We had breakfast at the eclectic Roots & Fruits the other day. Sat in the window on mis-matched chairs looking out onto the quiet Grand Arcade, we ordered a standard English breakfast of eggs, toast, mushrooms, beans, hash browns. Nothing fancy, nothing out of the ordinary, but well cooked and served with early Stevie Wonder [...]
La Grillade is a typical French restaurant, just like the places you’d find in any sizable French town. Except it’s in Leeds. That makes it special. The restaurant is housed in the basement of a Victorian terrace, and looks uninspiring from the outside. Down the stairs, it’s a different world, a series of small dining [...]
Let’s start at the end. “Please could I have the bill?” “Yes, of course.” The bill arrives, with a generous service charge added. Fair enough. The service had been OK. The waitress returns with the card machine and prints off a receipt with a space for a tip and a final total. She gives it [...]
Sir Titus Salt built the model village of Saltaire between 1850 and 1875 to house the workers from his enormous and imposing Italianate mill. Eight hundred and fifty houses were built for Salt’s workers, each with fresh water, a gas supply and an outside lavatory, amenities that, in the dark of the industrial North, bordered [...]