*warning. Do not read this post if you are hungry*
Friday is always a tricky night. Sure, we have food in the fridge. But as the working week draws to a close neither Mr Manbag nor I have the energy to cook it. Plus there are the usual after work Friday night drinks to attend to which would mean that we wouldn’t get home until it’s too late to start cooking. So we go for drinks and decide to eat out. We even decide where to go – we’re going to got to LSQ2, of
disastrous breakfast fame. Give them another chance.
LSQ2 is a really nice looking restaurant. There’s a leather banquette down one side with buttons coloured to match the massive lampshades that are in various shades of purple and pink. It’s a nice space. We haven’t booked so we take a seat in the bar waiting for a table to be free.
We wait. Annoyingly we can see several empty tables and the staff seem to be on a mission to ignore us – no chance of some drinks, nibbles or even a copy of the menu while we’re waiting. We watch the other customers. Aside from being distracted by a bloke with his shirt unbuttoned far too far for his age, medallion glinting against his chest, hair combed forward to hide his male pattern baldness we notice that quite a few customers aren’t paying at their table – they’re taking their bills to the bar to pay. And there are people sat with menus when we arrived that are still sat with them 10 minutes later. It would seem that did we manage to get a table here it would be a long time before we got served. So we take our voucher for a free bottle of wine and decide to go elsewhere.
After a brief bit of bickering we decide to go to Pepe Sale, a local and independent Sardinian restaurant. It is in the mankiest part of town. On the side of the ugly Broad Street Mall with the 70’s multi-storey car park above, the 99p store and super-ugly Civic Centre just around the corner. Even the dining area itself is a funny little place, like an office that has been converted in to a restaurant. As ever, though, the welcome is warm. We are fairly regular visitors, coming for a touch of real Italian food (as opposed to the food from the glut of chain Italians that Reading is plagued by) every couple of months. Marco talks us through the specials (hand-picked mushrooms sauteed with garlic and herbs, home-made spaghetti with clams, chillies and tomatoes) pours our favourite wine and leaves us to think. When he returns I mention how lovely the pasta they used to do (creamy sauce, loads of mushrooms and some kind of spaghetti that Mr Manbag insists were noodles) was. He says that the kitchen can make it for me. For little old me! So that means I need to change my starter (from the wild mushrooms). Marco suggests some pan fried goat’s cheese with griddled courgettes and some balsamic glaze. It sounds delicious. I order it.
After Marco walks away and we’re tucking in to the big basket of Sardinian flatbread (wafer thin unleavened bread baked with salt, olive oil and rosemary) when Mr Manbag says “so you’ve basically ordered food that isn’t on the menu”. Indeed I have. We are such a part of the clientele here that we go off off piste, or at least I do. Not just off the set menu (a.k.a. off piste) but off the menu altogether. I feel smug.
I feel even smugger when my starter comes. A delicious round of cheese which has been cooked until the outside is crispy and sweet (with a touch or garlic. Garlic oil, maybe?) and it goes wonderfully well with the courgettes and balsamic. Gorgeous.
But that is nothing. When my main arrives I am bowled over. Home-made tagliatelle, wild mushrooms of all shapes and sizes, a dollop or two of cream, a generous helping of garlic, a sprinkling of parsley and just a touch of freshly ground black pepper, added by Marco himself. He proudly tells us that the mushrooms were picked by him. I ask what one of the wide white slices of ‘shroom is. He offers to show us. And of course we say yes.
He returns with a basket of mushrooms, all different shapes and sizes, covered by a napkin like some special secret gift. My white slice is from the stalk of a humungous beast of a mushroom. It must be 6 or 7 inches wide and about that tall. The stalk is over an inch thick, creamy and white and tasty (it seems especially good at soaking up the garlic and cream flavours). He handles each mushroom with care and tells us “this one is found under oak" and then he picks up another, smaller mushroom "and this one I find under pine trees”. He tells us how he enjoys going out picking them by hand. Just him and his dog. I can even picture it in my mind (the dog in my imagination is a terrier, wiry and small). He covers the mushrooms back up , carefully laying the napkin shroud across their truffly bodies, and leaves us to enjoy our meal.
Eventually I am replete. I can eat no more. Each mouthful is a mix of pleasure and pain – pleasure at the taste but pain at the increased feeling of stuffedness. I pass my plate over to Mr Manbag, who had a much more compact and less carbohydrate based main than me and he duly does his duty. And complains that I always order better than he does. Whilst troughing the rest of my food.
As we stroll back across town, arm in arm, distended bellies bouncing away, we decide that we should eat there more often. That LSQ2 probably doesn’t warrant another try. That wild mushrooms are really rather nice. That it’s lovely to feel special and eat things that aren’t on the menu. And that all is right with the world.
