you?

I was planning a blog post in my head last night about TV chefs, and then today came the sad news that eccentric TV chef Keith Floyd has died at 65.

He was a classic example of a celebrity chef who polarised opinion. You either loved him or hated him. I never bought any of his books, but he was very watchable.

TV chefs come under three categories: firstly, watchable and entertaining but not "proper chefs" (Nigella, Floyd, Worral-Thompson, Ainsley, James Martin etc). Then there are those who are proper chefs, but not always very entertaining - Heston Blumenthal. And then the very rare hybrid, both entertaining and a seriously good chef (Marco Pierre-White.)

I love watching cookery shows and J finds it strange that with all the knowledge I must surely have acquired, I can still turn out tough roast beef on Sundays. It's the meat, I try to tell him.

I adore Nigella Lawson and I do have most of her books, although I haven't tried many of the recipes. I just like looking at the pictures. I think we all wish we could be Nigella: rich, famous, elegant.

I've never understood the appeal of Jamie Oliver. He seems too young and inexperienced to me to be held up as a food expert. I remember him throwing stuff into a pan and that characterises his approach to me. I can't take it seriously.

It's the same with Gordon Ramsay. I'm afraid I never got over the fact he was a footballer. I used to like his Kitchen Nightmares programmes - the first time - but he's too shouty and profane for me.

James Martin is a tubby twit without a neck who specialises in spun sugar baskets (yawn). Delia Smith is the one who's taught most of us how to cook. I don't enjoy her shows very much but her books are indispensable in terms of know-how. I also have an old Marguerite Patten book - she's now over 90 and used to advise housewives on how to cook in the war years.

I admire Marco Pierre White very much but I wonder about his taste buds. He uses a lot of ketchup and Knorr cubes, both containing vast amounts of salt. I always want to shout at the TV when chefs criticise food for not having enough salt. They should be weaning us off it and using herbs instead.

Heston Blumenthal doesn't do it for me, either personality or food wise. I've been to his Fat Duck restaurant on a couple of occasions. The first time it's a thrilling experience. The second time, oh not smoky bacon ice-cream again.

I would like to see Michel Roux Jnr given his own show. I could imagine that with his high degree of expertise and his stern, no nonsense approach, we could learn quite a lot, although it wouldn't be as entertaining as when Floyd was cooking and pouring himself generous measures of wine.