Category Archives: self-service

Ordinary, Scones, self-service

Edinburgh Filmhouse

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Now we know that if you are looking for a scone you would not immediately rush off to the cinema. Popcorn yes, ice cream yes, but not scones. However if you were at the pictures and there was a scone right in front of you, just begging to be eaten, then you might be tempted. Interior view at the Edinburgh Filmhouse

Force Majeure

That’s how it was for us when we went to the Edinburgh Filmhouse and ended up in their well appointed café area. You can get anything from a full blown meal to a pint of beer and a sandwich. There seemed to be only a single scone left. It seemed only right that we put it out of its misery. It would provide us with some sustenance for the film ahead. A scone at the Edinburgh Filmhouse

Presentation was what you might typically expect from a self-service place. Scone expectations were not exactly soaring. We were pleasantly surprised however when it turned out to be not at all bad. Quite good in fact, nice texture and quite light. The film , Force Majeure, was a Swedish production with subtitles and we did not have high expectations for that either but it seemed like the best of what was on offer. It was excellent. Based round a family skiing trip it laid bare the stresses and strains involved in close family relationships in an intriguing and very honest way.

Feeling fairly uplifted when we came out we were rudely brought back down again by the discovery that the former Secretary of State for Scotland had fessed up to being personally responsible for the ‘Frenchgate‘ scandal. A scandal that could have altered the whole course of the General Election in Scotland … unbelievable! If he had come clean before the election he would not have won his seat. There would be no LibDem representation in Scotland at all. Now the question is how can he hold on to it when it was obviously gained through rank dishonesty? It has also cost the taxpayer £1.4m to get to the truth.

Wheesht

More refreshingly perhaps, earlier in the week, the Presiding Officer (Speaker) in the Scottish Parliament had to resort to ‘wheesht’ instead of the usual ‘order, order’ to maintain a modicum of decorum in the debating chamber. And it worked! Anyway we can recommend Force Majeure and the Edinburgh Filmhouse scone if you find yourself so inclined.

EH3 9BZ           tel: 0131 228 2688       Edinburgh Filmhouse

self-service

Falkirk Wheel Café

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Nowadays, although it is not that long ago, it is quite difficult to think back to the millennium and all that was going on at that time. Remember the millennium bug that was going to throw every computer and hence the world into chaos at the stroke of midnight? In central Scotland the big project was the rejuvenation and rejoining of the Union canal and the Forth & Clyde canal. Both had lain derelict and unloved for many many years. At one time the canals had been joined by a series of locks but they had long since disappeared so the answer was to build the Falkirk Wheel to raise boats from the lower Forth &Clyde canal into the Union and vice versa.External view at the Falkirk Wheel Café

The result was a spectacular feat of engineering which has successfully put Falkirk, for the first time ever, on the tourist map. It seems to be continually busy with people from all over the world just coming to look at how it works. Or taking boat trips to actually experience it for themselves. Catering for this influx of visitors is the ubiquitous visitor centre with the usual gift shop and cafe area. The gift shop has all the stuff which you would find in any shop aimed directly at tourists. We always find this disappointing and slightly irritating because tourists to Scotland must find almost exactly the same choice of goods whether they are. At Falkirk Wheel or Culloden battlefield or Edinburgh Castle. Kind of the same way as the Queen must find that the world smells of fresh paint.

Internal view at the Falkirk Wheel CaféThe café here is confusing and disappointing. Difficult to figure out the system and, when you do, it just screams of inefficiency. That said they do have a reasonable range of stuff on offer. However, it is set up pretty much like a school canteen, a bit cold and clinical. The service is a bit like that as well, nobody seems to be enjoying working there. It probably suffers in the same way as all places that don’t actually have to attract customers in their own right. The customers arrive to see the Wheel and there’s nowhere else to go for something to eat or drink. A kind of monopoly situation.

We bought some lunch but because they had banana and chocolate chip scones we thought that, being dedicated sconeys, we had to try them as well. A scone at the Falkirk Wheel CaféThey were okay, quite good texture and definitely tasted .. you’ve guessed it, of banana and chocolate. Fine as a novelty scone but definitely not going to displace the traditional ones. Just call us old fashioned.

Democracy?

Apart from the Wheel itself, this was a disappointing experience. We brought some friends from England along who had never been to Falkirk before and had hoped for better. Also hoping for better as the election dust settles and Westminster gets back to work. It does make you wonder about the state of democracy in the UK. 85% of Scotland, 73% of Wales and 58% of England didn’t vote for the Tories but got them anyway. An outright Tory government threatening to do away with our human rights. Scotland even gets a Secretary of State to speak on its behalf, chosen from a shortlist of one. The one Scottish Conservative MP? There must be a better system!

Ordinary, Scones, self-service

Blossom’s Bistro

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Blossom’s is situated within the ever popular Torwood Garden Centre at Larbert between Falkirk and Stirling. Like the Centre itself the bistro is big, over 200 seats. Now you would not normally go to a garden centre specifically for a scone but at this time of year garden centres are going to be hard to avoid. You may as well try a scone at the same time. Internal view of Blossoms Bistro, TorwoodI have to say that Blossoms tries really hard and for the most part succeeds. There is a wide range of food on offer.

They even do an afternoon tea with generous helpings of sandwiches, cakes, scones, tea or coffee for £15 … for two people! Don’t think you can do much better than that! No surprise then that it’s a busy place, We suspect that many folk just come to the Bistro without going out to the plant area. They also support Central Arts.  An organisation of local artists, displaying and selling their artworks to benefit various charities. Highly commendable!

A Parliament of scones

It’s a beautiful warm day but I gather that some folks are getting a bit overheated regarding the upcoming election. Let’s look at it sensibly! Lets imagine Parliament being made up of scones. There would be about 650 plain ones, some of them pretty half baked. There would be another 900 or so fruit ones in ‘the other place’. All of them are half baked and we don’t really need them at all. A scone at Blossoms Bistro, TorwoodAt this point in time, before the election, all 650 of the plain scones have been discarded … binned. We only have the 900 fruit ones. Now much as I like a fruit scone many of these are well past their sell-by but there is no way of getting rid of them. Even the pigeons won’t take them.

No worries though, on May 7th, a new batch of plain scones will appear from all over the UK and normality should then be restored. However, the problem this time around seems to be with the Scottish scones. Seen by some, to be of inferior quality, hard to digest and best ignored if possible. Of course this in turn would be tricky for Scottish people to digest  because they  will have gone to a lot of trouble to make them and they know their scones are as good as any.

There are scones and scones

The democratic process that produced all these scones used to see them all as equal but maybe not anymore. Us sconeys have known for a long time that scones are not all equal, far from it. The scones we had in Blossom’s Bistro were better than expected but maybe tasted a little bit floury and slightly more cakeish than we would have liked. Nevertheless we enjoyed them, the coffee was also good, the service was very helpful and friendly. All in all, very good value for money. More than can be said for those in Parliament.

FK5 4EG          tel: 01324 557710         Blossoms Garden Centre

english, self-service

Chiswick House

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As the Thames buzzes with preparations for the boat race tomorrow the grounds of Chiswick House thrive with families out enjoying an early April day of 20 degrees .. just lovely. The original Chiswick House dates back to 1610 but the building we see today is early 18th century. It once belonged to the Cavendish and De

The camellia conservatory at Chiswick House, London
The camellia conservatory

vonshire families but now it is in public ownership and managed by English Heritage. The house was closed when we visited but the grounds are extensive and very well maintained. Lots of statues and gateways leading to temples.

 

The conservatory was supposedly the scene of the first ever music video when the Beatles, fed up with touring,  recorded Paperback Writer in 1966.

Most importantly, of course, there is a café.

The café area at Chiswick House, London
The café area

It is necessarily big both inside and outside to cope with hundreds of visitors each day. As we stood at the self service counter I guess we harboured preconceived ideas of what the scones would be like. They looked a bit on the solid side and we have experienced many places like this that were disappointing to say the least. However, such dismal expectations were to be completely confounded. A scone at Chiswick House, London

Sitting outside in beautiful warm sunshine we discovered they were really most enjoyable. On a par with some of the best. You get a wee jar of Triptree jam and a lidded pot of cream. Eminently sensible for a place like this where lots of people are sitting outside. This is the school holidays so lots of kiddies running around and generally having a great time playing frisbee, climbing trees etc. Fabulous to discover baby changing facilities … in the gents. A long overdue sign of the times!

Barnet and all that

As you wander around London you cannot help but observe the general affluence. No potholes, everything works, public transport is fantastic. It’s in stark contrast to other parts of the country. In the run up to the election we hear a lot about what Scotland gets (Barnett and all that) compared to ‘England’ however we tend not to hear much about London getting £2.6k per capita more than ‘England’. That’s a lot more than Scotland and considering the population is about twice that of Scotland, that’s a lot of money .. and it shows! Are we witnessing the north south divide … maybe?

Anyway, like its scones, Chiswick House and its gardens are a delight, you will not be disappointed.

www.chgt.org.uk       tel: 020 8995 0508

Ordinary, Scones, self-service

The Milk Barn

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Well here we are at The Milk Barn on the south side of Falkirk on a dull chilly day. The upcoming General Election has well and truly kicked off with all parties promising more scones tomorrow. Main issues seem to be: 1. should banker type folk get more cream on their jammy scones 2. should ordinary folk (i.e. not bankers), get any jam 3. is the EU meddling with our scones 4. should folks north of the border be allowed to call their scones Scottish instead of British.

Appealing MPs

Being Scottish the last one is of particular interest because once again the main unionist parties are demonstrating tInternal view of the Milk Barn, Falkirkheir complete lack of comprehension of what Scotland and its scones are about and in so doing seem to risk the Union itself. From a sconologist point of view, the unionist parties should really be promoting United Bakeries, who make brilliant scones. Unfortunately they are in Norway .. which isn’t even in the EU. So maybe not. Interesting though that all MPs are effectively sacked and then have to win back their jobs by appealing to us folk. Not only with scones, but probably with jam and cream as well. It will be an interesting few weeks.

The Milk Barn is a great bit of diversification by the Reid family who run Glen Farm. It’s probably not the sort of place to go if you don’t have children. The noise levels can be pretty high. On the other hand if you do have children it is a must do destination. There’s a great play area inside for smaller kids. An adventure playground outside for the bigger ones. A large grassed area for playing football. A fab ice cream parlour where you can watch it actually being made.

Fibreglass cows

You can even milk Glenda the life-size fibreglass cow! So great fun if you are looking for the kids to be entertained while you try and sneak in a quiet cup of tea and, of course, a scone.
Milk Bar sconeThe scones are home baked and although mine was an odd shape it tasted fine and butter and jam were provided free. Oh, and fab strawberry tarts

The place is busy most of the time. However, although the staff were run of their feet they still managed to be smiley and friendly .. well done.

FK1 3AA                       tel: 01324 630703                       Milk Barn

Ordinary, Scones, self-service

Tree Shop Café

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We were actually heading for the Loch Fyne Oyster Restaurant & Bar at Cairndow only to find out that they don’t do scones. Nor much else to go with a cuppa .. black mark. Undaunted we went next door to the Tree Shop Café. There we were told that they did not have any scones either .. aaargghh! Since there is nothing elseTree Shop int for miles we ordered some other goodies to go with our cuppa. On finding a seat however we looked over only to see a whole new batch of steaming hot scones being removed from an oven. A’hmm, what are these?

Tree Shop sconeForgotten

The lovely lady serving us apologised profusely saying that she had completely forgotten that there was a batch baking. No problem whatsoever, our cakes were exchanged immediately for fresh hot scones.
 All things considered, The Tree Shop is what you might call a typical garden centre café. A bit soulless and nothing to write home about. As it turned out neither was the scone but we enjoyed it nevertheless.

The garden centre specialises the best choice of plants suitable for Scottish conditions. The staff have a wealth of knowledge of what plants do well in our conditions and are happy to advise all our visitors.

PA26 8BL             tel: 01499 600263                       Tree Shop

Ordinary, Scones, self-service

The Green Welly Stop

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Green Welly Stop logoBecause it is situated in Tyndrum at a bifurcation in the road, one road takes you north to Fort William and the other west to Oban, this is a an extremely busy stop-off place for cars, motorbikes and tour buses. Just as well it has a huge car park to cater for all the traffic. There are several shops as well as the Green Welly Stop which is correspondingly big and must cater to thousands and thousands of tourists. Hence you can get pretty much anything you want on a self service basis. Needless to say it was the scones we were after.

A Green Welly scone!
A Green Welly scone!

 

To be fair they were better than expected. But struggling to get above average … which is pretty good for someplace so busy. Jam was extra. All in all it was pretty much what you would expect from a place like this. Did the job and that is what the Green Welly Stop is set up to do.

Main meal items produced in the main kitchens are hearty affairs. We always have a selection of traditional Scottish dishes on offer, as well as the internationally recognised Lasagne and macaroni. Pasta dishes do feature on our all day menu – these are so popular with the customers who have been hill walking, cycling or whatever healthy pursuit they have been doing!

Always trying to improve quick-to-eat, snack items, you don’t want to miss our range of home made pastries. These are a crispy delight! There is a vegetarian cheese and onion option, and the meat pastries vary daily between Steak, Haggis and Steak Mince. Enjoy these in the restaurant, or purchase them at the Snack Stop! A cracking meal deal is available here – a pastry and a soup to take away and enjoy!

Haggis and Steak

Our home baking continues going from strength to strength – once again, all of our baking is available for you to take home – The Snack Stop and the Filling Station have baking selections and we highly recommend our Fruit, Banana and Date and Walnut loaves – these are all baked fresh for you.

FK20 8RY     www@thegreenwellystop.co.uk     tel: 01838 400271

Scones, self-service

Mitchell’s Coffee Corner

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When you visit Oban and have done McCaig’s Folly, the shops, the harbour and the distillery you may feel in need of a cuppa and a scone. Mitchell’s Coffee Corner is not far from the Harbour and opposite one of Oban’s best pubs, Aulay’s Bar.
Internal view of Coffee Corner, ObanDon’t get your hopes up too far however. Not much in the way of atmosphere and the surroundings, like the scones, were a bit utilitarian. No table service and the scones come pre-buttered. Just why anyone would want to do this is quite beyond us. Do they know how much butter, if any, people want? My scone came with too much butter and the scone itself could probably best be described as ‘firm’. My coffee was fine as was Pat’s tea. A scone at the Coffee Corner, ObanWe wish Mitchell’s Coffee Corner well but it needs to brighten itself and it’s service up a bit .. just a bit tired and uninspiring. We like to promote the small independent businesses wherever possible so just as well Costa, next door, don’t do scones.

There is more to Oban than just ferries, follies and scones. The transatlantic telephone cable came ashore here during the Cold War and carried the hotline between the US President and the President of the USSR. The Nuclear Reporting Cell was located here as well in 1925. It housed the Royal Observer Corps who were responsible for reporting foreign nuclear aggression to Westminster.

PA34 4LL                tel: 01631 562 588               Coffee Corner TA