Growing up, we’d have a few family gatherings each year. These would be special occasions like birthdays, first communions or wedding anniversaries where the whole family on my Mom’s side, my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and all would get together for a meal. We always went to the same restaurant, the one at the Sunset Ridge Hotel. There are so many photos of my siblings and me from when we were very young and in our teens, with our cousins, sitting in the reception area or outside on benches at the hotel my parents used for their wedding reception. It was my grandfather’s local and where my uncle had his fortieth birthday. In the late seventies, my mother once drove my grandfather there in her Mini at such a speed that he had to say to her he wasn’t in a rush to get there. He’d meet his retired friends on Thursdays and frequented the place so much that he even had his own parking space out the front, his initials painted on the tarmac.

It made perfect sense that we’d all go for dinner there to celebrate special occasions. The staff knew our names which was lovely. Anyway, to the point of this store, my siblings and I always chose the same set menu: oxtail soup, turkey and ham, jelly and ice cream. I don’t think any of us ever tried anything else. My taste buds are more refined now but back in the early nineties and early two thousands that combination was what we all liked and it was consistently so good it made it easy to choose every time. We’d always get extra gravy because it was the best and I’ve never tasted anything like it since. We’d also share a bowl of chips. The nostalgia of the place still comes up in conversations over family meals although the hotel itself fell into ruin and was demolished, and the owner passed away a few years ago, we’ve never ordered the same: oxtail soup, turkey and ham, jelly and ice cream combination in any other restaurant.