Ducks in a row

We've just received through the post a copy of the free CAMRA magazine from the Manchester area. Published by Stockport and South Manchester Branch it's very professional. In it there is a nice article called "Peak Practice" which gives us a very glowing report. Check it out at
http://www.ssmcamra.org.uk/page24.html but watch out this link will go out of date when the next months issue is realised.

Well it only took Dave a month to get his birthday present - but it was worth waiting for. After much deliberation digital SLR camera is has now been acquired. So some indulgence....

Here you see a picture of one of our regulars Mr Redbreast. He often comes into the bar and he can be real trouble to get out again. But at least he stays with us through the winter......
And a seasonal visitor as are most. They arrived at the end of April and have now got youngsters that are just flying the nest. We guess they'll be gone by the end of September.

The last post was a little down beat due to the increasing difficulties of sourcing high quality local ingredients. This time we can announce that at least one producer has come up trumps by supplying Ducks from Goosnargh packed in polystyrene with ice and put on a standard carrier overnight.
See right "Ducks in a row!!".
It's a good job there's not much meat on a Robin.

And finally a pic from the peat track across the valley.

Remote and nobodies local.........

.......but increasing numbers of regulars.

It's interesting being possibly one of the remotest Inns in England. It is even more interesting when you try to source locally. Over the last 12 months we have engaged various local companies who supply quality food products. We are finding that some of them are experiencing problems making the delivery service economic due to increasing diesel and labour costs. We in turn find that achieving the quality service that stands out from the rest is getting increasingly difficult to achieve, but strive to do so we will.

We achieve our quality by planning ahead and trying not to overstretch ourselves or our staff. This is one of several reasons why booking for evening meals is important.

May has been a very good month keeping us busy, along with the increasing number of repeat customers who like what we do and with the better weather so far this year - we have a healthier trade. June kicked off with a beer festival that was very busy but increasingly it is looking like the effort of setting up the marque, organising casual staff and the cost of entertainment for what in effect is just one busy night might not really pay off for us - especially as the time between the May holiday and the beer festival is very short.....we'll have to take a view on this.

To return to the supply chain problems. We have just this week been told by a very good specialist food supplier that they no longer consider the Western Lake District an economically viable place to deliver to. This is somewhat disappointing when we are trying to champion local produce. Despite the sense in keeping food miles low it is actually easier to get food grown in the southern hemisphere than it is to get food delivered here from elsewhere in Cumbria.

Our thanks to Andy Pratt, Gilcrux Trout Farm and Country Cuts who still do us proud

The same seems to be true of staff. Even the Polish labour market is now drying up. We are always interested in quality British staff. Largely the quality staff are only recruitable from further a field, if there is anybody out there who can prove us wrong on this we'd be delighted to hear from you.

Iulian, thanks for your help when you were here, hope your exams go OK

The Boot Beer Festival 2008

Flambe fantastic!!

Yet again we failed to burn down the marquee. However Dave appears to have even less hair than he did last week.

We're really pleased how well the Eskdale Saddleback Pork went down - thanks Country Cuts - Sold out completely on Saturday night. But then we nearly had no food at all by the end of the night.

Vortigern stormed a good gig, despite being without a fiddler - and Moss Troupers were superb, you wouldn't believe they only practice for a few hours together before each gig, which is only a couple of times a year. If anybody has pics of the bands it would be great to have copies.

Here's Andrew and Razvan doing the real work (left) while Dave (above) is up to his usual pyromaniac activities.

Then there's Sarah, wondering what on earth her Dad is on about this time .....where's Alfie and Helen?????? Alfie we would guess is too busy playing football rather than working, and Helen is busy looking after customers.

Thank's Swindonians for the photo's...........did we get round to barring you or not??? or just baa-ing you.