17 September 2010

Recipe For Yorkshire Fruit Tea Bread

We have always loved teabreads here at home like those made by Elizabeth Bothams of Whitby, but I reckoned that some of those homely, comforting cakes could not be too difficult to make.  So this weekend I set out to make a traditional Fruit Teabread...

15 September 2010

Vanilla - A Beautiful And Sensual Spice

Vanilla comes from the vanilla orchid, called Vanilla planifolia, which is native to Mexico, but is now indigenous in many tropical parts of the world, for example Madagascar and surrounding islands.  There is a second vanilla orchid called Vanilla t...

11 September 2010

Should We Encourage People From Countryside To Cities?

...Self doubt gets you thinking.  I am still thinking through my concerns about Fairtrade and I wonder whether I've got it arse over tip. 

09 September 2010

The Hummingbird On Stroud Green Road

One of my favourite hidden restaurants in London has been for many years, The Humming Bird, at 84 Stroud Green Road, which serves traditional Caribbean cuisine.  Sophie and I visited there on Monday with my brother, getting drenched on the way back i...

07 September 2010

Where's the money...for us?

In the last couple of weeks, I have been contacted by The Executive Chef magazine and St James's House on behalf of the Royal Agricultural Society.  Both of them had the most wonderful advertising opportunities and we had been specially selected out...

06 September 2010

A Big Shout Out To Small Business Owners

We, the small business owners and micro-entrepreneurs, are the forgotten, ignored and trodden upon solid foundation of the British, American and every other economy in the world.  We employ most of the employed people and generate much of the new, gr...

06 September 2010

London Restaurants Around Finsbury Park

Sophie and I have been down in London for the last few days, leaving our children with my parents, while we enjoy the delights of exhibiting at the Speciality & Fine Food Fair trade show at Olympia.  We have been staying at my brother’s house in...

04 September 2010

Food Blogs Round Up - August 2010

It is the height of European Summer so a number of the food blogs are in holiday mode.  In spite, or perhaps because of the summer, Julia Parsons at A Slice Of Cherry Pie has been making Tuscan Style Soup.

03 September 2010

Recipe For Luxury Chocolate Gateaux Or Pavé

This is another recipe that I have followed from Pierre Hermé's inspirational cookbook "Chocolate", which I have reinterpreted for a British audience.  The only tweak I have made to it was in the use of edible gold as a garnish on top of the chocolat...

30 August 2010

A Sense Of Community

On Saturday morning, I went to Havenhands the Bakers in St James's Square in Boroughbridge*, then on to the Post Office before going to Ripon to watch the start of the Annual Raft Race in the Ripon Canal Basin.  On that short journey, I met several p...

29 August 2010

New Razors - Old Razors

I have been spending the last week  and a bit shaving with two new razors that I bought on Ebay.  They are Gillette Razors from the late 1950s - a Red Tip and a Blue Tip Super-Speed Razors.  Why, you might rightfully ask; well, with razors, Gillette...

28 August 2010

School Reports And Memories Of Mowden Hall School

I went to small, all-boys prep school in Northumberland called Mowden Hall School, which still exists and is now a mixed prep school.  In fact, my father went there the first year it moved to Northumberland after the Second World War.  It seems so ol...

26 August 2010

Recipe For Wild Salmon With Pink Peppercorn Sauce

This recipe began as one of those serendipitous events when on holiday this July in Scotland.  We had one of those small kitchens that has no equipment and a very temperamental cooker, plus we had brought almost no ingredients with us.  Then around a...

24 August 2010

Recipe For Business Success Cake

I am a fan of those little self-published recipe books as within them you often get real recipe gems that have been handed down from generation to generation within families.  You also get a lot of rubbish, as well, but a recipe book with even only o...

22 August 2010

Life Really Does Begin At Forty

I am 42 now and I have finally worked out what the phrase "life begins at forty" means.  It came as a Pauline moment as I was driving home the other day.  It really means that you only ever plan your life until you get to about 40 years old*, so now...

19 August 2010

Axel's Raspberry Cheesecake Recipe

My sister and her family came to visit at the weekend, so I was scrabbling around trying to come up with a summery pudding to create, while the rain was gushing down outside in torrents.  I decided that roast chicken with all the trimmings, followed...

16 August 2010

A Recipe For Meatballs In Tomato And Red Pepper Sauce

Cooking at home differs from fancy cuisine in restaurants in that it is about compromise.  While a top notch chef does not need to compromise on ingredients and quality, at home you need to juggle your precious time with what you have got available i...

15 August 2010

Recipe For Milk Shake

You spend hours and hours creating delicious home cooked food from scratch, buying the best ingredients you can find, then you hear you kids discussing the best type of chocolate or sweet and flavour of crisps (chips) in the back of the car*.  You fe...