It's all kicking off!

I see that there's been action inside the former Cafe Piccolo and in the gloom this morning it looked as though a lot of the chairs and tables have been removed, either to the back of the premises or possibly sold off to pay their debts. Mrs Brinkster says that she spotted a group of people in there last week looking around the place so perhaps something is going to happen in there soon..... perhaps.

Speaking of action one Worcester Park resident has got his name in the papers for all the wrong reasons, as the Sutton Guardian explains:

An angry football player attacked a referee after he was ordered off the pitch during an amateur match.
Darren Brown, 27, of Windsor Road, Worcester Park, pulled Peter Forshaw, of Eltham and kicked him in the arm during the Catford Power League game in September.
Mr Brown sought revenge on Mr Forshaw after he was sent off for an infringement on the pitch in Canadian Avenue, Lewisham, when his team, the Wandsworth Borough, were playing RBS.

In context it seems inappropriate to say that the Guardian's kicking a man when he's down but I doubt the next bit will be going on Mr Brown's CV any time soon:

Mr Brown was arrested five days later and police found a small amount of cannabis was found in an ash tray at his home.
Guy Dilliway-Parry, defending, said the assault happened because Brown had felt ashamed at being responsible for spoiling the match.
He disputed that Mr Brown, who has several previous convictions and was in breach of a suspended sentence for having drugs and a prohibited weapon, kicked the referee.

The chips are down...

Anybody recognise this Worcester Park chip shop up for sale?

Business description
Established by the current owner in 2004, situated on a community parade in the popular Worcester Park Area. Serving fish & chips and fried chicken.The freeholder will grant a 20-year lease subject to references with a starting rent of £12,000 pa. Business rates are £610 pa. The Vendor advises us that the weekly sales average £3,600.

Kingfishing for compliments?

On the way home from work last night I saw that Kingfish was having a bit of a makeover with a new paint job in progress. It was closed at the time I went past and in my hurry to get home I didn't notice anything to say how long it's going to be closed for but if it's just a paint job I'm guessing it won't be long.

Were any of you at Chessington yesterday? Mrs Brinkster had toyed with the idea of taking the Clan to our friendly, neighbourhood theme park but then went to Guildford Spectrum instead, which turned out to be a good move as the theme park was forced to close for the second time in three days because of a power cut affecting the area. Initially the headlines were about people stuck on the thrill rides but actually the worst affected were those on the placid Skytrain ride who were there for several hours as there's no easy way to get them down, unlike most of the thrill rides. The ever-predictable Daily Mail comes up with the stirring headline, "Terrified children left dangling near lion enclosure for two hours after power is cut to rides at Chessington World of Adventures" but it actually precedes a fairly unexciting description of the day's events. It does note that Police were called to calm angry park-goers and I read somewhere else that a Chessington spokesperson had said that everyone present would receive a free ticket for a return visit, which is the least they could do, literally. It doesn't compensate people who took a day off work to go or paid to stay in the hotel but then I wasn't there so I don't know what really happened so I'll leave the final word to a comment on the Daily Mail's article which seems to give a realistic view:

"Seven of us travelled to Chessington today [from Kent] only to be faced with the power cut 45mins into our time there. The above report makes you think there was uncontolable panic at the park - this was simply not the case. We carried on going around the park for two hours and whilst, yes we saw people stuck on the rides, there was no screaming or hesterics. The staff, whilst maybe not on the ball as much as they should be, where doing the best they could. People stuck on rides were given drinks and crisps. They should have however used the tanoy system to tell people what was happening. Upon leaving, we were given different info from different staff regarding complimentary tickets or refunds. We plan to return over the next few weeks and hope for good weather and more importantly, power!"

Panel beating

I see from the Surrey Comet that the Harvester up by the Plough is looking to create a food panel in order to give feedback on the food and also to meet up and discuss it with other panel members.

The Kermit quotes:
John Jackson, manager of the Plough Harvester, said: “We are always looking for feedback on our menus and we feel that by creating a food panel, we will have the perfect forum in which to discuss how we should be changing what we offer to guests.”

Good idea John but based on our recent trip there (see my Tweets) I'll give you some hints for free:

1. If I turn up at 4.45pm it would be nice for the waitress to acknowledge my existence rather than re-laying some distant table in the hope that she won't have to take my order before her shift finishes at 5pm,


2. If by some strange chance she does take my order before 5pm it'd be nice if she did it with with some kind of civility, perhaps even a smile, rather than grimacing as though she'd just finished sucking 2kg of lemons after having a tooth extracted,


3. When handing over from one shift to the other it'd be nice to have a bit more organisation. When the new, happy waitress brings the plates out using oven gloves then that's the big clue that they've been sat under the lights for too long,


4. As a result the food was dry.


5. The deep-fried stuff was really greasy.

You might remember that I posted back in May that they were asking for volunteer chicken-tasters so I'm not sure what's happened to that group. I hope they survived the experience...

Surrey Comet
Harvester's Food Panel

A new drive thru?

Is there a new drive-thru in Worcester Park? After my observation of the Porsche outside KFC the other night I took this photo of an elderly couple enjoying their fish & chips in their car parked on the kerb outside the Ocean Fish Bar!?!?

I guess you can't eat in and although the view's not much at least it's getting out!!

It's all about Worcester Park

Another perfect Worcester Park moment on Wednesday evening when I was trailing back from some late socialising in the City I spied a Porsche Boxster parked just outside KFC with it's lone male occupant tucking into a bucket'o'something. I don't know whether to congratulate him for being immune to class-consciousness by bringing his Porsche along to KFC or whether to point out that he was still class-conscious enough to eat it in the car outside and not mix with the regulars.

Ryan Gate, apparently under new management, has had a mini-refurb with some plastering work done in the cafe area and some nice new chairs and tables have appeared in there too. I haven't been in there since meeting the WPB to do our Santa photos so I'll have to go back soon.

Is it just me or has there been an increase in vans being used as on-street storage? We've got a few in Brinkley Road, one of which hasn't moved for months, and the owners just seem to appear periodically and take a few tools and then go off again. It's annoying because it does end up having an impact on parking in the road.

Monday night is the meeting of Worcester Park Residents Association at 8pm and there are a multitude of pressures on Worcester Park from air quality to the Hamptons, from planning decisions to leisure facilities so if you're interested in going then take a look at the website below or check out the details on the tree outside the Police Station on Central Road (or the numerous signs in Central Road shops).

Worcester Park Resident's Association
http://www.wpra.org.uk/WPRAMeetings.htm

Do you feel like Chicken Tonight?

And all year??

If you love eating chicken then the Harvester at the Plough has an offer for you. According to the "thisislocallondon" website their recent revamp has opened up the position of "Chicken Taster" so anyone who feel qualified to regularly pass judgement on the quality of their chicken offerings is invited to apply before the May 11th deadline.

"The winner and a partner of their choice will get to sample succulent chicken meals for a whole 12 months, with a complimentary visit to the restaurant each quarter.”

To submit your CV by applying for the role of official chicken tester, email contact details and the name of the Harvester to testers@harvester.co.uk
Applicants’ names go into a draw with one lucky winner announced after the closing date, Monday, May 11.

I think the expression "partner of their choice" is a dangerous one though as I don't think they intend it to sound as though the Harvester will set up adulterous trysts over a chicken dinner. Partner of my choice? If we couldn't find a babysitter it would be Stephen Fry or John Simpson.

This is Local London

http://www.thisislocallondon.co.uk/news/4330347.Chicken_taster_wanted_for_boozer/

Sutton Council at it again

You talkin' to me?? YOU TALKIN' TO ME?

Mrs Brinkster reported last night that De Niro's Pizza was shut and has a big sign saying that it's going to be opening under new management. Undoubtedly inspired by the Huntsmans Midas Touch transformation they'll be aiming to corner the market for Italian food at the top end of Central Road, as opposed to the bottom (La Mama) or the middle (Cafe Picollo, Pizza Express, Papa Johns).


Now for those Worcester Parkians in the Epsom & Ewell or Kingston council parts please excuse me while I rave incoherently about Sutton Council and mop up the blood spilled from the repeated concussion of my head against my desk. Just when I thought that they'd exhausted themselves in the money-wasting stakes with the horrendously conceived Sutton Life Centre they've managed to top it with, as the local Guardian reports, "Multimillion pound plans for a green Sutton High Street unveiled"
As we've seen with a variety of Sutton Council proposals they enter into a "consultancy" exercise worthy of the Vogons in "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" where they'll put up a turgid and uninteresting document (116 pages in this case) and when nobody can be bothered to read it and write in to object they assume that apathy is the same as enthusiasm. If you want to see the plans for yourself you have to go either to Sutton or Carshalton as they won't be visiting any other council-tax paying location in the borough.

For the sake of brevity I'll not go through all of my objections but will instead highlight point 9.12 which, to my mind, illustrates the gap between ideal and reality:
"Sutton town centre is served well by public transport services. There is direct rail access to London Victoria, London Bridge, Croydon, Epsom and Wimbledon."
Now I don't know about you but if I want to go shopping, and by that I mean proper browse-around-the-shops-have-lunch-and-make-a-go-of-it shopping, I'll go to Kingston. If we don't fancy the crowds we might vary that with Epsom or Wimbledon and if we have a particular need we'll head over to the Purley Way in Croydon but rarely, if ever, will we think of going to Sutton any more. If I was at London Bridge or Victoria I wouldn't be thinking to myself that a trip to Sutton was going to be a retail revelation and if I was at Croydon, Epsom or Wimbledon I'd just walk straight out of the station and go shopping there instead. Now that Woolworths and Gamleys have gone from Sutton there's precious little to bribe the little Brinksters with so as far as they're concerned it's akin to a desert wasteland in the "fun" stakes, which does not a good shopping trip make. For me the the only useful thing that Sutton has which the others don't is a Computer Exchange (CEX) which comes in handy sometimes but I can nip up to the Tottenham Court Road branch from work instead.

And if you read to page 72 of 116 in the consultation document you'll find how they propose to integrate trams into Sutton Centre, namely by sodding up the existing traffic arrangements. Trams around the one-way system? That'd be interesting.

Quite why the Council think that Sutton residents are going to welcome this is beyond me when even the chairman of the Sutton Environment Network has called it "wrong-headed" and coming from a corporate environment that has a honed and toned PR department this stuff wouldn't even have cut it in the 90s (or earlier) and isn't what they should be spending our Council Tax on (the outsourced PR, the outsourced research or the actual proposal).

For me one of the best things about the Guardian article was the first comment at the bottom, which I'll reproduce here as I love it:
"sfocata, Sutton says... 11:46pm Tue 21 Apr 09
So let's see... the Village Quarter is the scummy bit and the Exchange Quarter is, er... the shops. Then the Civic Quarter is the bit around the Civic Centre, and the Station Quarter is (I'm getting the hang of this now) the bit around the station! Just how much of these multi-millions was spent on this ludicrous branding exercise? Why not give each quarter its own unique swirl logo as well? Who's going to be first to submit an FOI to find out just how much has been wasted on all this "quarter" nonsense? It's a high street in a suburb, for God's sake! Make it green with proper policies, not with a rebrand worthy of Pseud's Corner."

Sutton Guardian
http://www.yourlocalguardian.co.uk/news/local/suttonnews/4305351.Multimillion_pound_plans_for_a_green_Sutton_High_Street_unveiled/

Sutton Life Centre - The 'anti' Group on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=77008483054&ref=mf

Sutton Council - Sutton Town Centre Area Action Plan
http://www.sutton.gov.uk/index.aspx?articleid=1398

Tears on Central Road

A moment of silence please for the passing of Mahmut Aygün who, albeit indirectly and unintentionally, gave Central Road some of it's character and the late night Worcester Park drinkers something to eat.

Back in the Summer of 1971 Mahmut was the first person to put kebab meat in bread and so the Doner Kebab was born. Without him we would never have had such places as the Charcoal Grill or Nefis but as German Newspaper (translated via Google) so tenderly put it:
"Mahmut Aygün - without him it would be around 1600 Döner shops in and around Berlin did not give many immigrants in Europe would be unemployed. "

I'm all choked up.

Ce n'est pas Le Kitchen

Pardon the schoolboy French but I noticed when driving past Le Kitchen (middle of photo above) yesterday that it has been reincarnated as "Bombay Masala", and looks very nice too. I really ought to give it a try as I've heard good things about it but we haven't got round to it as yet as the Munal and Meghna are both closer. I don't know if the makeover means that it's changed hands or just had a revamp.

With the weather as cold as it has been surely only a lunatic would be found playing football on a freezing cold Saturday in January wouldn't they?!?!? Ermm..... Well actually Brinkster Minor wanted to make use of the new facilities in the park in Longfellow Road so we braved the sub-zero temperatures to have a good kickabout. The nice smooth tarmac is great but has the side effect of letting the ball wander downhill as the site slopes down away from the road... not that the ball was stationary for that long with Brinkster Minor on the loose!


Has anybody else been to the Kimpton Park Way Recycling centre? It was gloriously quiet this weekend during the course of my three visits to the site (early spring cleaning!) unlike the normal carnage of the summer months but I was disturbed to see the workers on site sifting through the bins with a rake and pulling out anything that took their interest. I've seen them at it before (together with sharing round unsavoury images/videos on their phones) but on Saturday I saw one of the workers come up with a Man United pencil case he thought he could get a couple of quid for and other stuff too so I began to wonder what else they might have found... makes me want to make trebly sure I've shredded anything of potential interest before I put it in the rubbish.

Don't hold your breath (or maybe do)

Michael left a comment this morning about the traffic in which he uttered the fatefuly words "I wonder how much carbon is pumped into the atmosphere while motorists wait for no one!" which offers me the near perfect opportunity to demonstrate the new green tardis.

The picture below shows the pollution stats for the last week and you'll see that on most commuting days there's a peak in the morning and a peak in the afternoon, which goes some way to demonstrating how bad the traffic was.

On Saturday (30th) you can see a constant rumble of traffic and on Sunday there's not much at all, so although I can't give you an amount in tons (or tonnes) of pollution this gives you an idea. If you want to see some more green tardis stats then you can find them in the feed on the left or click here.

I've been wracking my brain (cell) to try and think of what to say about the new KFC that's accurate and witty without a hint of rudeness but I'll have to settle for "it looks very nice". I wonder if some of the regular clientele will worry that it's been turned into a Gordon Ramsay joint and that those people who eat in will worry that their food might be delivered to their table by someone with a spectacular French accent who will describe it in immense detail as they give it to them:

"Sir has chosen a zinger burger with the mayonnaise lightly drizzled, accompanied by the zinger sauce and french fries, and for madame..."

It does look good though so hats off to them for putting the effort in on the decor..... now for the menu ;)

Looking better!

The unpredictable priests of meteorological prognostication have relented in their poor predictions for tomorrow's weather and Metcheck now forecasts a maximum of 0.1mm through the course of the evening, which even the most rain-averse shouldn't have a problem with. Do stock your pockets full of cash and come along to Central Road tomorrow night prepared to part with it and enjoy an evening of Christmas fun with fellow Worcester Park-ies and our local traders.

Moving on, I notice that Cafe Piccolo now has part of the shop open as a cafe serving coffee, snacks and the like for those who don't want a full meal. The staggering part is that it was open when I went to work this morning and according to the sign on the door it opens at 6am!!! The lovely Costa doesn't open its doors until 7am I believe and I'm usually on a train by then so it's tempting to go into Cafe Piccolo on the way to the station just because I can :)

This post was brought to you by the letter "p".

In the land of the Rising Sun

As anyone who knows me will be able to tell you I do like good food. I mean really good food. Myself and Mrs Brinkster have been fortunate enough to dine at some of the loveliest restaurants on offer and when I met Gordon Ramsay last year I was able to chat with him about the merits of Claridges evening menu having been there not long before.

One reason to enjoy living in Worcester Park is the multitude of food offerings available with more Italian, Chinese and Indian flavours on offer than you could shake a stick at, proverbial or otherwise. Add to that the kebabs and other fayre available pretty much everything is covered to some degree (although we have to go to Desperado's in North Cheam for Tex Mex if we're in that mood). For us on Brinkley Road they're only a short stroll away which is all too tempting on occasion but our kitchen doodlings do turn out some decent results as well, thanks almost exclusively to the talented Mrs Brinkster.

That said every once in a while I want some really decent food without having to slog up to Mayfair or down the A3 to Ripley or even Reigate or the other side of Dorking. Fortunately it seems as though there is a gem which while it isn't exactly in our midst it is a short drive to Epsom away.


Earlier on this year we went to a birthday party at The Rising Sun in Epsom and on the way in we glimpsed the kitchen and said to ourselves "We'll have to come back here". Well last night we made good on that promise and returned with a couple of family members to see what they had to offer having been enthused by the menu on show on their website. I plumped for a couple of the specials with crayfish and lemon risotto followed by pan-fried monkfish in parma ham and lastly vanilla creme brulee for dessert. Others in our group went for dishes such as the crab, crayfish and chilli linguine, the smoked haddock fishcakes but none could resist the prospect of the creme brulee! All in all the food was excellent,as were the atmosphere and the staff, and my portion of monkfish was surprisingly large so if you're looking for somewhere slightly special to go to eat then I'd recommend you give it a try and I suspect you'll go back.

I'll still be heading off to Drakes and others but this The Rising Sun is defnitely on my list from now on. Pub changes are rarely universally welcomed by the previous customers but if they took over the Huntsmans they'd certainly have my support!!

Cracking storm Gromit!

Anybody in the Worcester Park area who wasn't in a subterranean nuclear bunker last night was treated to a spectacular light and sound show courtesy of some seriously inclement weather. I happened to be in New Malden at the time and the place I was in was lit up, and rattled, by both of the significant lightning events. On my return to Worcester Park I was prepared to strap on the outboard motors to get under the railway bridge but they weren't needed as it was only calf-deep (i.e. halfway up the calf on your leg, not deep enough to drown a young cow).

On the "eateries poll" I notice that the Munal has crept into second place behind Caffe Piccolo with Silks, Pizza Express and La Mama in joint third! I might link to it on Facebook as I think there's a restaurant thread on there.

Seeing double

A couple of days ago I noticed that the barbers next to the new sewing machine shop was taking shape with chairs and other paraphenalia going in and the name over the door showing as "Ciaran" (if my recollection is anywhere near correct). Last night I was walking past the defunct Digital Plaza and found the blinds up, the lights on and........... 3 barbers chairs in the middle of the room!?!?! Are we going to be inundated with barbers now as well as charity shops!

Casting my eyes further north there seems to have been a minor proliferation, if there can be such a thing, of Worcester Park restaurant websites. Silks website has been around for a while but I noticed last night that up at the Plough end of Worcester Park the competing Shalimar and Rupali both have websites up now, perhaps indicating an internet escalation of culinary tension in the neighbourhood. Can anyone point me at any more?

Radio Jackie this Saturday and a restaurant poseur

Radio Jackie are going to be at the Worcester Park pub on Saturday from 12 til 12 in aid of Children in Need. There'll be stuff during the day for the kids and stuff in the evening for the adults and they're looking to get "some appearances from people" in addition to the stalls and stuff. What details there are can be found here.

On a different subject it looks like there's a restaurant for sale in WP. The details are here and with an asking price of £1.9M and they describe the location as:
"Thriving Lucrative Dble Fronted 2 Units.1st Unit is Rest of 2000 sq ft with a seating of 100 covers & 2nd Unit is used as Function Room with a seating of 50 Covers. 2 Walk-in Cold Rooms. Extremely Nicely decorated. 2 Self-contained Flats of 3 Beds each on both units. (6 Beds altogether)"

There's no date on the post but Google thinks it was posted in the last week. I've had a couple of thoughts of where it could be but haven't come to any conclusion yet (double fronted restaurant plus function room?) but I'd appreciate your thoughts.

The secret of their success

It does seem like Caffe Picollo has been doing a roaring trade since it opened and perhaps above expectations, certainly mine, as I've noted before . A cohort of Mrs Brinkster went in to eat at Caffe Picollo on Wednesday and reports that she got a complimentary glass of wine on arrival..... nice. The second glass of wine also failed to show up on the bill....... bonus!!

Apparently, as they haven't had their alcohol licence through yet they can't actually sell the stuff, so they're giving it away. If that's true then I'd recommend you get your skates on ASAP before the licence comes through!

Roadkill cafe

Clan Brinkster departed the fair streets of Worcester Park and headed up to Norfolk last Wednesday, hence the lack of posts. I've been there enough times to know it well but one thing in particular did take me by surprise this time around, and that was the sheer volume of roadkill! It seems as though anything feathered or furry had surrendered to the attractive draw of the local tarmac and cast itself upon the oncoming traffic with unprecendented zeal with the aim of creating a memorial carpet along the local roads. I thought it could become one of those family travel games, "C'mon kids, lets play 'Guess The Roadkill'" but I didn't try it out on the rest of the clan, though my young daughter did display a fascination for describing the last repose of a (fortunately intact) rabbit by the side of the road as we whizzed past. Lucky she didn't see the other ones then.

On an entirely separate topic on returning to WP we were greeted by a now-open Caffe Picollo on Central Road, which looks great and, according to Mrs Brinkster, was doing a steady trade... particularly impressive considering the dearth of publicity. It has a deli inside taking up part of the space, which immediately increases the chances of getting us through the door! Looks like a welcome addition to Central Road, though I have to take this opportunity to say I actually saw a real customer coming out of the Worcester Supermarket having apparently bought something. There's a turnup for the books!

Caffe Picollo

With a flurry of activity the windows of the new Caffe Picollo have been open while they work on them and I have to say it looks really nice inside. In my mind it's could be competing with Pizza Express ("inside it's Chelsea, outside it's Worcester Park" ) for the best-looking restaurant in Worcester Park. Let's hope they've spent the same amount of time preparing the menu as they have building the thing.

Across the road from there, however, the "Worcester Park Circle of Life" has kicked in with the news that Choices Video is to close at the end of Thursday (18th Jan). They do have a sale on, which looks quite good, but didn't have anything in that I really wanted or didn't already have. Hopefully on Thursday they'll have slashed the prices even more so I can stock up on movies that I'll never get around to watching unless I'm cashing in on my critical illness cover.........

Further down Central Road the old Going Places is to become a supermarket of sorts. How they're going to compete with Waitrose, Iceland, the long-established Costcutter, the more specialist Ryan Gate "AND* the new Sainsburys Express is beyond me, but they've applied to be an off-licence, and there was a juggernaut from Poland outside the place last night unloading all sorts of shelving. Look like we shall find out what they're made of soon enough.

At last

The restaurant-that-is-taking-forever-to-complete now has a name, and it is [drum roll please] "Caffe Piccolo". Googling for it's pretty thankless though as there seem to be an abundance of Caffe Piccolos around. There are lights and stuff in there now but it still looks as though it's a long way from opening, although they are advertising for staff. A quick trawl through Sutton Council's planning permission site shows that the original application was put forward in May 2005......... that's how long!

The Sainsburys (aka The Old Camping Shop) is due to open next Friday (19th Jan) so we'll see what that brings to the cosmopolitan ambience of Worcester Park [ha, snort!]. I'm guessing a bunch of apparently abandoned cars at the top of Central Road under the guise of "parking" while the owners pop-in to get their lottery tickets and stuff.

For those who like whimsical observations from Surrey I can recommend a visit to the blog of PumpkinStrokeMarrow down in Epsom, a recently retired gent's musings on a suburban life filled with books, sudoku, Chelsea buns, allotments and..... deer fences! A different world, for those that are in need of one.