A Blogger's Day Off

Sometimes food bloggers want a day off and the aim is to just have a quick meal, no photos or recipes to try to get. That was  the plan recently when I was having a day out with my family for my granddaughter's birthday.

I can see now the bad idea of going into London in half term but it was a little girl's birthday wish so I met them at the station and off we headed for the Natural History Museum.  When we got there, there was a half hour wait till they opened the doors again and the queue would take about an hour and a half meaning a two hour wait in a queue - no thanks!

Instead we headed into Central London for the Chinese restaurant we always go to which turned out to be closed for renovations!  What else could go wrong?

We had passed a Jamie Oliver Diner so armed with the reputation of Jamie Oliver we went inside for our lunch.

Either Jamie Oliver had never been there or it was qute a while ago but it was not quite up to his usual standards.

Our party consisted of three adults and one child.  Four meals, how hard would it be to get them right!!

We shared two starters and had one soft drink each. This is important as it fills in the picture of the price too.

My burger came with my son's chips (they were in a little bucket) and the waitress took them off my plate and swapped them to his plate.  My chips which were deep fried acavados (yes, they were weird) on my son's plate.  My daughter in law got her hot dog and no chips and had to wait ages for them.  When I asked the waitress (who by the way kept referring to us as 'you guys') for a slice of pickle she asked if I wanted another one! No I said just the one missing from my meal.

The child's meal was chicken lollipops and chips with a lemony creamy dip.  In reality it was a piece of grilled chicken cut into slices with chips and no dip.

When we came to pay the waitress asked if we would like to leave a tip with the credit card payment! No we didn't.  I wanted to give her a tip - Don't keep calling us 'you guys'!

The bill was just under £70.00 - three adults and one child, two burgers (both over cooked), one hot dog and one 'chicken lollipops' and four drinks.  A bit excessive for the quality and level of this meal.

This is not a restaurant I will be wanting to re-visit!  Just saying.