527. Christmas At Hotel du Vin Stratford Upon Avon.

  In recent years, the beloved and greatly missed Lucy II and I have passed our Christmases in Ludlow at Fishmore Hall. In early 2024, the owner, the remarkable Laura Penman sold the boutique hotel with its Michelin listed restaurant, Forelles, to a businessmen based, I think, in West Bromwich and immediately large cuts were made to the quality of service in the hotel (while the room rates and food prices remained high) and the quality of the food served in Forelles. The service was often chaotic despite the efforts of one or two loyal staff and chefs came and went (I was told one stayed just a couple of hours) and last Christmas everything came to a head with a restaurant full of annoyed customers there for Christmas lunch for which they had paid a very large amount of money.

  I had still hoped to visit Fishmore during 2025:but my dear old dog died in March and little Lucy III, then aged 9 weeks, came to stay with me on 21 May and really was not ready to stay in other people’s property for a few months though I hoped to take her to the Ludlow Food Festival in the second weekend of September and stay at Fishmore then but I was told there were no vacancies and that was why Lucy and I passed the Food Festival weekend at The Feathers in Ludlow town. I contacted the hotel about staying for Christmas but I was told that Christmas 2024 had been such a disaster that it had been decided to close for three days. And so it was that Lucy and I had a change of location for Christmas 2025 and chose the Christmas package being offered by a hotel we regularly stay in whenever we are in Stratford upon Avon, the very dog (and human) friendly Hotel du Vin located in Rother Street. As for poor Fishmore Hall, it is up for sale again. Let us hope it finds a buyer who will treat it (and its staff and customers) with a lot of love and respect after the disgraceful way the present owner has abused the whole idea of hospitality.Bizarrely, Forelles remains in the Michelin Guide. I suspect this provides evidence that Michelin inspectors do not visit the restaurants that are included in the guide on a yearly basis or even on a two yearly basis because if that were the case, Forelles would certainly and sadly not find a place as a recommended restaurant in that particular book at present.

  The welcome to the Hotel Dublin was lovely, the room was familiarly spacious and we settled in instantly after opening the rather nice gifts left for us in our room, of which more later. Because this Blog is mainly about dining out, let us proceed straight to the food, after all this was Christmas and first there was Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve dinner allowed a spending of £35 as part of the Christmas package and this went a nice way to paying for my starter of prawn cocktail (it surprised me when it arrived at the table as I had ordered coquilles St Jacques en croute. I queried the order and I was told that I had definitely ordered prawn cocktail - the confusion was not easy to explain because although ‘coquilles’ sounds, I suppose, rather like ‘cocktail’, the word ‘scallop’ had been used more than once during the ordering process. The prawn cocktail itself was unremarkable - the salad only made up of lettuce and nothing else but the Marie Rose sauce was passable & the prawns plentiful. Still, I was rather lusting after the coquilles.

  The main course was an extremely well cooked piece of pan fried cod (pavé de cabillaud) with a nice crispy skin served with a accurately spiced curried cauliflower and absolutely delicious vinaigrette of pomegranate, golden raisins, red onion and lime. This was a great success and my disappointment about the coquilles was rapidly dissipating. Four dessert I had a somewhat disappointing trifle - there was hardly any fruit in it and no sherry. Trifles need sherry and in generous amounts. So a very good main but not somewhat unsatisfactory bookend dishes.

  Lucy the Labrador settled in for the night, happily comfortable and quite tired. In the morning on leaving the room, I saw that each room had been visited by Father Christmas during the night and little individual knitted socks were hanging from the door handle filled with a tiny candy walking stick and three chocolate gold coins. How sweet and what fun. On arrival, on the previous day, gifts of a bottle of champagne and a container of bath salts awaited me on my arrival along with a packet of toothsome chocolate praline Christmas trees.

  And so to Christmas Day lunch and I arrived in the restaurant to find a charmingly laid table had been allocated to me. There was a splendidly sized, pleasingly cheesy gougère as an amusement gueule and then I had chosen a very good starter of chicken liver terrine with a sweet fig and plum chutney, cornichons and toasted brioche. Things were going stingingly and the dog found her first Christmas lunch (as an observer up until then) to be a gripping and fascinating experience.

But the proof of the Christmas lunch lies in the turkey. This was really very, very good. The turkey was full of flavour and absolutely perfectly cooked - it was unimpeachable and the best Christmas Turkey I have had for years. It came with a good stuffing and a marvellously phallic pig-in-blanket and tge vegetables were generally well cooked - the red cabbage tender and not oversweet, the roast parsnips and carrots tender and tasty and the roast potatoes reasonably well done. The only disappointment for me were  the Brussels sprouts - sprouts, like Christmas, come but once a year and should celebrated by perfect cooking. I have been presented with some real stinkers in my time - boiled to a soggy pulp or served as hard, and bitter, as bullets. I do like my sprouts to be tender and not al dente  which is how many chefs seem to serve them. The texture of these sprouts, for me, erred too far towards the latter but others, no doubt would have praised them for the restraint applied to cooking them. Such is life.

  I had preordered my dessert and had chosen trifle again. It was similar to the first dish that I previously bred served but had more flaked almonds which made it a little more interesting. 

  Boxing Day dinner was somewhat disappointing though it started very well as I was able to pay 50p for a £14 glass of Kir Royale in the cosy bar due to a couple of offers the hotel was making. And very good it was too. For my starter I had a very satisfactory pâté de foies de volaille, an enjoyably not over-rich chicken liver parfait again with a nicely complementary chutney and toasted brioche.

  I was not happy with my main which seemed to be the leftovers from Christmas Day. It was suggested that I might like the roast beef - which sounded highly tempting and looked good but had the feel of being reheated meat from the day before and the accompanying vegetables had the same look about them. There was a nicely puffed up Yorkshire pudding but it was dry and unexciting and gave little of the pleasure that Yorkshire pudding should give.. There was the ane unctious gravy, which was needed, as at Christmas lunch. This was not a good main course. If I had wanted the Christmas Day leftovers then I could have stayed at home and served them myself.

  I had ice cream and a sorbet for dessert. 

   My final evening at the Hotel du Vin was altogether more enjoyable. After two heavily discounted kir royales in the bar, I had a hot, warming, bowl of sweet French onion soup with its cheesy lid - splendid - then I continued with the French theme by choosing roulette de ratatouille en galette des pois chiches gratinée au four (ratatouille in chickpea pancakes baked until golden). This was a great pleasure after all the heavily traditional English meat-based fare of the preceding days. The ratatouille was delicious with a toothsome sweetness to it and the pancakes were crispy and gave a necessary texture to it all. French and vegetarian - what is happening to me?

  I coukd not resist a class of splendid Royal Hungarian Tokaji to accompany my dessert. It was a great priblem - there were two new desserts on the menu. Firstly there was rum baba for which I always have and had then, a great longing but there was also galette des rois, the famous French dessert served at Epiphany and made from puff pastry and filled with frangipan and here served with an excellent vanilla ice cream . It was too good an opportunity to miss and I opted for the galette and was overwhelmed by the pleasure of it - it had the correct swirling patterns in the pastry which was perfectly cooked and was an inviting golden brown. The frangipani was delicious and the whole extremely memorable. A perfect dish to round off Christmas.

   The next morning, the dog and I once more enubered after an initial crisis in which  the driver who had taken on the job as a uber pet job suddenly decided he could not take Lucy because he had a allergy to dogs. Luckily, another driver appeared to be just seconds away and whisked us away from Stratford to bring us back to Birmingham and a necessary rest.

Rating:- 🌛🌛🌛🌛

After thought - as above - Christmas comes but once a year. Just like sprouts do. 

The painting below is titled ‘Seven Brussels sprouts’ and was painted by Eliot Hodgkin (1905 - 1987), a well-known painter of still life’s, in 1955

521. Afternoon Tea And Street Food.

 

  By using the term ‘dining out’, I usually think of two meals, either lunch or dinner. Generally now however ‘dining out’ has extended itself in the casual culture of middle-class hipsters who presently seem to be about the only people who can afford to eat out in their frequently grubby little enclaves in trendy suburbs to anytime-of-the-day street food, expensive burgers and costly pizzas and ‘dirty fries’. Much of this stuff is over regarded by a social group which over regards itself in parallel but there are some purveyors of street food products which do indeed show a passion for their products and consequently bring great pleasure to those who consume them.

  ‘Dining out’ may now also encompass breakfasts & the ‘all-day breakfast’ has long been elevated from its greasy spoon origins to being partaken of in more rarified establishments and ‘afternoon teas’ are now immensely popular particularly with ladies who previously lunched but now settle for a teapot, a scone (whether or not the jam or perhaps the cream is layered on it first is up to them in this casual society - for me the only correct format is scone, butter, jam and cream (call it a Warwickshire tea if you like), sandwiches and dainty little cakes and, if they can get away with it, and long before the sun is below the yardarm, a glass of Prosecco. Why they are called Afternoon teas is perplexing as they are often not consumed at teatime but sometimes as early as 1PM which is silly. I have seen a fatuous article trying to explain the difference between afternoon tea and high tea but I remain to be convinced.

  So we have it - ‘dining out’ - what is it? Lunch and dinner and now also anytime Street food, anytime breakfast and afternoon tea which lasts from just after lunch to just before dinner. 

  Here are some of my recent new-style dining out experiences which I thoroughly enjoyed - 

Breakfast -

  On another stay at the Hotel du Vin in Stratford upon Avon I chose to eat breakfast at the hotel as I have done several times before. This of course was breakfast not all day breakfast. The Hotel du Vin in Stratford really does serve very good breakfasts. I always feel that the scrambled egg is key to judging the breakfast. Oh yes! And the humble slice of black pudding. The perfect scrambled egg is a rare and fabulous beast.mi like it butterfly and mildly baveuse. The HDV chefs so often succeed in sending out a very fine scrambled egg. On this occasion the scrambled egg was excellent though not perfect but well deserving of a 7.5 out of 10. As regards the black pudding, most hotels overcook it and the contents are dry and flag in the mouth. The HdV usually avoids this and retains a little moisture in its cooked pudding which makes it all very edible. On this occasion, the pudding was not wholly perfect but well deserving of a 7.5 out 10. I will just add that the tomato was excellent - sweet and juicy, the mushroom ver pleasing being moist and firm, the sausage tasty but the bacon somewhat overcooked and tending towards the mildly leathery.

The previous evening I had enjoyed a dinner of truly delicious, mildly spiced cauliflower soup and a well-cooked confit duck. This was a very pleasurable pre-theatre dinner before setting off for the Royal Shakespeare Theatre’s Other Place to see a clever production of Macbeth set in a splendidly authentic-looking working men’s club in 1970s Glasgow where Duncan is a gang boss and Macbeth one of his thuggish lieutenants.

Rating:- 🌛🌛🌛🌛

  And so to Afternoon Tea. 

  Kiss Me Cupcakes is a coffee and cake shop, now only open occasionally, in Alvechurch Road in West Heath. The owner is Mary Ashman, a skilled baker, whose main work is making attractive and spectacular occasion cakes which are bespoke in design and cleverly made and extraordinarily appealing. Whenever Mary is holding a special event - in this case a Christmas-themed afternoon tea - I try to go along and not only support a valiant local small business but also to simply enjoy myself. The exquisite, wood-panelled sitting area, full of atmosphere drawn from its eclectic, homely furniture and old ceramics such as Royal Albert tea cups, saucers and teapots, is immensely relaxing and dog friendly and no place seems a better spot to find a chilled-out black Labrador lounging in the hope of sharing in the food served than there at Kiss Me Cupcakes.

  The tea does not have the pretensions of that which is served at, say, The Grand Hotel. But Mary serves it all very nicely. Neat little sandwiches - seasonal turkey and cranberry, smoked salmon and cream cheese and cheese with a delightful sweet chutney. Mary’s scones served with whipped cream and strawberry jam are light and moist, as fresh as anything newly baked (which of course is precisely what they are) and a great pleasure to languidly consume whilst sitting in one of KMC’s very, very comfortable armchairs. There’s a toothsome mince tartlet, just as sweet as you need it to be, and the lightest of fairy cakes beautifully decorated in the style of a Christmas wreath. The meringue with raspberries and passion fruit seeds , is unimpeachable - crispy outside, gooily gorgeous inside and there’s a fine chocolate brownie as well as the cinnamon hit of a gingerbread man to round everything off. This is fine value for £19 which of course includes tea - I was served two pots of Tea Pigs tea and enjoyed the quality of it. 

  Rating:- 🌛🌛🌛🌛.

5 December 2015.

And food, a street food lunch.

  Another facility not far from my home is Herbert's Yard in Longbridge where the immaculate Greidy’s has been the outstanding stall over autumn and into winter. I had a lunch there on a cold grey day and was warmed very pleasurably by my Greidy’s sriracha Thai chicken strips, quite hot to be honest, but full of flavour from the sewer sriracha sauce. The tender, moist chicken strips were served with a necessary and excellent salad and some very well cooked, instantly addictive salted chips and Inconcluded that this was one of those dishes tgat everyone should eat at least once before they die.

Rating:- 🌛🌛🌛🌛.

 I had chosen all the above dishes wisely. Breakfasts/afternoon teas/street food. Yes, I think they are part of the dining out scene (when done well) in this age when men can’t be bothered to shave, scruffy is fashionable and going to work is an occasional day out.

  

506. Baraset Barn, Alveston, Stratford Upon Avon And Dog Day At The Hotel Du Vin.

 

 The Baraset Barn at Alveston to the northeast of Stratford upon Avon was included in the Michelin Guide in its 2012 to 2016 editions. So why not now?

  The present Head Chef is Aaron Bodaly who has previously worked at the Kings Head in Napton On The Hill, a little east of Leamington Spa, from April 2019 to 2021 and then, after working for a recruitment agency, he worked from April 2024 to May 2025 at the Tite Inn, in the Oxfordshire village of Chadlington near Chipping Norton, where the television personality Jeremy Clarkson has his farm. Bodaly started to work at The Baraset Barn in April 2025. He therefore has a strong background in preparing pub food. 

  Passing a couple of days in Stratford to go to see ‘the play with the dog in it’ at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, I had been tempted to make a reservation at the Baraset Barn after an acquaintance had told me she had been served there the very best scallops she had ever eaten in her life. Well, there was a recommendation one just had to follow up on. Unfortunately there were no scallops on the present menu but I was up for it especially as the restaurant is dog-friendly.

  My dining companions and I were seated in the light, bright, comfortable bar area and Lucy the Pup Labrador was calmed by the kind, friendly and indulgent staff with little tidbits. The humans chose from a tempting menu and clearly we both had to start with the recommended scallops. We were not disappointed, they were indeed exquisitely cooked, unimpeachable. The  accompanying pea purée was very agreeable and the little cuts of pancetta were indeed the perfect match to scallops as of course they should be.

  We were both delighted with our mains. She enthused about her dish of roast rump of lamb served with peas, pistou, celeriac purée and goats cheese and I myself enjoyed equally my main, chosen from the list of ‘specials’, of king prawn and white crab (though I would have happily paid more to have been served more crab, a lovely lobster bisque risotto and very successful, pleasingly tender samphire. These had been excellent and interesting mains.

  Desserts were very good. I had lovely rice pudding with pineapple (shown above) and my companion chose salted caramel tart.

  Baraset Barn serves lovingly prepared food and I shall not hesitate to dine there again on one of my future visits to Stratford.

Rating:- 🌞

26 August 2025.

  And so, on to the Hotel du Vin in Stratford with the aim of seeing The Winters Tail at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre. I saw it and thought it was excellent and the next morning chose scrambled egg on toast for my breakfast. Scrambled eggs can so often be ruined by overcooking but those served that morning were perfect -  buttery and mildly baveuse - exactly to my preference. Absolutely delightful.

  On arrival at the hotel, the day before, we received a wonderful welcome, it being International Dog Day, and the hotel had come up with the idea of greeting each dog staying there with a special doggy bag containing little pleasures for them. Lucy posed nicely for a publicity photograph, her coooperation assured by a chew dangled before her. Well done, dog friendly Hotel du Vin.