Earlier this year, the legendary London restaurant St John celebrated its 30th birthday, and to mark the occasion it went back in time, offering its 1994 menu on weekdays at, and perhaps this is the crucial part, 1994 prices. Reservations were snapped up in no time, no doubt by people who could easily afford the 2024 prices.

A similar thing happened closer to home in September when the Nag’s Head, mindful that it was about to increase its prices for the first time in a while, decided to take its customers back to 2007, when it first opened. For one night, ale, lager and cider were £2.50 a pint: I imagine they shifted a lot of booze that night, even if punters mostly paid for it the next day.

So the whole retro thing is very on trend, I thought to myself. How could I jump on this bandwagon? And then I realised – I could do something to mark the inception of my blog too, and combat rising inflation into the bargain. 

I don’t mean money, because nobody was going to charge me 2013 prices. The only people paying the same amount for food now as they were eleven years ago are influencers, or “content creators” as they now like to call themselves. You know, the ones who ought to be using the hashtag #grifted. “I didn’t see a bill”, they frequently brag.

No, the inflation I’m talking about is word count: it’s no secret that my reviews nowadays are significantly longer and more detailed than they once were. I’m reminded of the quote attributed to Mark Twain, when he said that if he’d had more time he’d have written a shorter letter. There’s worse company to be in, as a writer. So how could I take you back to 2013 when this blog first began?

And then I decided: this week I would review Perry’s, one of the final 2013 venues I’m yet to revisit for the blog. And I’d ensure my review was no more than 1634 words, the magic number I used back in 2013. So I’d better get started, hadn’t I, because I’ve used 363 of them already.