Epicurean's Answer

Cost £5.38 (£4.69 for burger, chips and drink, 69p extra for cheese) Weight 222g Height 6.8cm Diameter 10cm Constituents Crown (with no sesame seeds), mature cheddar slice, burger, tomato, red onion, romaine lettuce, heel. With well over 70 choices on the Wetherspoons’ menu and each one available until 10pm, you can’t expect silver service. The […]

I spend a lot of time in the kitchen, as a consequence I spend a lot of my time being annoyed at things that I do. These are the ten most annoying things that happen to me on a regular basis. I’ve discounted cutting myself, whilst chopping , because of the combined regularity and stupidity […]

Cost £5.25 Weight 292g Height 6.5cm Diameter 10cm Constituents Crown, cucumber, tomato, lettuce, processed cheese slice, burger, mayo, mustard, heel. Del’aziz is “the first all round Mediterranean Delicatessen & Brasserie in London.” according to the website, that is. It has five branches in London and offers an array of ‘Mediterranean’ food – mezze, feta cheese […]

Cost £1.89 Weight 115g Height 4.5cm Diameter 9.5cm Constituents Crown, 3 slices gherkin, mustard, ketchup, processed cheese slice, burger, heel. I always get the feeling when I visit a Burger King that it’s not quite run as well as it should be, it’s never quite as slick, nor friendly as it’s golden arched competition – […]

Cost £0.99 Weight 70g Height 3.5cm Diameter 9.5cm Constituents Crown (with no sesame seeds), chopped onions, 1 slice gherkin, mustard, ketchup, processed cheese slice, burger, heel. When Richard and Maurice McDonald opened up their ‘McDonald Brothers Bar Drive-in’ in San Bernardino, California in 1940, they can have had no idea what their name would become. […]

Cost £6.95Weight 332gHeight 9.5cmDiameter 12.5cm Constituents Crown, relish, red onion, tomato, lettuce, real cheese, burger, mayo, heel. Gourmet Burger Kitchen was started by Kiwi chef Peter Gordon, to try and replicate the burgers from his homeland. I assume New Zealand is proliferated by restaurants serving badly constructed,  expensive burgers, cooked with no real precision. GBK […]

Our capital is a gastronomical gold mine, full of  amazing chefs, producing sumptuous dishes in stunning restaurants. It is also a massive, sprawling conurbation, whose inhabitance move ghost-like through it – their only trace, the detritus they leave behind.  This is what I like to immortalise in pixels, as found.

This was born out of a meal that I ate in Las Vegas, where my dining companion chose a dish named ‘Watermelon Ribs’. Being a big fan of ribs and enjoying watermelon, she logically put them both together, in her imagination, and thought it sounded like a smashing idea. It wasn’t. It was an unmitigated, […]

I visited my local Tesco metro and was poking around the shelves, trying in vain to find something other than Cornish pasties and energy drinks, when I came across the new 180g pouch of Celebrations – on a special price of ‘just’ two pounds. Several emotions washed over me as I stood there, Red Bull […]

I was once told, by a wine maker, that for every bad bottle of wine you drink, you should take a good bottle and smash it against the wall. You are on this planet for only a limited time, so why spend it drinking bad wine? Well, take it from me, the same is true […]

IHOP Although not strictly living up to its name, the American chain, International House Of Pancakes is a national institution for a reason. The speed of service, the 1,421 branches and the sheer quantity of food they can squeeze onto a plate, all make for breakfast venue to be revered. Whether you fancy pancakes, a […]

As a rejoinder to my post of The 10 best chocolate bars, here are my choice for the worst. I simplified my reasons why – the less time I have to think about these the less queasy I feel… Turkish Delight Like eating an overly scented Yankee Candle Snickers We all know peanuts exist – […]

I have a huge soft spot for Vermont’s Finest – Ben & Jerry’s. Before you say it, I know they are owned by Unilever, but that doesn’t detract that in 1978 two greedy blokes decided to make start a business making Ice cream  – simply because it was one of their favourite things! It was […]

Scrivens sat at the end of an elongated red brick shoebox row of shops. There was a hardware store, a greengrocers, a hairdressers, a rather strange woman’s clothes shop – which for some reason sold toys – and finally Scrivens, a strange L-shaped grocery cum newsagents. It was here where you spent your pocket money. […]

Below are scans of the front and back of a set of twelve cards. They were produced to celebrate the 350th anniversary of the Rich Tea – hence the Rich Tea occupying the first card. It is thought they date from the mid-eighties, although the exact date is a mystery, as is the exact date […]

  I had pictured myself with a handheld camera touring the depths of England, blowing the dust off old cookbooks, interviewing stalwarts of the WI, doing witty pieces to camera, all in search of the elusive Tunis Cake. This was to be my food odyssey, where I discovered not only the history of this childhood […]

I love supermarkets. I’m drawn, moth-like, to their bright, shiny interiors packed full of things. Rows and rows of things. So much so, that where ever I travel in the world, the first thing I do is visit the supermarket (with the exception of New York, then it’s Duane Reade, but for the same reasons). […]

Tom Eagle is a creative powerhouse based in Seville. I asked him to immerse himself in the world of fishfinger sandwiches and this was his response. Where I live in Seville, whitebait costs €2 for a kilo or €1.50 for 1/2 and sardines are about the same. When you see economies of scale at the […]

According to a poll conducted by Gaviscon Double Action amongst 1,302 over 16s, between the 19th and 23rd June 2009, the nations favourite dessert double act is Apple crumble and custard. The top ten 1  Apple Crumble and Custard (54%) 2  Strawberries and Cream (47%) 3  Profiteroles with Chocolate Sauce (36%) 4  Chocolate Fudge Cake […]

Based firmly in Yorkshire, Bettys of Harrogate have five Café Tea Rooms, all serving a menu celebrating the best of Swiss-Yorkshire cooking. Perhaps I should explain that Bettys wasn’t started by Betty at all, but a Swiss chap named Fredrick Belmont, which goes someway to explaining why they make such good chocolate. To celebrate their […]