86-87 Western Road, Hove
Many apologies to my readers for taking so long to post. Something about Blogger and Internet Explorer isn’t quite mixing these days. Also, I’ve been putting off this particular post for quite some time as I wanted to make several visits in order to give it the justice it deserves. After all, it won an Observer’s Food Award for one of the best retailers in the Southeast and I believe it is a very successful foodie enterprise owned by a woman. Oh yeah. Sisters are doin’ it for themselves indeed! I even attended one of their Cheese & Wine Evenings (do you see the sacrifices I make?) in addition to having lunch on at least three occasions. It’s only a hop, skip & jump from the building where I work. I know. Lucky, lucky chica.
The Real Eating Company functions as both a gourmet food shop/deli and a restaurant. Some foodie faves are on display here as well as homemade goodies:
(Tyrrell’s asparagus and black pepper crisps I can highly recommend although they are VERY pepper-y. I haven’t tried the Smoked Salmon and Horseradish flavour because unfortunately I don’t like salmon. I have to get my omega-3’s from flaxseed oil like the veg-heads.)
Onto the Cheese & Wine Evening. The cheese. Oh, the cheese. We were all given an info sheet and I noticed that the evening began with the most mild, a type of goat’s cheese, and ended with the almighty Stilton paired with a shot of brandy. We also had glasses of sparkling English wines, both white and rose, and some chardonnay and sauvignon blanc. I felt slightly intimidated as I’m only really beginning to embrace my inner cheesegeek but the info sheets were helpful as were the women conducting it.
Passing by on another occasion, my now slightly-more-confident inner cheesegeek got the best of me and I felt myself in a sort of trance, being led upstairs to their wonderful deli. The lady behind the counter was very kind and let me taste several cheeses, all of which are either British or Irish. (Sidenote: there are more types of cheese produced in Britain than in France.) She even managed to find me an English cheese that was quite similar to my cheese o’ the mo, manchego. It’s called Berkswell and it only lasted one day in my fridge. I also made purchase of some lovely soft cheese from Co Tipperary called Cooleeney (which I was very happy to find again this past weekend at St George’s market in Belfast) and of course, some of the REC’s own chutney. I even managed a small sliver (at £2.40) of the newly (thanks to a certain animated dog-owning cheese lover) famous Stinking Bishop. The verdict? VERY stinky. Also very lovely, if you like your cheese strong.
Along with all this lovely cheese, their deli contains several food and drink goodies, both local and imported. I nearly squealed (yes. squealed.) with ex-pat delight when I saw that they carry the uber-cool and award winning Pain is Good American hot sauces. Just look at those labels! Even if they weren’t fantastic (which they are) I’d love to have them just for the design. I wonder if PIG take submissions from the public. If they do, I’d love to submit my husband’s face upon biting into last night’s fajitas. They could call it “Great British Wuss” or something to that effect. I wonder if their supplier carries PIG’s line of bbq and pasta sauces. YUM. I think their Bloody Mary mixes would sell a storm as well!
Let’s get to the food already shall we? I’ve never been disappointed when going to the REC for lunch. I’ve yet to go for dinner, most likely due to sheer laziness. Go to Hove? For dinner? You mean get on a bus? Yeah, yeah. I’m workin’ on it already, sheesh. Below are some snapshots of a lunch I had with my friend Phil; I had the fish and chips (you know it better be good for a tenner) and he had the hare stew:
Small things like a homemade basket of bread totally win me over. I need to point out that this lunch is from at least 6 weeks ago as it’s not really summer fare. Phil was kind enough to let me sample his hare and lentil stew (first time I’ve had hare) and it was delicious. There were even bits of shot in it, similar to when he ordered the pheasant stew back in winter. Some would be squeamish but hey-you know it’s fresh and not intensively farm-reared. (They do their best to get it all out but sometimes it’s hard to find it all. Phil didn’t seem to mind and I don’t think most people would as long as you gave them a head’s up first.) Look at that order of fish and chips. The chips, cut perfectly and covered in flakes of sea salt. I should’ve taken a picture of my plate after I was finished eating. You would see that there wasn’t a bit of anything left, not even the homemade tartar sauce. It was very scrummy and very filling. So I ordered my lemon tart (the best I’ve ever had, surpassing Carluccio’s by a long shot) to go.
I feel a bit like I’m bowing at the altar here so I will add one slight criticism. I want you to know that it pains me to do so, mostly because I’m hoping that those in charge at the REC will see how much love I have for them and offer me a job. Alas, I must be true to my readers. They serve the lovely Luscombe range of drinks and I couldn’t help but notice that the takeaway price is less than half of the eat-in price. I’m well aware that restaurants bring in the majority of their profits through drinks, alcoholic and non alike, but that much of a mark-up would turn some people away. I point this out because it pains me to think that there is a demographic of people out there that won’t experience the REC simply on this merit but I’m telling you, I know that they’re out there. I’m married to one of them.