The ordeal of a first Vindaloo, Eartha Kitt's hankering for fish and chips - and an unusual Biryani. Walking tours guide Ian Mole remembers some of the places on Wearside where we used to eat.
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00:00 Hello my name's Ian Moore. I conduct a number of walking tours of central Sunderland. I do
00:05 shipyard girls tour, lost pubs of the 60s, lost shops and stores, lost cinemas. Today I want to
00:14 talk about a subject close to our hearts or should I say close to our stomachs, that is restaurants,
00:20 takeaways and food outlets in general. Now I'll start my tale at the beginning of the 70s, back
00:27 in the 70s, okay it's 50 odd years ago now, there wasn't a great deal in the way of exotic eateries
00:33 in Sunderland. To the best of my knowledge there were two Chinese, the Ling Hong and the Bamboo,
00:38 which had various names in its time, and the Delhi Durbar Indian takeaway up Durton Road.
00:45 There was a Chinese takeaway, the Goodyear, in the bottom of Chester Road but I'm not sure if
00:50 that was a restaurant at the time, I think it was just takeaway. I remember 1973, me mate's brother
00:57 had a few friends up from university, one of them was an American, and he said where would you,
01:01 what do you want to do, where would you like to eat? I said I'd love to eat some Czechoslovakian
01:06 food tonight and he said come on man, you're pushing it a bit there. But these days we've
01:11 got a lot of beautiful restaurants, but Vietnamese, Persian, Turkish, Harnessian, everything I think
01:18 is a really good selection. I've eaten Indian meals all over the world, my favourite is Mike
01:25 Delhi, I think it's the best Indian food I've ever had. So where we're standing now, the port of
01:30 cause behind us, in a previous incarnation it was the Biz Bar. Now to be honest I never went in the
01:37 Biz Bar, it was a bit above my league, I didn't have enough money. It was where, it's a place to
01:42 kind of see people and be seen. If you could get there early and sit in the window it looked very
01:46 cool for people walking by. Geoff Dockery in his book about music, promoting music in Sunderland,
01:53 he was often in there, it was a good place to network for him. There used to be some very,
01:58 very snazzy sports cars outside, I think they belonged to rich Greek students from there,
02:04 what was the technical college at that time. It was owned by the Nutriani family, a well-known
02:08 family in Sunderland. You probably recall Nutriani's ice cream coffee parlor in High Street
02:14 and the one down the seafront as well. There were a lot of Italian families, I don't know when they
02:18 arrived in Sunderland, probably in the 30s. I've heard tales of Italian people that were so poor
02:24 they actually walked from Italy to the UK to try and find a job in the South Wales cold fields or
02:30 whatever. So some of the names I remember, Tognarelli, Mincellas I think are still here,
02:36 Giraldi. It was a big thing to go and have a nick of bottle glory in Nutriani's. This is the
02:44 location of the Nutriani's ice cream parlor, coffee bar here. It was a real treat if you came
02:51 here. I have to admit I was guilty of a small crime here in 1968 and our little gang, to prove
02:58 you were a gang member, you had to nick a coffee spoon from Nutriani's and I'm afraid I did that,
03:03 so I think the statute of limitations might have passed now, so please forgive me, Nutriani family.
03:09 So just behind me there, just where Teutonic's open air bit is, used to be a nice Italian
03:14 restaurant called Pizzeria Pinocchio. I think it opened very early 70s. I was first there
03:20 spring 1972 when I was leaving school. A few of our teachers who got on very well with them
03:26 said let's go and have an Italian lunch somewhere. Well I'd eaten spaghetti at home and my mum even
03:31 made a prototype pizza about the year before, but I'd never been to an Italian restaurant before
03:37 and I didn't understand all this anti-pastry business, so I didn't know how big it was,
03:43 so I think we had minestrone soup and then they had cannelloni al forno and after that I was
03:50 knackered. I could hardly eat anything else and I didn't know the next course was going to be
03:55 big as well and one of the teachers, Mr Straits, said oh more you cannot take your grub. I don't
03:59 think that's true actually, but I was struggling on that day. On this side I think it was probably
04:04 my favourite restaurant in the 70s was Ling Hong, so the Ling Hong Chinese restaurant had been there
04:10 I think since at least the early 60s. One of my friends Marilyn was in there in February 1963,
04:17 it was her birthday, she'd just been to the empire and she was celebrating her birthday with a few
04:23 friends in the Ling Hong and who should walk in but the Beatles, so they were the band she'd been
04:28 saying in the empire and John Lennon said what are you doing eating fish and chips in a Chinese
04:32 restaurant? I think it was Chinese cuisine was a bit new though, so she just stuck to what she
04:37 knew best. So in the 1970s I used to work, 1977-78, I used to work in Green Terrace just around the
04:43 corner so I was often in the Ling Hong for a bit of an extended lunch. They had a three-course
04:48 special, I used to love it. The soup, I've never seen any Chinese soup like it since actually, it
04:54 was quite thick and it was a different colour but it tasted basically the same every day but I really
05:00 enjoyed it. The next course you had a choice of chop suey and a few other things and they'd have
05:04 all sorts of exotic desserts like a banana, a banana in batter, I think it's like a banana
05:11 fit, I'm not quite sure what it was but it was enormous so we're always in a scoffing that. Now
05:16 I need a bit of help on this one, about a month ago I saw a picture of the Vine Grill, now this
05:21 is a place I hadn't even thought of for about 50 years and I never went in there, I was too young
05:27 really to go for meals when it was in existence but I think it was somewhere here, I'm pretty
05:32 sure it was here, maybe where Jack's Thai restaurant place is now but it opened in 1957. I think it was
05:38 quite a swish place, steaks and stuff like this and just on the left here this is a place I used
05:43 to frequent a lot so I think it opened beginning of 1978 was Harvey's. Now in a previous incarnation
05:51 it'd be the newsagents called Porrits and people used to call this Porrits Corner. So it opened
05:56 like I say early 1978 and had all manner of exotic things which I'd never really had before, it's
06:01 times daft but a baked potato with mayonnaise, this was something really outlandish for me
06:08 and I drank a Campari, I don't think I really knew what a Campari was but I tried one of them one day.
06:15 A lot of people liked it because it was open after the pubs closed, pubs used to close early in
06:21 them days so it was a very popular hangout and it's gradually morphed over the years into various
06:28 incarnations, it's extended, it's unrecognisable compared to what it was before. Personally I never
06:34 saw a pizza or a kebab in Sunderland until probably the mid 70s so before that the mainstay of
06:40 takeaway meal was of course the chippy, a bag of chips for sixpence, two and a half pence.
06:46 This one behind us we called it the black and white chip shop because it was black and white
06:51 surprisingly. My mother used to be secretary to the director at the Empire Theatre
06:58 and one day I think it was the 1980s who should she have perched on the end of her desk but
07:03 Arthur Kitt. Arthur Kitt said Audrey we're going to get some really nice fish and chips and she said
07:08 oh try the black and white fish shop so I don't suppose Arthur went up herself like maybe her
07:14 assistant went to get the goodies for her. So you can see where we are just next to the fire station
07:21 there used to be some very very old buildings here until maybe the 70s, I think they're about 300
07:27 years old but one of them it was a called the chop suey house it was a Chinese takeaway.
07:33 If you're old enough to remember the summer in 1974 this was the summer of kung fu. The number
07:40 one song was kung fu fighting and kung fu the tv show was on everybody's into kung fu big style
07:45 and these people in the takeaways they didn't know I've got some stick when all the drunks rolled in
07:51 after the pubs closed and that. I noticed the lad in the chop suey house he had a picture of himself
07:57 leaping in the air bare chested giving up the old kung fu kick style hopefully try and deter any
08:03 would-be aggressors. So High Street Baths used to be just here and you may remember it could be very
08:10 cold in there so when you came out if you had a few bob you could buy something to revitalize
08:16 yourself and that of course was the Savalloy dip. There used to be a shop called Pie Burns
08:22 I think it was a baker shop really but my friend introduced us Savalloy dips he said
08:27 take the skins off please bit of paste pudding in a bun and they dipped it in the gravy and it was a
08:33 nice nice warm filling snack on the way home. So here we are on Fawcett Street and across the way
08:39 there this beautiful building was designed by an architect called Frank Coors who he also designed
08:45 the elephant tea room as well so maybe one day they'll restore the lower half of this as they
08:50 have done in the elephant tea rooms. Anyway back before I remember to be honest there was a very
08:55 swish sort of restaurant tea room place called Meng's sounds maybe Chinese but I think it was the
09:02 French family so if you went there you were really putting the board out. If you read the shipyard
09:07 girls books two of the the female characters get taken there on a posh date. A place I was very
09:13 fond of was the Hong Kong was a Chinese restaurant obviously just I think it was right here. I think
09:19 it was still open till about 20 years ago it's had various names over the years I think it was called
09:24 the Lotus Garden in the earlier incarnation but I only knew it as the Hong Kong. Sometimes they
09:31 had a businessman's lunch as well and go in the evening sometimes nice grub. My friend Arthur
09:37 was in here once about maybe 30 years ago with another mutual friend who let's call him John
09:46 right at the end of the evening the last ones in the restaurant and the waiters had all gone out
09:50 into the kitchen so they were alone in the restaurant and suddenly without saying anything
09:55 John got up and he ran out of the restaurant and Arthur thought what am I going to do he only had
10:00 enough money for his meal he couldn't afford to pay for John's as well so he was obliged to run
10:06 out the door as well he didn't really want to do it but he didn't want to shop his mate and he
10:09 couldn't bear so the two of them ended up legging it up high street and looked behind them and some
10:15 of the staff were in pursuit but they never caught them which of course is a very naughty
10:19 thing to do. I know one or two places the Delhi Durbar for example I think this was quite famous
10:25 for people doing a runner there so in the Delhi Durbar 1978's where I had my very first vindaloo
10:30 when they were kind of famed by how strong they were of course I was with my girlfriend I was
10:35 only about 23-24 so standards had to be maintained. I started eating after about the second mouthful
10:41 I thought my god I cannot handle this but I ploughed on and my eyes started running my nose
10:48 started running but I thought I've got to finish it you know I cannot lose face here so I managed
10:53 to consume it there was a quite an ordeal but these days I can handle vindaloo no trouble at
10:58 all I suppose you get used to them. A lot of Indian takeaways started appearing in the late
11:04 well late 60s early 70s there was one I can't remember where it was it was Hilton Road somewhere
11:10 somewhere near the railway and we had a few Bob then we were all working so if we've been out
11:17 having a few drinks we'd often get the munchies on the way home and they had a special biryani
11:23 and it cost £1.75 which was a lot of dough then really. On top there was a half a sliced banana
11:29 and a fried egg it seems a very strange combination but I think we got it twice and
11:37 being a bit of a pig I ate all of mine but I remember my mate woke up and he saw his
11:42 lying untouched next to him so I don't think he tried having one again.
11:47 [Music]