Eating Out in St Ives
“Norma, I’m just popping out for a Currie” – John Major
If you were of a suspicious turn of mind, you might think that there existed
in St Ives a secret society dedicated to ethnically cleansing the town of emmets
by luring them into “restaurants” and then leaving them there to
starve to death. This is the only
reason I can think of to explain the crowds of poor souls forced onto The Wharf
to fight for their pasties with hordes of gulls.
That, or the ians reckon it’s the nearest they’ll get to throwing
Christians to the lions.
St Ives is full of eateries, from the achingly trendy to something rather the
opposite. As we were simply aching,
we tended to avoid the former. We tried seven places in our five days in St Ives.
It’s not that we’re greedy or anything, it’s just that two of them
said they could get us a table in March. 2005.
So, here goes….
The New World
It’s a Chinese restaurant. It
does what Chinese restaurants do. We
went because we needed to eat fairly quickly to get back to the Sloop in time
for Jelly to buy us the remains of the last barrel of Doom Bar.
I’ve got two problems, though. The
first is it’s EXPENSIVE. The
second is the Bang Bang Chicken. It
was dire. More precisely, it was chicken, shredded greenery, and
industrial quantities of salad cream with a hint of something to colour it a
bit.
Compare and contrast. Try
putting Bang Bang Chicken into Google and see what you get.
It won’t be salad cream.
Peppers
Had a drink about 7.45, and
wandered around a bit looking for somewhere to eat.
Peppers looked OK , so in we
went.
“Table for two?”
“About 8.30 OK for you?”
“Fine”
Return at 8.30, shown straight to table, drinks ordered, menus perused.
Good starter, very good fish, good bottle of wine and a fine espresso.
Oh, and good service, too. And
only a whisker dearer than the New World. Hats
aloft to one and all there.
The Saucy Chef
Don’t go up those stairs. Unless
you’re tired of life, really don’t. It’s abysmal.
Went in about 7.45, and booked table for 8.30.
Returned at 8.30, shown to table, menus, drinks (warm Budweiser, one of my
favourites), placed order.
Waited
Waited a bit more. Another warm
Budweiser.
Asked very politely where food had got to?
“It’s on its way. Orders are done in turn”
Waited
9.40. Food arrived.
Closely followed by a waitperson asking if everything was all right for
us?
Well, no, actually, it wasn’t, but never mind.
We’re British. We can take it.
And would I like some mustard? English or French? French
please. Two of those squishy little
envelope things of Heinz French mustard arrived. I’d at least expect real French mustard for a bill of over
£30.00 for main course and drinks only.
It seems that we had committed the cardinal sin of not having a starter, thus
ensuring that we would only get fed when everyone else had had their pudding.
We both had steak and it doesn’t take long to grill a steak, even
badly, so why that couldn’t happen at the same time as everyone else’s
starters beats me.
What really pissed me off about the Saucy Chef was the impression that they
were doing us a huge favour by allowing us to eat there.
There was no apology, no offer of a refund, just two “complimentary
liqueurs”. I’ve no idea what they were other than disgustingly sweet,
but I suspect it was a bottle of something they’ve been trying to get rid of
since the last Royal Wedding but one.
So, quick change of name by deed poll – The Useless Chef
The Lifeboat
Arrived about sevenish, had a drink and looked at the menu.
Food, and more drinks, were ordered about 7.30.
Waited. More drinks.
Waited a bit longer. More
drinks. (Luckily, it was Tinners this time, and you can, if you must, drink
Tinners until it comes out of your ears)
8.15 Approach bar and ask about whereabouts of food.
Bloke behind bar says “Sorry, I’ll check right now for you”
8.20 Herself announces enough is enough and heads for the bar.
I hide under table. Returns
about 2 minutes later with bar bloke in hot pursuit..
I come out from hiding place under table.
Bar bloke says he is very sorry and here’s our money back.
Food will be here in one minute. It
is. And it’s OK.
Two cock ups in two days, but the guy in the Lifeboat knew exactly how to
handle it. Instant apology, instant
refund, and your food. We might
even go back.
The Queens Tavern
Big, slightly tatty round the edges pub.
Couldn’t really fault it, apart from the Tinners (more of which later).
Ordered the food, and having learnt a thing a two in the last few days
asked how long it would be. About
ten minutes. And it was.
It was fillet of sole, chips and salad, and sausage, mash, peas, and
onion gravy. From memory, the food
was just under £13.00, and it was just fine.
The Man with no Name
There’s a little take away pizza place along The Wharf whose name I
completely failed to remember, but they’ll do you a damn fine espresso for
only slightly less than the GDP of Mexico, which you can go and drink looking
over the harbour, which on a sunny morning is a pretty OK way of passing a bit
of time. And gulls don’t like
espresso, so they leave you in peace.
The Sloop
We didn’t eat in the Sloop. Mainly
because a) the guy behind the bar told us not to, and b) having seen the state
of Jelly after six hours of chopping veg in the slave pits (bloodshot eyes,
shaking hands, uncontrollable dribbling etc,) we’d probably be eating his
fingers. Actually, b) was a false
alarm, because we found out later he always looks like that.
Beer
Sadly, the men from St Austell seem to have forgotten how to brew beer.
Tinners is pretty awful, Tribute is not much better, and I didn’t try
the other one.
Sharps Doom Bar. God, how I miss
the Doom Bar. It is a wonderful
beer and everyone should drink lots of it.
Often. Don’t know why the
Sloop don’t keep it anymore, but it’s still to be had in the Union.
Sharps Special is pretty marvellous, too.
I don’t know if you can get in St Ives but the Tinners at Zennor has
it. For instructions on how to get there, read The Prisoner of
Zennor herein, grid up your lions, and start walking.
Tin (and some arsenic)
Go along the cliffs between Botallack and Pendeen, and if there’s a spark
of imagination in your body, you cannot but be amazed by the landscape created
by the tin mining industry over the last 250 years or so.
Go, too, to the Levant engine house and Geevor mine and learn a bit about the
winning of tin from nearly 2000 feet underground and a mile out to sea.
They’re both fascinating places with committed and knowledgeable people
there to tell the story of tin mining. I
left feeling humbled by the sheer scale of it all, much of it done by men, women
and children with little more than pickaxes, hammers and chisels and some fairly
unstable high explosive.
When we went to Geevor, they asked us to complete a form with our impressions
of the visit. What I meant to say,
but didn’t at the time, was please don’t turn the place into a theme park -
leave it as it is as much as you can, because it is fascinating just as it is.
So if anybody has got this far without falling asleep (assuming Jelly
hasn’t cut it out altogether) if you go to Geevor, tell them that.
One of the guides at Geevor is a big bloke called John.
You’ll recognise him because he’s the only one with red hair and a
beard. He’s also got a label on
his hat saying John, which should help. The
other thing he’s got is a rather fine triskele ring, and as herself collects
triskele jewellery, she’s curious to know where it came from.
Any information emailed to Jelly gratefully received.
Why she didn’t just ask at the time I’ll never know.