Dining Alone at Harvey Nichols

I'm not great at updating social media with all the changes in my life, so for those of you who know me I'll try to catch you up.

If the last thing you heard was that I was living in the Midlands, you're out of date: I moved to Bristol about a year ago, and I like it very much.

If the last thing you heard I was living in Bristol and going out of my mind looking for work, you're out of date: I found a job, and started working in Bath a couple of months ago.

If the last thing you heard I was working in Bath, you're out of date: just like bloody buses, you wait for ages for one then two turn up in quick succession. I start a new job in Bristol on Monday.

All of which means I am now ending a year of tumult, confusion, and oppressive 'free time'. The past couple of weeks I've been twiddling my thumbs a little, not quite knowing what to do with myself before I start the Next Big Chapter, so I decided to treat myself. I took myself to lunch at the Second Floor Restaurant at Harvey Nichols in Bristol.

I've never been for a fancy meal on my own before, so I did what I always do and put on an air of confidence that clearly said 'I do it this all the time, and what are you looking at, Mr Big Stuff?'. I was able to practice this beforehand by wandering around the make-up counters on the first floor looking for all the world like someone who would spend £25 on a single tube of lipstick, and definitely wasn't there to play with the testers then bugger off.

To their credit they hardly looked surprised at all when I asked for a table for one. The restaurant is spacious, with tall windows looking out over Quakers Friars and Cabot Circus, and decorated entirely in various shades of gold. The last time I was there the temperature was a shade too warm and the music had an intrusive thumping bass that made the whole atmosphere a bit weird and oppressive. This time the cooler temperature and far more agreeable Jazz standards being played meant the whole 'total gold' thing didn't feel nearly as aggressive as it did before.

I went for the Set Menu for September, which is a very reasonable £20 for three courses.

I started with a duck terrine, with a nicely dressed salad, thin, crisp bread and plum and ginger chutney. The duck was tender with decently sized chunks of meat, and each ingredient was exactly in the right proportion to the others. The chutney was pleasantly sweet, but I could have done with more of a gingery punch.

My main was slow cooked pork belly with rainbow chard and what the menu said was 'pickled apple puree' but turned out to be slices of apple poached in something like mulled wine. The portion was a little smaller than I was hoping, but I guess rich people don't eat much. The pork belly was delicious, but it is, as you know, a salty meat. The chard was earthy and well cooked, but a little oversalted. The sauce was rich and would have tied the whole dish together if it hadn't been slightly over reduced, leaving it a little salty. Salt was a theme, is what I'm saying. The three small slices of sweet apple were the only thing that saved the dish. It had clearly been made by someone who knew what they were doing, but took their eye off the ball where seasoning was concerned.

Pudding was a cider brandy parfait with 'apple and olive oil crisps'. The crisps turned out to be thin triangles of pastry, about the texture of a poppadom, sprinkled with cinnamon. I can't say I could discern either apple or olive oil, but they were very tasty nevertheless. Both the parfait and and the apple caramel it was served with were delicious - the highlight of the meal.

I'd be happy to recommend this place to anyone, and the set menu which varies month by month is excellent value, but the 'simple food cooked well' ethos doesn't allow much room for error, and I can't say this was error free.

I very much enjoyed my sole dining experience, although I did feel a little rushed. I guess the wait staff would usually wait for a lull in conversation before clearing plates, but since I was on my own (and the restaurant was largely empty), plates were cleared as soon as I was done and the next course brought out soon after. I barely had time to touch my bread rolls (which were clearly home made and very nice). I sat down at 2pm, and had finished my dessert by 2.40. I was hungry though, so I didn't mind too much.

So don't be put off eating on your own. Just bring something to read, and work up an appetite.

Creme de Mure

I must admit, I've been lazy recently. No particular reason, I've just gone through one of those periods where I don't feel quite so much like cooking something fancy, and I'm more likely to fall back on an old reliable recipe rather than something interesting or new.

But! Spells of apathy can't last forever, and time changes all things. Tides turn, seasons change, sunrise, sunset, circle of life, like the circles that you find, in the windmills of your mind, etc. The thing that has brought me out of my slump is the coming of blackberry season.

I moved to Bristol about this time last year, which meant that when blackberry season came around I had no idea where to find the best spots to pick them. But I play the long game, and I've been keeping my eye out for months. This time around I knew exactly where to go, and have successfully cleaned out, like, so many blackberries. If blackberries were a new species of human/vampire type deal, I would be the I Am Legend guy. They would speak of me in hushed tones as the Bringer of Death, Maker of Pies.

And now I finally have enough for me to make Creme de Mure, or blackberry liqueur. Ages ago Pete gave me 'How To Make Your Own Drinks' by Suzy Atkins (her off Saturday Kitchen) that had a recipe for Creme de Mure in it, and this is the first time I've been able to try it out.

Her recipe requires:
1 1/2 kg blackberries
2 litres red wine
1kg sugar
70cl vodka or brandy

This is meant to make 2 1/2 litres, and she recommends drinking within 6 weeks. However. As you know, I prefer to treat recipes as the opening offer in a negotiation, and therefore subject to amendments. My thoughts on this recipe were as follows:

1) 2 1/2 litres of a liqueur is a lot to get through in 6 weeks.
2) Blackberries are free.
3) Wine and vodka are not.

My conclusion was to use about the same amount of blackberries, but only one bottle of wine, and amend the amount of vodka and sugar as I saw fit. That way I'd produce less liquid over all, it would be more blackberry-y, and it would be cheaper. This is how it went:

Creme de Mure (Bronners Style)

You will need:

1 1/2 kg blackberries
1 bottle of red wine (Suzy says to use something decent, but then she would say that, wouldn't she?)
50cl vodka (actually, next time I'll probably up this to 70cl)
350g sugar

Wash the blackberries, getting rid of any twigs and bugs. Put them in a large tupperware box or any other receptacle large enough that can still fit in the fridge. Mash with a potato masher and add the whole bottle of wine. Stir a little, then put on the lid and keep in the fridge for a day or so. Suzy says 48hrs, but I'm a busy woman and only left it a day.

After they've macerated pass the wine and blackberries through a sieve into a large pan and add the sugar and vodka. I think I worked the blackberries through the sieve a little too hard so I did get a lot of extra liquid and some pulp in the final mix, but it doesn't seem the worse for it.

Heat through without boiling until the sugar is dissolved and the liquid has thickened and turned slightly syrupy. Store in sterilised bottles.

This ended up making 2 litres,  but as I said I may have forced more blackberry juice into it than perhaps I should. It has a little warmth of alcohol but is a bit weak, which is why I'd recommend upping the vodka. Or, you know, following the original recipe. Either way. On the other hand, I've mainly been drinking this in cocktails where I add more spirits anyway, so it all works out in the end.

Speaking of which...

The Bramble

You will need:

2 measures creme de mure
1 measure gin
dash of lemon juice (optional)

Pour everything over a tumbler of ice and stir. Drink. Drink it up.

Ooooh, this is nice. Not too sweet, fruity and refreshing. I've seen and tried a number of other cocktails that use Creme de Mure, but in my opinion nothing really matches up to this. Go. Drink it up.

Cream Tea

Enough fuckin around. Let's have a cream tea.

Scones

My recipe for this is fairly old, so it's all in ounces. I'm sure you'll be able to figure it out.

You will need:
8oz self raising flour
2oz butter
2oz sugar
2oz raisins or sultanas
4fl. oz milk

Rub the butter into the flour with your finger tips. Mix in the other dry ingredients, then slowly pour in the milk, mixing as you go. Stop when you've made a soft dough - you may not need all the milk.

Roll out on a floured surface until about 2cm thick, and cut into rounds. I should really have a non-novelty shaped cutter by now, but I don't so there you go. I used a glass instead. Brush the tops with egg wash or milk, and bake on a floured tray at GM7 (220 degrees) for 12-15 minutes.

Now in this instance I bought the clotted cream and jam to go with my scones, but I have made both of the accompaniments before so if you're feeling particularly intrepid you could make the whole affair from scratch. Behold:

Clotted Cream

You will need:
A pot of double cream.

Pour the cream into a heavy saucepan and heat slowly (without boiling) for half an hour. Let it cool in the pan, then stick in the fridge to chill. It'll be ready when a crust forms on the top. Spoon out into a container. The book I got this recipe from told me to 'discard the liquid left underneath the clotted cream', but I found no such liquid. So... keep an eye out for that, I guess?

Jam

You will need:
Equal parts strawberries and jam sugar (sugar with added pectin, available from most supermarkets)

Mash the strawberries and sugar together in a saucepan, then bring to a rapid boil for five minutes. Pour into a sterilised jar to store.

I know using jam sugar is a bit of a cheat, and looked down on by jam connoisseurs as it will often set the jam too firm. I am not a jam connoisseur, so I think I'm ready for this jelly.

Add whatever flavours you like to make it a bit more interesting - I've added crystalized ginger in the past. It can be a bit overwhelming if you bite into a large chunk, but I would still call it a success.

There you have it. Everything you need for a cream tea. A final word on etiquette; there is a long running debate on whether to spread the cream or the jam on first. The correct method is to not give a crusty shit. TTFN.

Strawberries and Cream: Jelly Edition

On the whole, I would say I find jelly more fascinating than I find it tasty. It appeals to the scientist in me, as it demonstrates a visible change in physical states. Proteins cool and bond, trapping water and turning a liquid into a semi-solid. Also, it's all wibbly-wobbly.

Eating it is a different matter. I want to like it, I really do, but generally I find the traditional cubes of fruit jelly dull and oversweet, and it's difficult to gauge how much leaf gelatin to use in any given recipe. But I still want to make jelly. The answer? To customise that shit, baby. Now I pimp my pudding by taking fruit jelly cubes and adding stuff.

I make up lime jelly with gin and tonic (highly recommended), I add citrus bitters to orange jelly to give it a grown-up, marmaladey twang. And now I've found something to do with strawberry, the boringest of all the jellies.

Take a packet of strawberry flavoured fruit jelly. Separate the cubes. Although the instructions say to dissolve it in a pint of hot water, I always add just a little water and stick it in the microwave for a few seconds to dissolve. This means you can add the rest of the liquid cold, and the whole thing will set quicker. Clever, non? Anyway. Add about 200ml single cream to the dissolved jelly, then make it up to a pint with cold water. Chop some ripe strawberries, lightly mashing a few as you go, and add them to your jelly moulds. Pour the jelly mix over the top. The strawberries will probably rise to the top, but there's not much you can do about that. Leave in the fridge for a few hours to set, and serve on its own, or with more cream and strawberries.

The jelly tastes creamy, but not fatty or cloying. It's a soft, milky, puddingish base that offsets the tartness of the fresh strawberries. And it's all wibbly-wobbly.

Cafe Maitreya

My father is a vegetarian. Now hang on, bear with me. It's not his fault, it's just the way he was raised.

Because he grew up before vegetarianism was really accepted as a thing that exists, he's gotten pretty used to not having much choice when he goes to restaurants. Let's just say it's a good thing he likes cheese omelettes. So when he came down to visit me on his birthday the other week, I suggested we try out Cafe Maitreya, a vegetarian restaurant in Easton I had heard about.

We could see why it has 'Cafe' in the title as soon as we walked in. The decor has that sort of laid back, daytime vibe, with light-coloured tables a touch too close to each other, big windows, and overpriced local artwork on the walls. It felt very informal and sociable, especially with the very decent music selection (until that abruptly stopped halfway through the evening).

We liked the sound of all the starters so the four of us ordered a different one each to make sure we would all get to try a bit. You've got to cover your bases. I had samphire fritters that were lovely, and as salty and greasy as scampi. Pete had an easy, classic asparagus and goats cheese. Mum had a 'weird but it works' radicchio, hazelnut and passionfruit salad, and Dad had a chilled garlic and almond soup with melon balls. I really liked the idea of this, but there was some sort of fortified wine in Dad's soup which made the whole thing strongly reminiscent of cream sherry. I marked that as nice enough, but more than a little odd.

For main I had spiced sweet potato pancakes with halloumi, while others had: 1) a coconut, cauliflower and tamarind laksa, 2) a warm salad of jersey royals, asparagus and lentils, and 3) a squash and applewood tarte tatin. Mum had read some reviews that said the portions were small, so we ordered extra wedges. The reviews were lies, told by lying liars. Do not order extra wedges. You will not need extra wedges.

The flavours of the sweet potato pancakes were powerful, but the texture was so dense and stodgy that eating it eventually became a chore. The consensus seemed to be that in the rush to pack in as much flavour as possible, a couple of things became a little overworked; the squash tatin was a little too sweet, some dressings were a little too acidic.

Despite the little hiccups here and there, we had a very enjoyable meal. Staff were attentive and friendly, and the food was, if not consistently amazing, always interesting.

It was also quite nice for Dad to have a bit of choice, and not be forced into a corner. If nothing else, Cafe Maitreya does an admirable job of proving you don't need meat to have a 'proper' substantial meal with strong flavours. I left with my belly all full of vegetables, and, as tradition dictates, farting like a trooper the next day.

Bristol Food Festivals

Against all the odds, it appears to be Summer. Y'know, an actual one. I caught the sun while wearing a t-shirt, thereby giving myself an absolutely epic farmer's tan, so there's no going back now - even if it starts raining tomorrow I'll have the embarassing evidence that sunshine actually happened this year.

Summer means food festivals, and in Bristol (the spiritual home of the grubby festival goer) there's a lot of 'em about.

Last weekend was the Foodies Festival at Bristol Harbourside. It looked like fun, but there wasn't a huge amount of detail on the website, so at £12 a ticket I had no intention of going. Until I won two free tickets in a Twitter competition, that is.

It was bigger than I was expecting, quite sprawling really. There were large tents for demonstration, but other than that everything was outside. Rain wasn't a problem, but there wasn't any shade. This became an issue, as on the day I went it was hotter than the devil's own arsehole.

The selection was nicely varied, and the options for lunch were excellent. I had a tasty if rather oversalted sauteed potato, saucisson and comte tartiflette, but my friend Anna really won the round with the finest Rib Eye Sandwich I have ever seen. It came from El Gaucho Barbecue, and it looked and tasted amazing (she was good enough to let me try a bit).

Shhhh. The meat is resting.

There were your usual stands of fudge, olives and sauces, and all of pretty good quality. We decided to pick up enough ingredients to have a Ploughman's for dinner. We got 'Wyfe of Bath' cheese from The Bath Soft Cheese company, some goat's cheddar, a garlic pickle from The Cherry Tree, and some venison salami. All were delicious, but the goat's cheddar rather suffered from the heat. The garlic pickle was particularly good.

In danger of sounding like a weak, wilting flower, I am simply not built for hot weather. I sweat like someone turned a tap on, and the efficiency of the irrigation of my underboobs make me consider using their design as a way to alleviate drought in sub-Saharan Africa. This was a heat that even gelato couldn't handle. I needed to sit down and have some fizz.

Classy

While Anna had a coconut.

Classier

Usually I would be happy to wander round indefinitely, but considering the heat (did I mention that? It was a bit warm) we didn't hang around too long. Despite that it was a well organised and varied festival, although I doubt I'd go again as I'm more a fan of the 'free' variety.

Speaking of free food festivals, guess where I went this morning? The Love Food festival in the Paintworks. No pictures this time, I left my camera at home.

Although much smaller, I think I enjoyed this one even more. The stalls with cooked food were outside and the rest of the stalls were inside, although in a nice airy, temperate space. As soon as we got there we were approached by a boy of about 12 offering us samples of baby back ribs. He had style, that kid, and the kind of grifting attitude that wouldn't have looked out of place on the set of Oliver! The ribs were pretty good too. Nice one.

We had pies for lunch. Mine was a pork pie, hand made with British Lop pork by a very nice middle aged lady. Her whole stall had the unpretentious air of the School Fete about it - a mish-mash of pies, cakes and preserves, all obviously made (to a very high standard, of course) in her own kitchen. Pete had a much more professional looking 'Bath' pie from the local company Lovett Pies. It had braised beef, ale and blue cheese in it. Very tasty.

Pete also got a hot chilli sauce called 'Fire Wata' from  Sister Gee. He was impressed with what he tried, and the man knows his chilli, so it's probably good. We went home with some Potato and Rosemary bread and some really ripe strawberries.

I think I'm about food festivalled out for now, so instead I might go round someone's house, take a look in their cupboards, then smile and say 'I might come back later' with no intention of doing so. Practically the same thing.

No Cream Chocolate Sauce

Chocolate sauce is not difficult to make. Melt some chocolate in some cream. There. Done. Oof.

What? You want to make it without cream in it? Why? Because you're having it with a rich dessert and don't want it to be too fatty? Also you don't want to go to the shops and buy cream because it looks like it might rain? Christ, that's no sort of excuse. I've just given you a perfectly good way to make chocolate sauce and you've thrown it right back at me. You're too picky, that's your problem.

Fine. I'll look it up on the internet...

OK, here's one. It's a bit complicated, but basically you make a a syrup with cocoa powder and... Wait, what?

You want to make it with chocolate because you don't like cocoa powder? What the hell is wrong with you?

FINE I GUESS I'LL JUST MAKE A NEW RECIPE UP MYSELF.

You will need:

100g plain chocolate
250ml water
3 tbsp golden syrup
1 shot liqueur or flavoured alcohol. Cointreau is ideal.

Break the chocolate into pieces. Put all the ingredients in a small saucepan, and slowly melt the chocolate. Keep the saucepan on a low heat and stir continuously until the chocolate has completely emulsified, the water reduced, and the sauce has become smooth and glossy (up to 15 minutes).

This can be served hot or cold, but I prefer it cold as it stays nice and thick.

Happy now? Probably not. God, you make me sick.

Pearl Barley Meatballs

Pearl barley is actually barley grains that have been polished ('pearled') to remove the tough outer bran, and not, as it sounds, the name of the brassy landlady of your local pub. After tiny pasta stars, pearl barley is my absolute favourite starchy non-essential addition to soups and stews. The reason tiny pasta stars won out is because they only take about ten minutes to cook, whereas pearl barley will set you back at least 45 minutes.

But since I like it so much I've started cooking it in big batches, then adding the pre-cooked grains to anything that takes my fancy. So far I've sprinkled it on salads, mixed it into chilli, and had it on its own with some chicken stock for a very quick and easy lunch. Really you can use it anywhere you might use other starchy staples, like rice or potatoes.

Extreme Close-up: Whooooooa!!

Potatoes, you say? Potatoes, exactly. So, if I would usually use something starchy like breadcrumbs or grated potato to bind something, like, oh I don't know, meatballs, I could use pearl barley instead? I don't know, Creepy Inner Voice, but let's find out!

To make about 20 meatballs, you will need:

400g lean minced lamb or beef (the pictures below are with beef, but lamb is tastier in my opinion)
150g cooked and rinsed pearl barley
1 small onion, finely diced
Salt, pepper, any other seasoning

Mix everything together using your hands. It's messy but thorough. Form the mix into balls using your hands or a spoon, or one spoon and one hand.

Shallow fry in batches in a large frying pan until browned all over. Don't move them around too much to start off with or they'll stick and fall apart.

Serve any way you see fit. Tomato sauce works well. I had mine in pitta bread with salad and tziki.

The pearl barley here gives a really interesting textural dimension to meatballs, and they soak up a lot of juice so they don't go too dry. Thanks, Creepy Inner Voice, you've saved the day again!

Grilled Lettuce

Is there a more pointless ingredient than lettuce? That was rhetorical - the answer is no. There is nothing more pointless than lettuce. It is nothing but magnolia walls, daytime TV, Michael Mcintyre flavoured banality. Lettuce is a chef's way of cheating you out of a tasty garnish. Lettuce coasts by and lets everyone else take up the slack. Lettuce should be ashamed of itself.

I am not a fan of lettuce.

On the other hand, if something is seriously reduced in price and not yet entirely inedible, I'm probably going to get it. That's just the way I roll. And that is how it came to pass that I had two little gem lettuces in the fridge, with few ideas about what to do with them. A salad would have been bleak  and disappointing without stronger flavours to go with it, so that was out of the question. I've heard that you can braise them, but I honestly wouldn't have known where to start. But what else can you do?

Griddle them, that's what.

Now, I know I use this griddle pan an awful lot, so I hope I'm not putting off readers who don't have one. A large, heavy frying pan will do just as well, but mine is at the bottom of the cupboard and it's really large and really heavy and I'd have to pull out a load of saucepans before I could even get to it, so I'm griddling instead.

I took one little gem lettuce and washed it without removing the stem, so all the leaves remained attached. After shaking it dry, I cut it in half and lightly brushed it with chilli oil and a sprinkle of salt. I then cooked them on the hot griddle for about 3-5 minutes each side, until the bottom part of the leaves started looking translucent and the outer leaves were nicely charred.

I am happy to say that the lettuce, on this occasion, redeemed itself. The charred bits were particularly delicious, and the whole thing was bitter, tasty and interesting.

These would be excellent served whole as a side to a main instead of a regular, boring, lettuce fucking salad.

Panzanella, aka Bread Salad

Considering the lovely weather today, I popped over to the lovely city of Bath to have a nice wander round in the sunshine. I don't know the place that well so my wandering was fairly aimless, but I had a lovely time. The one low point was encountering a frozen yoghurt shop that had aggressively loud music being piped outside by, I shit you not, an actual DJ. In a yoghurt shop. After shedding a brief tear for humanity, I checked out some of the lovely delis to cheer myself up (and get something for dinner). In Chandos' Deli I found a beautiful load of red and yellow tomatoes, and some fancy bread aswell. You know what you can do with bread and good tomatoes? Other than tomato sandwiches, I mean. Panzanella! Basically the two things chopped up and mixed together! I love it when something that ludicrously simple not only works but even has a name to make it sound all proper.

You will need: 

250g bread, (half a baguette is about right)
250g good quality tomatoes, a mix of varieties is best
25g chopped fresh basil
100g hard goat cheese, grated
Salt and pepper
1 clove of garlic, crushed
A good glug of olive oil

Chop the tomatoes and cut the bread into about even pieces. Mix everything together in a bowl, and leave to macerate for about half an hour. Then eat it.

This will make two large servings if you're having it on it's own for dinner (I did), but four if it's a side dish.

Usually I wouldn't stipulate getting the best ingredients. Obviously it helps, but we're all on budgets here, aren't we? Unfortunately, this really lives and dies with the tomatoes so don't bother making it unless you've got a really ripe and tasty lot.

This is great hot weather food. I will never be able to convince myself just to have a salad for dinner, so the bread here is essential to make it feel like you've actually eaten something, and since it absorbs all the delicious juices I'm pretty sure it counts as a vegetable. Trust me.

Experimental Soup

So I was chopping up a cauliflower the other day, as you do, and I remembered that people in the know recommend keeping the core of the cauliflower to use in soup, but when I cut the blasted thing out it was kind of piddly and not nearly enough to make anything decent with. So then I looked at the pile of cauliflower leaves next to the chopping board, and wondered if they were edible.

Note: In hindsight, if you're wondering whether or not something is edible, it's probably a good idea to check before you cook and eat it. But on with the story.

I figured throwing the leaves and core of the cauliflower all in a soup together was a decent enough way to find out whether they were, in fact, digestible. But I didn't want to waste perfectly decent ingredients to go with them just in case it tasted horrible. So I also threw in an old carrot, and a potato that was sprouting and a little softer than usual. Solid logic there.

I chopped everything up fairly small, covered it with water, and added a chicken stock cube, some salt and pepper, a crushed clove of garlic, some lemon juice, and some dried tarragon, then simmered for 20 minutes or so, and loosely mashed everything to keep it chunky.

And the verdict is... edible!

It turns out cauliflower leaves taste like a cross between cauliflower, cabbage and spinach. They're a little on the bitter side, but the lemon juice helped with that.

Experimental Soup - tell your friends.

Playing with: Desiccated Coconut

It's a tale as old as time. Girl needs small amount of ingredient. Ingredient is only available in large bags. Girl buys large bag, uses small amount, abandons the rest in the cupboard for ages. Haven't we all seen this old cliché play out before?

Why won't you just... die

But not this time. I have a big bag of desiccated coconut and I'm determined to use it. Here's what I've been doing:

Toasted sesame seeds and coconut.

I'm not going to insult your intelligence by listing the ingredients for this one. The clues are in the title. Dry toast the sesame seeds in a frying pan until they start to turn brown, then add the coconut and stir through. The coconut toasts quite quickly so it won't need long. Mix thoroughly and pour into a little serving bowl to sprinkle on the top of stir fries or other noodle dishes.

I'm a big fan of coconut in a savoury context (especially with chillies), but I think that desiccated coconut in sweets is dangerous territory. The slivers of coconut are chewy and dry the mouth out, so combining that with sugar can make quite a cloying, drying texture (See: coconut liquorice allsorts. Bleurgh).

On the other hand, with the right texture, a bit of coconut can be a subtle, fancy addition. I like to add coconut to white chocolate rice crispy sweets to class them up a bit. I use:

2 cups of rice crispies
100g white chocolate
2 tbsp desiccated coconut

Melt the chocolate and mix the rice crispies and coconut in thoroughly. Put a teaspoon each in a little cake or petit fours case and leave to set.

The favourite recipe I came up with involves mixing the coconut with breadcrumbs to give a little extra crunch and flavour to breadcrumb coatings.

To make Thai-style chicken goujons, you will need:

2 chicken breasts
Seasoned flour
1 egg
4 tbsp breadcrumbs
2 tbsp desiccated coconut
2 tbsp olive oil
1 small chilli, diced
1 tsp minced garlic and ginger

Slice the chicken breasts into even sized pieces, about a finger in length. Dip them first in seasoned flour, then beaten egg, and finally the breadcrumbs mixed with the coconut.

Cook on a high shelf at 200C or GM 6. In the meantime, mix the oil, garlic, ginger and chilli together. After 10 to 15 minutes, take out the chicken and pour a small amount of the oil over each piece, then put back in the oven for a further 10 minutes.

Serve with something appropriate - I had mine with a salad of coriander and spring onion.

Well, that's about me exhausted recipe wise, and I've only used half the bag, so suggestions welcome. I don't like it seeing it everytime I open the cupboard, judging me.

You son of a bitch.

Proustian Apple Muesli

I have a very distinct memory of standing in my Gran's old kitchen while she made apple muesli. My grandparents (now passed away) were living out in the sticks in Dorset at the time. Their whole house smelled of woodsmoke and Grandad's snuff, and whenever I make this muesli I can smell that house all over again.

If you haven't encountered snuff before, it's powdered tobacco that you're meant to take a pinch of and snort through your nose, except with Grandad's arthritis affecting his pinching abilities, his preferred method was to just throw a handful at his own face from time to time. It. Got. Everywhere. Little brown clouds of dust would rise at every footfall. The very atmosphere was 0.05% snuff. The secret ingredient in a lot of Gran's cooking would have been snuff, just because she couldn't keep it out. Feel free to add a little pinch to this recipe for authenticity's sake, but for the love of God don't do that.

But to the muesli. Gran would make big bowlfuls of the stuff and dish it out to everyone in the morning, but since I'm the only one eating it at home I've adjusted the recipe so you can make just one serving at a time.

For the dry muesli base:
500g oats
100g raisins, or other dried fruit
50g chopped or flaked almonds
1 tsp mixed spice

For the night before:
Eating apples (1/2 apple per serving)
Lemon juice
Apple juice (optional)

Mix the dry ingredients together, and store in an air-tight jar where no snuff can get in.

How pretty. A bit faux-vintage and twee as fuck, though.

The night before you want muesli for breakfast, take two to three tablespoons of the oat mixture and no snuff, and mix in half a grated eating apple and a little lemon juice, then add enough water or snuff-free apple juice to cover it. Leave in the fridge overnight, and by morning the oats will have soaked up the juice and be all nice and soft. This is also a good point not to add snuff.

Now eat your breakfast and stop complaining about snuff, there's a good girl.

Wine tasting at Majestic

I am officially an old woman. You know that beautiful bank holiday we just had? The one where everyone was outside, enjoying the sun and life and finding inner peace and joy and all that bullshit? Well I had a bad back. Yeah. Initial plans of a walk and picnic were quickly downgraded to staying in and sitting very, very still. Even my 'occasionally turning my head to look at something' ideas became impractical. I was not happy, to the point where I began cursing the happiness of others, and that may well have led to my descent into misanthropy and super-villainy if I hadn't remembered one very important fact: alcohol. It exists.

On Tuesday my local Majestic had their Summer Wine Tasting to showcase the new wines they have in stock, and even though my back wasn't entirely better there was no way I was missing it. So off I hobbled to find some nice summer drinks and anaesthetise my back. Two birds, y'see.

They had about a dozen wines out. I would have preferred a bigger selection, but it was respectable enough. I recall a wine tasting which had about 80 wines out, and even though I limited myself to the ones I really wanted to try I was still pissed as a bastard by the end of it. I ended up being half carried home and drunk texting some friends my opinions on Lethal Weapon. So I guess 12 wines is fine.

My highlights were:

Greywacke Sauvignon Blanc, £19.99 or £15.99 each when you buy two.

I'm a big fan of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, so I was kind of hoping that this wouldn't be much better than the cheaper versions which are my standard. It is, goddammit. It's got a beautiful, big, fruity, grassy taste, all tomato vines and lemons and apples. I could drink this all day.

Amarone, Cantina Negrar, £22 or £18.99 when you buy two.

This was rich, smooth and deep; almost fortified. It had a spicy, dried fruit finish, and a bit of honeyed sweetness. A very nice special occasion wine, and probably a good match for a cheeseboard.

Nyetimber Classic Cuvee, £23.99

English wine! I know, right? I've tried a couple of English whites which I have enjoyed very much and I want to try more, but there's still only limited availability and they're generally on the dear end. Nyetimber, as the enthusiastic chap at Majestic was telling me, have a vineyard in Sussex that almost exactly matches the soil and climate of the Champagne region, and as the wine is made by the same method it's about as close to champagne as you're likely to get. I can't disagree. It has a lovely honey-on-toast yeastiness and a really deep, full flavour. A real celebration wine.

As you can see, all of these are a bit expensive, so even though these were my favourites the likelihood is I'm not going to get them. I might treat myself to the Greywacke one day, but that's about it. The one wine I tasted that I almost certainly will get is the (drumroll please):

Mister Shiraz, £8.74 or £6.99 each when you buy two

This was rich, smokey and tasty, and not nearly as drying and tannic as I often find with beefy Shiraz's - it went down smooth. I think this would be a great food wine, and my tasting guide even recommended it for a barbecue. I reckon a couple of grilled steaks, chips, some good company and a bottle of this will suit a Summer's evening down to the ground.

You'll be pleased to know my back is much better now, but if it strikes me down again and my movement is limited to sitting in one spot and raising a glass, well, I'm prepared for that eventuality.

Quick Lemon Curd

I have an awful lot of affection for old cookbooks. I'm not talking antique Mrs Beeton era books, more the weird 1970's '100 Food Processor Recipes' style books.

Not even joking

I love the way recipes veer from practical and tasty, to wildly, offensively wrong. You'll get a good, basic recipe for cheese sauce, then they'll tell you to pour it over a curried banana. Again, not joking.

Thinking about it, I'm going to have to devote a whole separate post to just how much I love old cookbooks (Note to self: do that), but the pointI'm making this time is I got this excellent recipe for quick lemon curd from an old 'Recipes to use with your Microwave' book. It was probably one of the only edible things it featured, but was totally worth it.

You will need:

250g sugar
2 lemons, zest and juice
50g butter
2 eggs.

Put the sugar, butter, zest and juice into a microwave proof bowl, and heat on high until the butter has melted (probably between 30 seconds and a minute). Remove, and whisk in the eggs until smooth. Put back in the microwave and cook for a further minute on high, then remove and whisk again.

Continue cooking for a minute each time and then whisking until the mix has been cooked for a total of five minutes. Strain it, and store in sterilised jars. This quantity will make about a pound of curd.

You can try this with other citrus fruits, but remember they have to be as sharp as the lemons. I made orange curd once and it was waaay too sweet, but grapefruit works quite well.

Another thing you can try making is ice cream. The eggs and sugar in this make it a good base for ice cream, so all you need to do is mix it through some lightly whipped cream or (as I prefer) creme fraiche. The high sugar content means it stays quite smooth, so you don't necessarily need an ice cream maker, just whisk it together and stick it in the freezer.

I'm going to leave this batch as it is though, and have it nice and simple on my curried banana.

Beef Shortribs

Just a quickie today (fnyar fnyar), as this recipe is ludicrously short and also I forgot to take any pictures. But I'm still going to write about it because oh my god you guys this shit is tasty.

You will need:

2lbs or 1kg beef shortribs
1 500g carton of tomato passata (chopped tomatoes are fine)
1 pint beef stock
100ml red wine
2 crushed cloves garlic

Put the ribs in a casserole dish, and pour everything else around it. Cook it on a low heat (GM 2-3 or 150C) for 3-4 hours. Let the meat rest, then shred it. Check the sauce for seasoning. Whatever you do, don't season it before cooking, the sauce will reduce leaving it waaaaay too salty and you'll have to faff about for ages trying to fix it. So, cook it first, add salt if it needs it, even a little sugar if it's a little too bitter.

Serve the shredded meat with the sauce, and some mash.

And done.

The Star and Dove, Bristol

For the very first post I put up here I wrote about the Star and Dove (that link may not work right now, I think they're re-doing their website), a local pub which does phenomenal food. Seriously, these guys are going to get popular once word gets out so book up while you can. I was treated to a meal there for my birthday a couple of months ago, but wanted to leave it a respectable amount of time before I posted a review.

The deal with the Star and Dove (the Dining Room, at least, the bar food is slightly different) is they take recipes from the 12th to 18th century and recreate them with modern techniques. It's quite an odd sense of disassociation when you order something spelt lyke thys, and end up with a very contemporary looking plate.

I'm going to put my cards on the table here. I love stuff that is made to look like other stuff. Love it. I know it's gimmicky, but God help me, they brought a candle to the table and lit it and told us it was the butter for our rolls. For reals. It even had little dribbles of wax down it. How am I supposed to deal with that? Because if it isn't 'clap your hands and giggle like a child' then I may have chosen the wrong option.

We got aperitifs too. I love it when there's aperitifs. It's a little extra free gift to make you feel like you're getting your money's worth. Ours was a take on the flavours of a Waldorf salad. A rich celery veloute, with a fresh pickled walnut, crumbled apple jelly (they clearly like their gelling agents here - this was a jelly that looked and felt like sand, but would melt in your mouth), and a crisp of filo pastry.

My starter was a soft, tangy fresh buffalo cheese that matched perfectly with chicory and truffle honeycomb, while Pete had... I don't even know what to call it. It was like a ball of fish stock wrapped in smoked haddock and bacon cream so when you cut into it it would ooze more fish. In his words, it was the fishiest fish that ever fish. Fish. I'm not a fan of fish myself, but he assures me that if you did like fish you would probably like this fish. Fish.

My main was Welsh salt duck breast, with a liver mousse in a crispy pancake. I was conflicted about ordering this, because I love duck but really don't get on with liver. I needn't have worried. Although powerful tasting, the mousse avoided that graininess of texture that I dislike, and really tasted more like a fierce blue cheese than anything. Pete had a Carpet bagger steak, which was fillet steak stuffed with goose liver and pate. As you can tell, they are really offally versatile (do you see what I did there? I'm very amusing).

Puddings were amazeballs. Pete doesn't even like puddings all that much, but I've still managed to convince him to go back a number of times just so we can have a cake or dessert in the bar downstairs. I had 'Beetroot Salad', which involved beetroot candied, jellied and crisped and served with chocolate ganache, while Pete had a clotted cream and brandy ice cream, shaped and dipped in an orange gel to make it look like an orange, and served with orange curd. Stuff that looks like stuff. Love it.

So well played, The Star and Dove. Well played. I shall return anon.

Playing with: Liquid Smoke

Sometimes I find an ingredient that intrigues me, and I start using it in loads of things even when I don't know how. I did it with tamarind paste (great with couscous, less so on toast), and now I'm doing it with liquid smoke.

Apparently it's been kicking around the States for ages but it's clearly not a big thing in the UK. Probably because our experience of barbecue flavour is less 'smoke' and more 'fire-lighter fluid and sooty rainwater'. Anyway, I heard about it off of that Food Network, and finally found some in Dr Burnorium's Hot Sauce Emporium. And I've been playing with it ever since.

Liquid smoke is basically water which has had smoke bubbled through it, so it's a really authentic smokey (Smokey? Smoky? Smokey.) taste. The main thing you need to know about it is you DO NOT NEED MUCH OF IT. Seriously. This shit is strong. If you want to be subtle you have to add it a drop at a time.

It's a nice addition to chilli con carne, and it's good at making vegetarian bean stews feel more substantial. An extremely basic but perfectly serviceable version would use:

1 drained can black-eyed beans
1 can chopped tomatoes
1 diced white onion
1 clove crushed garlic
pinch of salt
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
1 tsp liquid smoke
1 tsp paprika

Cook everything on a low simmer for half an hour with the lid on, and a further 15-20 min with the lid off until it reduces to the right consistency.

That's what I would consider a traditional use of liquid smoke, but if you don't experiment you'll never find anything new. Yes, you'll make a few crimes against nature along the way, and the townspeople will no doubt curse your name as the 'Bringer of Abominations', but that's what being a scientist is all about. So here are some more counter-intuitive uses you could try. Be thankful I did the research so you didn't have to.

- Salted caramel sauce (add a TINY amount)
- Apple sauce (to go with pork, not puddings. Also, 'Pork not Puddings' would look good on a t-shirt)
- Chilli beef stir fry
- Mashed potato

I've also created my own barbecue sauce based around liquid smoke, but you could use this same recipe without it. This can be used as a sauce on it's own, or as a marinade for meat before it goes in the oven. You will need:

6 tbsp ketchup
1 tbsp black treacle (or 2 of dark muscavado sugar)
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon liquid smoke

Whisk everything together in a bowl until the treacle has dissolved, then check it's to your taste.

The sauce is quite thin which is perfect for a marinade, but if you want it thicker then heat it gently in a saucepan and whisk in 1 tsp cornflour dissolved in a drop of water. Stir until thick.

Once I made the sauce I stored some of it in a tomato:

And marinaded some chicken breasts in the rest.

After a couple of hours I griddled the chicken and served them with garlicy green beans and mash.

Liquid smoke then. I suspect it's going to be one of those things I use sparingly and when the mood strikes me rather than regularly. It hasn't changed my life, but this barbecue sauce really is a cracker.

Cold Weather Salads

I have a complicated relationship with salads. I tend to associate them with someone making a statement. Usually it feels like that statement is 'I don't like real food', but I know that's a bit harsh. There's a whole weird moral dimension where eating a salad makes you 'good'. As in 'yeah, I don't give to charity and my hobbies include burglary and stabbing, but I'll have the salad cos I'm trying to be good'. Pffft. Whatevs.

I may have got distracted there. My point is that there are cultural expectations of what a salad should be, and tasty isn't one of them. But really aren't they just big bowls of whatever is in the fridge? And isn't that just the sort of cooking I go in for? So aren't I just getting up on my high horse for nothing? You don't have to answer that.

Since the gods are angry with us and have cursed us with an unending winter, I've been making specifically cold weather salads. They're big and hearty enough to be a proper meal, but messy enough to still technically be a salad, I guess.

Squash, Chickpea and Goats Cheese Salad

Nothing suits the cold weather so much as a bit of spice, and the squash and chickpeas are great spice-carriers so you can really push the boat out here. You will need:

1 butternut squash, or whatever type of squash you prefer
1 can of chick peas
1 log of goats cheese
1 large bunch of coriander
Lemon juice
Chilli oil
Cumin
Ginger
Paprika
Cinnammon
Salt and pepper
Mustard seeds
2 sausages (optional)

Slice the squash into pieces about 1cm thick, and either grill or griddle them in olive oil until soft. Reserve the seeds, and dry fry them with the mustard seeds.

Put the drained and washed chickpeas in a bowl. Add the chilli oil, chopped coriander, squash seeds, lemon juice, and the spices in whatever quantities you prefer (start with about 1/2 a teaspoon of each and go from there).

Spread the chickpeas on a plate. Mix the grilled squash in the dressing left behind from the chickpeas, and put that on too. Finally, spread little chunks of goats cheese over the whole thing. If you're particularly hungry, and/or have leftover sausages in the fridge, they won't go amiss here either.

This has a really lovely Moroccan feel to it. The squash itself is already quite fruity, but I imagine pomegranate seeds would push it in a lighter direction.


Pork croutons, blood orange and feta salad

Remember when I made that roast belly pork? And I said to keep the fat for all sorts of things? Well this is one of those things. Honestly, white bread fried in pig fat is a thing of beauty.

You will need:

Pork dripping (or some other sort of delicious fat)
Stale bread (I used half a stale baguette, but about 4 slices of regular bread will do)
1 bunch / packet of rocket
2 blood oranges (regular oranges will do)
1/2 packet of feta

This one requires much less fiddling than the squash salad. Just fry the bread, peel and chop the oranges and dice the feta, and mix everything together. You don't need a dressing as the juice from the oranges is plenty. Have I mentioned that I love blood oranges? It's a fruit that bleeds! I can't get enough of them, and they're in season* at the moment.
*'In season' means 'currently availble at the grocers'.

I'm really pleased with this salad. The croutons soak up some of the juice from the orange and brine from the feta which stops them being too greasy. If you're going to eat fried pig bread, this is the way to do it.

Roast Pork with Apples and Onions

I really like the neighbourhood I live in. I'm just outside the centre of Bristol so I can walk into the city pretty easily, there are a few convenient shops close by, really decent pubs, and great places to eat. The one thing I haven't been able to find is a butcher. I was spoilt for meat - spoilt, I say - before I moved as I was really close to a proper fancy deli butcher, and I miss flirting a bit to get an extra couple of short ribs thrown in for free (Dear Pete - that never happened) (Dear Reader - that totally happened).

I still haven't found anything close by, but then there is a pub literally across the road from me, so you win some you lose some. I have, however, found another fancy little deli butcher in the city centre. It's called Source, and I like it.

They have a big focus on organic and rare breed meat so it's a bit pricey, but they've got a good range, and worth it for a treat. All their pork is Gloucester Old Spot, which I hadn't tried before but had heard good things about, so I got about 3 pounds of belly pork to roast.

Slow roast belly pork is really easy, but you've got to put the time in.

I used:

2 apples (Braeburn, if you're interested)
2 large onions
4 large potatoes
Lots of Belly pork
Salt
Dried rosemary

First of all I preheated the oven to as hot as it would go. This is to sear the skin and make sure you get crispy crackling. Score the skin of the pork and rub in the salt and rosemary. When the oven is hot enough, put the meat in a large roasting tray and pop in the oven for 20-30 minutes.

While the meat is in the oven, prep the veg. Peel the onions and potatoes, but leave the skin on the apples. Core the apple, and cut all the veg into large chunks. These are going to cook for a long time, so anything too small is just going to burn or melt away into nothingness.

After about half an hour, take the meat out of the oven and turn the temperature way down, about GM 2-3. Take the meat out of the tray, add the veg, and put the meat back in on top of the veg. This means the fat from the pork will drip down and baste the veg.

Put the whole tray back in the oven and leave for at least 2, preferably 3 hours.

When everything is done you should have really soft meat, crispy crackling, cooked onions and potatoes, with a meaty apple sauce. Remember to reserve the fat and any other brown bits for gravy.

The Gloucester Old Spot was delicious, and produced some of the best crackling I've ever made. The only thing is that it produces so much fat that the potatoes were more confit than crispy, so in future I might take those out of the tray a little early and let them just crisp up on their own separately.

REMEMBER TO KEEP THE DELICIOUS FAT FOR OTHER DELICIOUS PURPOSES. 'S really important. I got about half a pint out of this lot, and I could probably have used it to swim the Channel had I been so inclined.

GBM Week 8

... Also known as 'The Taffy Bin Rake'.

What happened, guys? Wales used to do so well. I can't help but feel that these contestants were perhaps not the programme makers first choices. So the numbers were made up with a child and a cat lady.

Richard was a returning contestant. Decent enough, but not mind-blowing. He won. His competition was Luke, fresh from performing in his secondary school's production of 'Grease', and Mary-Anne, who looked like my thumb when I've spent too long in the bath. I wanted to like Mary-Anne. I really did. I usually have a distinct fondness for mad old bats, and certainly I warmed to her in the final when she was very generous with Richard. But in the main she was just insufferable. One of those people who are happy to be brash to the point of offense, but blow up at the slightest hint of criticism. Luke was sweet, but he was 12. I'm sure he'll do very well in future, and to be a head chef at his age is amazing. I'd happily eat at his restaurant. But seriously. 12.


Highlights:

Biggest Prick of the Week - Mary-Anne

Least Prickish Prick of the Week - Luke. Bless.

Moment of the Week - When someone (Richard I think?) called one of Mary-Anne's dishes 'good simple cooking', and she reacted like he had slapped her in the face.

Bronwen's Favourite Dish - Richard's Chicken Salad starter with a fortune cookie in the egg.

Wild Card of the Week - Mary-Anne's upper lip. It droops into a point like the baby from 'Dinosaurs'.


Next week is the final and we can draw a line under this whole sorry episode.

Chicken and Leek pie filling

A few days ago, Pete and I were talking about how awesome I am (we do this a lot), and he mentioned that I had once made a really tasty chicken and tarragon pie. I'm sure I did, but I have no memory of how I made it or what went in it. I seem to remember it had mushrooms in maybe? That does sound like something I'd do. Anyway, I decided to make something similar, but since I didn't have any mushrooms this is done with leeks instead. Practically the same thing.

You will need:

2 large chicken breasts
1 medium sized leek
1-2 tsp dried tarragon
Zest and juice of 1 lemon
3 tbsp creme fraiche
Splash of white wine if you've got any open

Wash and chop the leek. Start frying it in a saucepan on a low heat in a little olive oil or butter, and add a pinch of salt and pepper.

Cut the chicken breasts into strips and add to the saucepan. Add the tarragon and the lemon juice and zest. The wine too, if you're using it.

Continue cooking on a low heat until the leeks are soft and the chicken is cooked through - about 15-20 min. Stir the creme fraiche through until everything is mixed together.

Mmmm... mush

 Now, you'll have noticed I haven't mentioned anything about pastry or pies. That's because right then I didn't particularly fancy making pastry, and honestly, I just made this delicious chicken stuff so I think it's a bit cheeky to ask me to do even more for you. God. But the good thing about the above mixture is you can use it in a whole bunch of ways. I had it as a sauce on pasta, but here's a few more variations you can make.

I used conchiglie pasta. Because that was what was in the cupboard.

- Use it as a pie filling using shortcrust pastry. As the filling is already cooked you don't need to put it in the oven very long. I blind bake the base for ten minutes on GM 5-6 first, then add the filling and the top and cook for a further ten minutes.

- Add two eggs to the mixture, put in a casserole dish and sprinkle breadcrumbs on the top, then cook for around 25 minutes on GM 5 for a light chicken bake.

- Add about a pint of chicken stock for a hearty cream of chicken soup.

- Take the leftovers from the fridge and heat up in the microwave without removing from the tupperware tub. Eat straight from the tub while watching 'Charmed'. Pause to shout at Shannon Docherty.

And many more! Probably!

GBM 5, 6 and 7

A triple update! How exciting!

Week 5 has to be my favourite week so far. Not only was it based in my newly adopted home region of the South West, but it also felt like a good, friendly competition. The standard was high, and judged by cuddly over-sized teddy bear Tom Kerridge. Who I love a little bit. Other judges come in and tell the competitors to buck up and get to work, but Kerridge trots up, says 'Don't be nervous!' in his thick Gloucester burr, and proceeds to have a jolly nice time with everyone. Just lovely.

The chefs were all new to the competition. There was Emily, who looked a bit like Emilia Fox from Silent Witness and a bit like a sparrow; Chris, who I don't have anything amusing to say about; and Peter Sanchez-Inglesias, whose name I love and whose accent was a cross between trendy London and North Bristol so it was great when his dad turned up and was total Spaniard.

I really liked Emily's ideas, but I think she had a bit of a rough week - there were some scores for her which I thought should have been higher, but what do I know, I can't taste it. Chris bugged me a bit. His food looked fine, but he straight up said that he didn't know how to make food funny. I mean, it's a tough brief, sure, and he's certainly not the first contestant to have no sense of humour, but to not even know how to try sort of baffles me. Make something into the shape of a knob and have done with it. Jeez.

I would have been happy with either Emily or Peter winning, but Peter had it pretty much in the bag. Here's my highlights:

Biggest Prick of the Week - Tough. I quite like everyone, but I'm voting for Chris because he has no sense of humour.

Least Prickish Prick of the Week - Kerridge, hands down.

Moment of the Week - The camera is set up on Chris, who moves out the way to reveal an eery half reflection of Kerridge in the glass door, looking like nothing so much as Pipes from Ghost Watch. Amazing.

Bronwen's Favourite Dish - Lot's of good ones here, but Emily's 'Shoot Lunch' venison took my fancy. Special shout out to Peter's Sunday Lunch.

Wild card of the Week - Simon Day being funny, but clearly a bit of a miserable sod.


Week 6 - Northern Ireland.

While I really don't want to be racially insensitive to the Northern Irish (I'm lying, I'm a massive racist), this week's competitors were clearly members of the supporting cast of Father Ted. There was Chris Fearon as Father Dick Burn, "Seriously though, Ted, I think you might win", "Do you really think so?" "NO!", Raymond McArdle as Father Fitzgerald (the one with the world's most boring voice), and Ian Orr as Father Larry Duff. I don't have a great analogy for that one, but he kind of looks like him.

Compared with the feelgood factor of last week, this week was really difficult to watch. Ian Orr (haha, it's like 'Eeyore') was ok, but Chris used to work for Raymond and I'm going to go out on a limb and say they didn't get on. I quite liked Chris in previous years, but Raymond clearly got him riled so there was some serious dick swinging going on. Raymond just made me uncomfortable. I think he was trying to be witty and banterish, but he came across as a no-agenda with mild crazy eye.

This could have been called 'The Week of the Tortured Metaphor'. Glyn Purnell (who I used to like, but stopped when I saw him say something vaguely racist on Saturday Kitchen. Yes, I'm a racist hypocrite) was the worst at this, but Ray did his fair share. Ray: 'Will your fish dish sink or swim? Chris: 'What?'.

The food generally looked pretty decent. As in previous years, Chris's ideas were better than the execution, but I still can't believe Ray won. That guy is going to get some serious beats in the final. Anyway, highlights:

Biggest Prick of the Week - Close call between Chris and Raymond, but I'm going to go with the latter. The clincher was when he was fiddling about with some of Chris's props, to which he was (quite rightly) told to fuck off. Instead of laughing it off, or putting up his hands and saying 'fair enough' he got all defensive and went on about it just being a laugh. People who defend bad behaviour by claiming it was a joke really wind me up, so Raymond must now suffer as a result of my own bug-bears. I stand by it.

Least Prickish Prick of the Week - Ian Orr (haha, like 'Eeyore').

Moment of the Week - Chris on Raymond's 'Titanic' main course: "The Titanic doesn't make me laugh. It reminds me of death".

Bronwen's Favourite Dish - Chris' beef pie. That looked proper. Can't believe Ray won.

Wild card of the Week - Ray's 'Chocolate Volcano' that completely failed to erupt and looked kind of gross. Can't believe he won.


Week 7 - Central

This week had previous winner Daniel Clifford, with Will Holland (Duncan Goodhew) and Richard Bainbridge (hairy hipster Duncan Goodhew).

Oh Daniel. Daniel, Daniel, Daniel. Last year he got his main course to the banquet (even though his other dishes weren't all that), and as a result his ego has swollen like my thumb when I've been fiddling with a hangnail too much and it goes all sore. I'm surprised he didn't have to stand really far apart to make room for his massive balls. So, Daniel was in this round, and had adopted a very patronising, almost patrician air towards the other chefs. I really wanted someone to beat him, and Bainbridge gave him a good run for his money in the final, but I will grudgingly admit he probably deserved to win. Dick. Richard had some really great dishes, but wasn't quite up to the same standard. Will's cooking was probably decent, but he had completely ignored the brief, and I was pleased to see that Marcus Wareing (who I have a soft spot for) came down on that quite hard. Seriously, guys, read the brief.

Highlights:

Biggest Prick of the Week - Cliffooooooooooord!

Least Prickish Prick of the Week - Despite an ill-advised puppet show version of a GBM final, I do think Richard was really quite sweet.

Moment of the Week - Daniel actually being quite gracious after winning - you really felt for Richard after he'd tried so hard.

Bronwen's Favourite Dish - Richard's guinea fowl in a massive red dinosaur egg.

Wild card of the Week - Vic Reeves was guest judge. He didn't do much, but Vic Reeves gets a free pass because Vic Reeves.

GBM weeks 3 and 4

A double update!

Week 3 was the North West, featuring Aiden (Northern Lex Luther), Mary Ellen (ditzy chemistry teacher) and Chris (*yawn*... sorry, what? Who? Oh yeah, that guy), judged by previous winner Phil Howard.

The theme for this week was 'The Reformed Bell-End'. Both Phil and Aiden were insufferable in their own special ways in previous years, but actually came out alright this time. Phil's arrogance didn't feature so much when he got to be a judge, and he was a reasonably fair one at that. And Aiden used to be the absolute poster boy for over-competitiveness (competitiveness? competitivity?) and snarking, but (while that side of him didn't completely disappear) the fact that both Mary Ellen and Chris were quite nice and not rising to it meant that he didn't have anyone to be over-competitive with.

I tell you what I didn't like so much. The narrator constantly harping on about the chef's failings. Mary Ellen had a rough first round and came up late, but still got high marks, which you wouldn't know if you only heard the VO banging on about how precarious her position was. And the epithet they came up with for Aiden was 'three time loser'. Not cool, writers. As time went by I found myself rooting for Aiden more and more. Mary Ellen was obviously nicer and had some cool ideas, but Aiden was so desperate to win and put so much effort in it became quite endearing. He even teared up a couple of times when he got high scores. Bless.

Aiden ended up the winner, but here's my highlights:

Biggest Prick of the Week - This was a tough one. Phil was condescending and Aiden was bolshy, but I'm going to have to give this one to Guest Judge Rowland Rivron. Because screw that guy.

Least Prickish Prick of the Week - Mary Ellen. She didn't quite hit it this year but I think she'll do well in the future.

Moment of the Week - The tears of Lex Luther when he finally beat Superman. I mean, won the final.

Bronwen's Favourite Dish - A tie between Aiden's beef dish and Mary Ellen's Bathtub of Beans. I'm not a fan of crabmeat, but it did look pretty cool. I love food that's made to look like other things.

Wild card of the Week - Rowland Rivron teaming up with Matthew Fort to make Dad jokes.


Week 4 was in the North East, with (I think) exactly the same competitors as last year. The only difference was the judge was Jason Atherton instead of Nigel Haworth, which produced much rejoicing, as Haworth was one of my least favourite judges of all time. Atherton was alright, but his grammar drove Pete barmy. 'Pronouns are not interchangeable motherfuckeeeeerrr'.

The chefs were Colin (slightly effete previous winner with a dry-ice fetish) Stephanie (mad-eyed eager country lass) and Charlie (dead ringer for the kind of guy who used to hit on me at my old Uni's Alt-Rock nights*, so I remain surprised he isn't actually a 4th year engineering student wearing a Korn t-shirt).

By all rights, this should have been Stephanie's year. She's had gimmicky-fun leanings before, but it seemed that Nigel Haworth (grrr) knocked those out of her last year when he consistently picked on her, even pulling her away for a chat about how badly she was doing (she was doing fine, he just didn't get it). In my view, Charlie was the one who hit the brief, even when it was bit, uhh, much. But Colin was streets ahead of the other two and it wasn't much of a surprise when he won. Having said that, it was really close between him and Stephanie on the final day, and when Tim Brooke-Taylor came back to tell them how close it was I really enjoyed seeing his face fall. He was a bit too smug.

Anyway, the highlights:

Biggest Prick of the Week - Charlie. In a way this series has been a lot more diverse than previous ones. The pricks they've featured have ranged from 'smug prick' to 'annoying prick', but I have to say it's nice to see a good old fashioned 'aggressively competitive prick' again. Well played, Charlie, well played.

Least Prickish Prick of the Week - Stephanie 'Mad-eye' Moon. Gawd bless her.

Moment of the Week - When Charlie brought up his starter that looked like a dog turd, and Jason Atherton was clearly unimpressed.

Bronwen's Favourite Dish - You know, I'm going to go with Charlie's Take Away kebab dish. I know it got slated and looked a bit of a mess, but I think it was a neat idea and took balls. Charlie wins again.

Wild card of the Week - Atherton: 'I'm looking for a plate what delivers good'. Pete: 'Fuck yooooooooou'.

I won't leave it so long next time. Promise

*I don't mean to brag here. Even back in the day I tended to give off a matronly, maternal air, so the Prog fans found me comforting while the Metalheads wanted to corrupt me. Ahh, the alt-rock crowd. I truly was their queen.

Chilli Pesto

This is basically a cross between green thai curry sauce, salsa verde and pesto. The creamed coconut and oil make it set into a thick paste that lasts ages, and it can be used in a whole pile of things. I stir some into couscous as a side or a quick lunch, use it as a marinade for chicken then grill it, and stick it into stir fries. It's probably good with fish too, but I can't stand fish and neither should you.

As the heat comes from the chillis you can adjust as you see fit, but I like it on the pokey side. Just remember that capsaicin is fat soluble, so when combined with the creamed coconut it will always be a little milder than you expect. Isn't that a great fact? I'll wait while you write that down.

You will need:

2-3 finger chillis, preferrably green but no biggie
2-3 chopped spring onions
1/3 block creamed coconut
handful chopped coriander (precisely the amount provided in a Tesco herb bag, or about 2 tbsp chopped)
handful chopped mint (same amount)
lemon juice
sesame seeds (optional, I like the crunch they give)
salt
vegetable oil
chilli flakes or chilli oil (optional)

Put everything except the vegetable oil and chilli flakes into a food processor.

Blend it. When everything is thoroughly chopped, slowly add some vegetable oil while the processor is running until the mixture turns smooth.

Check for seasoning, and add chilli flakes or oil if you want it a bit hotter.

Spoon into a container, and keep refrigerated.

Here's a picture of a lovely stir fry I made with it.

I just cooked the chicken in a wok with some onions and added a small amount of chilli pesto and some salad leaves (for greenery, I'm nothing if not aesthetic), then served with some re-hydrated rice noodles which had more of the chilli pesto stirred through.

If you're feeling a little adventurous put a couple of teaspoons in a mug and top with boiling water. Great for when you've got a bit of a cold, and way better than lemsip. Lemsip is rank.