Restaurant reviews by Justin Tanner, our retired food critic who thinks if Reform UK are a bit more right-wing they’ll walk it next time.

I HAD to escape this pissbag of an English summer. Endless bloody rain and I can’t even blame it on immigration, like I do every other problem with Britain. Although if we weren’t paying all their bloody hotel bills maybe we could afford some weather machines.

So I went to the last travel agent left on the High Street and booked a week’s all-inclusive in the Algarve. Have to admit, I don’t know much about Portugal, and when I get there three weeks later I discover the hotel is riddled with golf twats in poofy pink Ralph Lauren tops. I can’t see them immersing themselves in the rich local dago culture like me.

Then it turns out the ‘all-inclusive’ has a six-drinks limit! Three with lunch, three with dinner! ‘What about breakfast?’ I ask, to disdainful looks. Good job I picked up a litre of Bell’s on the plane, which I’ve got hidden under the bed. I’m not stupid.

To get my six I order a bottle of the local beer, which is called Super Bock. As if the name isn’t stupid enough, it tastes like piss. ‘Havez-vous uno Stella?’ I ask, but ‘all-inclusive’ is only for locally-produced booze. It’s saying something when you’re admitting your own booze is so shit you have to give it away.

Maybe the food will make up for it? Will it f**k. The national dish is cod preserved in salt then soaked in water before cooking. Are these people too primitive to have heard of freezers? I love a bit of salt on my cod and chips at the chippie, but this is taking the piss.

Then there’s ‘Iberian black pork’. Is anywhere in the world safe from woke diversity? It’s okay, but it’s no substitute for proper English bacon.

Then it’s octopus and squid. Or rather it isn’t. F**k that, I’m not eating something that looks like it belongs in a horror film. And sardines, grilled whole. Not eating something that’s bloody staring at me either.

I pick at it all unenthusiastically, then give up and join in the staple diet of the other Brits here: pizzas, burgers and chips. Although it seems pointless to travel more than 1,000 miles to discover the only food fit for human consumption is the same as the late-night kebab shop over the road.

I wash it down with my last two free drinks, opting for the port wine. Might as well get gout to go with the sunburn and insect bites I suppose. Then it’s back to the room for several neat whisky nightcaps. It’s back to Spain for me next year. You know where you stand in the Costas – by the bar or over the toilet bowl. That’s a proper holiday.