Our Inspiration

While our menu is a constant work in progress as we tinker in the kitchen to come up with new dishes and make everything as tasty as possible, we’d like to share our inspiration for a few potential dishes as we believe that it’s part of the story and each dish means something different to us.

As you’ll see we’ve always tried to keep in mind our love of the mountains and all of the places we’ve been lucky enough to visit over the years, but we’re always on the lookout for new ideas from places that we haven’t been to yet.

Scafell Pike

Done years before we first met, Michelle climbed Scafell pike with our chief engineer, Chelle’s Dad,  as part of the 3 Peaks challenge, summiting Scafell Pike, Ben Nevis and Snowden all within 24 hours! Although she hasn’t convinced Elliot to give it a second shot just yet we couldn’t resist having it on the menu and what else with other than England’s national dish…the tikka masala!

Tongariro Crossing

The Tongariro Crossing on the North of New Zealand’s two islands is a spectacular walk beside the very mountain used as Mt. Doom in The Lord of the Rings! We completed it together in the very first year of being together and wanted to bring New Zealand’s themes through with our take on a pulled lamb style jackfruit, infused with a honey and rosemary BBQ sauce.

Mount Fuji

Japan is one of the most beautiful countries we’ve ever been to and feature’s one of the most iconic mountains in the world. Fuji’s instantly recognisable peak was best viewed, in our opinion, from the top of a roller coaster of all things! We’ve taken inspiration from the amazing street food we ate while there, especially Okonomiyaki, a giant pancake cooked on a hibachi in front of you and smothered with teriyaki sauce and Japan’s signature kewpie mayonnaise.

Mont Blanc & Gran Paradiso

While living in Chamonix, France we worked for a mountain guiding company who ran tours climbing the tallest mountains in France and Italy, Mont Blanc and Gran Paradiso. While there we were both extremely lucky enough to be given the opportunity to join a tour on each, and after having both made the summits they will always be mountains with a very close, personal connection to us.

 Of course you couldn’t have a French dish without cheese so the Mont Blanc will be absolutely smothered with the stuff, including a nod to other classic French flavours with crispy onions, garlic bits and even some charcuterie influences. Whereas the Gran Paradiso will hopefully be a bit lighter, we’re thinking a nice rich marinara sauce, pesto and lots of stringy mozzarella so it still feels like a bit of a naughty treat.

Tunnel Mountain

Arguably the mountain that started us down this adventure! Set in the heart of the Rockies, Tunnel Mountain overlooks the town of Banff, our home for the last two years. It’s where, at the summit, El finally popped the question after six years of travelling the world together!

Being in Canada, you probably can’t think of loaded fries without instantly jumping to one of the nation’s stalwart dishes, poutine. Put simply it’s chips topped with tonnes of cheese curds, think melted mozzarella that squeaks a bit when you bite on it, then the whole lot absolutely drowned in gravy.

It’s simple, it’s beautiful and we like to think that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, so we aren’t going to change a thing!

Sunrise Summit

One thing we forgot to mention about our proposal summit was that it was actually done at sunrise! Although we wish someone had told us that sunrise that morning was going to be a very unspectacular, gradually brightening blanket of clouds, being up that early still made our moment all the more special.

The only thing missing afterwards to get us back down was a nice hot breakfast so our twist on the classic full English comes with cubed hashed brown potatoes rather than chips and a covering of baked beans, sausage and bacon.