Cafe Eat, Grainger market

They're coming along a bit like buses, these cafes, and I spotted another one on Pink Lane as well!  Hey ho, next week maybe!  But to business!  Cafe Eat, eat in or takeaway, actually eat in is a bit of a misnomer, as you are eating out in the middle of the Grainger market and I half expected comments from passers by and people holding up small children saying 'Look!  That one's eating!  Look!'

However, Grainger market is always nice to visit and there are cafes galore.  Could this be Newcastle's cafe hub?  Ordering arrangements weren't too clear - should I order at the counter, wait to be seated, wait to be served, carry my tea back myself?  Life can be too darn complicated if you try to get it all right, so I ordered at the counter, other people were waited on.  I waited for my tea, and pie and peas to be brought to me while others carried their own tea back and waited for their food.

The pot of tea was lovely.  The pie and peas were just right.  The price was great value and they do deals on scones/cake and tea in the afternoons.  Long may it continue!

Jayz II , Grainger Market

It's the run up or countdown (depending whether the glass is half full or half empty) to my birthday this week.  I've already had one card, two invites for food and a visit from my lovely brother planned.  Really, it's a serial birthday party.  Most people get all their friends in one place and celebrate, I keep mine neatly compartmentalised and end up doing about six different things.  So, today was Birthday Party 1, but where to go?  We did think of  chinese, but couldn't find just the right place, we thought cake, then we thought savoury and by that time were so hungry that cannibalism seemed a distinct possibility.

 Fortunately we were saved by a a chance encounter with Jayz II, where for about the same as you would pay for insubstantial cakes for two in a more (pretentious- is that a word?) establishment, you can get fish and chips with mushy peas and a pot of tea and sausage, beans and chips.  I had the sausages and mighty fine they were too, ditto beans and chips. 

It was a real nostalgia fest.  The kind of meal I would have eaten in the Fuchsia Cafe with my mother in the recent past.  The kind of cafe that just reminded me of my childhood and the original Chicken Cafe in the butter market (long since demolished)  in Newton Abbot where we'd have a cup of tea on market day.

And you know what?  It wasn't even on my hitlist!  I still have more cafes than weeks left in this year!  Birthday Party II here we come...