Glasgow Eats

The first time that I went to Glasgow, I very much enjoyed The Ubiquitous Chip - which appears to be fairly ubiquitous as the city's go-to restaurant recommendation - but was not generally enamoured of the rest of it.  This summer we spent two nights there and had a splendid time.  It is too easy to think of Glasgow as Edinburgh's poor relation; it is less obviously pretty but it has a rough and tumble charm of its own that I just didn't appreciate the first time around.

Of course, our biggest priority was to make sure we got in some good food while there.  We already knew that we wanted to pay a return visit to The Chip, which took care of the first night, and it was just as lovely as before.  Highlights included a roast pork belly dish, with charred Baby Gem, butternut squash salsa and smoked onion cream:

And a white chocolate bavarois with raspberry fool and pistachio crumble.  White chocolate and raspberry is such a lovely combination, don't you think?  And this had the most beautiful, airy texture - like Angel Delight as made by actual angels.

If you are looking for a good spot for breakfast, and aren't too fussed about comfy seats, then you need to get down to Babu Street Kitchen.  It is Bombay street food with a Scottish influence - might sound weird, but tastes delicious.  D went for the bacon and omelette chapatti wrap:

While I had bhurji pau - spicy scrambled eggs on a toasted, buttered roll - which is a dish that I am determined to recreate at home.  It was zingy with ginger and chilli and just what I needed to blast away the cobwebs:

I'm only sorry we didn't make it there for lunch as that looked pretty special too - next time, Babu, next time!

Breakfast can only keep you going for so long though, and our second evening saw us roll up at a venue called The Meat Bar which had endeared itself to us by a) being just down the road from our hotel and b) being called The Meat Bar.  It's one of those faux dirty joints that are all over the place at the moment specialising in steaks and ribs and burgers and as far as all that went, it was jolly nice.  I had a smoked brisket sandwich which had a good punch of peaty flavour through the tender meat, while D opted for a burger which was satisfyingly messy.  Special mention must go to our shared dessert though, which was a salted caramel ice cream sundae topped with crumbled crispy bacon:

What can I say!  It kind of worked!

Finally though.  Possibly the foodie highlight of the entire trip and something that has been missing from my life for far too long.  Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the deep fried pickle:

There's not really much to say beyond the fact it's a slice of pickle.  In tempura batter.  Deep fried.  Hot, crispy, salty, sour...these babies were things of beauty and joys forever - and a very firm thank you to Glasgow's Brewdog for introducing us and possibly removing five years from my current life expectancy.