We popped into IKEA for some bits at the weekend.. yea right like it's possible to just pop in for something, even if you only go to the item you want it will take half an hour of walking.! Actually on that score I am waiting very interestedly to see how the new Coventry store works. In some ways I'm dreading the possible traffic problems espacally round the time our two universities start their new years but in other ways it will be interesting to see how it differs from an out of town store. You see the Coventry one isn't just off a motorway junction like the rest it is slap bang in the middle of the city ! It is over several floors and I am really hoping they make it easier to just pop into one section rather than being lead by the nose as the other stores do.. I think they would be stupid not to as a lot of their potential trade is people on their lunch break and you can't brose a whole store in that time but we will see.
Anyway back to our shopping trip. As it was lunch time we decided to go to the cafe and I was pretty much expecting to have chips or salad or maybe a cake as they do a GF one.. however as we waited in the queue we spotted the kids fish and chips had a big GF symbol on it but somewhat strangely the adult one didn't and neither did the meatballs which seemed a bit daff as most Swedish meatball recipes over here are GF.
Still we asked when we got to the counter and yes the kids fish was GF but the adults wasn't and neither was any other main meal! The fish was however at the far end of the counter meaning it was a lot less likely to get contaminated so I end up with two kids meals as it was cheaper than them trying to make up an adult one and I ended up with more chips! I am happy they are trying but I think I might chat to the cafe when they open in Cov and see if they could change the meatball recipe or at least do the adult fish GF as well. It was nice to have battered fish for once but the portions were very small even with two kids ones.
As to the actual shopping, we got the small one a place in the crèche much to his delight and so had 3/4 hour to look round. We got the cupboard doors and drawers to finish the units in the utility room and some new plates and bowls from their 365+ range.. we got 6 new bowls which will be good for soup, stew etc and then one each of the rounded off square dinner and side plates to see if they went with my Reflex Denby which is now discontinued. I think they will actually go quite well and we have been thinking of swapping our everyday china to white as the current black stuff can't really be mixed with the Denby. That wasn't the only things we picked up but the main ones of relivance on here I think.
I have just found your blog, I am interested in your recipes, one of my family member can't have gluten so I will come back and forward the link of your blog to her :-)
ReplyDeleteGlad you like it. Feel free to pass it on, I'm always happy to help where I can it's one of the points of doing this, that and logging things for myself.
ReplyDeleteHi Esther
ReplyDeleteI feel much better after reading this post. There is to be a new IKEA branch in Southampton, right in the middle of the city (it must be thier new strategy). I didnt know they did GF food in thier restaurant, so that could well be a mini-haven of GF food in the middle of the city. YEAH! Its normally salad for me when shopping in Southampton
YEAH! :)
I know with Coventry they were pushing for a site on the edge up by the motorway, around where the new football stadium and huge Tesco's was built but the city council wouldn't allow it but did encourage them to build in the city centre because they wanted to bring trade into the city not encourage it out to the edges.
ReplyDeleteIf a bunch of us pop in to our local stores and give them feed back on the GF offerings and suggest things like changing the meatball recipe then they might become even better.
I will be interested to see how the inner city cafes do as the ones in the out of town stores feel like lose leaders to me, price wise, which you can do when you know everyone is going to spend time in the store and buy stuff but in town that will not be true.