safe snacks

Just found the Scores on the Doors site, which publishes BCC health inspection results for cafes, restaurants and other food-based stuff in B29.

The results for food hygiene in restaurants are here, though no-one got a max of 5 stars. Bohemia and the Oak Tree Sandwich Bar top the list with 4 stars - looks like Oak Tree Lane might be B29's shiniest because the takeaway list is topped by Chez Moi on the same street. Also pleased to see the tasty Jumbo takeaway on Pershore Road with 4 stars - they also do healthy food, although the site doesn't list any healthy eating award results for Brum.

The pub list is topped by the Ember Inns chain - The Country Girl and the SPT. I can' t say I'm a massive fan of the SPT food: the nicest thing I can say is that it's OK if you get peckish while you're drinking. At least they seem to have stopped their bizarre refusal to serve soft drinks in pint sizes (previously you'd get "sorry, it'll have to be a 10 oz glass" or something ... wtf?).

On the cafe front, the Rich Bitch recording studios max up with 5 stars (can you go there if you're not recording something?), and the trusty Selly Sausage gets 4 (though personally I'm not a huge fan of the veggie options). My favourite hangover buster, Lesley's Corner Cafe, gets 3 - I'm happy to carry on scarfing down the veggie breakfast with that. The site also covers things like butcher's shops, but I'll leave you to do your own meaty searches.

Liberty's heli of a curry (from The Sun newspaper)

Sticking on the big-news-from-B29-theme, I was reminded on Friday of this excellent story from 2006.

As reported in The Sun newspaper, pop group Liberty X splashed out £4,500 by hiring a helicopter to deliver food from the Sundarbon restaurant on Bristol Road in Selly Oak, to London.

Apparently Westlife are big fans of the Sundarbon food as well.

Podnosh, The Knife and Fork, and a new speed camera

This very complimentary snippet on Podnosh today has made me release that it's been a while since my last post.

So then I started to borrow yet more content from Podnosh, like this insightful blog from a newly trained Birmingham bus driver which is well worth a read.

Then I noticed that Birmingham: It's Not Shit has gone through a very worthwhile redesign and come out looking very lovely and shiny in the wash.

And it has an associated flickr group with a recent photo of one of the landmarks of B29, the soon to be disappearing Knife and Fork (left: photo by ellybrown1980).

Still just about surviving (although not still serving unfortunately) but by the gathering of equipment and signs I would imagine that it is sadly just about on its' last legs.

I also couldn't fail to notice tonight that an extra speed camera has appeared on the Pershore Road very recently (not even any marker lines on the road yet), heading out of the city just after the junction with Pebble Mill Road beside the Nature Centre. Just about here.

It didn't slow down my journey to the excellent Jumbo Chinese takeaway though, thankfully.