Went in a cafe of the wrong class today. [sad face]

[TiggyD]

There were 2 cafes near each other. I picked the wrong one. I'm lower middle class and the cafe was for middle middle class to about lower upper class. I should have guessed by the little accent they put over the 'e' in the name.

I went in and up to the counter and asked for a sausage roll and a hot chocolate and they didn't give it to me. I was told to go sit at a table. My sausage roll came served on a plate with salad which, and you might not believe this, somebody had drizzled on! I'm guessing it was basil oil or some such frippery, although the cafe with an accent was next to a boating lake the same colour.

I should have gone to the other one where I'm sure I could have just taken the sausage roll in a bag or on a paper plate without being drizzled at.

It's hard being English.

Hot tubs are not mc. They're on a par with Sky television, surely????

Apocryphal story from The Telegraph, April 2015:

Labour grandee Peter Mandelson once mistook a Hartlepool fish and chip shop's mushy peas for the avocado dip guacamole.

Fiderer - if you don't yet own the classic book 'The Meaning of Liff', you really need to get it.

Some of the references may be a little dated - is there still anywhere which serves a trio of 'relishes' with burgers ( a green one, a red one and a yellow one) ? And do they do it ironically?

Thread hijack alert!

Fid am en route today to Washington. If oonly our own dear Jed Bartlet were really campaigning!

As you were

was dammit

Errol DH is originally from a little place near Market Deeping which means 'stealing from a market stall' according to Meaning of Liff, as I recall

Thanks Errol have ordered it

Is there a game similar to Mornington Crescent where we could use place names?

Shepton Mallet to Weasenham St Peter, as an example. You can't go from East Barsham to East Rudham on a Monday, or you could if you went the long way around via Fring.

Hijacky < TSSDNCOP - Hassled & I have a white board and blue&red markers at the ready to do a Josh. Have a feeling whatever the outcome I'll be due a re-watch when this election is over. Where's Leo when you need him?>

Is there a game similar to Mornington Crescent where we could use place names?

I think anyone who understands the rules of Mornington Crescent should know the answer to that one.

Errol.

Where are we aiming for? I do like "Little Snoring" but was rather taken by Whaplode Drove, Swanton Novers, and South Creake.

Oh, I think the end point must always be Mornington Crescent. But start where you will ... possibly not on this thread, unless a teashop or other type of eating place can be named.

The Guacamole/mushy peas incident occurred in a school dinner hall he was visiting. Local news had a field day!

Yes, the whiteboard and marker plans are ready. I also have a secret plan to fight inflation which I'm sure will come in handy.

2kids2dogsnosense that's hilarious, I can just imagine the local reports!

In other tea-servage nonsense I had a shocker of an experience in a cafe in Eastern Europe this summer. I had ordered a cup of tea, which was served as a cup of boiling water with a tea-bag on the side. I asked if I could have some milk with it, expecting to be given a little jug or carton of milk to add once the brew had brewed. Can you imagine the horror that came upon me as the lady serving me took away my cup of boiling water.......and poured milk directly into it there and then.

It took every fibre of my British Being not to show any public display of emotion whatsoever, other than a cheery "thank you" but inside I was dead I tell you.

I had ordered a cup of tea, which was served as a cup of boiling water with a tea-bag on the side

Some Italian places here do that. Drives me crackers! You need BOILING water directly onto the tea bag or leaves to make a decent cuppa. I usually send it back now. It's not like it is hard work put the teabag into the cup and THEN put the boiling water in, is it?

the lady serving me took away my cup of boiling water.......and poured milk directly into it there and then. It took every fibre of my British Being not to show any public display of emotion whatsoever, other than a cheery "thank you" but inside I was dead I tell you.

I would have cried . . .

I used to think that the curly sausage in Wimpy was the mutts re sophisticated dining as a child.
a bender in a bun?

Has anyone mentioned the kind of places which offer to ADD THE SUGAR FOR YOU!??

When you're getting a coffee to take away?

They hand you a paper cup...with or without lid. Then look at you like :/ when you ask "Where's the sugar please?"

It's usually in a grotty, crusted pot behind the counter and they say

"How many?"

And I always say "I'll do it myself"

They HATE that. I wonder if they're tight with the sugar or what? What is their REASONING behind not having sugar readily available for carry out coffee!?

I went to a lovely little artisan tea room in Nepal with Tibetan prayer flags flying and everything. The tea was beyond rank. They'd used the same water that they'd boiled the rice in, and instead of using milk they used rancid YAK butter.

I didn't leave a tip

That'll have buggered your karma. You can't really quibble at regional tastes.

I made the mistake of taking my Dad to a frightfully naice eatery once. It was famed for it's vegetarian food. In retrospect this was a mistake as my Dad (deffo NOT middle class) is the type of chap to read all through the menu before ordering a steak and chips meal.
He was appalled by the "weird rice stuff" (bulgar wheat) and the fact that there was no meat.

He sat at the table (by a tres posh manageress)saying "there should be a sign outside saying Bernie Inn 10 miles up the road...go on it's worth it."

That was 15 years ago

I have never dared go back. Could have killed the bugger

I've given up on tea here in Forrin. Years of "Black tea with milk please" and years of "With milk? Are you sure?"
Years of sometimes tepid water, Lipton's tea bag, small pot of UHT coffee cream.

Switched to ordering hot chocolate, less disappointing. And inhale my imported Clipper/Twinings tea when I get home.

Was in a cafe/café in England at half term. Decent tea, shortbread, and a host of wanky bakey things which I ignored as was so pleased to have real tea. In a pot.

Simple pleasures.

I don't like the tea rooms with one tiny toilet and the only thing separating you on the toilet and your tea drinkers is one door. Because, and I am not a poo troll, I ALWAYS end up going in after someone has clearly done a number two and then someone ALWAYS goes in after me and probably thinks I did a shit in a tearoom. And these are posh tea rooms, not scrotal ones. Unless me calling it 'posh' immediately denotes my class...?

I ALWAYS end up going in after someone has clearly done a number two and then someone ALWAYS goes in after me and probably thinks I did a shit in a tearoom.

I used to go to a posh deli when the dds were tiny. It was the only place in our village to go apart from a freezing play corner in a church, and as I was going slowly insane from 'babies in a village with fuck all to do - itis' I went to this deli nearly every day, for a cup of coffee and an artisan scotch egg or some such poshdelifuckery.

The toilet in this place opened directly into the café, and one day when I was in the toilet, with dd2 in a buggy and dd1 tottering about, dd1 discovered the amazing talent she had for undoing locks......and pushing the door open to expose her harassed mother sat on the toilet with her knickers round her ankles to a café full of other artisan scotch egg munchers and the 2 students that worked in there as waiters. How I laughed.

Talk of toilets reminds me. A couple of years ago i was in toilet at library, beside cafe in library building - several women there washing hands or waiting for cubicle to be free. Someone had left a skid mark in pan. An elderly woman said very loudly 'It wasn't me. It was her', and pointed to the back of a departing woman. I was amazed she was so sure - and that she actually cared. Nowadays i think we should all just be glad we've got a library & it comes with a toilet.