More rubbing

Back to the Rubbing House earlier in the month, the second visit in as many months, after a long absence. With the first visit being noticed at reference 2.

A substantial, mixed sharing starter, very Mediterranean. Rather better than one expects from pub grub. Followed, for me anyway, by more calf's liver. And I remembered to ask for the gravy on the side, in a jug. Pretty good, but not quite as good as last time, perhaps because I didn't use enough of the gravy. Perhaps because I overdid the starter a bit.

Notwithstanding, a good meal at a very reasonable price. One can why the place was busy, even on a Monday lunchtime. We thought that the proprietor might have been doing front of house, so perhaps a place which gets the benefit of more care and attention than is apt to be the case in a managed chain restaurant, be the chain ever so hot on quality control.

And as well as eating, we had an opportunity to look at some old family photographs, possibly from the early part of the 20th century or even earlier, including a very striking hand tinted photograph of the head of a lady. Not the one above, but one which does give something of the idea. Popular until swept away by the arrival of colour photography after the second world war. See reference 6.

It seems that the Japanese were very keen on the technique, with the example above offered by the Royal Asiatic Society at reference 7. A society with a rather colonial ring to it, but which still exists and looks to have a large library and large collections.

Back home in time for a quick foray into Epsom, resulting in the capture of trolley 467, as noticed at reference 3.

PS: on the day, I did not notice the Jockey Club Catering building, according to gmaps, just a few yards to the south of the Rubbing House, as snapped above. Their reference 4 is a little unusual, but it does include a number of helpful, if rather noisy, videos. So I now know how a bottle of wine should be presented and poured at table. And moving onto reference 5, I find that the Jockey Club, having started as a club for turf people - presumably both the nobs who paid and the chaps who rode - back in the middle of the eighteenth century, has moved on and is now, in the main, a racecourse operator, having taken on Epsom in 1994. The implication being that all the catering at its various venues are run under the one umbrella, in effect, a chain of restaurants. Must look out for the building next time we are there.

References

Reference 1: https://www.rubbinghouse.com/.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/01/to-leatherhead.html.

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/02/trolley-467.html.

Reference 4: https://jockeyclubcateringteam.com/.

Reference 5: https://www.thejockeyclub.co.uk/.

Reference 6: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hand-colouring_of_photographs.

Reference 7: https://royalasiaticsociety.org/japanese-hand-tinted-photographs/.