Posts Tagged ‘cocktails’

We saw another good turnout for the January meeting of West Yorkshire Humanists. We initially put out only a dozen or so chairs in a circle. However, we soon had to add more, making for a large and very misshapen circle. Always a good thing of course!

This month was debate night and we discussed a number of issues. The headline debate was ‘can terrorism ever be justified?’ The arguments are complex and myriad once you get into it.

After the meeting we went to The George for a few drinks.

They had alcohol-free cocktails for £2.95. I am not sure anyone had ever ordered them before was there was a lot of confusion about how to make them. However, they tasted good, and we ended up getting a second round.

Earlier this month we headed to Sam’s Chop House to celebrate Hugh’s birthday. It’s gone down hill a little since I first went there, and they don’t even have chops on the menu which I think is ridiculous (it’s not in any way unreasonable to expect Sam’s Chop House to serve chops), but there you have it. After, we headed to The Lounge for a few cocktails.

Last week, my friend Brett was up in Leeds. He wasn’t up for a particularly good reason, but never the less it was a fine opportunity to catch up, so we headed over to the Cuthbert Brodick to take advantage of more fortuitous timing – Tuesdays are of course steak night at Cuthbert!

It really did make me wonder why we don’t do steak night more often. It’s like £7 for a mixed grill and a drink! You just can’t beat that.

After, we headed over to Browns, to take advantage of their good range of non-alcoholic cocktails. Their menu seemed somewhat more limited than it has been previously, but maybe I just have a distorted memory of the good old days.

Hey, do you remember SoBe? Probably not as it’s new. Well, forget about it anyway because it’s gone. It’s now called Hirst’s Yard. Confusing, it’s also located in Hirst’s Yard, along with a load of other bars.

Myself, Elina, Norm, George and Kat were recently out for post-Nando’s cocktails when we received a buy one get one free flyer, so decided it was worth a go. Perhaps they decided that the SoBe look was simply a bit too bright and happy for Leeds, but the essentials remained the same – quality, properly mixed cocktails, at reasonable prices (which changes to very reasonable when you have two for one vouchers).

It was reasonably quiet when we went in at around 9pm, though picked up soon after that, so head down early if you want a seat.

We followed that up with a trip to the ever-popular Call Lane Social where we ventured up to the tiki hideaway upstairs. You can question the wisdom of lighting drinks on fire when you have a tiki-style straw roof that is highly flammable, but we survived to tell the tale, so all is well.

At this point, myself and Elina left as we had to be up early the next morning, but I presume the night ended in a strip club.

That’s life on a planet in a binary star system.

Having pushed back my leaving do at Buzz Sports to accommodate the other four people who were leaving, it turned out it handed directly on top of the first social event of the new organisation I’m now consulting with.

I know what you’re thinking – the obvious thing to do would have been to constantly make excuses about going to the bathroom and then rapidly running between venues pretending I was simultaneously attending both events in some kind of sitcom setup.

Unfortunately, I eventually opted for something far more pedestrian. Having worked round Sandinista, The Lounge, Mojo’s, Fibre, Revolution and Call Lane Social with Gooroo, I headed over to Maven to find the Buzz crew. By this point (11pm) there were only two of them left standing – Simundo and Ian.

As it turns out, Maven is quite a find (and number two in the best kept secrets in the UK, according to Ian). They don’t seem to have cocktail menus – I just went up to the bar and told them what ingredients I liked and two minutes later I was sipping on a very nice raspberry based long drink. Delicious. Further investigation is definitely required.

On Tuesday, Atheist Society headed down to Las Iguanas for some dinner as part of their weekly social. It’s a great place to eat and best of all, they do 2 for 1 cocktails before 7:30. So by the time we sat down at our table we had to get a tray to take all the drinks over that we had lined up.

Unfortunately the food didn’t entirely agree with me and I ended up losing half a night’s sleep with stomach problems. First bad experience I’ve had there, and I eat there quite a lot. I think I’ll steer clear of the chicken next time :S.

Recently, we headed over to James’s house for a bit of a party. It was interesting to see the exact same bag and printer at his house, but in the end we decided that he hadn’t burgled me, then got home quicker than we could get to his house and pretended he owned everything all along. So, in the end, a good night all round.

Last week, we headed over to Trio for a bit of a work social. Despite making it clear that partners were invited, but not welcome, it somehow quickly turned into a bit of a couples-fest and as a possible first for Buzz, actually ended up with an equal gender balance.

The drinks were good. Their Rekorderlig was a bit of a rip-off, they had a “special offer” of bottles for £2.50, but it wasn’t the kind of bottle you would expect if you got a bottle of Kopparberg, it was a small beer style bottle.

Far more importantly, however, we were there for the two for one cocktails.

These started well, they had a menu but the first bartender we got was willing to mix up anything and I was soon sipping on an apricot martini. The second bartender we got was far more disappointing, however, despite working at a cocktail bar, he had never even heard of a sloppy joe, let alone being willing to mix one. Service was at least reasonably speedy, however.

The restaurant was far more of a disappointment. Despite charging almost £20 for a fillet steak, it couldn’t even compete with the likes of Brooklyn Bar or The Restaurant, let alone Blackhouse or Cattle Grid, all of which are cheaper, despite being in the city centre!

All in all, a good place to go for cocktails, but I can’t recommend eating there.

Having finally got my hands on a cocktail shaker (after so many times of being denied by Marko’s lack of stock) I decided to throw a bit of a cocktail party before Wendy House. After all, the last cocktail party we threw, ended very, very well 🙂 .

Thanks to Kat for the photos.

On Friday, myself, Si and Sarann headed into town to grab some dinner.

We ended up at Cafe Rouge in The Light, which was looking fairly empty for a Friday night – ideal for some good conversation. Service was a little disappointing given how few people were in there but the quite atmosphere was enjoyable.

The food was mediocre, I went with the Steak Rouge which was OK, but given there are so many great places to have steak in Leeds, it wasn’t any more enjoyable than say the £6 steak I had enjoyed at Wetherspoon’s the previous Tuesday.

Afterward, we headed over to Browns for a few rounds of cocktails. Apparently they will mix anything to your order but we didn’t put them to the challenge and rather opted just to work out way through their signature menu.

After a few rounds of cocktails and the wine I had had at dinner, I found myself leaving the bar somewhat intoxicated whereas Si, the supposed teetotaler until a year ago, didn’t seem to be feeling it. Maybe Si is a secret alcoholic after all?