Gary Marshall

there certainly was a series in the telegraph, for some reason i remember a poached chicken recipe, it was in my file of recipes for ages too. No doubt it got binned in some indiscriminate clear out.

the black cod & crab are indeed very good Yin, you better get back soon!

never had a bad meal here, lovely place just watch your directions, there's a crucial turn that's not very well signposted that sets you off around the reservoir that you need to find otherwise it's quite easy to get lost.

Are you sure Sadie? I find the Landlord a tad pompous and over opinionated ← just two of my finer qualities. went to j bakers it is good and certainly the most interesting dining to be had in york centre, of course all the best cooking is in the sticks!

it's not really a 'suits' destination at all, you'll be fine, and the tables are very well spaced so its unlikely that any other tables behaviour will impinge on your lunch.

no, not at all, and it minimises the risk of disappointment!

have they got a vacu-vin thingy for the wines? offering everything in 250ml is good for the punter. having just noticed the size of the carafe though, 250ml, that's what we call a large glass! have you got a copy of the list matt?

when made with yorkshire butter, thirsk eggs and tarragon from the garden still a work in progress, we're trying to find a balance between changing the menu frequently but keeping some of the favourites on. At the moment the only dish that's always on is the steak. We happen to have some good fillet at the moment so we have two steaks on, i think we'll eventually put the sirloin back as a 'normal' main course and add more to the 'classics'. Our wild garlic chicken kievs went very well, they could be a permanent dish in summer. the pork was looking good last night, poached in stock then grilled, very tender and we're going all 'marco' at the minute, barrel carving veg for the turbot!

what a difference a few months make! we've changed our menu format tonight, trying to add a few more dishes and make it a bit more accessible to the non-foodie. We now have 'simply yorkshire' & 'blacksmiths british classics' What do you think? Gary & Sarah Welcome you to the Blacksmiths Inn! Thursday 11th May 2006 We now offer an early bird menu Wednesday to Friday ! Selected Dishes (*) are available at £12.95 for two courses or £14.95 for three for orders taken before 7pm. Starters Wild Mushroom & Watercress Soup, Home Made Bread £3.95* Hand Made Scotch Quails Egg, English Mustard Mayonnaise £5.50* Fillet of Peppered Beef ‘Carpaccio Style’, Montgomery Cheese Shavings, £6.50 Red Onion Rings, Aged Balsamic Beer Battered Black Pudding Fritter, Beetroot Chutney £5.50* Seared Shetland Scallops, Crayfish Risotto, Broad Beans, Garden Peas, £8.00 Plum Tomatoes, Fresh Herbs / £15.95 Simply Yorkshire Produce Plate of Nobles of Whitby Oak Smoked Salmon, Soda Bread £6.00 / £12.00 First of The Season Sand Hutton Asparagus, Melted Butter £6.00 / £10.00 Fletchers ‘Parma’ Style Ham, Pickles, Home Made Bread £6.00 Main Courses Bradley's of Staxton 21 Day Aged Fillet Steak, Red Onion & Celery Salad, £19.50 Yorkshire Blue Cheese Fritter, Bacon Vinaigrette Free Range Pork Fillet, Black Pudding, Cider Potato, Coxs & Lovage Butter £13.50 Rack of New Season Spring Lamb, Hot Pot Potatoes, Rosemary Broth £15.50 Chicken Breast, Asparagus, Girolles, Mash, Fresh Tarragon Reduction £12.50* Poached Turbot Fillet Spring Vegetables, New Potatoes, Shellfish Juices £16.50 Blacksmiths British Classics Bradleys of Staxton 21 Day Aged Sirloin Steak, Béarnaise Sauce, Chips £18.50 Fletchers Free Range Pork Sausages, Mash, Onion & Thyme Gravy £9.95* Blacksmiths Salmon Fish Cakes, Lemon Cream, Chips & Salad £10.95* All main courses are accompanied with Vegetables Bowl of Triple Cooked Chips £1.95 Extra Vegetables £1.95

glad to hear it's still on top form. must get over there sometime soon. cheers gary

we'll keep some back next time and see what happens! a pity that they are a little small for the steak size we like to use, only little these dexters!

Change is afoot at Number 3. where Senderens leads, leeds follows! despite having a good following for their modern french cuisine the market in leeds (ex- anthony's) seems to be heading towards more casual dining and after five years the owners chef Martel & maitre d' Denis have decided on a reinvention. So the tasting menu, table cloths, amuses, pre-desserts and huge wine list will go ( ) and in its place a 10 choice starters/mains menu with starters under £10, mains under £20 and Desserts £5. The wine list will be a more concise 15 whites/15 reds. It will also be open 7 days a week. The aim is to keep the quality and standards (and indeed many of the old favourites will appear as specials) but make the restaurant more accessible to the goodly folk of leeds. given the restaurant is basically in an upmarket modern brasserie format anyway with a central banquette this idea looks emminently sensible to me, number 3 always deserved greater recognition and hopefully this is one way they will achieve it. (and 1st september is a friday, wonder where i can go for lunch )

one of my dad's favourite mottos is 'if it aint broke, don't fix it'. so it was with some trepidation that we tried out some new beef on sunday, unfortunately our current supplier can't keep up with our demand so we're trying a few other potential suppliers. Chef Andy had found a great supplier of dexter beef, a local farmer who feeds them on grass and dry ages the meat for 21 days. We were hopeful of being able to source some prime cuts from them but unfortunately anthony worrall-thompson got there the day before and took the lot however we managed to get a large bone in rib of beef for sunday which Andy duly roasted. Unfortunately i didn't see the uncooked joint (i'll try and get a pic of the next one) as i was out on my bike building up an appetite, but apparently it was fattier than a normal rib, and the fat was yellow. However when roasted the internal fat wasn't obvious and the meat itself was genuinely different in taste, i could best describe it as 'caramelised in taste but quite patently cooked rare' my accomplice-in-dining i think went for 'buttery'. put it this way we want it as our regular cut from now on Coupled with duck fat roasties & fresh horseradish sauce it was a very enjoyable. With some seared scallops and confit bacon to start with, montgomery's cheddar to follow and ginger parkin (i think) to finish, aided and abetted by a vat of domaine d'arlot cote de nuits village 1999, turned very rapidly into evening/ crashing out on the sofa, waking up at 4 am!

i can highly recomend their chicken and cashew nuts, it took me about 4 visits to get onto the 'proper' stuff!

the actual bank holiday is monday 28th. if places are specifying 3 night minimum they'll probably want you to stay fri/sat/sun nights.

a good site for plotting journeys is www.viamichelin.com i went to sharrow bay last week, stuck in a time warp but a wonderful one, good value lunch, great value wine, fantastic setting over looking the lake. first time i've been to the lakes and i would recommend them. took about 1 1/2 hrs sharrow bay to york. there's not a lot of culinary excitement in york but there's plenty to look at if old buildings are your thing.

if you've got the space then marquee is an excellent way to go, then you have complete control not only over the food but the drinks too. paradoxically i gave up worrying about the food, realising that with 120+ guest in summer there's not a lot you can serve to those numbers and keep the quality right so we went for simple but done well, plated starter, may have been smoked salmon and then a huge buffet but all really well done, just the basics but when done properly there's nothing wrong with honey roasted ham and good sirloin! then had choice of deserts & cheese again buffet style. other advantage is you don't get ripped off on wine, my golden rule for a good wedding, get plenty of wine down the guests! Majestic are brilliant for this, it's sale or return, they deliver and do glass hire (though our caterers did it in the end), they do discounts for bulk and the buy 2 save a £1 sort of offers add up when you buy a few cases, we worked on a bottle a head! so rather than paying £12 -13 for rubbish house wine we had georges duboeuf beaujolais, latour macon lugny, (some meursault for the top table!) pimms and champagne on arrival. Majestic is pretty much unbeatable on champagne, you can't get it cheaper in the trade most of the time. Our Caterer did the bar in the evening, we just did a pay bar, there's a limit to how much free booze you can provide, if they keep the bar takings then they'll probably not charge or just a nominal amount. another marquee tip, the largest expense is in putting in a level floor, but they can 'dress' any building, our wedding marquee was hung inside a giant grain store with an entrance put on the side, so we had the garden to wander around in for pre-wedding drinks and then into the marquee in the evening. My friend got married in the local village hall done similarly, so that might open up a few venues for you. at the end of the day it probably won't work out cheaper than a hotel do but it will be more personal and you have absolute control don't have to use their wine/dj's/food, or have someone coming round and telling you your wedding has to finish at 12pm because it's last orders!

so i completely dismissed what looked a load of rubbish and it was passable, doh! sounds very like the sky programme 'greatest dish in the world' or whatever it was called though.

we don't have a seperate vegetarian menu but we will make something especially. if we have notice all the better, the chefs do try and do something creative for the veggies, to my knowledge we have not yet served a goats cheese tart!

guess what? closed tuesday for food too! we do dinner wednesday - saturday eves 6-9 pm, lunch saturday 12- 2 pm & lunch sunday 12- 3.30 pm

On the positive side, we're not that far from the A1, take the green hammerton juntcion A59 to york then round the york ring road signposted A64 scarborough. about 45mins depending on traffic on the ringroad. unfortunately on the negative side, we're not open on mondays unfortunately.

i would agree that is hard to cook both legs and breast correctly at the same time, this works for me.... at it's simplest and speediest i cut the legs off, the wing tips & the end of the carcus leaving a 'crown' and cavity. i then fry the bird all over to crisp the skin in a frying pan with butter and olive oil, take it out of the pan and into a hot oven (i only ever use it on it's hottest setting) on a rack with water underneath. Your choice whether to stick a lemon in the cavity or some garlic cloves, or put some veg into the water, which makes good gravy at the same time, and stops the fat from burning. the chicken will cook quite quickly 30 -45mins but i usually double check with a thermometer. if i was planning to use the legs i'd brown them first and put in the oven, 20 mins before the bird perhaps to ensure they were done.

whereabouts in manchester slacker? it takes me an hour an a half to manchester airport if that helps, bapi drives like a girl, in two hours i'd be in Liverpool. get onto the m62, A1-m1 link, A64 York follow until you see the sign for westow at the top of the hill. easy trip, well worth it for a bit of aged sirloin, duck fat roasties, yorkshires & gravy (not forgetting the horseradish), you can have veg too but i think that's an unnecessary distraction from the meatage and may also take up valuable pudding space i'm hungry now.

Tony & Olga were up a few weeks ago having lunch with me & the mrs, scott & sam friar. we have also become a popular haunt of many of the york restaurateurs which is good, especially when i need reciprocal visits on race days horseradish is indeed homemade, i haven't had the beef for a while, it's nearly always sold out before i get chance to have any! next time you are in the area let me know

I thought Pool Court at 42 in Leeds had a star? I haven't been, opting instead for Anthony's, which was fantastic. Clearly michelin worthy. Has anyone been to Pool Court? I go to Leeds every couple of months and wondered whether I should give it a go, or return to Anthony's. ← did have but as yin says it closed down. Chef jeff baker has taken over at rish in york, re-naming it j baker bistro-moderne, sounds more in the mould of galvin than somewhere with starred aspirations, i hope to go soon. no3 york place is definitely worth a try, especially if you are interested in wine, denis co-owner/maitre d'/sommelier has a good list and knows his stuff.