Category: Road trip

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TELL US YOUR TIPS

The Extra Mile from Glovebox Guides (ed. 3)

Avoid the Services: Nominate great cafés for the new guide

Research is underway for the 2023 edition of The Extra Mile – Delicious Alternatives to Motorway Services – every driver’s essential guide to good food on the move.  
 
Nominations are welcomed from (or for) independent cafés, cosy tea rooms, quirky pit-stops and welcoming farm shops – within a 15-minute drive of a motorway or main A-road junction – to feature in this useful glovebox guidebook and on its companion website. Is there anywhere we really shouldn’t miss?
 
Writer, Kerry O’Neill, said, “We’re keen to fill the upcoming fourth edition of this sell-out guide with some classic and new foodie destinations to help drivers avoid the monotony of motorway services. We’ll uncover the best farm shops, cafés, tea rooms and eateries we can find near motorway and main A-road junctions, many of which would love a helping hand following the challenges of recent years. The Extra Mile helps its readers find and support the small and independent food and drink businesses who are going the extra mile to keep us all fed and watered in local, low-food-mile style.” 

 
England, Scotland and Wales: the café hunt continues 

In early Sept 2022, Icelandic foodie and photographer Iris Thorsteinsdottir will set off to explore Scotland’s off-motorway and A-road wilds on a quest to find more venues to join The Extra Mile while author Kerry O’Neill continues her quest across Wales and England.  
 

Nominate yourself or a favourite venue 

To nominate a venue to join The Extra Mile – Delicious Alternatives to Motorway Services for the team to visit, go to Find a stop to see if it’s already part of the collection. If not, submit the information at Join the Guide. Nominations should be interesting and independent (or part of a small regional chain) with a strong locally-sourced food ethos. They must be within a short drive – 15 minutes maximum and the closer the better – of a motorway or main A-road junction in mainland England, Wales or Scotland. Most importantly, they should be friendly, foodie and fabulous!
 

Who can be nominated? 

  • Coffee shops and tea rooms 
  • Cafés and bistros (including those within gardens or visitor attractions) 
  • Farm shops, farm shop cafés, garden centre cafés 
  • Delis and bakeries 
  • Vegetarian and plant-based cafés 
  • Unusual take-aways, pre-order picnics/ veg box companies 
  • Ice-cream parlours 
  • Breweries, wineries or distilleries with sit-in food options 
  • Family-friendly and dog-friendly spots 
     

Buy a copy for yourself or for a gift

The Extra Mile – Delicious Alternatives to Motorway Services is the essential glovebox guidebook for anyone seeking interesting eats while exploring England, Scotland and Wales by car. It’s the ideal gift for drivers, food lovers and gloveboxes everywhere. The most recent edition (ed. 3, 2019, by Laura Collacott) sold out and was refreshed and reprinted for 2022 by Glovebox Guides. The new, fourth edition is being compiled now, with a deadline for inclusion of 30 Sep 2022. The book will be in good bookshops and online in 2023. For updates and an alert when the new edition is available to order, subscribe to our newsletter on the homepage. Buy the current edition now while stocks last.

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Notes for editors 
For further press information and to discuss related content, photography, book giveaways and reader competitions, email Kerry at The Extra Mile Guide.

 
The Extra Mile guidebook 
The Extra Mile – Delicious Alternatives to Motorway Services is the essential glovebox guidebook to memorable food and drink experiences while on the move. It helps readers replace monotonous motorway food with the fresh, colourful and often locally sourced flavours of over 300 independent cafes, growers, makers and bakers, all within a 15-minute drive of a motorway or main A-road junction. Plan your journey, explore the alternative eateries and eat better when on the move, while supporting local producers. 
 

The Extra Mile website 
The Extra Mile site is an extension of the print guidebook with venue details and a ‘search by map’ function to direct hungry drivers to their chosen foodie venue. The site is updated regularly, with a curated collection of stop-offs, eateries and farm shops featuring in each new edition of the book. To submit a venue or request to join the collection, visit Join the Guide.
 

Glovebox Guides 
Glovebox Guides is an imprint of Printslinger Ltd, the independent publishing company run by renowned slow food lover, Alastair Sawday. Glovebox Guides will publish the fourth edition of The Extra Mile – Delicious Alternatives to Motorway Services in 2023 as the first in a series of new titles.  Buy direct from Glovebox Guides to ensure you get the refreshed 2022 reprint.
 

Kerry O’Neill, author 
Kerry O’Neill is a UK-based travel researcher and writer with an MSc in literary tourism. She has collaborated with key sustainable travel, food and wine brands including Secret Compass Expeditions, Sustrans, TravelLocal, Sawday’s Special Places to Stay, Sidetracked magazine, Avery’s Wine Merchants and FoodWorks South West. The Extra Mile is her first collaboration with Glovebox Guides.   

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IT’S A HARD JOB, BUT…

Image of Farm Shop sign

Laura Collacott, writer of the first three editions of The Extra Mile, is back on the road in June 2022. She’ll be making a cameo appearance in the new edition of the book (due out in spring 2023), as she’s seeking out memorable new venues in the North East for the fourth edition of our essential glovebox guide to good food on the move. Laura found a moment to reveal the reality of life on the road. It’s a hard job, but somebody’s got to do it after all…

View of the North York Moors
Laura’s view over the North York Moors this week

“Ah, the joy of being a food writer. We know what you’re thinking. Meandering from café to farm shop, chatting idly to the good people behind them, languorously tucking in to gargantuan sandwiches, feasting on slabs of cake and scratching farm pigs behind the ear. Gently fattening.  

If only.  

In truth, finding the good cakes and best breakfasts involves a lot more legwork. It starts with poring over maps and trawling the internet for places that look promising, followed by long days on the road zipping from place to place and diverting to follow tip-offs from locals or the glimpse of a promising signboard. Many of the places we visit don’t make the cut for various reasons – too greasy, too bland, too unfriendly; simply not special enough.  

But for those that are – special enough – those that we wouldn’t hesitate to recommend to a friend, we set to work. We speak to the owners to find out why they set it up, and their food ethos; to staff to find out how it runs and where the ingredients come from. We talk to customers to find out what they like best about the place and what their favourite dishes are. We explore the shelves and inspect the menu, tasting mouthfuls where we can and taking extensive notes. Then we’re off again, on the hunt for the next. 

Far from eating cream teas in every stop (we’d be the size of houses if we did), this is a life of hastily eaten pastries and scotch eggs on the hoof. A life of broken snatches of Radio Four shows and disgraceful crumb- and paper-strewn cars.  

Sometimes there are long, dispiriting stretches where nowhere fits the bill. But when you do stumble across a fantastic place, where the welcome is all wide smiles and the owners are foodies who can name the farmers who supply the eggs and salad leaves…it makes the empty miles melt away. 

And then there are the views. The sweeping, moorland vistas or emerald hilltops that you just can’t see from the motorway. The countryside traffic jams caused by a string of ducklings crossing the road and the little-known towns that surprise you with their vibrance. That’s when we’re sure it really is worth going the extra mile.”  

Order The Extra Mile book now

The updated third edition of The Extra Mile is being prepared for print now and will be back in the shops around mid to late July 2022. We’re updating everyone’s opening hours so that you don’t turn up for a slap up feed when a cafe is closed, and we’ve removed those places that are no longer open. Order from our Shop today and your book will arrive and may even still be hot – or at the very least a little bit lukewarm – off the actual press. If you order it elsewhere online, it will likely be people’s older stock of the 2019 edition so our top tip to ensure you get the 2022 reprint with up-to-date intel is, buy directly from us.

NEW edition coming in 2023

Laura and our other similarly discerning roving reporters are on the road in 2022, seeking out more great finds to feature in the fourth, spring 2023 edition of the book. Subscribe to our newsletter (scroll down the homepage to enter your email) and keep an eye on our social media channels for news of its release. Don’t forget to let us know if you discover any terrific eateries while on your travels this year. We’d love to feature their local characters and flavours in our new collection of independent cafes, pubs, restaurants, farm shops, ice-cream parlours and attractions across the land.