The beer tides are turning

For so many years we have been presented with wine lists in restaurants, offered wine flights to go with our tasting menus and suggested glasses of bubbly as “the very best way to start a meal, madam”. The only place you would find customers heartily chugging beer with a meal was your local Indian restaurant.

But now I’m pleased to see that beer’s stock seems to be on the rise.

As a food blogger, I spend a lot of my time eating, photographing and writing about food. I think it’s fair to say that food is a big part of my life. But so is beer. I grew up with parents in the real ale industry, and I don’t go a week without a pint or four.

Beerd Kingsdown

I love pizza. I love beer. Beer loves pizza and pizza loves beer. It’s all one big happy family, and a family that is brought to Bristol courtesy of Beerd in Kingsdown.

Beerd is owned by Bath Ales, and has been providing a plethora of local and international brews for some time now. Excitingly, they are also currently running a pop-up in Clifton village for those of you who don’t fancy the walk over (lazy bones). However, as I am also a lazy bones, I prefer to frequent the location that’s simultaneously close to my work and my home. More time for drinking.

Birch

If there was an award for the highest proportion of glowing reviews in the shortest period of time, I think Birch restaurant in Southville would probably take home the prize. In the few short weeks since they have opened, I have seen countless reviews highlighting just what a star of a place it is. Bristol folk are lining up to get a piece of the action.

So in order to break with tradition, I am going to start my review with the things I didn't like about Birch. The negatives of my meal and the little niggling annoyances I haven’t been able to let go. So here goes…

On the day I went, my birthday in fact, it was raining. Like end of days raining. And my hair got wet, and lost some of its oomph.

Okay, now that’s the negatives dealt with. Let’s talk about the rest...

Mathilda's Chilli Bar

When I heard that a new chilli restaurant was opening in the Bearpit, I knew this was somewhere I was going to try very hard to love. I think it’s the attraction of a restaurant that is confident enough to serve one thing. Mathilda’s Chilli Bar serves chilli. Admittedly it comes in two varieties, but that’s about it. Like chilli? Go to Mathilda’s. Don’t like chilli? Don’t. It’s as simple as that.

And speaking of simplicity, Mathilda’s is definitely setting out its stall in terms of décor. Black walls, white tiling and tea-lights in treacle tins are about as decorated as it gets (if you discount the row of tiny cacti and Tabasco sauce bottles above the kitchen). The effect is striking.

The Stable

The Stable opened on the Bristol Harbourside last year, with a promise of ‘pizza, pies and cider’. A West Country chain, they have five venues across the South-West, with a new location in Newquay due to open next month. They focus on South-West producers, and there are plenty of local name-checks to keep a Bristol food-lover happy.

The Stable is an impressively large restaurant, with huge wooden sharing tables and a vast bar which dominates the area. The venue is referred to as a ‘Cathedral to Cider’ which suggested to me that this was a place where the drink might be more important than the grub.

Thali Café Montpelier

My family love Indian food. We cook it, we order it in and we frequently get together to eat at our favourite restaurants. My sister loves it so much she held her 6^th birthday party at our much-loved local curry-house. So bearing that in mind, I could think of no better choice of restaurant for their most recent visit than long-standing Bristol institution, Thali Café.

Thali Café has been serving happy customers with Tiffin take-aways and glorious Thalis for fifteen years. They can now be found in four venues across the city demonstrating the enduring Bristolian love for all things Thali. On this occasion however, the original restaurant in Montpelier was the venue of choice.

The Gallimaufry

The Gallimaufry (or ‘Galli’) was the first place I ate in when I moved to Bristol. In that time I have eaten there on numerous occasions. Some good, some brilliant, some just missed the mark. But all in all, it’s a place which can be relied upon to serve up some decent food with an equally decent price tag.

Local producers are proudly displayed in this bar come restaurant on Gloucester Road. After opening in 2012 they were quickly named Best Newcomer at the Bristol Good Food Awards in the same year, and have upheld a loyal following ever since. The Galli serves up breakfast, lunch and dinner, in a trendy environment displaying ever changing local art and plenty of live music events to enjoy whilst drinking or dining. 

Small Bar

It was an embarrassingly long time before I set foot in Small Bar, Bristol’s newest craft beer venue. I have no excuse for this. However, now I’ve finally made it I can assure you it won’t be long before I return. 

Small Bar occupies a lovely building on King Street, which is rapidly becoming a real destination for decent beer in Bristol (The Royal Navy Volunteer Tavern and Beer Emporium are just across the street). The name Small Bar had given me the impression that I’d struggle to find a seat at 7:30pm on a Friday. Thankfully the place is anything but small, given you plenty of perching options to while away the evening. The interior is very pared down, with plenty of low lighting and wood giving you the feeling of a good local boozer.

Gorging, not grumbling

This week I had a really bad food experience from one of my favourite restaurants.

This is a beginning sentence I really didn't want to write. And in fact, I’m not going to go any further.

Avon Gorged is supposed to be about gorging in Bristol. So that is why I’m choosing not to write about my experience this week. It was bad, but I know that they were having an off day. So I'm going to give them another chance.

Having no individual focus for my blog this week however, gives me the opportunity to mention a couple of places/experiences I hadn't quite got around to honouring...