Spring House Farm Shop

If you are like me, trawling the A1/​M1 north to south and south to north happens all too regularly. Moto makes me think a fairy dies every time you walk through those automated doors. Little Chef is, well, it’s Little Chef, and I think we all know what that means, right, right?
On my latest venture south of the border, I was travelling with the oldies, which means we travel at the speed of the parents. Which, on the bright spring day that was Thursday, was alright with me. What was not alright was the prospect of eating crappy overpriced food and drinking burnt coffee at any one of the service stations that blot the landscape. Enough, I thought, we are ambling the day away, therefore, why be forced into bad food land? Lets take a risk and pull off the motorway to find a café, or a pub to have lunch.
And so we did after a couple of attempts and misses of exits (hair raising, indeed!) which brought us into the village of Leeming Bar. We would have pulled away back onto the motorway, but luckily we went left instead of right (that might have been down to me demanding to go to Northallerton… but never mind that) and came across Spring House Farm Shop. Inside is a gallery of homebaked treats — bread, cake, roulade… as well as the normal items shops sell i.e. chutneys etc.
At the back was a small café, where we tucked into cheese and onion chutney (caramelised… so. damn. good.) sandwiches (home baked bread rolls) and soup. My eye fell on… well, I can’t tell you, as it’s my sister’s birthday present and a fellow member on Unilocal,but it was really rather smart, I promise you. I, as the lardass member of the family, also grabbed a slice of coffee and walnut cake. Although the walnuts were not spread through the sponge, it was one of the lightest sponges I have had in a long time. Glad I tried!
By the end I had spent forty quid on my sandwich — one birthday present down, some tomato and smoked garlic ketchup, onion marmalade as well as some mango chutney and some other bits and bobs. My other sister bought breakfast (some amazing giant field mushrooms) from the small but delicious fresh vegetable section and we were good to go. This is definitely up there on my list of farmers markets and a welcome change on what is one helluva laborious drive.