skip to main |
skip to sidebar
As so often happens, a special offer at Waitrose tempted me to check out a novel food item. This week, "Genesis Crafty Pancakes". These comes in a pack of four and are small to medium sized pancakes — you could hold them in one hand.
The flavours I selected were Blueberry and (Belgian) Chocolate Chip. You're supposed to warm them/toast them under a grill, but in my house that was never going to happen. Straight into the toaster with them — their small size making them ideal for this.
I started with the blueberry ones. Warm from the toaster I then treated them just as I would home made — spread them with coconut oil instead of butter (great, you should try it) and sprinkled them with brown sugar. The texture and flavour of the pancakes was generally excellent — indistinguishable from home made, really.
Where they fell down was on the blueberries. Because of the thinness of the pancakes I suppose whole blueberries were never a possibility, but what blueberry fragments were present were few and far between. Just occasional little brownish splotches. Disappointing, although there was some blueberry flavour throughout the pancake.
The chocolate chip ones on the other hand were jam packed with those chocolate chips (careful they don't melt in your toaster!).
I prefer the blueberry pancakes in principle, but if chocolate is your thing these will go down a treat. They're too rich to need butter (or coconut oil) spread on them. Although I do have a devilish little notion to try them with peanut butter...
(Image credits: I got both the blueberry and chocolate pack shots from Waitrose.)
I try to avoid writing disparaging commentary about restaurants, so when I had a disappointing experience in Miami a few months ago — I fancied a burger, a friend recommended a chain with a high reputation, I went there and was decidedly unimpressed — I decided to just let it go.
But now I've discovered that this US burger chain is opening up in London. So I can no longer remain silent.
The chain is called Five Guys and they've just opened a branch in Covent Garden. I paid them a visit — the place was bustling, busy and obviously already a considerable success — and asked the pleasant and helpful staff there about their cooking policy, which it turns out is the same as in the States. So I can confidently assure you the end result will be the same as I experienced in Miami. And it was not good.
There are many things to commend Five Guys. The restaurants are inviting, nice design, friendly service, the chips are tasty, the toppings are free... but my praise ends there. The burgers are not, in my humble and purely personal opinion, worth eating.
Because they insist on cooking them well done. The customer doesn't get any other options. It's well done or no burger. And the result?
A tasteless, colourless, overcooked slab of dry meat at the centre of your bun. You have to stuff the damn thing with those free toppings in a desperate attempt to get some moisture into your meal. But it's no use...
Why boast of your "certified stamped prime fresh beef" if you're just going to cremate the stuff? I know some people prefer their burgers well done, and some go even further, way beyond the Five Guys burger, and devour it burnt (but isn't burnt food a potential health risk?) However, many other people don't want a cremation-burger. Give us rare, medium rare, or medium...
It's also true that in some places, burger joints have to cook their meat well done by law. Luckily, in the UK, that isn't a nation-wide situation.
And that being the case, Five Guys doesn't stand a chance as far as my taste buds are concerned. Not when there are other burger joints like Byron or the mighty wonderful GBK out there.
Make mine medium rare, please.
(Image credit: The — admittedly delicious looking — burger & fries shot is from Battle of California's post about Five Guys versus another US burger chain. The fries pic is from a review on the blog Ink and Paper (Napkins).)
There's been a recent wave of British cheeses with added fruit — and I have to say I heartily endorse them. Some are better than others, though — and I've just encountered one of the best.
Bowland is a Lancashire cheese with apples and sultanas and a coating of cinammon. It's available at Waitrose — I bought some purely on impulse and I'm very glad I did. It's excellent, and the combined flavours of the cheese, fruit and spice has a synergy which is usually lacking in these fruit cheeses.
The whole is definitely greater than the parts. Give it a try.
(Image credit: the picture of the Bowland cheese in its wrapper is from Michael Lee Fine Cheeses, a tasty little site.)
This splendid ciabatta, made with golden durum wheat, comes with a recipe on the label. More of a serving suggestion than a recipe — very simple, and very familiar. Indeed, an old favourite. But I hadn't had it for a while, so it was with my mouth watering that I warmed the bread for 10 minutes in a hot oven, then sliced it in half down the middle and spilt one half lengthwise.
I then layered the cut quarter loaf with sliced tomatoes (using the other quarter loaf as a surface for slicing the tomatoes, to catch the juice) and slices of mozzarella and ground some black pepper over it. Then I added torn basil leaves and repeated the whole process until the quarter loaf was stacked high.
Then I poured olive oil on it ('drizzle' is the official word, but this was a generous drizzle) and stuck the other quarter loaf back on top to make a big fat sandwich. Then I devoured it.
It was outstandingly delicious. The olive oil I used was a top Spanish number called Picualia Aove 1. It's a classy oil and one of my favourites. There is a hint of agreeable, aromatic rankness to it which at first suggested fresh garlic to me. But it's more accurately compared (as it is in the company's literature) to truffles.
This oil has a strong character of its own and next time I might try a blander, simpler oil which instead of asserting itself merely brings out the flavour of the other ingredients.I can hardly wait to attempt this experiment (I still have half the loaf, remember?). And I can only begin to imagine what it would be like with real buffalo mozzarella instead of the cheap stuff I used...
But in the meantime, this is the meal of the week.
(PS: Tried the blander oil but Picualia made for a noticeably superior sandwich.)
(PPS: Bought another loaf and tried it with buffalo mozzarella — Laverstoke Farms Buffalo Mozzarella — and it was superb. Which it should be, considering it cost three times as much as my usual mozzarella; but only because it was on special. Normally it's five times as much.)
(Image credit: the pack shot of the bread is from Waitrose, which is indeed where I bought it. The Picualia olive oil bottle is from the Evoo Gourmet website.)
I'm always keenly interested in olive oil, so when I had a chance to try a posh-looking specimen of a Chilean extra virgin oil from Tesco, I was keen. Aura Limited Edition (I'm a sucker for that) Estate Bottled (ditto) is a blend of Arbosana and Picual olives. It was also on special, about a third off its full price at Tesco's (as I write this it's still on discount there for a couple of days), so that was the clincher.
Disappointing to report, then, that at a Supper Club blind tasting of extra virgin olive oils (dipped with pieces of bread) the Aura didn't stand out. I decided not to buy it again. In fact, I decided to get rid of the rest of it in cooking. So I used it in the legendary Jim Harrison Pizza Sauce.
But the results were so fabulous that I actually went out and bought another bottle. There was something about the synergy of the oil with this recipe which was devastatingly delicious. Well worth a try.
(Image credit: The bottle shot is taken from Aura's own rather groovy FaceBook page.)
As Part 2 of my great Christmas Heston Experiment I sampled his Mini Ham Hock and Piccallili Terrine Slices.
(Ham hocks were until recently a cheap and unfashionable cut of meat. Suddenly they're trendy.) And these Mini Slices were very nice. As much as I enjoy his more spicy and exotic creations, I do prefer Heston to be straightforward.
These slices don't require any cooking or other preparation — I immediately and decisively disregarded the suggestion to serve them with piccallili mayonnaise and micro herbs, whatever the hell those are — and simply dished them up on pieces of decent quality bread with some salading, maybe a sliced tomato and either ordinary Hellmann's mayo or a drizzle of olive oil. Tasty, wholesome and simple.
This confirms my impressions in an earlier post. Heston is at his best when providing simple food from straightforward ingredients of high quality.
I still feel sorry for the pigs, though.
(Image credit: The picture is from Ocado, Waitrose's online sales site.)
