Ordering online from supermarkets - does it work?

Waitrose Calendar - if you got one last year, you could use it to mark your delivery slot.

Problem
The delivery options are great. You can get delivery in time slots, which are on the hour and on the half hour, from 7-8 am until 9-10 pm. When I looked online after mighnight, Saturday, in effect Sunday, the next day slots on Monday which were already filled and taken were 7-9, 4-5 and 5-6.

Ordering online from supermarkets sound a great way to cater for a leaving party in a studio flat or hotel suite.

However, my efforts in the UK were not a success.

I tried Waitrose. Then Ocado. They sent me a survey and asked my opinion. I said:

Firstly, keep my shopping bag full so if I accidentally close the website I haven't wasted 90 minutes.

Free Delivery?
Secondly, I opened what I thought was an Ocado offer for £30 off and free delivery and got neither. It seems that I have to spend £60 and to get special deals I have to sign up for a year which is not possible as I am retired and shall be away for more than a month at some time in the winter.

Waitrose lets you sign up with Facebook or google or Paypal. That's handy.

Waitrose and Ocado
I started on the Waitrose website, then went onto the Ocado website with different offers and now can't make out if they are the same or different as my website on Ocado disappeared and is not in my history.

I would like to be able to save products in favourites, so if I try to re-load my basket it will pick them again, but I am not sure how to do it. I think it only does that after you have completed your first shop. What if I am hopping about and want to save teh chocolate digestives whilst I look for alternatives?

When I go to close the website without completing my order, it does not offer to save anything.

Basket Price
The website should also give you a running total so you can see if you are near the minimum spend. I think I saw it once. Maybe I moved the screen and it went.

I don't know why the cookies haven't saved me. Instead, I have to start filling in passwords all over again.

How Many Biscuits Per Pack?
Some of the packs said, two pieces, or four.
However, the biscuit packs and cakes mostly don't have numbers of pieces or slices.

I have no idea how many 'family size' serves. A family of four? Six? Twenty?

I am going to a club committee meeting of about 6 to 8 people and want to take a pack of biscuits and a cake or something like profiteroles. I don't want to find I have 8 people and only 7 biscuits or four pieces of cake you can't cut without making a mess all over our paperwork.

Prices
The Waitrose / Ocado online prices are much higher than Tesco Express which has bananas under £1 and a giant box of grapes for £3. I also cannot buy a sandwich, only sandwich fillings. All day in any supermarket I can get sandwiches for £1 or from Tesco for £1.10p.

Tinned Fish
The tins of sardines and mackerel are also much more expensive than Tesco, and the baked beans.

Cheesecakes
I had trouble working out which of the cheesecakes were baked cheesecakes and which were the mousse sort which make a mess and are more like cream than cake. I would like a round cake pre-cut into slices for a party.

If you want to order a large amount, good.

Alternatives
Maybe I'll go back to the Poundland website.

ADVANTAGES FOR YOU
However, your circumstances may be different from mine. You may find that, as there advertising claims, they save you hours of time. And stop you making impulse purchases. And enable you to check your own fridge to be sure you really have run out of something before you buy it.

Useful Websites
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocado
Waitrose.com
www.ocado.com
poundland.co.uk
This sites explains that although products may overlap, the two sites are different. The article was written in 2014 as you can tell from the prices and offers.
https://www.thedrum.com/opinion/2014/03/03/battle-between-ocado-and-waitrose-shows-why-integrated-campaign-needs-more
Author
Angela Lansbury

Pub du vin, Birmingham - best French onion soup

We had tried the Hotel du Vin in York and loved their extensive choice of wines, so we booked a dinner at their restaurant in Birmingham. The hotel was fully booked for two midweek nights, but we managed to find a bargain hotel (see my other post) and splurged on a fine dinner.

Wine: I like sweet wine so my choice was tokay. Tokay is from Hungary.

Starters: I opted for French onion soup.  Lovely tasty crispy cheese top. Plenty of onion underneath. Served in a proper French bowl.

My companion had shellfish. The half lemon was wrapped in muslin to stop pips being squeezed into your food. The muslin was tied with green ribbon.

My main course was chicken. Solid pieces of chicken.

Creamed potatoes as a side order cost extra.

My dessert was baked cheesecake. No as crumbly as the New York style cheese cake in the coffee shops in Singapore. But good enough. (I hate those half defrosted mousse cheesecakes which don't taste of cheese nor crumble like cake but look like a piece of blancmange boasting about its ancestors.) I like baked cheese cake.

Baked cheese cake has a huge number of calories. So does any sugary sweet/dessert. But partner in diet or calorie crime did offer to taste my cheesecake.  But he added to the variety whilst adding to the calories by ordering a rhubarb trifle.

I used to like Cafe Rouge, still do. If you think your local Cafe Rouge is three star then this place is four star. If you think Cafe Rouge is even better, four star, then this place is five.

What's not to like? Music was loud but they turned it down.  The tables were round, varying in size from little tables for two to a massive table seating eight, maybe more, but their dining chairs are wide. The table wobbled - due to the real wood floor, but the slice of cork bottle top sorted that out when I replaced it under the table leg.

Service: Smiling but slow. (They said one of their staff was off sick.)

Coffee was not exciting, no magic extra touch. Portions were plentiful. We must remember to take a mini-fridge in the car for leftovers if we ever go back.

I must make a note to go back. Why? For food which tasted really wow factor.