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Monday

Melanie McDonagh Melanie McDonagh

It’s not all roses: 6 alternative Valentine’s Day gifts

We can blame Robbie Burns. That line about my love being like a red, red rose didn’t actually specify Valentine’s Day, but it has meant that 14 February is forever associated with roses at a time of year when they’re not in bloom. Not here anyway, which means that all the red roses around are from far-flung places. Plus they’re not really scented. No. Hold the red roses. Keep them for June and send them for midsummer or something. Here are six suggestions for Valentine’s gifts that don’t entail actual roses. And on the whole, let’s steer clear of pink, shall we? The usual line up of pink items for

William Parsons

Why it’s time for a pilgrimage revival

At 3 a.m, with sleepless hours slipping by as storms besiege my tent, it’s easy to ask: why? Why swap the security of a home for a pilgrimage on foot with no itinerary beyond a smudged path on a 14th century map? And no comforts beyond those carried on my back or offered by strangers? Back on the bright path next morning, though, the question answers itself. The way is its own reward: the land resonates; the past speaks; my soul sings – and so do I. But my departure had not only been inspired by the pull of the open road. There were push factors, too. The economic attrition

Saturday

Olivia Potts Olivia Potts

A twist on the toastie: how to make a croque monsieur

When I was little, toasties were my father’s domain. Many of his fillings cruelly haven’t made it on to mainstream toastie menus (tinned chicken curry was my mother’s favourite) – but his corned beef and onion one has stood the test of time in our household, and toasties remain a mainstay in my grown-up home. The croque monsieur is the more cosmopolitan, French version of the toastie. A croque monsieur is ham and cheese between two slices of toasted bread, often with a bechamel sauce inside and on top, bubbling and golden. There are lots of variations: the most famous is the croque madame, in which a fried (or sometimes

Friday

Steerpike Steerpike

Parliament blows £12k a week on traffic marshals

First there was talk of a medal; now MPs have had their pay bumped up to more than £86,000. And today Mr S can reveal the latest wheeze to bolster the image of parliament in the eyes of the public. For days now, Steerpike has heard complaint from Commons staff about the appearance of ‘useless’ traffic marshals on the estate in garish orange jackets ‘who stand around doing nothing all day’, according to one disgruntled researcher. The staff have primarily been hired to station the road between Black Rod’s Gardens and New Palace Yard during the current building works, with a total of eleven dotted elsewhere across the estate –including

Penworthy

Two tips at double figure prices for handicaps at the Cheltenham Festival

I make no apologies for the fact that over the next month I will spend a lot of time looking forward to what I regard as Britain’s finest annual sporting event: the Cheltenham Festival. Yes, there will be groans from racegoers that Guinness is a rip-off at £7.50 a pint; yes, it can get overcrowded even if you pay more than £100 for a club enclosure ticket; yes, the Willie Mullins and Gordon Elliott-trained horses will win more than their ‘fair share’ of the big races. But the sheer quality of the racing, the exhilarating atmosphere and the beautiful setting of the course nestled beneath Cleeve Hill are all a

Marianna Hunt

The best places to eat in Bristol

Thousands of people have fled London for buzzy, creative Bristol in recent years. Among them: top chefs, bakers, brewers and baristas. ‘There’s a thriving community of young food entrepreneurs, many refugees from the viciously profit-driven London restaurant scene,’ says Xanthe Clay, chef, food writer and Bristolian. ‘They are taking advantage of lower rents and rates to cook what they want to cook – not what some venture capital backer demands.’ Those to watch include Jamie Randall and Olivia Barry – the chef team behind Adelina Yard, near Queen Square in the city centre – who bring experience working with the likes of Angela Hartnett. There’s also James Wilkins, an ex-pupil of

Esther Watson

How narcissism ate itself at the Grammys

A transgender woman and a non-binary person dressed as Satan walk into a bar. That’s not the beginning of a bad joke, but the defining performance of the 65th Grammy awards, held in Los Angeles on Sunday.  You may have seen the clips. The singer Sam Smith wore what appeared to be a terrible Halloween costume: red high heels and a red hat with devil horns. He clomped around the stage performing ‘Unholy’ with Kim Petras, who was in a cage surrounded by flames and whip-wielding dominatrices. CBS’s broadcast of the ceremony on American television was sponsored by Covid vaccine-maker Pfizer – catnip for conspiracy theorists who think that Covid

Emma Wells

For sale, the £3m Welsh mansion with political foundations

Known as Wales’s first tycoon, the industrialist and Liberal politician David Davies was born in 1818 in a hillside tenement in the village of Llandinam, Powys. Davies, the son of a farmer and sawyer, went on to amass a fortune through bridge-building, railways, coal-mining and dock development, while also serving as an MP for Cardigan.   The teetotal Calvinistic Methodist, probably best remembered for founding Barry Docks in the 1880s, was known for his philanthropic deeds, although he did have one obvious indulgence. In counterpoint to his hill-darkened boyhood home, where he cared for several younger siblings, in the 1860s he constructed a light-filled family property that he named Broneirion –

Wednesday

Simon de Burton

Can the Ineos Grenadier rival the Land Rover?

When Land Rover finally axed its ‘old’ Defender in 2016 and promised to replace it with something better, traditionalists shed tears as readily as their beloved old-school Landys dripped oil. And the arrival of the ‘new’ Defender in early 2020 did nothing to help: ‘too expensive’, said some; ‘too complicated’, said others. ‘Too precious’, they moaned. ‘Not a real Defender’, they concluded. Oddly, it seemed, such people really did want to carry on driving a car based on a 70-year-old design that was bereft of safety features, as aerodynamic as a breeze block, as draughty as a shed, rusted readily underneath and with the turning circle of a tanker. But

Kara Kennedy

The etiquette of field sex

Field sex is, I believe, an experience that unites those from all walks of life. Whether it was a drunken fumble, a discreet teenage quickie hidden from your parents or a planned act to inject some spice into your waning marriage, plenty of us have felt the vulnerability of walking to the car with a muddy back, anxiously wondering if we’d been spotted by a dog walker.  Admittedly, field sex etiquette isn’t something that I’ve put much thought into. But after Prince Harry’s older woman (two years older to be exact) laid bare her five-minute rendezvous with the adolescent royal, it got me thinking about the right way to do it.  The