Thought for Food
A Tour of North Wales
By RAYMOND POSTGATE I am the editor, and indeed the writer, of a gastronomic guide to British hotels and restaurants, called the Good Food Guide, and published regularly by Cassell (7s. 6d.). In between publication dates I get, of course, a great deal of information about the food at various places, some of it reliable, some not so reliable. Hence- forward, I aim to pick out some of the more interesting—and, I hope, more reliable—pieces of news and pass them on to you. But first, a warn- ing. Since the Good Food Club is independent and accepts no payment from hotels or res- taurants, it has no staff and I shan't be able to answer individual queries—though the Spectator will do its best to do so.
When I say I am 'writer' of the Guide I should explain that I merely mean I hold the pen. The material does not come out of my head. Any- body who claimed to have visited and personally tested the cuisine of nearly 800 places in Great Britain within (at the most) eighteen months should either be denounced as a liar or asked to leave his stomach to the nation. The material on which I write my verdicts is supplied by the many thousands of members of the Good Food Club. (All readers of the Guide are automatically members of the Club, and are asked to send in their comments to me.) This time, however, I am going to write about my personal experiences. The information won't be the more valuable for that reason; it may be less. I have recently, and with great pleasure, gone on a gastronomic tour of North Wales. But the hotel-keepers knew I was coming, and it may well be that they made special efforts, as they would not have done for a casual client. This possibility is reinforced by the names of my com- panions, Wynford Vaughan Thomas and Philip Harben. Wynford's voice is known to every Welshman who has a radio or a TV set; Philip's beard, I imagine, has only to appear at an hotel door for electric messages to be sent through to the kitchen.
Nevertheless, what was set before us is in- dubitably proof that these hotels can, if they choose, cook most admirable food; what one has to do is to ask. It is by no means sure, by the way, that they will all be open and serving food at Christmas; a letter of inquiry beforehand is an elementary precaution. Anyway, here they are : Saracen's Head, Beddgelert. Recently taken over by a young and enterprising, if rather shy couple, Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd Jones. We had excel- lent large rainbow trout, stuffed 'and grilled, with butter poured over them. Normally, I suppose, these would have come from the river running by the hotel, but last summer was so dry there were hardly any fish in its shallow waters; anyway, they were fresh. The centre-piece was the Welsh roast lamb. I cannot understand why it is so difficult to get Welsh lamb in London, and why, when you do find it, it 'doesn't seem to taste the same. It is the sweetest of meat, because, I sup- pose, of the mountain grass and herbs the beasts feed on. It was excellent here and not over- cooked. There was also a blackberry pie whose crust Harben said was perfect.
Trecastell Hotel, Bull Bay (Anglesey). The lobsters caught in Bull Bay. are supposed to be firmer and sweeter fleshed than any others except those caught near Swansea. This appears to be quite possibly true; the landlady, Mrs. Hanson Boulton, chopped them up and served them in their shells accompanied by pimentoes and mushrooms, and they certainly had a quality of their own. The kidneys in red wine which followed were soft (they are usually leathery) and there was a quite remarkable 'Arabic Banana,' served in its skin, hot, under a meringue and flavoured with a liqueur.
Portmeirion, near Penrhyndeudraeth. This is, if you are ignorant enough to need the informa- tion, an astonishing ltalianate village built on his own estate by Clough Williams-Ellis, the architect. There is a lot of literature about it, written by people far more competent than myself on the subjects of landscape gardening and building. It is undoubtedly very beautiful and there is prob- ably nothing like it elsewhere in the world. All I am qualified to say is that in the Hotel we ate Welsh buttermilk soup flavoured with samphire---- samphire, I said, a fabulous marsh-plant, which I have never tasted before and which gave a bright final taste of its own to the smooth white liquid. We also had Portmeirion pie, a crisp crust over hot mussels cooked in the chef's own sauce. And, of course, Welsh lamb.
Though it is not intended to repeat information already printed in the Guide, I feel I must men- tion that the Tyn-y-Coed, Capel Curig, not onlY fully lived up to its reputation, but offered us something we had never tasted before—Welsh cockle patties, a quite delicious first dish.
Finally, make a note of the Mermaid, Foel Ferry, opposite Carnarvon Castle on the other side of the Menai Straits. It is a very small place which a culinary genius, Mrs. Hinchcliffe Davies, made famous for a limited and not cheap menu of really high cuisine. When she left, all gourmets in the area lamented, because there is nothing of even remotely the same character for miles around. I have not been to it myself under the new regime, but a large number of people tell me that Mr., Mrs. and Miss St. John Price have restored its pristine distinction. If you go there, tell me about it.
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