A Chefs Life.
Friday 31 December 2010
Wednesday 29 December 2010
Suffolk, local produce.
Some amazing local produce can be found in Suffolk, Aspall cider for example.
But there are also smoke houses, great butchers, loads of farms and as it is on the East coast, loads of fresh fish.
Here are a few pics of a few things that I discovered whilst on holiday in Orford.
Monday 27 December 2010
Cooking with Fynn.
I spent some valuable time with my family this Christmas.
Here is Fynn, my nephew helping me make Pheasent and cider casserole.
Christmas Lunch.
Here are a few pics of my Crimbo lunch,
Orford smoked fish (salmon, rainbow trout and mackerel)
Norfolk bronze turkey (raised in Suffolk) and bread sauce with all the trimmings,
Steamed Christmas Pudding (home made by my mum 3 months ago),
Cheese.
Wednesday 22 December 2010
Wimpy, the old skool burger!
When my mate asked me if I wanted to go to a Wimpy bar with him I thought he was taking the mick! Then I thought about it and it had been 20 years since I had been to a Wimpy bar (Ben Vines 10th birthday party, 1990!), and then after a brief bit of research, realised that there was much more to the Wimpy bar than I expected.
The first ever Wimpy bar was created by Eddie Gold in 1951, it was situated at Lyons Corner House in Coventry Street, London. By 1953 Eddie was running 12 branches. By the mid 70's the company had expanded to over 1000 branches in 23 countries!
Unfortunately, by the late 80's Wimpy was loosing ground to McDonalds, who opened their first UK restaurant in 1974.
Despite Wimpy being the only major burger chain where you can eat a burger with a knife and folk and to include the 'Bender burger' and a Quorn burger on their menu, nowadays only a few Wimpy Bars can be found across the UK.
So we headed over to Clapham Junction. On entering the Wimpy bar, it reminded me of being a kid, I was a bit excited to eat a burger with cutlery and have a retro milky coffee!
The food was alright and it filled a hole, between four of us we had 2 bender burger and 2 'International mixed grills'!, a large milky coffee each and a pud each, a sort of doughnut with whipped cream and chocolate sauce.
£54, 4 people, 2 courses each, and a few milky coffees, who could complain about that!
Tuesday 21 December 2010
Cheers Dan.
Danny, my pastry chef mate, got me a late birthday prezzie, this 1 kilo Melton Mowbray pork pie from Borough market!
Thursday 16 December 2010
Seaweed bread.
Spent the morning with my chef mate Fred on Monday, he is head chef at the recently opened 'Cantinetta' in Putney, he is a great chef and his speciality is baking, as he was head baker for Geoigio Locatelli for 4 out of the 8 years that he worked for him!
Recently I have been going through a bit of a 'seaweed fetish', it is soooooo good for you, full of vits, greatness, easily sourced, helps you to digest food, loads of it about and so on.
I wanted to make seaweed bread, as I have tried it a few times, but never freshly baked, and by the time it gets to London, usually from Wales, it is a few days old! What could be better than warm, freshly baked Seaweed bread with seaweed butter!
So we spent the morning in his kitchen, as the restaurant is closed on Monday lunch.
We made a bread that he bakes daily in the restaurant, but lowered the salt content and added 300grams of pureed seaweed!
Baked it, then cooled it for an hour or so then got stuck in! Fantastic! Super bread!
Monday 13 December 2010
Saturday 11 December 2010
30th Birthday party at St. John.
I have been completely spoiled this weekend, breakfast at the Worseley, and dinner at St. John, oh and a few mulled ciders at Borough Market in between!
Here is the menu 16 of us shared,
To start,
Venison with celeriac, rocket and pickled walnuts.
Brown shrimps with white cabbage.
Main course,
Whole baked White fish (plaice) on white vegetables.
Pheasent and pigs trotter pie,
both served with new potatoes and buttered sprout tops.
Pudding,
Baked custard.
Bread pudding with butterscotch sauce.
It was an amazing night, a Michelin starred Pie and a pint of London Pale Ale! It doesnt really get much better than that!
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