Sunday, April 14, 2013

The English Cottage, Oxford.



 After a couple of days in London, we went to a small town in the country for a business meeting and stayed in this charming place.  The Bell, is a little cottage, with only a couple of rooms, and one the best  restaurant I have ever eaten in England.

 This was a little storage shack across the street from the Inn.   I thought it was so charming, I had to take a picture of it!
 This is the gardens attached to the Inn.
 The countryside.

 This was my parents room.  Loved the color scheme and the charm.  They had a claw foot tub that I was so jealous of.  However, I had the shower that they wished they had!
 This is my little room above the kitchen. It was on the other side of the property.  So I was off on my own.  I was loving it, until at dinner my Father told me all these stories about haunted Inns in England.  Needless to say, I didn't sleep that well.

 Here is a picture of the restaurant.  They served us a lovely breakfast every morning, and then had a the restaurant open at night.  I didnt have my camera on me for the other dinners, but here was our first nights dinner:
 Beat salad, with macadamia nuts, micro greens, goat cheese, and a balsamic glaze.
 Fish and Chips.
 Lamb with potatoes and leaks, with balsamic glazed plums.  (This was my dish, and it was Heaven!)
 Mushroom cream sauce, fresh herbs and gnocchi.
 Treacle Tart with fresh cream.
This was the Creme Brule that they served us on the last night.  It was on my InstaGram and as you can see its quite fuzzy.
 My Mom and I decided to go to Oxford, England for the day.  We had both been there many times, but we decided that it would be fun to go and visit again and have high tea.


If you have been following my blog, you probably know how much I love  If you havnt seen my Alice In Wonderland party then you should check it out HERE!

Got this cute little sucker along with the original book by Lewis Carroll at the Alice shop. 
University of Oxford grounds.


 The courtyard inside the gates.
 This is the dining room, if you watched Harry Potter you might recognize this as their dining hall.
 Thought this was hilarious, another picture I put on InstaGram.
 City of Oxford.

 Eagle and Child Pub, we decided to have lunch there.  To experience where many famous writers and academics have spent there time.

 This was the meal,  Meat Pot Pie with roasted veggies.  I wasnt a fan, it was very salty so I only ate a couple of bites.
The apple salad, again wasnt a fan, but the atmosphere was very fun and exciting.
 We decided to have Afternoon tea in one of there famous tea rooms, though it came out very dry and stale.  The only good thing was the Chamomile tea after a long day in the rain.



Monday, April 8, 2013

Foodie London


I've heard many people say that they love London, but the food isnt anything to write home about.  From my experience, I have actually found some very lovely places to eat, that were some of the best food I have had in my life!  Not only were they delicious, but very reasonably priced.  Here is just a few of them that we found on this trip.  Most we didn't eat at, but they looked amazing so I had to take a picture.
If you are in Paris or London, you have to stop by and try a macaron at LADUREE.  I promise, no other macaron will be good enough for you after tasting one of these!  They are just simply incredible and they have a ton of different flavors to try from.
Saw this little gem on the side of the road and just too a picture!
A shop owner that we were visiting, suggested we have lunch here. Some of the best Italian food I have ever had!

My dear friend Zinta, in the pic below with me.  Not a great picture, but I adore her enough to post it.  We made it to England just in time to celebrate her birthday.  So we went to anywhere she wanted. She choose this lovely Vegetarian Restaurant, that had the most wonderful food.  We even bought the cook book we loved it so much!  Just be warned, it has very little eating space, but I find that all the best places do.

Next we went to my favorite little tea shop to get tea.  She is showing me how the "English" pour a proper tea...
The tasty teas we tried, I bought 4.  I cant even beging to tell you how much I love them!
This is the Breakfast that we were served every day at our Hotel.  It was more food then I could eat, but   it tasted so good, minus the eggs.  I'm not a huge fan of scrambled.
As we were walking around one more, we came across a food Market.  The following pictures are of what they sold.  We didnt buy anything.  After the breakfast we just ate, we couldn't possibly!  But it was fun to see and look!

Zinta told us to try out the Humming Bird Cafe. It's an American Style Bakery.  From the moment I walked in, I completely loved the Interiors.  The Bakery was very well designed, and it was extremely busy.

Brownies with the hummingbird on them.
Here is there cookbook.  I own a million cookbooks that I never use, so I decided not to get it, but the cupcakes were very delicious!
Chocolate Cupcake and Red Velvet Cupcake.  We did eat these and they were worth every bite!
Across the street I saw this darling ice cream shop. Too full to bother eating any of it, but if I had room, I defiantly wanted to try. Loved the lighting and the entire display.

Passing windows along the street.  They had all these lovely baked goods in them...
This is a creperie that Zinta took us too about five years ago.  We loved it and highly suggest it, though we did not eat there this time, since we had just eaten breakfast.
More window shopping...
If you have never had the chance to visit the food court at Harrods Department store, I highly suggest it.  Its quite the thing to see.  However, I didnt know if you were allowed to take pictures, so I only took a couple.

So this is a place my sister introduced me too, when I went on my Art study abroad.  It was across from our hotel and I LOVED it!  Its a panko fried chicken with curry and bitter greens with a vinegar dressing.  It typically doesn't have that much sauce on it so in the past I thought it was better.  But I still enjoyed it.
While waiting for my Father to get back from a meeting, so we could travel to the country side.  We stopped by our hotel one last time to eat Afternoon tea there.  It was the best afternoon tea I had ever had.
Scones and Clotted cream and jam.
They had a lot of lovely teas to choose from, I had there Chai.