Malton…

Day 1, Tuesday, September 27, 2022

After flying for nearly 24 hours and landing at Heathrow at 5am (ouch) we picked up the rental car and headed north for Yorkshire, arriving in Malton, in North East Yorkshire, just in time for lunch.

The so-called foodie capital of Yorkshire, Malton is a busy market town with a history dating back to the first century AD. It’s also the birthplace of one of my foodie heroes – James Martin – of course, we’d call in here!

There are lots of other little factoids I could tell you about this place – like how the grand house/ castle was ordered to be demolished in 1674 and the stones divided between the two sisters who had inherited it and couldn’t agree on what was to happen with it. My favourite though is how some of the buildings in town inspired Charles Dickens when he was writing “A Christmas Carol.”

The above few paragraphs are almost word for word what I wrote about Malton last time we were here in 2019, but this time some things have changed. Pubs and restaurants are having the same issues here as everywhere else and the pub we ate in last time, The Royal Oak, wasn’t doing lunches but had had a paint job done. Nice.

Instead we drove to “Old Malton” and The Wentworth Arms for our first proper meal on English soil and our first proper helping of Yorkshire hospitality.

Old Malton is about a mile northeast of Malton and was, as the name suggests, in existence before Malton, appearing in the Domesday Book as Maltune. Anyways, Old and New Malton were joined together as a civil parish in 1896.

Also in the area is Castle Howard. (The pic below is from google…not me.)

The home of the Howard family and once the seat of the earls of Carlisle, if you’ve seen Brideshead Revisited, the first series of Bridgerton, Victoria, The Buccaneers, and heaps more, you’ll have seen this place. It’s absolutely worth a visit, but not this time.

We visited here the first time we were in York way back in 1995, but called in this time (as we did in 2019) at the farm shop only for some more supplies – important things like Yorkshire butter, local cheese, parkin, pork pies.

We did, however, stop a little way down the road at Bulmer Hill to check out the Carlisle Memorial Column (well, we couldn’t miss it really) erected in memorial to George Howard, the 7th Earl of Carlisle. the Howards really do like their tall things.

File miles south of Malton is Westow and our home for the next four nights.

Located in the gorgeous Howardian Hills, there are no shops here in the village, but plenty to see on a cold morning walk. There are also 15 grade II English heritage-listed properties, one of which is the cottage we were staying in – Herbert Cottage.

Fading fast we opted for The Bay Horse in Burythorpe, just a couple of miles down narrow country roads. Recommended by the housekeeper at Westow Hall, the welcome was warm, the atmosphere cosy, the locals friendly, and the food fantastic.

Grant chose traditional gammon steak with all the usual Yorkshire trimmings and I went for pasta – pappardelle with mushroom and guanciale.

Resisting the temptation of another glass of Rioja, we were back at Herbert Cottage and in bed by not much after 8.30pm.

Tomorrow we’re off to York…