If someone was to ask you to imagine a "cosy cottage", what sort of image would your mind conjure up? An idyllic setting, no doubt deep in the beating heart of peaceful countryside. Warmth, comfort, love. A chimney and a thatched roof perhaps, with a roaring fire and maybe a dog snuffling around your feet as you either drink a steaming mug of tea or leaf through an old, yellowing James Herriott paperback. Preferably both. You are tired from a full day of walking out across fells and striding over ridges, and you are eagerly awaiting some food whilst your bones sing gratefully from the confines of the luxurious winged armchair you are happily tucked away in.
As you are summoned for dinner by the mistress of the cosy cottage, you might expect to tread softly through into a room like this:
Now myself and Matthew Earwaker hadn't been striding over ridges or walking out across fells but we had been engaged with a morning of hard sport; I had had football training and Matt had had an intense session of battledore, following on from the previous night where he had stayed up 'til 3am watching a truck race. We were both weary from our exertions and we needed a-feeding. A stint in a cosy cottage would be perfect, and so we found ourselves entering into Cosy Cottage on London Road for our post-exercise fastbreaking.
Matt and I had shared cosy residentials previously. Back at Exeter University we had been housemates for two years, and this autumn Matt has finally given in to persuasion and become the next Exeter alumnus to make the move to Brighton. We are finally reunited, and hopefully the new year will see us revisiting our former passions; 5-a-side football (previous members of The Brotherhood of Justice) and music (current members of SmoothGay). Perhaps with a teeny tiny bit of FIFA or PES thrown in for good measure. Only a tiny bit though. Just a wee bit. We don't want to stifle our productivity.
Instead of the luxurious winged armchairs, roaring fireplace, and inquisitive dog, we were met with a very chic and stylish interior, rather than a cosy one. The walls had wooden trim, there was a jagged mirror on one wall, there were fairy lights, and all of this was soundtracked by some pulsating hip beats from the stereo. It was altogether more house than cottage.In the windows are a neon sign and a poster advertising its shisha bar, fronted by a model looking suspiciously akin to Jo O'Meara from S Club 7. A wonderful cover for this particular book. From the outside it looked as though it was going to be a good traditionalist greasy spoon, but here it looked as though they were making a concerted attempt to refine any grease into a thoroughly flashy substance that they could perhaps sell off, maybe as a knock-off Brylcreem that you could apply to your hair before hitting West Street.
And so, the breakfast:
Vegi Breakfast
2 veg sausages, 2 eggs, beans, tomato, mushrooms, 2 hash browns and toast
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| Vegi Breakfast - £5.95 |
Okie dokie then.
Ugh.
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| Dr. Giggles, 26, Brighton |
To be fair to Cosy Cottage, it wasn't a disaster. The beans and the Glamorgan-style sausages were richly lovely. The beans in particular had a deep sultriness to them that surprised me. Rather like how quite a few people who frequent the hotspots of West Street are nice people underneath all of those beauty products and the simmering violence.
The hash browns were quite thin, and so were inevitably crispy. This was tempered by a mellow inside, which lacked punch. The mushrooms were cheerful, but this cheerfulness was severely hampered by the size of the portion. They seemed like an afterthought unfortunately, which was tragic since they were quite tasty.
The main problem was the cooking of the cottage; they seemed to mess their timings up a bit. Whilst the eggs had pleasantly explosive yolks, the whites managed to be both soft and crunchy simultaneously. The tomato was underdone to the point of being al dente. There had been some seasoning application, but it really needed much more time in the cooker for it to have any kind of tasty impact on the dish. The same could not be said for the toast; the bread was decent, but my cynical side wonders whether it came pre-buttered in an attempt to conceal the burning it had suffered.
It didn't feel as though much care had been put into the preparation of the breakfast. This might wash with post-pub and club grub where your inebriation means that, so long as its hot and you don't need to cook it yourself, you have a great time eating it. Breakfasts need more tenderness than this. Breakfasts should lift you up, not bring you down. A good breakfast prepares you for an adventure, rather than guiding you home. Cosy Cottage failed in these respects. It just goes to show that, whilst you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, it is even more important that you don't judge a cafe by its title.
Function: body of breakfast, mindset of kebab 2/5
Adherence to canon: Yes
Taste: some positives, but overall disappointing 2/5
Value: at least give me 2 spoonfuls of mushroom for that price 2/5
Presentation: burnt toast never looks good 2/5
Venue: Although the food adhered to the canon, the venue did not 1/5
Overall: more hard house than cosy cottage - 2/5
Matt will be back to Brighton tomorrow hopefully. Then we'll be able to play some FIFA. Only a little bit mind. Just a tiny wee bit.
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