DEBORAH ROSS
Iseem to have been away for a very long time, which has been hard for you all, I’m sure. I put it down to the Jumbo Crossword which, at Christmas, took over my page and I’ve been struggling to get it back ever since. That Jumbo Crossword is just so spitefully ambitious, and has been dying to knock me from my spot for as long as I can remember. Indeed, the last time I saw him — at a Spectator party, I think, which only the two of us attended as everybody else was famously at it elsewhere — he gave me a look which said: ‘Rou’ye fro ti, dlo lrig.’ What? I’m not a great crossword-doer and, at the time, did not realise it was an anagram of: ‘You’re for it, old girl.’ I had to ask a passing old retired person to work it out for me. But this is one of the problems with crosswords. You can never have a straight conversation. And the Jumbo Crossword is still after me. Often he hides in the bushes opposite, wearing dark glasses and a big coat. He thinks I can’t see through the disguise, but as those who attempted this particular crossword will know, his 24 Across is such a whopper it sticks out a mile. ‘Go away,’ I always call out. ‘It’s my spot and you’re just not having it.’ I can’t be sure, but I think he always comes back with ‘Woc!’ Anyway, good Christmas? Fine, apart from being abused by a Jumbo Crossword. To avoid his stalking, I even spent a few days with my elder sister and her family who have moved from London to ‘the Country’ which I now know is in a place called ‘the Wiltshire’. This place called ‘the Country’ that is in ‘the Wiltshire’ is rather frightening, particularly at night, because street lighting hasn’t been invented, so it’s very dark. And so quiet, too. No police sirens, no joyriders taking the speedbumps at 100mph, no sexual assaults at 4 a.m. or even 20 past, no Jumbo Crosswords in dark glasses rustling menacingly in bushes and shouting abusively in the most cryptic way. Spooky. But my sister is happy and I do love her even though, as kids, she devoted much of her time to convincing me that I was adopted. This is a terrible thing to do to a younger sibling, particularly as I was really pleased and excited and then heartbroken when I found it wasn’t so. I had wanted to slam doors and shout, ‘What do you care? You are not my real parents!’ whereas ‘What do you care? You are my real parents!’ just didn’t have the same sting about it. I also imagined that, when my real parents turned up, they’d feel so guilty that we’d all live on Chocolate Crème Eggs in Hamleys for ever after.
So my parents are my real parents and my sister is my real sister and here we are in ‘the Wiltshire’ where I offer to take everyone out for lunch. I do this because I am a nice, generous person. The fact that, earlier, I had heard mumblings about Going For A Lovely Long Walk To See The Pigs And Feed The Ducks And I Know What, We’ll Take A Flask And Sandwiches, has nothing to do with it. Not a sausage. I love a good walk as much as anyone. Once, I walked all the floors of Selfridges with only 17 rests and 49 food stops. ‘Are there any decent restaurants round here?’ I ask. I then add, helpfully, ‘A restaurant is an inside place where someone cooks you nice food and you sit for a long time and then you pay for it.’ My sister is offended and says there are many restaurants in the Country. As such, I don’t bring up the street lighting, even though you’d have thought that the Country would have caught on by now.
As it happens, the nicest restaurant in these parts turns out to be Allium in Fairford, a little Cotswold market town just over ‘the Border’ in ‘the Gloucestershire’. Fairford is lovely, with its big church and 16th-century pub and all that honey-coloured Cotswold stone because, obviously, bricks haven’t made it here either. Allium itself is sited in a Grade II listed building which, inside, is quietly smart, with its vanilla-painted panelled room, chocolate suede chairs, tables draped in white linen and no Jumbo Crosswords hiding under them (I checked). My sister and I are a little nervous about coming here, largely because we have a huge army of children with us, and this restaurant, which opened only last May, has already been awarded South-West Restaurant of the Year by Les Routiers Guide 2005 and Gloucestershire Newcomer of the Year by The Good Food Guide 2005. Yikes. Every restaurant now affects to like children, but very few do really, and who can blame them? All that mess and dribble. All those upturned drinks. All that wetting of the pants. Actually, that’s just me. (And trust me on this: don’t skip your pelvic floor exercises after having a baby. Alternatively, if you do, never sneeze.) Still, we phone ahead beforehand to ask if children are OK, and receive some very encouraging noises, so think we’ll give it a go.
The restaurant, it turns out, is owned and run by James and Erica Graham, a husband and wife team who previously ran the Michelin-listed restaurant at Wickham Vineyard in ‘the Hampshire’. James, who has worked with Raymond Blanc and Gordon Ramsay, is the head chef while Erica is front of house. The youngest kids certainly test Erica’s devotion by colouring in stickers and then insisting she wears them on her chest. She does. Most cheerfully. She also says the restaurant is happy to do half-portions, or something plainly cooked, if we like, which some of the kids do.
The lunchtime menu? Stunningly good value, I think: £15 for two courses, £17.50 for three. And just listen to what you can have: truffled cauliflower soup; confit breast of pigeon with asparagus and poached egg; panfried calves’ liver with capers; loin of pork with white beans and bacon. I start with the truffled soup which, I have to say, might be worth moving to ‘the Country’ for. It’s both intensely earthy and light as a cloud. Wonderful. Next, most of us adults have the confit of duck with cassoulet which I would like to find fault with, because finding fault is so much fun, but I honestly can’t. The confit is crisp on the top, loose on the bone, and the beans, which can so often be mushy, have retained both their bite and integrity. As for my mango soufflé with mandarin ice-cream — well, superb.
So here it is, then, a truly family-friendly, excellent restaurant, wholly reliant on seasonal local produce, that isn’t up itself. My last memory of Erica will be with a badly coloured-in cherry on her bosom. However, I am now back in London with the sirens and sexual assaults and Jumbo still in the bushes. Should I never appear here again, you will know he has done me in. Stabdra!
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