Supermarket cheats
Admittedly, when I get home in the evenings, I don’t always want to lovingly prepare dishes from scratch, sometimes I get by with a little help from my friend, The Supermarket. Here’s three of these secrets I’ll let you in on…
Mae Ploy Green Curry Paste
Making your own chilli paste can be costly and time-consuming, but this curry paste takes all that out of the equation. Just fry, then add coconut milk, water, vegetables and meat and you’re done! The tub gives you eight portions and is around the £2 mark. Now you can have quick thai food without reaching for the takeaway menu!
Asda thai selection pack
Another thai one, this is perfect for making tom yam (recipe coming soon) and costs just 86p (price correct 9th March 2010, Fratton store). In the pack you get thai shallots, garlic, lemongrass, chillies and galangal. Buying all the ingredients seperately would cost a fair bit more! The only thing it lacks is kaffir lime leaves – I’m lucky I can pick frozen ones up at our local asian supermarket and just take them out when I need them.
New! Ambrosia Crumble Puds
I just tried these yesterday and I swear these are my new pudding cheat. The custard contains compote (there’s a few fruits to choose from, I had apple) and I warmed mine up in the microwave and sprinkled the crumble balls over the top. OK it’s not a proper apple crumble but they still rate top in my shop-bought desserts.
My favourite kitchen tools
I’ve been wanting to write this blog post for a while but my favourite gadget list grows on an almost weekly basis. Here I’m bringing you a few of my most favourite (and some even indispensible) kitchen tools which make my life so much easier, and bring a little style to my cooking.
Kenwood kMix hand mixer
I got one of these for my birthday and was sceptical that such a beautiful thing could possibly be that good at mixing. This hand mixer is certainly a thing of beauty, I love the retro cream finish (it’s also available in other colours too) and it’s extremely quiet too. The paddles made light work of beating eggs and sugar into a light batter and it comes with a stand for the paddles and mixer, so you can leave it on the worktop for people to admire.
WMF Salt and Pepper mills
I was once a person who thought a pepper mill was just a pepper mill, but I’ve soon learnt that not all pepper mills are made the same.
I spent a long time tagging along behind Chris on his post-Christmas sales shopping, comparing and contrasting the various different options on offer. These WMF ones are not only extremely stylish sat atop your dining table, but they’ve also got a couple of design differences to those of say, Cole and Mason that make them just that little bit better. Firstly, the grinding mechanism is ceramic, so it’s much harder than the steel ones, meaning it’ll give you years of milling. Also with this design, the mill is at the top of the design, so it doesn’t leave pepper all over your table after you’ve used it. Yes, they seem pricey (Chris got his for £20 each in House of Fraser’s sale) but they are well worth the money.
Optimum baking trays
I think these are a Robert Dyas own brand as I can’t seem to find them anywhere online, not even in their own online shop. They’re currently on buy one get one free and both the oven tray and the muffin tin are outstanding quality. They’re heavy duty and come with a 10 year guarantee. At around £10.99 (and being BOGOF) it’s definitely worth popping down to your local Dyas for.
Titan peeler set
These peelers cut my peeling in time in half! There’s also a handy julienne peeler which is great for adding thin pieces of carrot to a stir fry. If you can find the set with the mandolin board, then buy that instead. I know they’ve been advertised on tv shopping channels which always makes me a bit sceptical but trust me when I say these are brilliant.
Cupcake courier
As I walk to work very often my creations were ending up like they’d been through a war zone, so I searched online for a solution. Lakeland do offer a similar style but it’s only one level high. The reviews of it weren’t great either. This one has perfect sized holes for normal fairy cakes and has three levels, enabling you to take up to 36 cakes in it. The only thing I will say of it is that it’s hard to get the cakes out of it. My colleagues offered to drill a small hole in each of the bun holes so that I can push them out with my finger underneath. I use mine almost every week!
Crockpot/Slow cooker
I originally bought a small slow cooker from ASDA for £10 because I wasn’t sure how much use I’d get out of it. However, it’s soon become a staple kitchen item for me because I have to put almost zero effort into dinner when I get home and the meat is always so deliciously tender. I’ve cooked soups, stock, stews, ham in cider and ribs in it – the possibilities are endless. Just pop all your ingredients in in the morning, switch it on, and by the time you get home the food will be done.
I recently upgrade to this crockpot from Robert Dyas which is just £20 and can serve up to 4 people. I found it much easier to cook my ribs in and the pot is dishwasher, oven and microwave safe. Did I mention it’s very low energy? Environmentally and wallet friendly! Watch out for a crockpot recipe soon on LTT…
Garlic peeler tube
I often have trouble getting the skin off garlic, but this makes it a doddle. Just cut the ends off the garlic, put it in the tube lengthways and gentle roll the tube on hard surface. Magic!
Review: Restaurant 27
I celebrated my turning a quarter of a century last week, and my birthday present from my boyfriend was a meal at the newly opened Restaurant 27. I was extremely excited, as I’d heard the chef from my favourite restaurant Bistro Montparnasse (now just Montparnasse), Kevin Bingham had ventured out on his own and opened this new resturant, and was aiming for a Michelin star.
Before we even got there, I was pleased to be asked if I had any special dietary requirements and if there was a special occasion on the table, and I was called on the day to confirm the details again. When we arrived our coats were taken and we were seated at “the bar” where Chris had a G&T and I had a limoncello. I didn’t realise it was a shot, not a long drink on this occasion and felt a bit out of place downing said shot whilst Chris slowly sipped his drink down. We were served canapes – I’m afraid I cannot remember the names of them, but I will describe them to you:
- A radish slice containing goat’s cheese
- A Malaysian(?) curry spiced roll
- A Caerphilly cheese croquette
All were divine and a great promise of things to come. We ordered our starters and as neither of us are particularly competent with choosing wine to go with our meals, we were given some great advice. There is a good range of wines in terms of price range and variety, and there is also a rare wines menu too for those whose noses and tastebuds are a little more attuned to the good stuff.
Once we were seated to our table, we had a little pre-starter of a shot glass of creamy almond and swede velouté with bombay potato served in a little espresso cup. It was the perfect amuse bouche and similar to the kind of taster we’d had in Bistro M (in there we had a pea and red pepper one which we tried to recreate without success). After that we were served a roll with seaweed and sesame topping and a sundried tomato ciabatta – I was served saffron butter with mine and Chris has seaweed butter with ours. This was dependent on our choice of starter – I ordered the king prawn and mussel chowder with potato and leek cake and Chris ordered butter roasted scallops served with brown shrimp sand and oyster foam. I was a little surprised to see that my chowder also contained salmon as it hadn’t been mentioned on the menu but it was delicious all the same. I don’t normally like fish (I tend to only eat prawns) and I’m a bit of fussy eater so didn’t fancy the other starter options, but the mussels were so soft and tender I completely changed my opinion on seafood. Chris’s starter reminded me of sandcastles on a beach when the sea had gently lapped over them and the shrimp sand added to the seaside feel. We later heard the people on the table next to us complaining that they though there was too much shrimp sand, but it was served on the side so you could have as little or as much as you want.
For main, I ordered the 30 hours cooked belly pork which was a 6 hour upgrade from the one at Bistro M and was delicious as expected although with all the canapes, pre-starters and starter I’d eaten was probably in terms of portion size a little large and rich for my tastebuds and I didn’t quite finish it all. Chris had black forest Gressingham duck which was complimented perfectly by the cherry and dark chocolate.
We also had a pre-dessert which was lemon (again sorry I can’t remember exactly what it was) and it cleared the palette perfectly and was gently fizzy on the tongue and left me feeling light and refreshed ready for pudding.
Pudding I can only describe as sheer delight – if you watched any of the Masterchef Best of British last year where one guy made a sweet shop on a plate, then you’ll know exactly what I mean. The desserts were beautifully presented – a wonder to the eyes and tasted as good. I had the apple crumble icecream cone served with madeleine cake and calvados jelly and Chris had the dark chocolate marquise with nougat, custard truffle and almond gel. I really enjoyed mine but didn’t feel the calvados jelly really went with the other textures of my meal (despite jelly and icrecream being a childhood favourite, it didn’t work with the crunchy tuille cone). The marquise was enjoyable and I loved the nougat particularly.
At the end of the meal I was given a little treat of chocolate cake in a box for my birthday which I haven’t broken into yet – it’s a nice gesture especially as I was so full from all the other delights I’d tasted that evening.
A word about the atmosphere – there’s only about 10 tables which is a good size and ensures it doesn’t get too roudy or noisy in there, but I felt that the ceilings were too high and created a slightly village hall feel about it. There was little to create a cosy atmosphere – there’s not too much to look at on the walls and there’s an picture of two children on the wall (I’m guessing the chef’s children) which seems out of character to the rest of the food related images. If Michelin took into account ambience (which apparently they don’t) they wouldn’t get the sought-after Michelin star. I was also slightly disappointed with the service – we were asked if we wanted dessert wine and then had to ask our waiter to take the dessert order after the first waiter wanted to take the order within 1 minute of being given the menu, and consequently disappeared after we said we needed a little more time.
Our meal came to £106 with two bar drinks, a bottle of wine and a glass of dessert wine between us which I thought was good. I’m still unsure if I would go back – I am a die-hard fan of Montparnasse and not sure whether the same environment has quite been recreated here. The food was surely fantastic though!
Lay The Table featured on Domestic Sluttery
I’ve been featured on the lovely Domestic Sluttery blog today, why not hop over there and read the article?
Review: Snowdonia Cheese – Red Devil
I bought three cheeses from Snowdonia cheese when I found their stand in the food hall at the Norfolk Show. They make gorgeously waxed cheese truckles which taste as good as they look! I sampled all of them and settled upon Green Thunder (with garlic & herbs), Ginger Spice (with bits of stem ginger) and Red Devil (with chilli’s and crushed pepper). I loved all of them and they all taste great on biscuits and I used Green Thunder with some tomato and pasta dishes. But for me, Red Devil was an instant favourite, and the one I nibbled through first.
Red Devil has just the right blend of spice to ensure it’s not overpowering and remains completely morish. I have found that it makes the most incredible tasting cheese on toast and melts well. The cheese is mature but allows the additional seasoning to mix well with it.
I decided I just had to have some more of this cheese myself, and when my chiller boxed arrived by next day delivery, I was super excited to taste it again. You can order cheese from the Snowdonia Cheese online store and it costs £5 for overnight delivery in a chiller box. The minimum order value is £21 or 6 truckles.
Welcome to Lay The Table.com. Feed your mind and your tummy with some delicious recipes from me, Becs. I enjoy making food to share: cupcakes, snacks and re-making dishes I tasted around the world when I went travelling across Asia. Please do leave me a comment, I love to hear from you!