There is holiday hell and then there is self-catering

No salt and pepper, no spices, not enough loo roll – welcome to your holiday cottage

“Welcome basket”. It sounds so nice, doesn’t it? So … welcoming. Driving up the M1 to the holiday cottage you booked online, you picture the delights that await you, and smile inwardly even as the sign ahead says: “Queue after the next junction.” You know already there’ll be a lemon drizzle cake from “our local farm shop” (ie a factory in Derby). Also, a jar of marmalade, a bottle of apple juice and a loaf of bread. There always is. But everything else – ginger snaps? Black pudding? A Peking duck? – is still, at this point, subject to the kind of moderately wild imagining that has you pushing your foot down just a little harder on the accelerator.

What you’re forgetting, of course, is that welcome baskets are not, in fact, even remotely welcoming. They are passive-aggressive acts, timed to remind you of both your own desperation (“How much did we pay for this, again?”) and of the fact that a “self-catering holiday” is basically a contradiction in terms (true in any year, but never more brutally so than in 2021). The first rule of the welcome basket – congratulations, you’ve arrived! – is that it will not be a basket at all, but a cardboard box or a plastic bag. The second rule is that, though the house is for four people, it will invariably contain only two, or six, of everything: two yoghurts, two scones, six sausages. (You do the maths, as they say.) The welcome basket’s essential message is: please don’t imagine for a minute that you’re going to be able to get away without visiting Tesco tomorrow.

Needless to say, the nearest Tesco is 20 minutes’ drive from where you are, unless it’s raining or the market’s on, in which case you can double that, and by day four – how time flies when you’re running a boutique B&B! – the route is already drearily familiar. Naturally, you knew that all the fresh things you stowed in the boot of the car before you left would have to be replenished eventually. What you did not expect was that the cottage’s owner would provide no pepper, no salt, no oil for cooking, no vinegar, no spices or herbs of any description, and only two loo rolls. Yes, yes: two loo rolls should have been plenty. No one has gastroenteritis (yet). But half of one is currently wound around the finger you almost sliced off because the knives in the cottage were last sharpened around the time Hardwick Hall was built.

Still, it’s not all bad. After two days, you managed to work out how the hob works, and after three, the dishwasher. It is a bit tedious, the way that even now you still have to open each cupboard three times before you find the mugs, but on the plus side you can feel pretty smug about the fact that you brought your good frying pan with you. Everyone laughed when you hauled it out, from a box that also contained a microplane, a cafetiere and two bottles of gin. But they’re not laughing now, are they? (Except when they’ve been at the gin, another bottle of which you now add to your mental list.)

Looking ahead, you’re about to get a night off: trial-by-omelette will be on hold tomorrow, because you’re all going to the Indian that’s recommended in the folder. (There’s always a folder, though reading it lends no clarity to anything, whether you’re talking about local attractions, jigsaws or where to put the recycling.) No, it won’t be as good as the one at home. But at this moment – ah, the last mini roundabout is finally in sight – you’d give anything for a poppadom and a chicken korma.

And the day after that, it’ll be time to start packing up. To leave or not to leave the untouched jar of marmalade: that is the question. (You don’t want to be petty, but you’re still smarting about what they’re charging for the logs you never thought you’d need in mid-August.) It’ll be so nice to get home, almost like a holiday, and next year there’ll be – won’t there? Please tell us there will be – a hotel somewhere hot. You’ll have no need of a frying pan, then. The breakfast buffet will be almost as long as the Pennine Way, and just as beautiful.

Contributor

Rachel Cooke

The GuardianTramp

Related Content

Article image
I wanted to order my breakfast from a waiter not an iPad
Eating is a social pleasure – touchscreens just serve to make it more solitary

Rachel Cooke

18, May, 2019 @4:00 PM

Article image
I thought the best place for French food was Britain. Then my holiday breakfast arrived… | Rachel Cooke
I long to believe the French eat better than everyone else. And, for one morning at least, it seemed to be true

Rachel Cooke

19, Aug, 2023 @4:00 PM

Article image
The perfect holiday needs a perfect cafe | Rachel Cooke

Rachel Cooke: It's not the beach, the walking or the weather: finding a good place to eat can turn a good holiday into a great one

Rachel Cooke

15, Jun, 2014 @7:00 AM

Article image
Eating alone isn’t good for you – but you do get to read at the table
Research shows that eating on your own at home is a prime indicator of unhappiness but it does have its plus points

Rachel Cooke

16, Jun, 2018 @5:00 PM

Article image
The origins of clean eating
Why the fashion for restricted diets has been around longer than we might think

Rachel Cooke

18, Sep, 2017 @7:00 AM

Article image
I’ve been a barmaid and a waitress. I know exactly what late-night banter means
Will a storm of sexual harassment allegations in America bring any real change to restaurant culture?

Rachel Cooke

21, Jan, 2018 @11:30 AM

Article image
Coming soon: turnips are the new kale
The iceberg lettuce shortage is only the beginning. Brexit will have a huge effect on the food we buy. Best to fall back on some great British veg

Rachel Cooke

20, Feb, 2017 @8:00 AM

Article image
Honesty box – or dishonesty box?
The light-fingered might take advantage of the honesty box, but for the creative cook it provides a roadside recipe challenge

Rachel Cooke

21, Aug, 2017 @7:00 AM

Article image
Am I ready for my cookbook cull?
There’s a weight of memory and knowledge in my cookbooks. And now I have to get rid of some …

Rachel Cooke

22, May, 2017 @8:00 AM

Article image
Who needs to know how to grow vegetables? It's learning how to cook them that counts
If we’re to quit our addiction to packaged food, it’s life skills we need, not lectures. Step one: focus on ease, speed and value for money

Rachel Cooke

24, Apr, 2017 @7:00 AM