The galloping gourmet started at 9.30am on Saturday 6th July 2013. An uneventful trip down the A1 and M11 from Tockwith North Yorkshire, with the first pit stop at: The Cricketers, Clavering North Essex. A charming village pub/restaurant with exceptional food and service, only to be expected as the owners are Jamie Oliver's parents. I had a marvellous Pork Belly and Heidi had a wonderful 5 spice Duck Salad. It was a beautiful day, about 29° Celsius and the diners outside were eating freshly prepared Pizza from Jamie's oven venture.The chefs were very accommodating when I got talking about my bread making courses at Richard Bertinet, River Cottage and Bettys. They make their dough with a 50:50 mix of strong flour and double zero flour - the wetter the better was my memorable out-take.

Onward to our overnight stay at : The Marquis at Alkham, conveniently located just 5 minutes away from the Eurotunnel terminal. Sadly that was the only redeeming feature. The room was uninspiring, we had to ask for toilet paper and the TV remote was missing with no solution made other than apology. Having already had a nice lunch we decided to have just a main course, both having the local beef, a duo of Featherblade, one braised and the other thinly sliced and perfectly pink. This came with Anna Potatoes and a lovely selection of broad beans, complimented with a slightly overpowering mustard jus. The food was excellent but the service was appalling. We waited 1 hour and 25 minutes for our main to be presented at table, the service seemed to stop halfway through service. We had a miserable waiter who blamed Heidi for ordering hers medium to well done! Clearly this was not the braised element. This is a very over rated establishment with poor service and a scruffy/forgetful sommelier. Next time we will go straight to France and skip the overnighter.

Total mileage: 270 miles