http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/ The Oxford Times /leisure/food/restaurants/ en-gb Sat, 04 Jul 2009 06:39:50 +0100 Sat, 04 Jul 2009 06:39:50 +0100 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/rssterms/ M6 nvincent@newsquest.co.uk (Nigel Vincent) webmaster@digitalmedia.newsquest.co.uk (Tim Joy) http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/resources/images/727338/?type=rsslogo http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/ http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4458482.Ringing_the_changes_at_the_Bell_at_Hampton_Poyle/?ref=rss ‘It’s a pub that doesn’t sell food because its customers don’t want it,” I wrote 22 years ago about The Bell, a tiny one-room local at Hampton Poyle. If only its then landlord Ernie Soanes could see the place today! Thu, 25 Jun 2009 09:52:38 +0100 6afed80c19d274e48973a4bc79b697e5 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4443747.The_Merry_Miller_at_Cothill/?ref=rss was going to prove a memorable dish indeed. Nevertheless, I pressed on, hoping that the spoonfuls that followed were going to be more easy to swallow. They weren’t. This was memorably awful soup. After three or four mouthfuls I gave up. It had been a bit like trying to eat the bristles of a brush. Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:43:06 +0100 8fd86796abf88336c7362f618b4165c4 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4417171.Wild_about_Wild_Thyme/?ref=rss The commitment to local produce demonstrated by Chipping Norton’s excellent new restaurant Wild Thyme can hardly extend, for obvious reasons, to produce from the sea. The town is said to be as far from the coast as you can get in England, so the definition of local would have to be flexible indeed to embrace such delights as the juicy pearl-white turbot I enjoyed on my first visit or the delicious crab that preceded it. Wed, 03 Jun 2009 12:42:08 +0100 5b7e3d9eae37be24489eb89a185e9262 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4329525.The_Indian_Room_The_Exeter_Hall__Oxford_Road__Cowley/?ref=rss It is a fact of life today – unpalatable though it is to some – that many pubs of the traditional English style must either adapt or close. The Exeter Hall in Cowley (but only just) is one that has adapted. Wed, 29 Apr 2009 13:43:41 +0100 a8cec18084a51e9d44ded6f00e16523f http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4311818.The_Bear_at_Home__North_Moreton/?ref=rss I was first made aware of the good things about the Bear at Home in North Moreton – some of them at least – through an article early last month in The Times. Wed, 22 Apr 2009 17:16:38 +0100 a457c70541520267951f1d758af42def http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4277641.The_Thatch_in_Thame/?ref=rss Dined on Monday of last week in the Great Hall at Christ Church where the table decoration immediately in front of me was a beautifully detailed silver model of a horse – a trophy awarded until the Second World War at the annual point-to-point races of the Bullingdon Club. Wed, 08 Apr 2009 17:16:38 +0100 03675bbeb1a04cfff030ccdd7772a38a http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4255059.Gee_s__Banbury_Road__Oxford/?ref=rss I wrote enthusiastically about Gee’s on this page after a memorable birthday dinner there last summer. There need be no apology, however, for my returning so soon to sing its praises once again. With a new chef in charge of the kitchen since December, and appealing new menus introduced under his guidance, this admirable establishment – by some way my favourite upmarket Oxford restaurant – is on a real high at present. Thu, 02 Apr 2009 10:22:43 +0100 9f0f8cf590d37d22b760bb721644ffe7 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4235835.The_Plough__High_Street__Witney/?ref=rss I wrote at the end of January about The Lamb at Satwell, and within days it had closed, along with three other eating establishments owned by Antony Worrall Thompson, whose business had been placed in administration. A week later, I visited The Plough, in Witney, in order to review it on this page. Two days before the article was to appear, the pub was badly damaged by fire and forced to close. Could I be carrying a jinx fatal to the catering industry? Thu, 26 Mar 2009 09:21:45 +0000 50deac6a4b2ac507d2338adaabf139d8 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4212997.The_Swan_at_Ascott__Ascott_under_Wychwood/?ref=rss I don’t often get out to the Wychwoods and for some reason I always seem to take a daft route. Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:28:05 +0000 053823ac005c4863f8f224b30609f401 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4196799.Oxford_Brookes_University_Restaurant__Gipsy_Lane__Oxford/?ref=rss Reckless in the face of the deepening recession, I lunched on consecutive days last weekend at Quod (superb pollack with winter vegetables each time, since you ask). On both occasions, the place was full to busting. Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:38:23 +0000 16ece917c47128a661600f6b76ca0983 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4176926.The_Black_Boy__Headington/?ref=rss Political correctness that I cannot entirely reprehend presumably lies behind the decision to promote the Black Boy in Headington with the image of a horse rather than a human. Thu, 05 Mar 2009 11:08:00 +0000 b81fbc489946d2c4cce57d336add77d0 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4156474.The_Eyston_Arms__East_Hendred/?ref=rss There’s a sign on an approach road into Oxford from the west advertising “the best Sunday lunch in the world (except your mum’s)”. While flattering to mothers everywhere, the come-on does not do the biz with me: I want any Sunday lunch I eat out to be much better than mum’s – the pursuit of excellence is the reason, after all, why one hasn’t stayed at home. Thu, 26 Feb 2009 10:47:40 +0000 1ec04de70180f8c5ee1f0ff7e816e75f http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4121426.Woody_Nook_at_Woodcote__near_Wallingford/?ref=rss While it sounds the ideal title for a children’s television programme about cuddly animals, Woody Nook is, in fact, the name of a 17-acre vineyard and an associated restaurant. Thu, 12 Feb 2009 12:22:10 +0000 19f8b9bd28f9eba6beb7699c4bbb6a32 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4101690.The_Brasserie_at_the_Malmaison_Hotel__Oxford/?ref=rss First I’ll give details of a rather marvellous offer. Spend £75 a couple on an à la carte meal in Malmaison’s restaurant on a Sunday evening and you can have a bed for the night in this luxurious hotel for just £1 – subject, of course, to availability. Rosemarie and I did consider trying it for ourselves, but since we live only half a mile away the idea seemed slightly absurd. Wed, 04 Feb 2009 17:29:18 +0000 267cb5c91bf7d69ad3961bb623a15d86 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4085046.The_Lamb_at_Satwell__near_Henley/?ref=rss The chill wind of the economic recession is having its effect on restaurants everywhere, even those operated by celebrity chefs. Checking out Antony Worrall Thompson’s website on Monday, in connection with the article you are now reading on the Lamb at Satwell, I found that another of his catering operations – the Greyhound pub just up the road at Rotherfield Peppard – is no more. A terse message flashed up on the screen: “Due to the current economic climate we have had to close the Greyhound.” Thu, 29 Jan 2009 10:09:34 +0000 5e47adb0fd5238f5c4da611c9076bb55 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4065346.The_Swan__Long_Hanborough/?ref=rss I liked The Swan Inn at Long Hanborough the moment I walked in on a freezing cold night – minus 7 it read on the car thermometer – and found not one but two huge log fires merrily burning in the bar. Wed, 21 Jan 2009 16:47:24 +0000 ef6032e2a80df22d4edb39005296ea0b http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/4047235.Cafe_Coco__The_Royal_Oxford_/?ref=rss The catering entrepreneur Clinton Pugh has offered great visual appeal to his customers in all of his bars, cafés and restaurants in Oxford. Wed, 14 Jan 2009 16:05:15 +0000 5b9f8629b0d6288de33700a9c64e224c http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/3972032.Lords_of_the_Manor/?ref=rss Denise Barkley enjoys a very special night as two talented chefs create a double gourmet delight at Lords of the Manor Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:39:54 +0000 183ef9acf7332fd37d84ec4eb730fa10 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/3966256.High_price_for_poor_fish_at_Villandry__Bicester_Village/?ref=rss Villandry sounds uncomfortably close to villainy – which is what many might consider this new restaurant’s unjustifiably high prices to be. Wed, 10 Dec 2008 16:02:02 +0000 5e189b228d6e9d9241ae32bf5218b238 http://www.oxfordtimes.co.uk/leisure/food/restaurants/3947073.Nando_s__George_Street__Oxford/?ref=rss Before last week, my one experience of Nando’s had been a rather nasty meal at its Cowley Road operation shortly after it opened six or seven years ago in what had previously been the Prince of Wales pub. The sweet taste of the glutinous coleslaw remains with me to this day. As can be imagined, then, I didn’t exactly rush to sample the second Oxford branch when it opened at the beginning of the year at the west end of George Street, where the Opium Den used to be. Wed, 03 Dec 2008 15:40:30 +0000 e31c84667f729032a77559623fb80e2f