As the county town of North Yorkshire, Northallerton is to York as Albany is to New York City; often overlooked in favour of its larger neighbour in an “always the bridesmaid, never the bride” kind of way. It is, however, a charming place. You just have to look a bit harder to see it than in Ilkley and Harrogate.
Things aren’t helped by the fact that Northallerton very much hides its light under a bushel. First impressions aren’t fantastic. The train station is unimpressive and the town centre is a bit drab. On the bright side, it’s an honest and down-to-earth place with a relaxed atmosphere and no pretensions. Although there’s clearly some money there, as evidenced, amongst other things, by a branch of Links of London (and Bettys of course), Northallerton isn’t even a one Porsche town. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but the overall impression is of a place that doesn’t have confidence in itself and isn’t making the most of what it has to offer. Much as I found the “Edinburg Woollen Mill” on the High Street comically endearing, I couldn’t help wondering how long that “h” had been missing, and what it said about the broader sense of civic pride. It was as if someone had taken an attractive and prosperous market town and then polished it quite vigorously with a cloth dipped in Doncaster. The sign above the entrance to the Town Hall proclaiming “Northallerton Welcomes The World” was dated 25 September 2019, a date several weeks before I arrived. I hoped that the offer still stood.
First impressions can, however, be deceptive. Spend some time in Northallerton and it soon becomes apparent that there is more to it than first meets the eye. Look above the shop fronts on the High Street and you will see that they are housed in a variety of buildings which elsewhere would be celebrated as fine examples of Georgian and Victorian architecture. Northallerton hides its charms quite well, but once you start to see them, they pop up everywhere. In that context, several particular gems stand out and make Northallerton well worth a visit.
The Porch House
I haven’t discussed accommodation in my Bettys Tour 2019 blog posts so far as it hasn’t struck me as a particularly interesting aspect of my travels. In Northallerton, however, it was one of the highlights. Built in 1584, the Porch House is the oldest private residence in the town. Not only is it absolutely charming, it also oozes history, being a place where Charles I stayed in 1640 as a guest, and in 1647 as a prisoner. If you’re nice to the owner, he’ll show you what remains of the original wattle and daub walls. I stayed in what is referred to on the website as the King Double Room, which looks out over the walled garden. The room is as camp as Christmas for anyone interested in that sort of thing. For anyone else, it’s an extremely comfortable and peaceful bedroom, in which you will get a very good night’s sleep. There’s also fresh milk for your tea and a jar of home-baked biscuits by the kettle. Given that I have a slight penchant for the maximalist in interior design and a fairly camp sense of humour, I was in my element. The picture below tells you all you need to know without giving the game away entirely.
For anyone who likes swags and tassels, the Porch House is reassuringly well-provided. I’ll confess that they aren’t really my thing and that my flat is tassel- and swag-free, but they certainly added a touch of camp splendour to the place. They also provided an interesting topic of conversation as I asked the owners in a slightly embarrassed fashion if I could photograph the one in the breakfast room after trying unsuccessfully to find an opportunity to do so when they weren’t around. I explained that I knew someone who liked tassels and that the photograph was for her benefit. Needless to say, the twinkle in their eyes, as they indulgently suggested a couple of others that might interest me, indicated that they didn’t believe me for a second. You might be disappointed to read that the King Double Room lacks tassels, but the wallpaper more than makes up for it.
Given that this blog is mostly about food in one form or another, I should also mention breakfast. I went for the full English both days. Although absolutely delicious, this was a tactical error on day 6, given that I needed to be on top form for elevenses and the rösti for which Bettys is famous. However, my inner Yorkshireman got the better of me and screamed “Ow Much?” too loud at the prospect of not making the most of a breakfast which had already been paid for to make do with a bowl of muesli and a slice of toast.
For those of you with a liking for black pudding and sausages, they were locally sourced and extremely tasty, especially the black pudding. If, like me, you prefer your scrambled eggs on the sloppy side, they were a rich and silky delight.
Lewis & Cooper
Lewis & Cooper is an independent delicatessen and grocer’s shop on the High Street, which is foodie heaven to put it mildly. From the outside, it has a pleasantly traditional sign and the sort of window display that gives you a tantalising idea of the lovely things on sale. Inside, however, it’s a TARDIS of a place that is much larger than you’d expect, especially in a town the size of Northallerton. It was also pleasing to walk round a shop full of happy, and clearly regular, customers, rather than some dusty museum, hanging on precariously as a result of them going elsewhere to do their shopping. I’m not sure I should admit this, but I spent about an hour looking at jams, chutneys and condiments, leaving reluctantly with some Wensleydale cheese from the Hawes Creamery, having made a vow to myself to visit again when I had more space in my bag to take stuff home. The pictures below hint at the range of condiments on sale. There were as many shelves devoted to jam. I dream of having a shop half as good as Lewis & Cooper on my local High Street.
Bettys
The Northallerton branch of Bettys is housed in a charming Georgian building on the High Street, which shines out as a beacon to passers-by and gives an indication of how the rest of the town could look if the surrounding buildings were given a similar wash and brush-up. It feels quite narrow, compared with the other branches of Bettys, consisting of a series of connected rooms which stretch back in a line from the shop at the front. The larger rooms have skylights that help to create a bright, airy and elegant atmosphere without being grand. The best room of all, however, is the small one without a skylight just behind the shop, which feels like a cosy sitting room, albeit one with a banquette running down each side.
As with Northallerton more generally, the customers felt more ordinary and down-to-earth than in Ilkley or Harrogate; as though they were popping in for a break whilst doing the shopping rather than making an occasion of it. They struck me as more likely to go for a toasted teacake than a macaron and definitely not the type to cock their little finger whilst holding a teacup. I’ve heard it said that you can gain a good idea of the level of economic activity in a town or city by counting the number of cranes on the skyline, and wonder if you can make a similar assessment of the clientèle in Bettys by counting the number of cake stands in use in each branch.
On my first visit, I was seated in one of the larger rooms. I ordered the Traditional Afternoon Tea and sat back, looking forward to the Engadine slice and the lemon tart, even if it was topped with a yellow macaron. I was also mentally preparing myself for the rich chocolate cube that had almost contravened my non-bite-size chocolate coating prohibition in Ilkley and Harrogate, and could de-rail the afternoon tea efforts of the average consumer of indulgent treats if not handled correctly.
Imagine my surprise when the cake stand was placed on the table in front of me. There had been a cheeky substitution on the top tier, resulting in the chocolate cube being swapped for a slice of chocolate and cherry torte! Bettys Northallerton had made a virtue out of a necessity, in the process serving something that was much easier to eat with a cake fork and wasn’t nearly as rich as the chocolate cube. As far as I was concerned they definitely came up trumps.
Generally I’m not a fan of fruit and chocolate combined because I find that they often get in the way of each other, much as I love them both separately. I’ve already written about how much I dislike chocolate & orange and now is the time to confess that I’m not a massive fan of chocolate & cherry either, meaning that I am always a little wary of anything which nods in the direction of the Black Forest Gâteau. My overall impression, however, was that the torte was perfumed, rather than flavoured, with cherry. This made it more reminiscent of a rose or violet cream, which for me is a very good thing indeed, although I am happy to accept that rose and violet creams are quite a niche indulgence. Put simply, this wasn’t any old chocolate and cherry torte. It was an absolutely delicious one.
The next day I set my stall out to sit in the small room just behind the shop, and bagged a table when I went in for elevenses. The weather was quite dreary when I arrived, which made the small room even more inviting. I sat down, breathed a sigh of relief and wasted no time in ordering a slice of Curd Tart. It slipped down surprisingly easily, despite the full English breakfast I had wolfed down a couple of hours before, which had scuppered my plan to try the Swiss Breakfast Rösti before lunch.
I returned in the afternoon, noticing a spare table in the small room as I made my way over to be seated. Nobody was going to stand between me and that table, and I firmly resisted the efforts of the waiter to ensure that I benefited from the sunshine coming through one of the skylights. He looked a little puzzled that I should wish to sit in relative darkness, given how sunny it was in the rest of the tea room, but soon got the message. I felt like telling him that I was visiting from Whitby for the day to see if he got the joke, but decided against it.
I was looking forward to trying the Swiss Breakfast Rösti as a late lunch or an early dinner, despite my tactical error at breakfast, and sat down with a sense of relief both that it was served all day and that the Bettys Matrix provided for the possibility of having it as a savoury item at any time. When the waitress explained that it was served with two rashers of bacon, a tomato, mushrooms and a poached egg, I decided to take the hint and chose instead the relatively light option of the Bacon & Raclette Rösti with a mixed salad. It was utterly delicious, but incredibly filling.
When the waitress came back later on to ask if I wanted anything else, I was tempted to ask if there was anywhere I could go for a little lie down. She smiled knowingly as I made it clear that I was totally stuffed and said “You don’t think it’s going to be very filling because it’s flat and it’s got potatoes in it, but it is”. Please don’t think that in reproducing these words I am making fun of the waitress. She was the kindest, most warm-hearted person you could hope to meet and I understood perfectly well what she was really saying. Nevertheless, her comment tickled me no end as I sat there contemplating how much I had eaten and made a mental note to adopt the same logic in relation to large portions of food in the future, by flattening everything I ate from that point onwards. I stumbled back to the Porch House, resolved not to eat until elevenses the following day, and settled down for a quiet evening with a book, a glass of water and a cup of tea.
The following morning I stood on the platform at Northallerton station, waiting for the train to York at the end of the third leg of my tour. It was a beautiful, crisp Autumn day, the sun was shining and the sky was clear and blue. I was reminded of an amusing display in the window of Barker’s, the department store on the High Street, urging customers to “Embrace Autumn” by wearing, amongst other things, mustard faux fur. As I thought about my reasons for embarking on the tour, the words “Embrace Autumn” took on a new, and altogether more personal, meaning; an uplifting and quite emotional one involving an acceptance of the passage of time, visiting places in my home county as a middle-aged man that I wish I’d seen years ago, and revisiting others that I first saw as a child, but this time with the benefit of hindsight and experience. Luckily it doesn’t involve wearing mustard faux fur but, if my dad’s taste in sweaters is anything to go by, it’s only a matter of time.
What I learned today... 