WELLS FOOD FESTIVAL - 12th OCT

On Sunday 12th October there's a food festival happening in Wells, Somerset and I'm going to be there to give a talk about food blogging and pop ups!

Wells Food Festival launched last year and had over 3,500 people come along on the day. This year they're back - bigger and even better. The day focuses around showcasing local produce with a food market, lunches, talks, street food stalls and more. The day runs from 10.30-4.30 and everyone is welcome to this free event.

So, what can you expect from the day? Well first of all there's the artisan market, with over 50 stalls selling locally produced food from within 25 miles of Wells. There's locally produced organic wines, loads of Somerset cheese, flour, apples and cider, chocolates, pies, breads and sausage rolls, chillies, honey and loads more - I can't wait to roam around and buy one of everything to take back to London with me!

As well as all the stalls selling produce there'll be 13 street food vans on site selling hot food, ready to eat so you can pick up a wood fired oven pizza, a buffalo burger, veggie samosas or a plate full of Greek meze delights. But if you fancy something a bit more substantial for your Sunday lunch there are a few sit down banquets happening on the day as well.

Chef Valentina Harris is doing The Great Italian Sunday Lunch, using Somerset ingredients to cook up an Italian style feast. Tickets are £40 a head for this 5 course lunch which is sure to be an absolutely scrumptious feast.

Another option for lunch is Tom Hunt's Forgotten Feast Autumn Banquet that he's making using vegetables rejected by supermarkets for not being pretty enough, and a whole pig, fed purely on these same 'waste' vegetables. His starter of hot smoked pigeon breast with blackberry sorbet served with sourdough and truffle butter has already got my tummy rumbling! Tom Hunt's cooking is right up my street, and if you want to know why, then book a ticket for £30 each and go along and find out for yourselves. Tom is cooking his feast for 200 people, so there's plenty of tickets to go around.

If it's tea and cake you'd prefer there's afternoon tea at the banqueting room in the town hall, running from 2.45-5pm where you can pop in for hot drinks, finger sandwiches, scones and cakes. You'll also find Pearl Lowe and Trine Hahnemann signing copies of their newly released books.

The afternoon will offer the opportunity for learning as well - there's various talks and walks going on, covering subjects like foraging, truffles and how to grow great veg - full details of which can be found HERE. And from 3pm you can find me, along with 2 great bloggers - Anita, from A Lover of Creating Flavours and Vanesther of Bangers and Mash, - at the Parkes room in the town hall, doing a food bloggers workshop to talk you through starting your own blog, keeping it going and what to do with it from there. We will be there to answer all your questions and help you with anything you need blog-wise. Spaces are limited though so if you'd like to come along, then do send an email to the team.

If you are coming along, do leave me a comment below, and please do come and find me and introduce yourself - I'd love to meet you and learn your blog and/or foodie ideas!!


 

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LONDON PRODUCE SHOW

Last week saw the launch of a new event in London - The London Produce Show set up home in the Grosvenor House Hotel for 3 days, filled with fruit and vegetable producers from all over the world. The lovely ladies organising the event invited me down, via amazing boxes of fruit and veggies that arrived at my house, to the opening cocktail evening and the show the following day.

The first I knew about the show was when Liz got in touch via Twitter to ask if I'd like to come and if yes, what my postal address was. This was followed by a box waiting on my doorstep, that contained a bottle of rum, a cocktail shaker, dragon fruit, grapefruit, limes, mint and lychees. I made a dragon fruit and lychee mojito, which was just like a super healthy fresh fruit juice (with added rum!)

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EATING IN SEVILLE

A couple of weeks ago the boy and I took ourselves off to Andalucia for a well earned break. In fact, I had won a weekend at a 5* hotel near Estepona back in Autumn last year, via Quintessentially Travel, so had booked another 7 days on top of that via AirBnb, firstly in Seville then on to Cadiz, before the weekend at the hotel. More on both the hotel and Cadiz in my next few posts, but here I want to tell you about Seville.

I spent a year living in Seville in 2004. I have wonderful memories of lots of good food, interesting tapas bars and great places to drink. Although structurally Seville hasn't changed too much (apart from the addition of trams and tubes!) pretty much everything else seems to have been replaced or upgraded. Yes, there were still a few places I knew and recognised, but the food scene in particular, seems to have taken off in a big way. Gone are many of the small, traditional tapas bars, having been replaced by fusion restaurants, sushi bars and all sorts I would've never expected to see in Seville. 

We set off, armed with various emails and blog links that recommended places to eat, and print offs from Lizzie's blog, Hollow Legs, including her really helpful spreadsheet she compiled from a Seville/Cadiz visit, ready to go. However, on arriving in Seville, I began to realise just how much has changed, even since Lizzie's visit 2 years ago. We hung on to all recommendations, and visited a few of them, but were thrilled to bump into an old acquantance of the boy's and mine, the very talented grafitti artist Seleka, who now runs the wonderful DeLimbo gallery in the centre of Seville, and had a whole load of recommendations of the newest and best places we should go to eat.

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LUNCH AT CHOP'D

Quite a few years ago I was in the Canary Wharf shopping centre, shooting a commercial for O2, and one of the assistants went to get our lunch. She came back with boxes full of fresh, locally sourced goodies from a place called Chop'd and I've never forgotten it. It was such a novel concept to be able to choose your own ingredients and create such a brilliant salad for lunch.

Fast forward about 8 years, and Chop'd now have 9 stores across Central London. I was invited to try a few of their current salad combos for myself and popped into the store in Selfridges to see what's changed since my last visit.

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MOTHERSHUCKIN LUNCHTIME

Last Saturday lunchtime I treated myself and the boy to lunch at a pop up -it was so nice to go to someone else's pop up for a change! I booked 2 places at the early sitting (2pm) of a pop up I've been meaning to go to for a while now but kept missing, so was glad they had space to fit us in. "Mothershuckin lunchtime" is all about seafood. The lovely girls who run the pop up source the freshest, best seafood they can get and serve it up to 15 people at a time in the Muse gallery on Portobello road.

We set off from home to Portobello, with the sun on our backs, on the nicest Saturday morning for a while. Portobello was buzzing, and it felt quite exclusive being able to slip into the Muse gallery while people peered in from outside, wondering what they were missing out on!

As with all good meals, we started with a good drink. I had the Bloody Mary, which was made with the Mothershuckers' own horseradish and a chilli infused vodka, while the chilli-shy boy stuck with a Meantime London lager.

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PRINCESS VICTORIA, UXBRIDGE RD

I must've been told about The Princess Victoria pub on Uxbridge Road by more than 10 different people over the last year, recommending that I eat there. And having booked a table about a month ago which we weren't able to make, it was high time I got myself down there to see how good it really was.

So that's where we headed for lunch on my birthday.

The Princess Victoria is halfway down Uxbridge Road, between Shepherds Bush and Ealing Common. It's an unassuming building, with frosted windows facing the road, and is somewhere you could easily walk straight past if you didn't know what was hidden inside. But don't let that put you off - once inside it really is quite impressive! Wood panelling lines the walls, and a large circular bar swoops into the first room you enter. Past the bar area is the main restaurant, full of solid wood tables with wooden chairs. A long serving table goes up one side of the restaurant room, with various homemade breads out, ready for service. 

It was Monday lunchtime when we went, and although not busy, there were a few people eating. I was surprised they were serving food at all, as most gastro pubs I know don't do Monday lunch.

We were offered a table in the main restaurant, but opted for a cosy table in the bar. The ratio of staff to diners was about 1:1, and the staff were all really friendly and welcoming.

I could've sat and tried to work my way through their entire menu, as it's really my type of food, made with responsibly sourced ingredients. But we had a lot of unpacking to do, so decided to share a starter and have a main each.

The menu at Princess Victoria is split into Charcuterie; Oysters, cured and smoked fish; Starters; Mains; and "From the ageing room....".

We went for the Tamworth pork and peppercorn pate with pickle and toast to start (I'm a sucker for a pickle, and this one was perfect!) I could've done with a little more of the crispy toast on the side, but that's probably just because I'm a little greedy! The pate had an excellent texture and just the right balance between salty and sweet.

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WEEKEND WONDERS - SALMON and LENTIL SALAD / POPPY BREAD / HONEY WALNUT CHEESE

We're about to have our house refurbished (floors, carpets, bathrooms, kitchen - yey! etc), and have to move out to do so, so spent the whole weekend packing, boxing things up, trying to work out what should go to recycling, and getting the house as empty as possible (again, I'm less than helpful with a broken hand, but I did try!)

Lifting might not be my forte for another few weeks, but I am now able to whip up a few basics in the kitchen as the strength of my thumb/finger grip is getting better. I therefore decided to do my part to help with the weekend move by keeping everyone well fed. The move also forced me to empty the freezer, which is what inspired the first dish I cooked, as I found half a side of salmon in the freezer which I'd got when it was on special offer at Ocado.

It still feels like summer to me, so I made a huge, healthy salad to keep everyone going on Saturday.

LENTIL AND BAKED VERDE SALMON SALAD

Makes enough for 6-8 people

Salmon:

1 half side of Scottish salmon

2 lemons

Handful basil leaves

Tablespoon of capers

Couple of anchovy fillets

Olive oil

Salad:

300g puy lentils

1 cube vegetable stock

1 tsp garlic granules

Basil stalks

3 carrots

2 spring onions

Handful of tomatoes

1 cucumber

Basil

Salt and pepper

Dressing:

1 part lemon juice

2 parts olive oil

Large pinch sea salt

1 crushed clove of garlic

I actually made this in 2 parts - I cooked the salmon on Friday evening and cut off a fillet each for me and the boy, which we had warm with green beans, new potatoes and homemade hollandaise sauce. Then on Saturday I made this salad.

To cook the salmon, preheat the oven to 220C (200C fan).

Slice 2 lemons thinly to create discs. Put the lemon discs onto some tin foil on a baking tray. Sprinkle the capers over the lemons, and add the basil and anchovy fillets. Drizzle with oil and a good grind of pepper. Place the side of salmon skin side up on top of the sliced lemons. Rub the salmon fillet on both sides with olive oil and another good grind of pepper. Put the salmon in the oven and cook for 10-12 minutes (I did ours for just over 10 minutes and it was perfect). Gently peel off the skin when you take the fish out of the oven.

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SALMON with STUFFED PEPPERS / SALAD DRESSING

I wasn't intending on posting this recipe up here, as it's more of a compilation of foods than an intricate recipe, but it tasted and looked so good that I felt I had to share! It's the perfect summer supper that's quick and easy to make. You can eat the red peppers with other fish than salmon, they're also great with sticky chicken, and they're brilliant to take to a picnic. 

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SUMMER PRAWN and PEA SOUP

This isn't actually a soup. Well it is, but normally soup has more liquid than other ingredients, so I suppose this more of a broth. Either way, it's the perfect lightweight, healthy meal that's quick and easy to cook. The original recipe came from Lyndsey Bareham's column in The Times, but I've made a few tweaks to give it my own twist.

Serves 2.

250g Jersey Royal new potatoes
1/4 vegetable stock cube
1-2 cups of water
1 lemon, zest and juice
200g raw king prawns, peeled
200g peas

100g green beans, chopped into 2cm pieces
1 tbsp creme fraiche

Rinse the new potatoes and chop into bite size pieces (about 2cm square). Put the potatoes in a wide saucepan (I actually use the wok to cook this in) and pour over enough water to just cover them. Sprinkle with a tiny corner of vegetable stock cube. Bring to a gentle simmer and cook uncovered for 8 minutes or so, or until the potatoes feel slightly soft when poked with a knife.

Add the zest and juice of the lemon and the prawns, stir, and cook for another 2 minutes. Now add the peas and beans and cook for 1 minute.

Remove from the pan, and stir the creme fraiche into the juice.

Serve in bowls with plenty of the liquid, a grind of black pepper, and a big wedge of lemon.

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'THE BIG LUNCH', 'NOSE TO TAIL' AND 'ENOUGH FOOD IF'

Sunday 2nd June is Global Sharing Day and this year's theme is food. The idea behind it is to get as many people across the world sharing food together, whilst also highlighting the food surplus and waste we produce. There are loads of events going on to get involved with including The Big Lunch, which aims to get people to arrange a meal to share with their neighbours, by holding street parties.

I'm doing my bit by teaming up with Liv from Grub Club to host a lunch as part of 'People Who Share' - a partner of The Big Lunch, who asked us to join tens of millions of people across the world in sharing food with each other for a day, and to think about the tonnes of edible food that get sent to landfills - in the UK alone nearly 7 million tonnes of purchased and edible food goes to waste every year. 

I'm also going to an evening that Action Aid are putting on to talk to bloggers about Enough Food IF, a campaign to reduce and eliminate world hunger (that affects nearly one in six globally). More on that campaign to follow....

Grub Club are also doing more than just our lunch to highlight the issue of food waste. From the 1st - 14th June, Grub Club are hosting a Nose to Tail fortnight. They, like so many of us, are fed up with the amount of edible food that is sent to waste while people are going hungry. So they've teamed up with Ethical Eats and Slow Food London to put on a range of events to get you inspired. They've got foraging and fishing cookery courses, a series of '2 dinners, 1 lunch' pop up restaurants in Peckham, an informal butchery masterclass, learning about the less commonly used cuts of meat, with Hill Street Chews in Hackney, and so much more. 

As a little treat, Grub Club are running a competition to give away a couple of pairs of tickets to their kick off event, It's Ghana be Nasty, this Saturday. For your chance to win, either sign up for Grub Club's newsletter here or share their facebook post here. 

What are you doing to get involved with food sharing campaigns?

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TIBITS - VEGETARIAN in the WEST END

Tibits is a purely vegetarian restaurant, nestled just off Regent Street, in the Heddon Street food court, and is a cross between a sit down restaurant and a fast food take away place.

I was invited to try the food at Tibits and chose to go on a weekday evening. Despite it being a school night, it was really busy, and although it's right in the middle of tourist-ville, it felt like there were quite a lot of regular customers there too.

We started the evening with a fresh fruit juice cocktail - both going for the Apple and Cucumber mojito, that I thought was really good. It was really refreshing and I can imagine how good it would taste sitting in the sun outside the restaurant (the day we visited was sadly not one of the 3 sunny days we've had so far this year!)

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SUPER FAST PRAWN CURRY

Sometimes (in fact quite a lot of the time) when I get home from work, I really want to cook something for supper that’s easy to make, full of flavour, and has some of my 5 a day in. There are lots of things I could cook that require an hour’s love, or 2 hours slow cooking, but often I just want to get home, put something on that will be ready within half an hour, or less, and eat before it gets too close to bedtime!

This is my go to recipe for exactly that. It’s super quick, very easy, packs a massive flavour punch, and goes down equally as well on sunny evenings as it does on cold winter ones.

Serves 2 or 3

Olive oil
1 onion
Half teaspoon of coriander seeds
Black pepper
1 clove garlic
1 stick of lemongrass
1 teaspoon medium curry powder
½ teaspoon turmeric
Pinch of saffron
1 tin coconut milk
Juice and zest of 1 lime
400g raw prawns
1 pack bean sprouts
Handful coriander leaves
1 red chilli
Lime, to serve

Heat a small amount of olive oil in a deep frying pan, over a medium heat. Add the finely chopped onion and fry for 3-4 minutes until it is turning translucent. Reduce the heat slightly; add the coriander seed, black pepper, crushed garlic clove, and finely sliced lemongrass, and fry for a further 2 minutes. Now stir in the curry powder, turmeric and saffron strands, and pour in the coconut milk (try to avoid the half fat stuff – I don’t know what they do to it to reduce its fat content, but whatever it is, it means it doesn’t cook as well, and tastes pretty strange).

Once the coconut milk is gently simmering, mix in the zest and juice of a lime, and the raw prawns. Stir everything together and simmer for 2 or 3 more minutes, or until the prawns have turned pink. Remove from the heat, chuck in the bean sprouts, and serve in bowls with rice noodles or rice, a few thin slices of chilli, a sprinkling of coriander leaves, and a wedge of lime.

And there you have it – supper ready in less time than it takes to get home from work.

What’s your go to meal when you want a super speedy supper?

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WEEKEND WONDERS - DUCK SALAD / STICKY CHICKEN THIGHS / CAKE

One of my favorite things to do on lazy, quiet weekends is to make a den/nest out of as many duvets and quilts as I get my hands on, in front of the fire, and then serve picnics of delicious food to the members of the nest! Most of this weekend was just me and the boy - perfect - and I cooked up lots of yummy treats for us. Here are just some of them.

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EASY BREAD - NO YEAST NEEDED

I first came across this recipe a few months ago via Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's River Cottage, and have since made many variations of it, ending up with the perfect, fail-safe loaf of bread.

I can't stress how easy this is to make - no kneading, no yeast. Just mix and put it in the oven. The most difficult part of the recipe is remembering to turn the oven on BEFORE you start making the bread, as it takes such a short time to make, your oven might not get hot enough, quick enough!!

Makes 1 loaf

Preheat the oven to 170C (160C fan)

220g self-raising wholemeal flour (my favorite is Allinson flour, made in the UK)
180g self-raising white flour
2 teaspoons table salt
1 level tablespoon caster sugar
50g sunflower seeds
100g walnuts
75g dried cranberries
50g sultanas
50g dried apricots
400ml San Miguel

Mix the flours, salt and sugar in a bowl. Break up the walnuts, either with a rolling pin or a quick blitz in the magimix. Chop or magimix the dried apricots. Add the nuts, seeds and dried fruit to the flour mix and pour in the beer. Mix it all together.

Butter a bread tin, then dust with self-raising flour. Pour the bread mixture in.

Cook for 70-80 minutes, or until golden brown.

Leave to cool then serve with butter and salt, or a lovely creamy goats cheese.

I wrap my bread in greaseproof paper to store it, and although it normally gets eaten within 48 hours, it will keep for up to 4 days, although the crusts will get crunchier.

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SMOKEY BARBECUE SAUCE

Barbecue sauce goes well with lots of meals. We eat it with this pulled pork recipe, but it's equally as lovely with chicken, prawns or anything straight off the barbecue. It will also keep for a couple of weeks in your fridge, so the recipe below makes enough for more than 1 meal.

Don't let the list of ingredients put you off. This is a one pot sauce and not at all complicated. If you don't have mushroom ketchup, add extra Worcestershire sauce. And if you don't have any tomato passata, you can use ketchup, but if you do this, you need to halve the amount of sugar you use.

2 tbsp butter
1 large onion
5 cloves garlic
1 tbsp fennel seeds
200ml rice vinegar
150ml red wine vinegar
600ml tomato passata
2 tbsp worcestershire sauce
3 tbsp mushroom ketchup
70g brown sugar
1 tbsp honey
2 bay leaves
Sprig of thyme
1 tbsp english mustard
1 heaped tsp paprika
Salt
Lots of pepper

Heat the butter in a medium sized saucepan, over a medium to low heat. Chop the onion and garlic and add to the pan. They don't need to be chopped with any care, as the whole lot will be blended at the end.

Cook the onion and garlic gently until they become translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the fennel seed and fry for 2 more minutes, stirring as you go. Now add the vinegars, tomato passata, Worcestershire sauce, mushroom ketchup, sugar, honey, herbs, mustard, paprika, salt and lots of pepper, and bring up to a simmer.

Stir regularly and leave simmering for around 30 minutes, or until the liquid has reduced by half and starts to coat the back of a spoon. Remove from the heat and leave to cool for 5-10 minutes.

Remove the bay leaves, and blend the sauce. Serve cold with whatever you like, and enjoy!

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WINTER WARMER - FIERY PUMPKIN SOUP

We are having a mini halloween/firework feast this year, and because we are doing it on a Friday I have been planning a menu that I can cook the night before, ready to heat through when I get home from work on the Friday. I definitely want to serve a soup, that everyone can help themselves to and bring outside to watch the firework display. I have tried a few different flavour combinations but this was the best, and it includes pumpkin, so I can use up the flesh carved out from our ghoulish pumpkins!

This soup is cooked for 4 hours, so be aware of this if you're thinking of just knocking it up for dinner after work - it's best made when you have some time to wait for it to cook - make lots and freeze the rest in batches. You can also do this in a slow cooker, but cook it for 6 hours on the slow setting.

Makes enough for about 8 people, or 4 batches for 2.

FOR THE SOUP
2 large, white onions
800g pumpkin flesh
1 celeriac
500g carrots
1 bunch of celery
1 head of garlic
3 red chillies
2 litres of chicken stock
4 bay leaves
Salt and pepper

TO ADD
1 slice of bresola per bowl of soup
Creme fraiche
Chives, parsley or mint
Red chilli

Preheat the oven to the lowest gas mark (around 130-140 degrees C), or if you are using a slow cooker, turn it on and set it to it's lowest temperature. Get a large casserole dish or saucepan with a lid ready.

Peel, and chop the onions, pumpkin, celeriac and carrots into large chunky pieces. Pop them all in your pan. Wash and chop the celery and add to the pan, with the peeled garlic cloves and chopped red chillies. Add the bay leaves and stock, and season. If you are using stock cubes, then do not add salt at this point. Wait until it is cooked, then taste and add salt if required.

Place the pan on the hob and heat until the stock starts to boil. Put the lid on the pan, and place the whole thing in the oven, or slow cooker. Leave to cook for 4 hours.

After 4 hours, remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly. Once cooled, spoon the mixture into the blender and blend in batches. Return all blended soup to one bowl and mix. Taste the soup and adjust seasoning if needed.

Spoon the soup into bowls, and top each bowl with some bresola, chopped into cm slices, a dollop of creme fraiche, some chopped fresh herbs of your choice and a few rings of sliced red chilli (or some chilli sauce).

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EGGS, EGGS, EGGS

A year ago I didn't eat eggs. I hadn't eaten eggs for years, apart from the time I had rather stupidly decided to try a duck egg which was far too rich and didn't go down well at all! But now, I eat eggs at least once a day. I always eat free range eggs, and love to pick them up from farm shops if I get out of London for the weekend. And the combination of smoked fish, eggs and creme fraiche is just irresistible.

Here are two recipes I love - they are both great as a luxurious breakfast at the weekend, or, with the addition of potatoes in the second recipe, a quick evening supper.

SMOKED SALMON and SCRAMBLED EGGS

Prepare all your ingredients - slice your bagel in half, get the smoked salmon out of the packet, and whisk 2 eggs per person with a large dash of milk, ground pepper and a thinly sliced spring onion.

Put the bagel in the toaster.

Add a large knob of butter to a medium hot pan. When melted, add the egg mix and leave for half a minute. Take a wooden spoon and mix up the eggs, continuing to do this until the egg is scrambled, but still wet. Remove from the heat.

Butter the toasted bagel and top with a dollop of creme fraiche. Serve the scrambled eggs on top of the creme fraiche with slithers of smoked salmon on the side. Add pepper and half a lemon.

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BEST SALAD EVER

Refreshing yet rich, this salad is SO good, and takes 2 minutes to make. It's great on its own for lunch, or with seared steak.

For 2 people

1 bag of watercress

2 cooked beetroot, chopped

1 avocado, chopped

50g roquefort cheese

Pinch of sunflower seeds

Lime juice

Olive oil

Wash and chop a bag of watercress. Add 2 chopped cooked beetroot, 1 chopped avocado and little nuggets of Roquefort cheese. Mix together with some sunflower seeds, drizzle with lime juice and olive oil, add salt and pepper... and enjoy!!!

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