Food and drink on Cardiff's Whitchurch Road

Last March, I started a new job. My old office was on Ocean Way where Subway and the pub across the road were the only lunch options, so imagine my excitement when I started working a stone's throw away from Cardiff's Whitchurch Road.

I've tried lots of the cafes and restaurants this busy road has to offer over the last 15 months, so I thought I'd post a summary of where I've been so far.



Got Beef

I've been to Got Beef three times over the last few months, and it might be my favourite restaurant on Whitchurch Road. There's a big variety of different burgers on the menu, ranging from the weird and wonderful to good old bacon cheeseburgers. Got Beef is very reasonably priced, particularly if you order from the lunch menu, and it's a great option for both lunch and dinner. You'll smell of burger fat for a few hours after you've left, but I promise it'll be well worth it.

Brass Beetle

Brass Beetle specialises in pizza and cocktails, and I've been there twice so far.  I've always had my car with me so haven't been able to sample their cocktails yet, but they also have a lovely selection of mocktails. The pizzas are cooked in a huge wood-fire oven at the back of the restaurant, and my pizza was really spectacular both times. Taking the size of the pizzas into account (they're massive), I think Brass Beetle is pretty reasonable. Again, it's a nice option for both lunch and dinner.

Crispy Duck

I tried Crispy Duck for the first time last week. I don't know of many pan-Asian restaurants in the Cardiff and Penarth area, so this one was an excellent find. I had lemon chicken and egg fried rice, and my friend ordered the sweet and sour chicken. We were the only people in the restaurant when we arrived at 6:30pm, but it was full by the time we left. I thought the prices were very reasonable, and I'll definitely be trying this restaurant again soon. It's worth noting that it's only open for lunch on Sundays, but it felt more like a nice dinner option to me in any case.

The Greek Spot

A big group of us went to The Greek Spot a few months ago for a colleague's leaving lunch. My food was ridiculously cheap, and there was loads of it! I'd say it felt more like a lunch spot than a dinner location, but that might just have been because there were so many of us. We were served very quickly and the staff members we met were really friendly and helpful. With such a varied menu, I'd definitely like to visit again at some point.

Cocorico Patisserie

I've been to Cocorico a few times for both food and drinks. The lunch I had there was absolutely delicious and it still pops into my head all the time. I've also had hot chocolate and macarons there a couple of times. I'm yet to sample their decadent cakes, so I need to make sure I tick that off my list before the year is out. Although the cakes are pretty expensive, I thought the lunch prices were very reasonable. Cocorico closes at 6pm, so it's one to add to your lunch list.

The Pot Bistrot

I haven't eaten at The Pot Bistrot yet, but I did pop in for a hot chocolate with a friend one evening. There was a lovely atmosphere in the restaurant and it felt quite upmarket. The Pot has sporadic opening hours during the week, so make sure you check when it's open ahead of your visit if you do decide to pop in one afternoon or evening.

I've also popped in to So Coffee Bar numerous times for a takeaway hot chocolate, and I fully plan to treat myself to a drink-in hot chocolate and a piece of cake at some point. My only complaint is that they're not open on a Monday which is when I need my hot chocolate fix the most! 

By this time next year, I'll hopefully have tried even more places on Whitchurch Road. Can you recommend anywhere else I should try? 

What I ate in Venice

It already feels as if our trip to Venice was about two years ago after a crazy busy couple of weeks. One way of keeping the memories alive is to blog about them, so here's another holiday blog post!

I posted a photographic summary last week, so this week I've decided to focus on what we ate (and drank) during our time in Venice.

We ate breakfast at the hotel every morning as this was included in the price of our room. I've loved the breakfasts we've experienced at every Italian hotel we've ever stayed in, and Hotel Savoia & Jolanda is no exception. They offer a huge buffet breakfast with loads of choice, and you can be as light and healthy or as deliciously indulgent as you like. I had a hot chocolate every morning along with various combinations of fresh bread rolls, meats, cheeses, pastries, yoghurt, granola, and lots of other sugary beauties. Don't be fooled by the photo below... this isn't an accurate representation of the size of my breakfast!

Breakfast kept us going until late morning which conveniently meant we were hungry again just in time for lunch. We usually had something quick from a little side street, such as a pizza slice or a filled wrap, which we took away to eat as we walked. These lunches were really cheap but so fresh and tasty.

We decided to have a sit-down lunch one afternoon at Hotel Londra Palace's Bistrot 4172 which was spectacular. We sat outside in the sunshine with a glass of Prosecco and a Mojito, and we were given a massive bread basket to start. I ordered the Ravioli dell'alto Veneto and I could honestly have eaten it three times over because it was so perfect.

As if that wasn't enough food to be getting on with, we also went out for a nice dinner every evening while we were in Venice. Due to the great location of our hotel, we didn't have to stray very far to find amazing and varied restaurants. On two evenings, we simply walked downstairs to eat in our hotel's Ristorante Principessa. The other restaurants we tried (Conca d'Oro and Trovatore) were only a short walk away.

Do you know what I really love about Italian restaurants? It's perfectly acceptable to order pasta for your first course and steak for your main, and you can still order a starter and/or dessert if you fancy it. SO MUCH FOOD.

You might think we had more than enough food between our breakfast, lunch and dinner, but you'd be wrong. We also needed to make sure we kept ourselves going with little (and large) snacks throughout the day. We had a scoop or two of gelato most days, and we also had a lovely pastry and hot chocolate in a little cafe one afternoon. I also treated myself to a rum hot chocolate from Venchi which I had to eat with a spoon because it was so thick. Yes, really.

As you can see, we ate rather a lot of food during our holiday. We also made sure we sampled several cocktails along the way, and we had some lovely Prosecco and wine with our dinners.

We stopped off at the hotel bar for a happy hour cocktail nearly every afternoon, and we had some amazing after-dinner cocktails at the LondraBar. 'Amazing' doesn't actually feel like a powerful enough superlative to describe them... they were definitely up there with the best cocktails I've ever had. Cocktails in Italy tend to be served with a selection of snacks, so our constant stream of eating was never interrupted.

I think this blog post proves that our food and drink escapades in Venice get an eleven out of ten (at least). 

Have you visited any of these restaurants, or have I convinced you to try them on your next trip to Venice? 

What I ate in New York

Now that my Christmas and new year blog posts are done and dusted, I thought it was about time I wrote another blog post about New York.

January feels as if it's dragged on for about a hundred years, and it genuinely feels like a lifetime ago since we experienced the magic of New York during the festive season.

We really love eating (shock horror) so we researched lots of places to eat before we went and plotted all the possibilities on a Trello board. We also added a few must-do-again restaurants to our list after falling in love with a few on our first trip to New York six years ago.

If you know me at all, you'll know that my days are always structured around food whether I'm at home, in work or on holiday. We started every day with a classic American breakfast which usually kept us full until mid afternoon, then we'd have a snack and a hot drink before going out for dinner a few hours later.

After reading the title of this post, I know you all just want see some food photos rather than scrolling through my ramblings. Your wish is my command...



Breakfast 

We ate breakfast at our hotel on the first morning. It was a good breakfast but was very expensive, so we decided to eat at Tick Tock Diner every morning for the rest of our trip. It was only a ten minute walk from our hotel, and we had a bonus view of the Empire State Building from our table if we were given a window seat. The pancakes at Tick Tock Diner are my absolute favourites, and I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm salivating just thinking about them.

Fast food 

One of the many excellent things about New York is the sheer amount of places where you can eat on the go. There's a huge variety of cuisines to choose from to suit every possible dietary requirement and appetite. Our most difficult decision was figuring out how to try as many places as we possibly could during our trip without over-eating and making ourselves sick.

We discovered a place that sold huge pizza slices for two dollars on our first afternoon so we promptly went there for our first snack of the holiday. Obviously you can't go wrong with a pizza slice for two dollars, so we visited a couple more times before the end of our trip.

We couldn't go to New York without getting a takeaway cheesecake to eat in our hotel room over three days, so we made sure we went to Junior's to get the biggest slice of cheesecake I've ever seen. True to form, it did last three days. 

The next two snacks were absolute must-dos after our last trip. The best hot dog I've ever had from the food court in Grand Central Station, and a giant burrito from Chipotle Mexican Grill.

Lastly on the snack front, no day in my life is complete without a hot chocolate stop. Although we tried to go to coffee shops we wouldn't find in the UK for the most part, I did succumb to a Starbucks one afternoon when I had a sugar low and was freezing cold. 

Dinner 

We'd scouted out all the restaurants we went to for dinner on TripAdvisor beforehand and they definitely lived up to the hype.

My favourite find was Bareburger on 46th St, and we ate here on our first evening and our last evening. If America does one thing really well, it's big fat burgers. And just look at the size of those onion rings! There are lots of sweet potato fries hiding under there too which were equally as delicious. 

After trying Junior's last time we visited New York and rating it as our best meal of the trip, we absolutely had to visit again. The photo makes my meal look a bit beige and bland, but I can promise you that it wasn't. However, I will grudgingly admit that it was far too big for me to eat the entire thing. 

Pure Thai, a little hidden gem on 9th Avenue, was another firm favourite. We would easily have walked past it without a thought if we hadn't looked it up on TripAdvisor. It was a tiny little restaurant with fewer than ten tables so we were lucky to get seated without a booking. The food was so simple but SO TASTY, and the service was fantastic. 

We splashed out on an expensive meal at K Rico Steakhouse, a few doors up from Pure Thai. We had three courses and a couple of glasses of wine, and it was well worth the price. The waiter helpfully warned us that the desserts were big enough to share, so I didn't eat that entire slice of cheesecake myself (just in case you were wondering). 

I well and truly miss New York and its amazing food, and I'm absolutely starving after writing this post. Have I inspired you to try any of these places if/when you visit New York? Let me know! 

Annual Christmas shopping trip

For the last ten years or so, my uni friends and I have organised a Christmas shopping get-together just before Christmas. We usually meet in late November or early December, but we met a little earlier this year due to my impending trip to New York.

Our first few meet ups took place in Cribbs Causeway, and we've also met in Cardiff a few times. However, in recent years, we've met in Bristol city centre as that's the most convenient meeting point for the majority of the group.

Our trip was scheduled in for last Sunday and I decided to catch the Megabus to Bristol. It only cost £10 for a return ticket and it was certainly a lot more relaxing than trying to drive my way around Bristol. I took a photo of City Hall from the bus just before I left Cardiff, purely because of the unexpected rainbow!

It was raining when I left Cardiff, but I was met with brilliant sunshine and blue skies when I arrived in Bristol. I wandered around a couple of shops and made some standard purchases from Lush before making my way to our meeting point on Park Street. I got trapped in the massive Remembrance Day crowd while I walked to Park Street, so I stopped for a while to watch some of the ceremony and to pay my respects by observing the two minute silence.

We all met just before 12 and decided to go straight for lunch. These days, there's a lot more focus on eating and talking than there is on actual shopping during our meet ups. Our go-to restaurant is Pizza Express as there's always something on the menu to suit everyone, so we made our way there immediately.

I ordered a pink gin cocktail and the ragu romana pizza. I don't think my pizza was quite as good as last year's festive beauty, but it was still pretty excellent. To be fair, I don't think I've ever been disappointed by a meal in Pizza Express.

After a long lunch with lots of catching up, we looked around a few of the pretty shops on Park Street. Although I didn't buy much as I've nearly finished my Christmas shopping, I always love looking around the beautiful independent shops and soaking in the Christmassy atmosphere.

I needed to get back to the Megabus stop by 4:30pm, so we finished off the day with a caramelised orange hot chocolate in Costa. Let's be honest, no Christmas shopping trip is complete without a Christmas hot chocolate with all the trimmings. I did accidentally ask for a caramelised onion hot chocolate which was pretty embarrassing, but let's gloss over that part.

I was completely exhausted by the time I got on the bus. I even managed to have a little nap on the journey back to Cardiff which is unheard of for me. I loved catching up with everyone and sampling Bristol's Christmassy atmosphere, and it feels pretty exciting that one of my pre-Christmas staples has already taken place. 39 days to go until the big day!