The simple menu at this Oxfordshire pub barely hints at the glories of the food on your plate
The Double Red Duke, Bourton Road, Clanfield, Bampton, Oxfordshire OX18 2RB (01367 810222). Snacks and small plates £7.50-£16, large dishes £12-£35, desserts £9, wines from £27
Later, I would think of it as the redemptive scallop; as the bivalve that made amends for the tragically broken promise of the one that had gone before. Then I would hate myself for allowing the ludicrous phrase “redemptive scallop” into my head. At the time, though, all I thought was: “Damn, there are three of them. That means I have to share the other one. Why, God, why?” It came on the shell, under a thick drift of crisp, golden breadcrumbs which in turn had been drenched gleefully in wild garlic-flecked butter. The scallop had been cooked to a glossy mother of pearl within, and there, like a showily tinted comma from an illuminated manuscript, was the brilliant orange of the coral. Eventually, I took to scraping at the ridges of the shell for the crusty bits. There were many crusty bits.
