Our fourth lockdown visit to the Blenheim last week, the first of the tenner fest regime, whereby the Chancellor subsidises our efforts to keep the hospitality sector afloat. In fact, the second day of operation of the scheme, with the first day having brought in quite a number of lunchtime punters. Enough that stocks of essential supplies - things like thick-cut, homemade chips - had run low. While the second day was quiet and we were able to have our usual table, under the awning, next to the pavement.
There was a drinks menu on the back of the food menu, but I did not think to look at it, just ordering a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc, with the results illustrated, rather than the stuff noticed at reference 1. Cheap and drinkable, but I have been able to find out nothing about it, apart from the central valley in Chile being the equivalent of Marlborough in New Zealand. Was there a label on the back which would have led me to the horse's mouth? Was the stuff actually blended in some large refinery in some suburb of Santiago? With vignerons for miles around sending in their tanker trucks to keep the place topped up?
More new-to-us staff and perhaps a new-to-menu chef as the food was not quite up to the standard of the week before, well short of that of the week before that. Despite our order having been the same on every occasion. A problem which BH has had with the 'Cricketers' down the road, which seems to be staffed more or less exclusively by agency staff. A curious pub which, in the thirty years we have been near it, has never really taken off, despite the apparently excellent location, right on the green by Stamford Green pond. While, at about the time we arrived, it was a youth joint, usually packed out in the evening with exuberant teenagers, some the worse for wear for drink, some of whom regularly ended up in the pond. No fatalities that I was aware of. Before that, I believe it was a regular, old-fashioned house with a resident tenant and his wife and with a decent, regular trade. Nothing special, but they made a living. They made enough. A system which is more or less dead.
The waiter, perhaps the duty manager, explained that the tenner fest scheme was administered by the Inland Revenue, a cunning bit of government which meant that you could not participate unless you were on good terms with the tax people. Pack drill modest, apparently amounting to little more than an Excel spreadsheet, one line to one bill, backed up by receipts of some sort. I dare say till rolls were good enough. It probably helps being part of a big chain, with the necessary coming down from head office. Not so good for independents who have to learn how to do it for themselves.
Amused at the end of the meal by the arrival of an anonymous chiller lorry delivering supplies to the parade. Costcutter first as the more important customer, then the pub. Perhaps the café after that. With the pub taking, inter alia, half a dozen cabbages of the green ball variety. Not clear to us at all how they would do so much cabbage in a week, with my portion having amounted to a few shards in some rather unpleasant mayonnaise, delivered in the natty little stainless steel tub at the bottom of the snap above. But then I never was very keen on mayonnaise, much preferring salad cream from Heinz if I am going to go in for that kind of stuff. With freshening up tinned tuna and making potato salad (with onion, naturally) being the only regular uses that I can think of.
Moaning aside, we still enjoyed our lunch, watching the world go by, and we shall be back this week. Not so clear what it going to happen when it gets too cold to eat outside. Certainly not yet ready for eating inside.
PS 1: I have been meaning to try the café next to the butcher for a while now, and they do have a small number of seats outside. Somehow the time has never seemed right. Probably doesn't help that it is so near where we live, with the Luna café beyond the Longmead Estate somehow seeming more glamorous and inviting. Must do better, must support local business. But in the meantime, see reference 2.
PS 2: snap of café not being available, it not having been built (somewhere to the right of the butcher) when the Google Street View people last went by in 2012. Unlike the road in which we live, last visited in 2018. Clearly a much more important road.
Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/09/celebration.html.
Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/08/extra-bacon.html.
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