Restaurant reviews by Justin Tanner, our retired food critic who thinks Luis Rubiales might as well have grabbed her tits for all the fuss there’s been
THE older you are, the harder it is to shrug shit off. For example I had a bit of a basic week – a Chinese takeaway and eight cans of lager every night – and I felt terrible.
So I thought what the hell, I’ll use that voucher my ex-wife’s cousin sent here in error and book myself a night at a health spa. Sweat out forty years of poison in one session, or I’m demanding my money back.
Besides, it’s bound to be crawling with bored middle-aged women looking for a discreet fuck. What happens at Champneys stays at Champneys and all that.
I check in for lunch and ask where the bar is. Raised eyebrows and a curt explanation they only serve alcohol at dinner in the evenings. Not a good start.
And once in the buffet queue I discover that fuck me, they’re not joking with the whole healthy eating thing. No steak. No chips. Just plain grilled chicken, endless salads and 500 kinds of coleslaw.
I pile my plate high, but grilled mackerel, though. Hideous, oily shite that smells like a Frenchman’s bike seat. If this is what you have to eat to keep heart-healthy I’d rather die in a tsunami of cholesterol.
Everyone’s walking around in bathrobes, as advertised, and probably nude underneath. Which forces me to keep my Speedos on beneath mine so I’ve got something to strap my erection down.
I expected my afternoon masseuse to be a gorgeous Swedish blonde called Helga, saying a heavily-accented ‘naughty boy!’ when I grab her arse. Fuck no. It’s a strapping brute of a woman who looks like a warder from Cell Block H, complete with five o’clock shadow.
Goes at my back like she’s tenderising a steak. I know you hate men, love, but I haven’t done anything yet. If I asked for a happy ending she’d yank my cock off and laugh.
Evening rolls around, as does dinner, and I’m starving. Guess what the wholegrain, healthy and frankly small bread rolls come with? Hummus. Lurpak’s contraband here.
The chicken breast with seasonal vegetables marches in with kale, steamed cauliflower and green beans, which will have me farting like a Holstein Friesian all night. The plates are decorated with calorie counts. As food goes, it’s closer to dying.
And the dessert menu? More like a desert. Essentially I’d be chewing scented foam. Still hungry, I head for a quick fag outside. It’s pissing down and my complimentary slippers are ruined but it doesn’t matter, you have to give them back when you leave anyway.
Breakfast? Muesli, fruit, not a bacon rasher in sight, and plant milk in the tea. Now excuse my ignorance, but how in the name of Chinese buggery do you milk a plant? Where’s the udders on an almond?
Pointedly whistling the theme from The Great Escape, I order a taxi to the nearest Wetherspoons. So that’s good health, is it? I’m surprised I fucking survived.
