Reviews

October 25, 2014

Autumn Reviews – Cru Kafe, Supermilk and Doughnuts!

A round up of a few items that have caught my attention recently…

Cru Kafe Coffee Pods

Let’s start with the coffee…I’m a huge fan of a good cup of coffee. At home, we have a Nespresso coffee machine, I’m pretty sure it’s the Nespresso U model and it’s the second one we’ve had having upgraded our model last Christmas. It used to be the case that you had to buy your Nespresso-compatible pods directly through the ‘Nespresso Club’ and whilst they have lots to offer, it’s good to see other pods coming onto the market. I was pleased to try a brand new range of Nespresso-compatible coffee pods from Cru Kafe, a British company who win bonus points for producing eco-friendly pods, filled with Fairtrade, organic, 100% Arabica bean coffee. The Cru Kafe team select beans sourced from a high altitude and their artisanal blends result in coffee that is extremely smooth and velvety. I’m happy to have have swapped my morning cup of coffee for a morning cup of ‘Cru’ and I was also delighted to try their new decaf version, which is just as flavourful as their stronger blends. You can buy Cru Kafe pods easily online – my first order (after finishing the samples too quickly!) was delivered the next working day and arrived in a neat cardboard box with no excess packaging.

Cru Kafe pods are priced at 0.29p a capsule and are available in decaf, light roast, dark roast and intense strengths. You can place a one-off order or sign up to a subscription service.

Try Cru Kafe’s Pumpkin Spiced latte – the recipe is here.

Follow @CruKafe on Twitter

Hotel Chocolat Supermilk

Now, as well as a good cup of coffee, I also like a slab or two of chocolate and British grower Hotel Chocolat never disappoint. I was excited to be one of the first to receive a sample of their very latest blend of chocolate – Supermilk – described as “the most comforting, creamy milk chocolate, with less sugar than a dark.” I’ve devoured quite a bit of this Supermilk chocolate now, first as a sample, and then again when I bought a stash at my local store in St Albans. It has the same hit as dark chocolate, but it is smooth and certainly not bitter. It’s perfect on it’s own (or even with a good cup of coffee) and with 65% of pure cocoa – it’s a wonderful blend for baking. With their new blend of Supermilk, Hotel Chocolat are trying to rebalance the percentage of sugar to cocoa in milk chocolate blends – given that most ‘milk chocolate’ on the market is made with twice as much sugar as cocoa. Supermilk still has a sugar content of 20% along with a splash of milk, but the cocoa content is akin to a darker blend; the idea being that with a higher cocoa content, you can satisfy a chocolate craving with a smaller amount of chocolate…I’m still working on that concept!

Look out for The Supermilk Collection (3 packets) for £9.45. Individual 110g bars (65%, hazelnut or popcorn) are £3.75, whilst Supermilk 65% Chocolate Puddles are £5.50 for 110g. Buy online or instore now

Follow @HotelChocolat on Twitter #Supermilk

Bread, Cake, Doughnut, Pudding by Justin Gellatly

So we’ve had the coffee and the chocolate and now it’s time to move onto the doughnuts! The doughnuts on the front cover of this book certainly caught my attention. They happen to be the doughnuts of Justin Gellatly, who was the Head Baker and Pastry Chef at St John for twelve years and who now owns his own bakery in Borough Market. In actual fact, more than just doughnuts, this book is packed with some fantastic recipes – you’ll certainly be keeping those Bake Off contestants on their toes with this repertoire. With 150 recipes it’s hard to know where to begin – in it you’ll find Breakfast, Baking and Bread, Savoury Baking, Cakes and Teatime Treats, Biscuits, Doughnuts, Warm to Hot Puddings, Cold Puddings, Ice Cream and a slightly eclectic chapter at the back called The Store Cupboard.

Three recipes that stood out the most to me were – The Chocolate Brownie (Justin’s recipe from St John), Spiced Pepper Plum Tart (an amazing recipe with seasonal plums, black pepper, ginger, star anise and cinnamon) and the Deep-Fried Jam Sandwich – Justin says “If you don’t have time to make doughnuts, this is a very good substitute.”

Bread, Cake, Doughnut, Pudding by Justin Piers Gellatly, Published by Fig Tree (Penguin Group) priced at £25 Hardback – currently £17 on Amazon.

My Mini Doughnuts!

Paid Recipe Commission

Now that I’ve got you thinking about doughnuts, why not pop over to the Good Food Channel and have a go at my recipe for Mini Doughnuts with Chocolate Sauce? Warning: they are extremely moreish!

With thanks for the samples of CRU Kafe, Hotel Chocolat Supermilk and for the copy of Bread, Cake, Doughnut, Pudding – I have not been paid to write about any of these products and have chosen to highlight things I think you’d enjoy.

December 20, 2012

Review and Giveaway: Three Quadrille Cookery Books by James Martin, Anjum Anand, Tom Kitchin

Just in case Father Christmas doesn’t deliver lots of brand new cookery books to you on Christmas Day, the lovely folks at Quadrille Publishing have offered me three of their top Quadrille cookery books as a giveaway prize for one of my readers. These will keep you going well into 2013, and will provide you with plenty of inspiration for your cooking in the New Year.

1. James Martin Slow Cooking – Mouthwatering Recipes with Minimum Effort (RRP £20) Quadrille Publishing

Put your hands up if you love James Martin. He’s the cheeky Northern chappie who presents BBC’s Saturday Kitchen and he has a very loyal army of fans. His food is often inspired by British, comfort cooking, the kind of food your grandmother would cook for you. James’ family were pig and cattle farmers, so they would often eat hearty slow cooked stews, such as beef stew with dumplings. Slow Cooking offers a good mix of easy-to-throw-together soups, slow vegetable bakes, fish, one-pots, slow roasts, stews and braises and my very favourite chapters, slow puddings and slow bakes. I would love to lock myself away in a log cabin somewhere for the winter and I’d be very happy if I only had this book to cook from and a stash of red wine. Recipes I immediately want to cook are the Potato and Turnip Dauphinoise, the Miso-Marinated Monkfish, Ultimate Roast Chicken (a recipe based on one by Thomas Keller where the chicken is soaked in brine), the Treacle-Glazed Ham Hocks. To finish, I want to make the Jam roly poly, which has just five ingredients. You’ll love this one.

2. Anjum’s Indian Vegetarian Feasts – RRP £19.00 Quadrille Publishing

I met Anjum Anand at Food Blogger Connect in 2011 and I remember her saying at the time that she was writing a vegetarian cookery book. She demonstrated and served us all her Grilled Courgette Carpaccio, with Chickpea Salsa and Pistachio Dressing, a recipe which features in this book. It was one of those dishes that created an immediate impression and I remember coming straight home to make it. I think this is a really interesting book because it has allowed Anjum to draw upon her Indian heritage and memories of being raised by a vegetarian mother. Anjum’s father ate meat and so Anjum remembers eating both rich, meaty curries as well as vegetable and lentil dishes. Anjum also then married a vegetarian, who came from a generation of vegetarians and so she inherited recipes and advice from her new family, too. Her own children are vegetarian. I also like the fact that Anjum says that many of the recipes are a reflection of the diversity of India’s regional food, but she also includes recipes that have inspired her during her travels. She also adds in recipes that she just likes and cooks at home often, the ones that are ‘hanging by a home-spun cotton thread to an Indian heritage, but are too delicious not to be included.’ An example of that is the very first recipe in the book, a Coconut French Toast, or Anjum’s Mango, Pomegranate, Berry and Coconut Trifle towards the back. I’d love to try the Smokey Spiced Aubergines and Anjum’s Easy Everyday Lentil Curry, most of all. Rest assured, I’ll be cooking my way through this colourful book in the New Year!

3. Tom Kitchin – Kitchin Suppers (RRP £20) Quadrille Publishing

For a very long time, I have wanted to take a trip up to Edinburgh to visit Tom’s restaurant The Kitchin. Tom is a renowned Scottish chef who was trained by Pierre Koffmann, Guy Savoy and Alain Ducasse. Tom very quickly received a Michelin star, just six months after opening The Kitchin. I am sometimes wary of books by celebrity chefs, just because I think they often can’t help being cheffy and so the recipes don’t translate well for the home cook. But this book, and I have saved the best to talk about till last, has left me completely smitten. Not only are the recipes homely, comforting and easy to follow, the book reads like a great big Scottish tartan blanket-wrapped hug! In his introduction, Tom says that he and his photographer, Laura Edwards, prepared and photographed all of the dishes in the book, just as Tom would cook them and serve them at home, and I believe him. At the back of the book, Tom thanks his ‘wee boys’ for coming along to photo shoots on Sundays and Mondays. Best of all, for anyone, who, like me, has extreme prop envy (think rustic bowls, a roast saddle of lamb nestled in a big pile of hay and tables graced with thick tartan fabrics) there are some props credits sourced by Polly Webb-Wilson in the back, too. I have already made Tom’s Pears Poached in Chocolate (photo below) and will be off to the pet shop to find some eating hay on which to cook my own saddle of lamb with Boulangere Potatoes laying beneath. A stunning book, well worth adding to your list or buying for the foodie in your life.

Here’s how to enter the Quadrille Publishing Giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I hope Father Christmas does bring you a cookery book to add to your collection!

June 20, 2012

Review: Eat Your Veg by Arthur Potts Dawson

Move over Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, here comes Arthur Potts Dawson with his take on all things veg! New from the Octopus Publishing Group is Eat Your Veg, a cookery book packed full of ideas on how to bring more vegetables to your table – putting veg at the centre of your plate.

Arthur Potts Dawson loves his veg and after 25 years of cooking as a professional chef, he certainly knows his turnips from his tomatoes. The key is to using what’s in season, “It’ll taste better and it’ll cost you less,” says Arthur.

Designed to get you thinking outside of your veg box, this is a great book for anyone who is keen to experiment with flavours in the kitchen. Arthur’s aim is to present simple recipes that make the most out of the particular veg in question; a bold and bright beetroot soup (cover picture), flavourful broths, gratins and new ideas on serving veg, such as Arther’s Pan-fried french bean bundles with sesame seeds or his striking Radish salad with pomegranate and cannellini beans, below. This would be just as good packed into a lunch box for work as it would be scaled-up for guests.

There are no rules or regulations about how or where to buy your veg, the focus is on variety and on introducing more veg to your daily life. Arthur offers his advice on skills too, such as roasting, mashing and pickling and there are basic recipes for stocks, sauces, dressings and veggie-friendly accompaniments. There is some mention of meat and fish in the book, so this is not a vegetarian cookery book, although all the recipes, can of course, be adapted to suit.

I particularly liked the organisation of Eat Your Veg – there are five main chapters –

Roots and Tubers (featuring beetroot, carrot, sweet potato, celeriac, salsify etc)
Bulbs and Stems (featuring including garlic, onions, fennel, kohlrabi, asparagus etc)
Leaves and Flowers (featuring lettuce, rocket, sorrel, broccoli, artichoke etc)
Fruits and Fungi (featuring avocado, peppers, sweetcorn, aubergine and mushroom etc)
Beans and Pods (featuring lentils, broad and borlotti beans, peas, french beans and okra etc)

Also included are ‘Skills’ as mentioned, and ‘Feasts’ with recipes for a Mediterranean spread, Tex-Mex Grill and a sumptuous vegetarian Curry feast -with dishes passed on from an elderly Bengali chef.

The recipes themselves, are in the most part, fresh and quick to make. We love the Waste not asparagus soup, made from leftover asparagus stalks and the Sweetcorn and coriander pikelets (little sweetcorn fritters, below). There are plenty of simple salads, too, including a Heritage tomato salad with marjoram (one of my favourite herbs) and a Potato and cucumber salad made with Japanese vinegar, olive oil and sunflower seeds for a twist – perfect for barbecue season!

There are also some tasty dips and snacks, the Smashed broad beans with Pecorino and Baked tomato, garlic and red pepper crostini jumped out. Arthur’s Italian-inspired recipe for Penne with Garlic, Rosemary and Mascarpone is impressive and tasty, as are the Creamed Girolles with Grilled Polenta.

A few of the recipes are a tiny bit sophisticated for a domestic kitchen – I am not sure I would have the time to prepare twelve globe artichokes or that I would very regularly make my own ravioli, but it is nice to have some more challenging recipes included.

If you are cooking for very small children, some of the recipes might be a bit ambitious, although you could try making the pikelets, as we did, or the Cheesy peas on toast or even the Baked borlotti beans on toast with garlic and fresh tomatoes to tempt your troops.

All in all, Eat Your Veg appeals to my taste-buds because I already love cooking with seasonal produce and because it encourages me to be a little more adventurous than usual. It is a tiny bit cheffy, but then again, you do benefit from the fact that Arthur has great skills and knowledge that he is keen to pass on.

With many thanks to Octopus Press and Authur Potts-Dawson for my signed review copy. Eat Your Veg is priced at £25.00 Photographs by Liz and Max Haarala Hamilton.

You can follow Aurthur Potts Dawson (@ArthurPottsD) and Octopus Books (@Octopus_Books) on Twitter.

Which books caught your attention over the spring?

Look out for plenty more mentions of fun summer cook books on Fabulicious Food!

October 10, 2011

Guest Post: Top 10 High Street Chocolate Bars (Giveaway Closed)

I’m super excited to introduce my first guest post, written for National Chocolate Week, by Judith Lewis from the Mostly About Chocolate blog. I met Judith at the recent Food Blogger Connect Conference in London and was so impressed with her knowledge of chocolate that I asked her to put together her ultimate chocolate shopping list – available on the high street – for National Chocolate Week. As well as writing her amazing chocolate-focused blog Judith is also a judge for the Academy of Chocolate…so there isn’t much Judith doesn’t know about a good bar…enjoy!

Top Ten High Street Chocolate Bars

When I go looking for chocolate in the supermarket or on the high street, what do I choose? I’ve been asked this question so many times and sometimes it is actually related to my mood – do I want something sweet, high quality, chewy, filling… what do I want out of a chocolate bar at the point at which I’m being asked.

When I was asked to choose my top 10 however, I got a chance to think about it, really ponder it and also take a trip to the supermarket and really test some of the chocolate I hadn’t reviewed that had come on to the scene lately.

I have a feeling sometimes the choices are going to shock you and at times it’ll be wholly predictable. I’ve chosen to go with the supermarket chains of Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Tesco for this and while I realise not everywhere has a Waitrose, also not everywhere has a Hotel Chocolat, Thorntons or a Seed & Bean Stockist but they are in a large number of places so I went with what I could get in Manchester or London and also near my own home in Oxfordshire.

Tasting chocolate is an immensely personal thing. Something I like, someone else may hate. I favour slightly acidic, fruity chocolate with a heady scent and clean finish. I’m not a huge fan of a woody/spicy edge nor of leather and tobacco flavours so I tend to choose certain chocolates as top. In an attempt to be more balanced, I’ve chosen a variety of chocolates for this from the sweet to the dark, from the fruity to the leathery.

You’re going to notice I’m slightly biased – unflavoured, single origin bars tend to be ranked more highly here than flavoured or milk bars. That’s because taste is personal but I really recommend you discover chocolate for yourself. You may enjoy Jivara more than Willies, or the Thorntons Tonka more than the G&B Almond. This is one person’s opinion and I hope it inspires you to try them yourselves!

10 – Lindt Lindor Chocolate Bar – Available at Waitrose & other shops – Now, this isn’t a high quality, fancy chocolate bar but I love the way the bar melts in my fingers as I eat it and how if I let it get warm each square seems to have a liquid centre. This is a yummy, delightful bar which is a bit too sweet for some but I just live the Lindor truffles and the bar us just as yummy. I have been known to keep a bar in a pocket until it warms and then get all mucky and messy while eating it!

9 – Thorntons Milk Chocolate with Tonka Bean Bar – Available from Thorntons Shops – The milk chocolate was very sweet and the flavour of the tonka bean is difficult to describe. It is slightly floral with an overtone of vanilla mixed in with almond and a touch of buckwheat honey.

8 – Valrhona Jivara Milk Chocolate Bar – Available at Waitrose – This sweet malty milk chocolate is delicious. If you like sweet chocolate or milk chocolate and worry that fancy chocolate will not be appealing but want to start trying something better, this is a good starter bar. Of all the available milk chocolates, this has a deeper, more interesting flavour and while sweet to me, it also melts and finishes cleanly.

7 – Green & Blacks Almond & Darker Milk Chocolate – I feel I need to specify here that the milk chocolate is slightly darker here. This is a delicious darker milk with mostly whole almonds in it. I actually think it tastes different than the miniatures but it is just so yummy. I really enjoy this as a slightly sweet, almost malted milk chocolate with delicious whole almonds. Not one for sharing!

6 – Divine 70% Dark Chocolate – Available from a number of shops – This bar is a firm standard in my cupboard. It is a delicious mild dark chocolate with a slight hint of fruit at times but a good smooth dark chocolate without any hint of a bitter edge. I have, in the past, been known to take a strip of 4 squares off, melt the rest and use the strip as a dipping stick to dip and lick the melted chocolate off of. Ya, I know – totally decadent.

5 – Sainsbury’s Santo Domingo Organic Fairtrade Dark Chocolate – Available from Sainsbury’s – I’m not sure whether the flavours were intentional but there is only a light acidity here and the fruit is absolutely a dried grape or raisin flavour. There is a hint of earthiness that occasionally raises its head but on the whole it is an inoffensive dark chocolate with a slight dried fruit flavour.

4 – Tesco Organic Dominican Republic 70% Chocolate – Available from Tesco – I was so surprised by this bar. Slightly leathery mellowing into a light raspberry but with an almost spicy (not hot – just flavourful) edge mellowing into a delightful deep brownie chocolate flavour with a light, clean finish. If this is a flavour profile you enjoy it is absolutely a great buy.

3 – Rococo Sea Salt Milk Chocolate Bar – Available from Waitrose – This milk chocolate is interesting with a malted flavour and a delicious deep milk flavour. I note that there is a slight flavour of something floral. The sea salt isn’t too intense and for me that makes it delightful because I’m not a huge fan of intense salt flavours in my chocolate. I don’t want the salt to be front and centre and here it really comes through gently. The chocolate isn’t too sticky as some milk can be. The milk chocolate is delicious and I ate a lot in a single sitting! This is a 37% bar and I think they could even go slightly darker and keep this bar yummy.

2 – Hotel Chocolat 120h Conch Purist 65% Chocolate Bar – Available from Hotel Chocolate shops – The tiny granules of this 120 hour conch make this chocolate melt like butter in your mouth. This chocolate tastes less of fruit and has a subtle flavour. It tastes almost creamy with a slight hint of vanilla. It’s difficult to describe how the finer grain of the chocolate which is a result of the longer conch time really mellows out the flavour of the chocolate and gives it a smoother taste, but it does.

1 – Willie’s Delectable Cacao 71% Madagascan Sambirano Superior – Available from Waitrose – When I opened the foil and released the scent of chocolate and mixed ripe red berries, I knew I was in for a treat. The initial flavour of fruit is joined with a sharp acidity as the very first thing you get. I was then surprised a bit as an earthy chocolate flavour developed in my mouth. I’m not a fan of that dark, almost drying sensation but I was willing to stick with it. The subtle flavours of fruit keep poking their way through the melt but I’m moving it around a lot in my mouth to get it – pushing it to the front of my tongue to let it melt there to capture the fruit and acidity. Lovely experience but really any of the range are delightful!

I hope you’ve enjoyed this list and I hope you’ll discover them for yourself. This is my opinion which does happen to also match the Academy of Chocolate 2011 opinion of which I was one of the judges. Please do discover these yourselves and comment about what you like from your high street or supermarket shop!

Giveaway

You have FIVE chances to win a selection of my favourites from Judith’s list (minimum five bars) – simply do one of the following:

1. Follow Mostly About Chocolate (@MostlyAboutChoc) on Twitter and leave me a comment here to tell me you have done so

2. “Like” the Mostly About Chocolate Facebook Page and leave me a comment here to tell me you have done so

3. Tweet this post using the button below and leave a comment telling me that you have done so including your Twitter username.

4. Follow me @RenBehan on Twitter and again leave a comment in the box below to tell me that you have done so, including your Twitter username.

5. Visit the Fabulicious Food on Facebook and “Like” and leave a wall post to tell me you have done so.

You can enter this competition via any or all of the five ways described above but you must leave me a separate comment for each time you have entered.

The winner will be chosen by an online randomiser.

I will be able to see your email and contact you if you have won, but your email will not be visible to the public and will NOT be passed on.

UK residents only please – the chocolate won’t travel well too far!

Closing date: Friday 14th October 2011 at 3pm

The winner will be announced in a subsequent post on Saturday 15th October 2011.

Look out tomorrow too for a Hotel Chocolat Purist Hamper Giveaway worth £26.00