Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
The Norwegian author Jon Fosse had just entered middle age when he published Morgon og kveld (2000), a slim novel depicting the first and last days in the life of an ordinary fisherman. Damion Searls’ English translation received scant coverage when it was first published in the US by Dalkey Archive Press in 2015. Back then, Fosse was relatively unknown in the English-speaking world. He has since gone on to international repute after winning the 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature, and the book has now been published in the UK for the first time, courtesy of Fitzcarraldo Editions.
Morning and Evening begins with a 13-page birth scene. A baby boy is born, and the father exultantly declares: “His name will be Johannes . . . And he’ll be a fisherman, like his father.” We then abruptly skip forward a number of decades; Johannes is now an ailing, elderly widower pottering about his shed, dolefully contemplating the laundry tubs and gardening tools that had belonged to has late wife, Erna: “Every one of these things . . . is at the same time heavy with all the work that has ever been done with it and light, so light . . . that’s how it is, the people leave and the things stay.”
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Johannes goes out for a walk, feeling curiously weightless and sensing that “everything has changed somehow, the things, the house, they all look different, heavier and lighter somehow, as though there were more of the earth in the houses and more of the sky too.” He meets his oldest friend, Peter, and together they go out to sea in a dory to retrieve a catch of crabs from crab traps; after returning to shore, they find themselves unaccountably clad in their finest suits. Later he runs into his daughter, Signe, but she doesn’t register his presence.
Eventually the penny drops: Johannes died in his sleep that morning, and has been wandering around as a ghost; Peter, himself long dead, is tasked with shepherding his friend’s soul to the afterlife. The reader figures it out before Johannes does, which makes his confusion all the more poignant. “Everything is all wrong today, everything that happens today is happening so immediately and suddenly.”
Fosse’s distinctive prose style — a spare, elegant minimalism deftly complicated by stylised, mesmeric repetitions — conjures a suitably haunting atmosphere, a sense of a once familiar world turned uncannily strange. The phrase “Johannes thinks”, for example, occurs with far greater frequency than is strictly necessary; coffee and cigarettes, the symbolic mainstays of a lifetime’s homely routine, are a recurring, melancholic motif. The almost complete absence of full-stops is no mere gimmick: the narrative, effectively punctuated by a string of lower-case “and”s, has an easy, hallucinatory suppleness that serves the story well.
The result is a work of graceful, spine-tingling beauty. Despite its sad premise, there is something oddly comforting in the novel’s ambience of cosmic inevitability, encapsulated in the resigned, matter-of-fact laconism of the dialogue: the word “Yes” features with conspicuous regularity, as does the phlegmatic refrain, “That’s how it is”, which is uttered by several characters including the midwife who delivers Johannes, and the doctor who certifies his death.
Fosse was an atheist when he wrote Morning and Evening, but later embraced Catholicism in his fifties. We can perhaps discern, with hindsight, a harbinger of that religious awakening in this tale’s quietist overtones and its soothing evocation of a benign hereafter. As Peter gently ushers Johannes towards the other side, he reassures him: “Everything you love is there, everything you don’t love is not there.”
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Morning and Evening by Jon Fosse, translated by Damion Searls Fitzcarraldo Editions £9.99, 64 pages
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KATHY GARRETT and Andy Carter are a £7billion duo.
That’s the astonishing total which the National Lottery’s longest-serving winners’ advisers have handed out to those lucky punters who have hit the jackpot.
The pair have met more big winners than anyone else in the UK.
And to mark the lottery’s 30th anniversary they have revealed some of the secrets of the more than 5,000 happy winners who they have come to know as friends.
Kathy knows the identity of the mystery recipient of the biggest-ever prize — a mind-boggling £195,707,000 on the EuroMillions draw in 2022.
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Remarkably, the winner has managed to remain anonymous and Kathy will not give any clue to their identity.
READ MORE ON LOTTERY WINNERS
But she does say: “They’ve done very well and are doing very well.
Eiffel Tower
“They understand that it’s a lot of money for them and they want to give something back, but to do it in an anonymous way.
“It’s life-changing for anybody to win on the lottery but when you win that sort of money you need an awful lot of support and help, which they have had.
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“We guide them and introduce them to people that can help to make their journey a little bit easier.”
Paying off the mortgage is the next thing. But the lottery has paid for a lot of new hips, new knees, new teeth, new hair
Andy Carter
Andy, 50, has been a winners’ adviser for 18 years and has become a bit of a household name.
When winners call the National Lottery to claim their jackpot they will often ask: “Will Andy Carter be coming to see me?”
From reviving ‘dead’ pets to Ibiza benders and living in a caravan – how Lotto winners who scooped £194m splashed cash
Over the years Andy has found that winners tend to follow a similar pattern. He says: “Most will buy a new car straight away.
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“Quite a few people will put a deposit on a car before we even get there and want to know, ‘When’s my money hitting the account?’
“Paying off the mortgage is the next thing. But the lottery has paid for a lot of new hips, new knees, new teeth, new hair.”
“And laser eye surgery,” adds Kathy, 60, a mum of four from Kent.
Remarkably, only one of the 5,000 winners they have dealt with wanted to tell no one — not even family.
Kathy says: “The reason he kept it a secret is that he wanted to surprise his partner and propose to her.
“He arranged to take her to Paris for the weekend and took her to a restaurant in the Eiffel Tower, where he proposed to her.
“Thankfully she said yes, and then he revealed that he’d also won the lottery. But he wanted her to accept his proposal before telling her he had won a million pounds.”
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Private jet
The winner booked his romantic holiday in France using an idea that Kathy came up with — a concierge service that make dreams come true for lottery winners.
She says: “It’s proved very popular because some of these winners have never been on a holiday before, or they get a chef in to cook Christmas dinner for all the family, maybe hire a private jet to fly off somewhere.
“Once somebody literally went 200 miles up the road in their private jet and never left the UK.
“We had a lovely couple who won a lot of money last year and they took the whole family away on a private jet — and the dog went with them.”
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Andy adds: “Someone said to me the other day, ‘What’s the point of me having this money if I can’t do stuff with the people I love?’.”
The duo’s phones often ping with photos of their big-winning clients on an exotic holiday.
Kathy says: “It’s lovely because you can see the difference their win is making to their lives and that they’re fully embracing it and enjoying it.”
Andy adds: “They could have thought of anyone but they think of you. There was a guy I dealt with who said, ‘I’m going to travel around the world and watch cricket’.
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“Now I haven’t spoken to him for years, but every so often he emails a picture. He’ll be in Barbados, Sri Lanka or Sydney, in the great sporting arenas of the world.”
Kathy and Andy are part of a team of seven who visit every lottery player who wins more than £50,000.
They take with them a book in which punters can record their memories of the win — and a bottle of champagne that comes out when all the formalities are completed.
Often during that first meeting winners’ phones will be constantly pinging as news leaks out that they have won the jackpot.
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Andy says: “Sometimes you turn up at people’s houses and the whole village or even the whole town knows.
You’ve got people knocking on the door when you’re there and messages are coming through saying, ‘Congratulations on your lottery win’.
The oldest winner I’ve paid was 105. It wasn’t going to make a massive difference to her life at that age but it gave her real pleasure to see that her family would benefit from it
Kathy Garrett
“The winner, who hasn’t gone public at this stage, will often look at their phone and say, ‘Oh, I haven’t seen him for years’.
“Nice news spreads fast and people are genuinely pleased. They like to know someone who’s won the lottery.”
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Kathy, who was once hugged so hard by a delighted winner that she feared he would crack her ribs, says: “The oldest winner I’ve paid was 105.
“She lived in a little house and she had all her family around her.
“It wasn’t going to make a massive difference to her life at that age but it gave her real pleasure to see that her family would benefit from it.”
Kathy says: “She will be 100 when she gets her last payment. She’s going to have a huge party if she makes it.
“Doris is great and really making the most of it, helping families and enjoying the holidays.” After 30 years, the odds of winning the lottery are just as vanishingly small as they have ever been, but Kathy and Andy say their big winners keep on playing — and some have hit the jackpot again.
Kathy says: “In 15 years I’ve paid five winners over £50,000 twice, which is absolutely incredible.”
Andy adds: “Last year I visited someone who had won and he said, ‘I think you may have seen my brother’.
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“Two brothers had won the lottery, a year apart. One had won £2million and the other just under a million.”
And Kathy recalls: “I had two sisters — one won the lottery jackpot and the other won £1million, four years apart.”
Very emotional
Many punters give up work the moment they win, but some can’t let go of their jobs so fast — including a butcher who scooped the jackpot.
Kathy says: “It was coming up to Christmas and people were coming to collect their turkeys and he didn’t want to let them down by saying, ‘I’ve got an appointment’.
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“He wanted to see me because he was going to get his lottery money but he couldn’t just shut up shop and focus on his win. So every two minutes he’d jump up to go and hand somebody their turkey.
“His customers had no idea he was disappearing into the back of the shop to see me.
“He stayed anonymous. He did carry on with the shop for a little while — and then changed direction.”
Andy says: “Builders are the ones that can’t walk away.
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“They are so loyal, they don’t want to let anybody down, and even though they could pay for somebody else to do the work, they go and do it themselves.”
Syndicates are fun. I once went to a funeral parlour with some undertakers who had won. I even went to the Greggs factory to meet workers who had won £100,000 on EuroMillions. It was like Willy Wonka in there
Andy Carter
She says: “He was very, very emotional. At the beginning he was in tears because he just wanted to carry on as normal. It was a huge amount and it just took him a little while to get his head around everything.
“He’s fine. The whole family are really happy and they’ve built their own home.
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“He wanted to help his friends still do the building work. Most winners are loyal — they’ve committed to something and they don’t want to let anybody down.
“So even though they have got over £100million now in their bank account they’ve still promised to fit the little old lady’s door for her up the road, and they want to carry on doing that.”
Andy says: “I have never met a winner who has told the boss to stuff his job.”
Over the years the pair have also paid out prizes to lots of family and workplace syndicates.
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Andy says: “Syndicates are fun. I once went to a funeral parlour with some undertakers who had won. I even went to the Greggs factory to meet workers who had won £100,000 on EuroMillions. It was like Willy Wonka in there.”
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Jay Powell backed a gradual approach to lowering interest rates, saying the US central bank does not need to be “in a hurry” amid a strong economy and a “bumpy” path down for inflation.
In a speech delivered in Dallas on Thursday, the Federal Reserve chair hailed the “remarkably good” performance of the world’s largest economy amid “significant progress” in taming the pace of price increases.
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Given the economy’s resilience, Powell signalled little urgency to ease monetary policy quickly, instead cautioning there was still work to do to get inflation all the way back to the central bank’s 2 per cent target.
“The economy is not sending any signals that we need to be in a hurry to lower rates,” Powell said in prepared remarks. “The strength we are currently seeing in the economy gives us the ability to approach our decisions carefully.”
Last week, the US central bank opted to lower its benchmark policy rate by a quarter-point to a new target range of 4.25-4.75 per cent. Officials next meet in December for their final gathering of the year and appear on track to deliver a third-consecutive cut.
The Fed’s challenge is to take its foot off the economic brakes quickly enough to prevent any significant increase in joblessness, but also slow it enough to ensure that inflation is kept at bay.
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“We are confident that with an appropriate recalibration of our policy stance, strength in the economy and the labour market can be maintained, with inflation moving sustainably down to 2 per cent,” Powell said on Thursday.
Officials more broadly have endorsed a gradual approach to lowering rates, given both the underlying strength of the economy as well as the stickiness of residual price pressures.
The latest consumer price index report released on Wednesday underscored how uneven the path down to the Fed’s 2 per cent is likely to continue to be. Powell on Thursday described it as “more of an upward bump than we had expected”, even as he said overall downward trend was “still intact”.
After several months of larger-than-expected drawdowns in inflation, the annual pace ticked up to 2.6 per cent following a third straight month in which “core” prices that strip out volatile food and energy prices rose 0.3 per cent.
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Another metric of underlying inflation — one that focuses on prices for services that also exclude housing-related costs — ticked higher in October and now registers an annual pace of 4.4 per cent. Powell on Thursday said he expected inflation to continue to retreat, “albeit on a sometimes-bumpy path”.
Earlier on Thursday, Adriana Kugler, a Fed governor, affirmed that the central bank was ready to pause its rate-cutting cycle if warranted by the data.
“If any risks arise that stall progress or reaccelerate inflation, it would be appropriate to pause our policy rate cuts,” she said at an event in Uruguay. “But if the labour market slows down suddenly, it would be appropriate to continue to gradually reduce the policy rate.”
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Economists have warned that the economic proposals put forward by president-elect Donald Trump, such as tariffs and deportations, could cause inflationary pressures to reignite.
Asked on Thursday how that may affect the Fed’s policy decisions, Powell said the central bank would be “careful about changing policy until we have a lot more certainty”.
He said the impact of tariffs “isn’t obvious until we see actual policies”, stressing that the Fed would “reserve judgment”.
GIVING your children pocket money is a great way to teach them how to budget.
And encouraging them to earn their pennies is also a valuable lesson in responsibility.
Here are some ideas to get kids managing their own cash.
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CHORES: Children love a cash reward for little jobs such as tidying their room or helping with the cleaning.
This can also help instil the idea of working for your money — plus you get a helping hand around the house.
However, some parents may prefer kids learning to do their bit without a financial incentive.
READ MORE MONEY SAVING TIPS
BANK ON IT: Handing over physical pocket money is fine, but as more businesses become cashless, a card might be easier. It offers more protection if it gets lost as it can be cancelled, whereas cash could be gone for good.
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From age 11, you can open a kids’ bank account, which is fee-free and comes with a debit card. Children are not allowed to go into an overdraft.
APPY SPENDING: There are a number of specific pocket money cards and apps which can be used by younger children, from the age of six.
Preloaded cards are similar to a debit card and the corresponding apps allow parents to keep an eye on where their kids are spending. You will usually get an instant alert when the card is used.
Some of these accounts come with a small monthly charge. However, there are free options. If you’re a NatWest customer, you can join Rooster Money for free, saving on the annual £19.99 charge. Or HyperJar offers a free prepaid debit card and app.
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SAVINGS: It’s important to educate youngsters on the benefits of saving if they’ve got their eye on an expensive purchase or have a special occasion, such as a holiday, coming up.
I’m eight-years-old and own my first HOUSE – I saved up my pocket money from chores to buy it & it’s now worth £500k
You can set up physical envelopes or jars for cash.
Alternatively, HyperJar lets you create individual digital pots for different things.
Setting up savings accounts together is a good opportunity to talk about the idea of earning interest on your money.
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All prices on page correct at time of going to press. Deals and offers subject to availability.
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Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the world
Argentina said on Thursday it would “re-evaluate” its role in global climate talks after walking out of the COP29 summit, fuelling concerns that the South American country could become the first to follow Donald Trump’s threatened exit from the landmark Paris agreement.
Trump’s campaign said he would withdraw the US from the Paris climate accord on his return to the White House, as he did during his first term, leaving ministers and negotiators at COP29 in Azerbaijan to fret that other populist leaders could follow suit.
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Argentina’s libertarian President Javier Milei withdrew the delegation of negotiators his country had sent to the UN climate summit in Baku on Wednesday, a day after speaking to Trump by phone.
Milei demoted Argentina’s environment portfolio to a junior departmental level after taking office last year as part of a sweeping austerity package and sharp ideological realignment of his country’s environmental and foreign policy. He has said human-caused climate change is “a socialist lie”.
Milei’s spokesperson told a press briefing on Thursday: “The [withdrawal of the COP29 delegation] will allow the new foreign minister to re-evaluate the situation, reflect on our position. It’s part of the measures that the foreign minister is starting to take in his new role.”
Ana Lamas, Argentina’s under-secretary for the environment, declined to comment further on whether the country was considering an exit from the Paris agreement. “The delegation is coming back to Argentina, for now there is no more information,” she told the Financial Times.
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Milei fired foreign minister Diana Mondino last month after Argentina sided with Cuba at a UN vote condemning the US’s economic sanctions on the Caribbean nation.
He and his new foreign minister Gerardo Werthein, a wealthy businessman who was until recently Buenos Aires’ ambassador to the US, are this weekend due to attend the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida, where they aim to meet Trump.
The US is the only country to have left the Paris agreement. Almost 200 countries signed the blueprint to limit the global average temperature rise. Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro threatened to withdraw, but did not follow through.
Many of the countries at the UN meeting have rushed to present a united front, arguing that even if the US quit the Paris agreement, the global context was very different from the first Trump term. Countries and industries had begun to make the shift to green energy as they took into account the further consequences of climate change, they maintained.
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“The health of the Paris Agreement is quite good,” said Jennifer Morgan, Germany’s climate envoy, in Baku. “You have here a multilateral forum where countries work together to find solutions, despite geopolitical tensions, despite elections.
“We have been through elections in the past and have continued to move forward,” she said. The “costs and devastation” of climate change were prompting countries to act.
Another lead negotiator said: “The world has moved on. The economic case is strong for the transition — there are so many renewables all over the world.”
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Argentina had been in charge of the so-called Sur negotiating bloc of countries at the two-week climate summit, and has been replaced by Brazil.
The Argentine delegation had submitted a statement to the COP29 opening meeting on Tuesday, declaring the nation’s opposition to “the imposition of regulations and bans promoted by the very countries that developed by doing the same things they are questioning today”.
A central objective of the Baku summit is to set a new finance goal to help poorer countries shift to green energy and adapt to climate change, but the talks have been overshadowed by controversies during its opening days as well as the absence of more than half of the world’s leaders.
France also decided not to send a senior political official to the summit this week, after the host country’s President Ilham Aliyev used a speech at the event to accuse the “regime of President [Emmanuel] Macron” of “brutally” killing citizens during recent protests in New Caledonia.
The research analysed factors such as price, value, popularity, and proximity to train stations to rank the top 10 Sunday roasts in the country.
Sara Paoloni, who is a travel expert at London Northwestern Railway, commented: “At London Northwestern Railway, we understand that enjoying a traditional roast dinner is a cherished part of British culture, especially during the festive season.
“Our Roast Dinner Index not only highlights the best places to indulge without straining your wallet but also emphasises the convenience of accessing these fantastic dining options easily.
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“We hope this research inspires people to explore new culinary experiences while enjoying the comfort and value that these top-rated pubs offer.”
The Old Crown, Birmingham
Located in Digbeth, the Brummie boozer has the best Sunday roast in the country, according to the research.
Roasties in the pub start from £15.95, with the most expensive costing punters £18.95 for a mix of crispy pork and sirloin beef.
Each roast is served with roasted potatoes, maple glazed carrots, braised red cabbage & seasonal greens, a homemade Yorkie and slow-cooked gravy.
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As a proud Brummie, I’ve been to the boozer and love its old-school charm with stained-glass windows and rustic desks.
Just be sure to bag a table early if you plan to spend your Saturday evening knocking back a pint because it can get very busy.
The Duck and Waffle, London
Located on the 40th floor of a skyscraper in central London, the Duck and Waffle runs a three-course Sunday roast for £55 per head.
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Each roast dinner is served with spiced carrot purée, maple mustard glazed parsnips, Yorkshire pudding, roast potatoes and gravy.
There are a choice of starters too, including corn ribs, a lobster roll and a beef tartare.
For pudding, guests can order a Biscoff Cheesecake or a Sticky Toffee Waffle.
The Culpeper, London
Located on Commercial Street near Aldgate East Tube Station in Central London, the London boozer has the third-best roast dinner in the country.
Spread across four floors, the London building features a pub, a restaurant, a private dining venue and overnight accommodation for guests.
The ground-floor pub serves a range of roast dinner options, with mains from £22.
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Diners can choose from chicken, beef, pork chops and butternut squash, with each roast accompanied by roast potatoes, red cabbage, carrots, gravy and a yorkshire pudding.
The Camberwell Arms, London
The third London boozer on the list is the Camberwell Arms, which was also named as having one of the best Sunday Lunches by the Guardian back in 2017.
Here, roast dinners start from £18.80 per person, while share plates for two start from £50.
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The Welsh House, Swansea
Swansea’s Welsh House was the only restaurant in Wales to feature on the rail operator’s Roast Dinner Index.
Located on the Waterfront, the Welsh restaurant and bar serves roast dinners from as little as £15.05
Cultra Inn, Holywood
The Cultra Inn is set inside the landscaped grounds of the Culloden Estate and Spa.
Here, Sunday lunch is served from 12pm until 2.30pm every Sunday, with two-courses starting from £32.
Guests can order turkey, pork chop, Irish beef, salmon and butternut squash ravioli for their main dish.
Starters range from soup of the day, while desserts include cheesecake and brownie.
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The Harwood Arms, London
The last London pub on the list is the Harwood Arms.
It’s the only Michelin-starred pub in London, with the Fulham pub already winning awards for its grub.
On a Sunday, the London boozer serves pork belly, a deer shoulder and skate wings.
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Two-courses start from £64 per person.
The Pack Horse, Derbyshire
Named as one of the best 50 gastropubs in the UK earlier this year, the Pack Horse has also been praised for its Sunday Lunch.
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The veggie main starts from £20, with the venison loin, the highest-price main, costing £30.
The Hand and Flowers, Marlow
Located in Buckinghamshire, the rustic pub serves one of the best roast dinners in the country.
Roast dinners come in at £175 per person, so it’s certainly a treat.
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The Owl & Otter, Newcastle
The family-run Owl & Otter is a gastropub in Burnopfield, County Durham.
Its Sunday mains start from £15.95, including the nut roast and the roast chicken.
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