This time we were going all posh with a lunch in the Citizen in Glasgow.
We got the bus in to Glasgow and were surprised when it took a different route than normal. It turned out that the westbound dual carriageway that leads to the motorway was being dug up and resurfaced. The work will until the end of this week. I’m assuming the eastbound carriageway will get the same treatment next week. Poor bus driver had a dreary long drive through the many traffic lights in to Glasgow.
The Citizen is an old established restaurant in Glasgow. It’s located in the old offices of The Glasgow Citizen Newspaper on St Vincent Place. Scamp had an Itison voucher for lunch for two. We got seated at the back of the restaurant, which is where most of the diners were.
Menus looked good and Scamp ordered Haggis Stack for her starter and Fish and Chips for her main. I had Mackerel Pate for starter and Steak Pie for main. Scamp’s haggis was lovely she said and I can verify that, having a wee fork full to taste. The batter on her fish, though, was a bit oily she said, and the chips appeared to be not twice cooked, but more like four or five times cooked. My starter was fine, although the mackerel pate had a bit too much cream in it, but the steak pie had been in the oven for too long and the meat was dry and hard. We had a cocktail as part of the deal and we both chose the gin version. They certainly weren’t stinting with the alcohol in the cocktail. Maybe a bit sweet, but certainly packing a punch.
All in all, we weren’t all that impressed with The Citizen. Oily batter and a pie that was baked to death are not what you expect to get in such an illustrious restaurant. We’ve had better examples of both food choices in Brodens in Condorrat. Maybe it was because we were on a voucher meal, but that shouldn’t matter. We were still paying customers. I don’t think we’ll be back.
I’d noticed the photos on the wall when we went in, lots of them and I recognised the work as being from Charles Hamilton’s camera. We correspond quite often on Flickr and I remembered that I’d read that he had been asked to produce a set of Glasgow Faces for the restaurant. Good to see that they are still there.
We had a walk around Glasgow. Up Sauchiehall Street to see the renovations being done there. Scamp laughed at a sign that advertised the shops that would be “Coming Soon” to the street. Among them was Watt Brothers which closed about three years ago!
Got the bus back home and thankfully it was just the normal route. Later we watched the second episode of Bake Off: The Professionals. Just as good as the first one.
PoD was a shot I took outside the GOMA of two ladies having a laugh. I don’t think they knew each other, or even spoke each other’s language fluently, but a joke is a joke in everyone’s language.
Tomorrow Scamp is intending to go to see Annette’s granddaughter’s dance show, so she has given her apologies to Kirsty. I was half intending to go to Kirsty’s class by myself, but someone must have warned them and it seems like everyone is giving it a body swerve. Am I really that bad? NO! Don’t answer that question!!