Sluggish

When you try a new restaurant or even just a new dish, you always fear the food will not be what you expected. It's one of those things that I actually dread because there is nothing worse than that feeling of disappointment with your meal. And it happened to me yesterday :-(

I went to Bosham for the day, a lovely village near Chichester. I thought it would be a good chance to try out a local restaurant or pub. After a little walk around Old Bosham, exploring the arts and crafts shops in Bosham Walk, Matt and I became quite hungry. We had seen a couple of pubs dotted around so stopped by them to scope them out. Unfortunately, they didn't feel particularly welcoming, with one in particular having some rowdy football men which I just did not appreciate!

When deciding on new places to go to, I don't just look at the menu but like to feel out the atmosphere as well. You don't want to eat somewhere feeling uncomfortable. There are lots of places I've been to for the first time when I've felt perfectly welcome and enjoyed myself. Then there are others like these pubs, where as soon as I stepped in them, I just wanted to get out!

In the end, we went back to Chi. By that time, we were starving and decided to go to Zizzi's because it was fairly close to the station! I was a bit disappointed that we were going somewhere familiar but I was too tired and hungry to mind too much.

On the way, we passed the Slug and Lettuce and I thought, hold on, I've never really eaten here. A quick look at the menu enticed us in. I fancied something comforting to eat so went for the steak and mushroom pie...and, when it arrived, I was amazed with what I saw!

But not for long.

It wasn't bad to begin with - the height of the pastry was staggering and it was light and crispy, though messy to eat, as it flew about everywhere when I cut into it!

However, as I dug into the meat of the pie, I realised that the red wine gravy was rather rich and overwhelmed the taste of the beef and mushrooms. I don't like too much sauce/gravy with my food anyway so it was probably to do with that more than anything. But then I noticed that the pastry didn't actually extend down the sides and underneath - it was sat in a bowl with pastry covering the top. Now I don't know if that is just the posh way to eat pies but I do like my pastry. So that didn't help lift my spirits about this pie either.

So I moved on to the mashed potato.

Uh oh.

Did you ever used to eat it at school? It always had a slight metal twinge like it had been sitting in the pan for too long underneath that strip lighting. As soon as I had a forkful of Slug mash, all of those school memories flooded back. And not in a good way. Just gulp and swallow, gulp and swallow, I thought to myself, to avoid any risk of that industrial aftertaste.

Oh, and to top it off, the green beans were cold.

If one part of a dish goes down, I take the rest of the food down with it!