While York has certainly taken a hit from the economic problems that Covid has inflicted on the country, it is not in the parlous state that some internet commentators would have you believe. Of course we’re not unscathed and there’re a few notably empty units, but a recent trip to Peterborough really reinforced in my…
There’s a lot to be said for slightly unambitious but tasty pub grub that can be knocked out relatively easily for sensible amounts of money. Sometimes the opportunity to fill up on ham egg & chips or scampi & chips with a pint on the way home from work is just the right level of…
A decent pub adds a huge amount of value to a village and its residents, providing a centre for socialising and occasions as well as, hopefully, making it a destination for non-residents in which to spend money. I can’t ever imagine living further than walking distance from a decent pint over which to discuss similarly…
Fried chicken can be tarred with a bit of a bad reputation, with its presence most ubiquitous at what could most generously be termed the more widely accessible end of the food market. That’s not to say that there isn’t a place for more refined versions of this dish, with Skosh memorably accompanying it with…
Assumptions about what’s impossible have been blown away in the last 12 months. Roll out a newly developed vaccine in double quick time? Sure. Find the cash to pay huge swathes of the country to stay at home for a year? No worries. Get the general public to buy into avoiding personal contact with their…
I don’t think many of us are doing the things day to day that we expected to be doing six months ago. Even if we are, I suspect we’ve all seen significant changes to how we carry out those activities such as working from home or going about our business separated from customers by a…
I would love to be bold enough and organised enough to be intentionally on holiday just a few weeks after travel restrictions were lifted. The truth is a bit more prosaic than that though. Over Easter, I was due to be working on an event in the centre of York that potentially merited a few…
While we continue to find our way around what a meal out will look like over the coming weeks and months I’m left to reflect on the last place I dined in pre-lockdown, a meal that I’d hesitated to write about with the eventuality of the venue not being able to reopen foremost in my…
This lockdown may have left us prone to introspection and reflection but as tempting as it is, this is no time to be looking back, something that people are rather too keen to do when talking about Walmgate Ale House and The Chopping Block York, its resident restaurant. Its previous incarnation as Meltons Too, sister…
One thing I didn’t expect to be doing too much of throughout lockdown was trying new places to eat, but the way this year has panned out has been far from expected to say the least. With the most restrictive part of the lockdown hopefully in the past, we can start to dare to make…