Author Archives: Grace

Taste of Christmas 2010

Posted on by

Free tickets came up on offer once again for Taste of Christmas so Sandra and I decided we had nothing (but time) to lose by taking them up. You can easily spend a whole day at the Taste festivals but by mid-afternoon the events start to really get crowded by which time I’ve normally had enough! Still, Sandra and I still made the most of our time at the festival which included being only metres from Heston as he officially cut the ribbon on the day’s opening (I couldn’t believe how rude some people were – there was a couple off to my side who still had a pretty good view of Heston, particularly considering how short I am, but was still pushing us around to get even closer)

Heston’s appearance in the Taste Theatre was scheduled second on the bill and learning from previous events we made sure to get to the Taste Theatre extra early (before even the first chef appeared!) to line up. There were two lines, one for the VIP ticket holders and one for regular ticket holders (us), and both lines ended up being even longer than they were last year. We were worried that all the VIP ticket holders would take up the seats but actually they are only guaranteed seats in the first five rows, and that included seats off to the side, and once they’d started filling the rows they let us regular ticket holders in … as a result we ended up nearly smack bang in the middle with better positioning than some of the VIPs! Although too bad about the camera!

But first up in the Taste Theatre was Silvena Rowe. What a character. This Bulgarian born on the Turkish border chef has been all over London and written a few cook books and even consulted on the movie Eastern Promises. Currently executive chef with the Baltic Restaurant Group she treated us to a very entertaining and sexy session (it’s her accent and her hair that does it …)

So Heston’s session was less about his cooking and more about other people’s cooking! He was actually judging a contest which involved members of the general public having a stab at a Heston-esque Christmas dish (Christmas with a Heston Twist.) There were three finalists who I must admit came up with some interesting creations. But before the finalists came up Heston discussed with us his cooking style and talked about exploring fully all of our senses.

We then got to sample his special Christmas mince pie and also this other thing which we were instructed to eat whilst holding our noses, which was a play on changing the flavour without bias of expectation.

The finalists were all clearly chuffed to be up on stage sharing it with Heston. One guy in particularly kept talking and talking and talking. I think he talked his way into winning. Ha ha! The first guy created “snow”, the lady Christmas cake themed cup cake (the Heston twist being the dry ice on the bottom creating a mood I guess) and then the winner created a re-visiting of an Eton Mess. At one stage Heston was like, uh, can I have the mike back now please? Ha ha.

After the Heston session it was off to try some of the food before the crowds got too ridiculously out of control. Pork belly was the order of the day for me – I can’t resist it!

Modern Pantry: Vietnamese Style Duke of Berkshire Pork belly, mash, pickled bean sprouts, crispy shallots. It may not look like much but it was pretty tasty.

Roast: Slow Roast Wicks Manor Pork Belly with Bramley apple sauce, root vegetable mash and port reduction. Delicious and perfectly tender.

Club Gascon: Foie gras popcorn. The popcorn didn’t really work too well with the foie gras but otherwise a nice dish.

Hotel du Vin: Braised Donald Russell Ox cheek, hickory smoked pommes puree. Getting very full at this stage – the ox cheek was melt in your mouth tender though a bit rich considering how full I was starting to feel.

I couldn’t resist more pork belly though with Hotel du Vin: Pugh’s roast porchetta, pommes lyonnaise and charcutterie sauce. Mmmm …

After lunch we headed off to the Waitrose Cookery School to burn off some of our energy, but I think we had a net gain instead of calories from the dessert we made (which we eventually ate!!)

We were partly through making our dessert when one of the assistant chefs came along and did this to our egg! Entertaining but don’t think Sandra was too impressed as it made a mess of our table and of our separating the yolk from the white! Ha ha!

Think the assistant chefs were more interested in having fun with us than anything else – but I didn’t mind! The whole session made me laugh!

The finished products

Zen China

Posted on by

Groupon recently had a deal where you paid £39 for what was purportedly a £120 six-course meal for two at Zen China. I was looking forward to what sounded like a nice meal at Zen China – the Chinese restaurant which is set within County Hall. The restaurant admittedly has a nice view and with the snow having fallen slightly it was very scenic indeed looking out. The fact I made much of the view looking out of the windows shows just how impressed I was by what was going on inside … which is to say not much at all!

For the six courses you could choose amongst the following options (the ones with asterisks next to it are the ones we decided to eat tonight)

  • Shredded Roast Duck and Vegetable Soup,
  • Classic Beijing Marinated Beef Strips with Spices (*),
  • Duck Pancakes (*),
  • Braised Sea Bass Slices with Spicy Beijing Sauce (*),
  • Sauteed Chicken with Ginger,
  • Red & Green Pepper,
  • Braised Pork Meatballs with Fruity Beijing Barbecue Sauce (*),
  • Sizzling Spicy Beef Slices with Black Beans,
  • King Prawn with Cherry Sauce (*),
  • Braised Chinese Mushroom with Greens,
  • Imperial Fried Rice with Duck Meat (*),
  • Egg Fried Rice,
  • Steamed Rice.

    • By implication, the restaurant values each dish, on average, at £20! Imagine if you’d picked the steamed rice as one of your six courses and were paying full price you’d probably be feeling just a bit ripped off.

    The duck was personally carved up by one of the chefs. They did the trick where they make the pancake for you and as a result instead of getting all of the duck you end up getting only half (at most) of the actual portion. They did come back and serve a bit more of the duck but certainly not the entire portion.

    The rest of the food was disappointing. Each dish, apart from the Imperial Fried Rice, was basically a fried dish. Sure I would expect that for the Beef Strips but certainly not the sea bass and the king prawn. This ended up being basically a sweet and sour dish and then the meatballs were yet another version of a sweet and sour. The rice was hardly memorable.

    The service was friendly with the waitress making lots of small talk with us. However, considering the restaurant was not very full, they didn’t pay too much attention to tables so, for example, getting our waters topped up and getting the bill proved difficult as we could never see where the wait staff were, or could see they were way over the other side of the room (it’s a pretty long room.)

    Even on the groupon deal I didn’t feel Zen China made the most. They certainly didn’t have to fry and overcook everything and the wait staff really could have done with monitoring the room more closely. Not sure I’ll be rushing back over the Zen China in a rush.

    Come Dine With D: Duck and DVDs at D’s

    Posted on by

    James and I trundled over to D’s house today for a spot of home cooking by D and also, probably for the first time ever in history, to watch one of the Twilight movies where the ratio of males to females was in favour of the males. Ha! James I still can’t believe you maintain that when we went to watch New Moon the male/female split was even. Ha again!

    D has certainly mastered the art of understated cooking. The whole process seemed so simple – a few cracks of pepper here, a bit of herbs there, some chill for bite on to the duck and into the oven she goes. In the meantime whilst that was cooking he also prepped up some salmon and prawns for our starters. Mmm ….

    The duck came out gorgeous and though the potatoes were admittedly already pre-cooked they still roasted up very nicely. A great meal indeed by D and when visiting D you certainly can’t complain that he doesn’t feed you. I don’t think I’ll need to eat for a week … at least!

    Surprise Leaving Do

    Posted on by

    I’m off to pastures new shortly and the kind people at work threw me a surprise party tonight. The question of the night was whether or not I suspected and I must admit I had my suspicions! Still, it was a really nice thought and I was touched by how many people turned up and contributed to the evening.

    Awesome presents as well. Rehana said she had a blast spending all the moment. She really knows me well with my gifts including decadent chocolates, vouchers for a cupcake and cocktail course, a voucher to go rolling down a hill and a lovely Pandora bracelet.

    Thanks everyone for a great night, great gifts and the hilarious card.

    Tom Aikens Redux

    Posted on by

    Pat and I could hardly believe that Tom Aikens came back on offer so soon after our last visit. Having said that we hadn’t intended on going again for a while as it just seemed too indulgent to have the same rich meal again within three months. However, checking the menu the offerings were going to be different (Christmas theme) so we were in like a shot!

    We both said from the outset that despite how fantastic the bread offerings were at Tom Aikens (and they were still really fantastic tonight) that we would try to resist eating too many of them throughout the meal. I was able to resist to some extent but between us we still ate enough to require requesting a second butter patty. At one stage Pat declared “no more bread” but then the next second when the waiter came around offering more bread Pat immediately said yes! Ha! He just couldn’t resist.

    For our amuse bouche we were familiar with two of them (the Polenta and Parmesan croquette and the Olive “Bubble”) with the new kid on the scene being the truffle soup. Divine much? A touch on the salty side I still could have eaten the truffle soup all day long. Mmmm …

    Our first dish last time was a scallop dish and this time it was also scallop but served very differently. Roast Scallop, black pudding, and parsnip purée. As fresh as the scallop was last time I think I enjoyed this one much better. The black pudding went surprisingly well.

    For a Christmas treat next up was Venison Carpaccio, fig purée, toasted walnuts. Very festive and very fun dish. Very colourful – lucky I wasn’t wearing a white shirt!

    Poached and Roasted Foie Gras, cassoulet Haricot beans. Not a fan of beans but the foie gras was tasty. I’m scared by just how much I’m starting to fall in love with foie gras. Not that I would go out of my way to get it … but I have no problems now chucking it down.

    A fish course of John Dory, with chestnut ravioli, cabbage, bacon was one of my favourites tonight. The sweet and the salty played off the John Dory really well in this dish.

    The next dish was really cute. Not sure if it was plated intentionally but I love how it actually looks like a bird! Roast Partridge, pear purée, choucroute, winter truffle sauce. Truffle. Check. Partridge cooked right. Check.

    Desserts followed our savoury dishes. Two types: Confit Red Wine Plums, vanilla parfait, red wine sorbet and then the more Thanksgiving Pumpkin Pannacotta, pumpkin cake, candied kumquats. Yum.

    And finally, what we had been waiting for, the petit fours! Tom Aikens really knows how to start and finish a meal!

    Sushi Date with Sandra

    Posted on by

    Sandra and I thought we should put our sushi making lessons to use by making dinner. It also was a good opportunity to check out her and Jules’ new digs.

    We started the day by heading off to a farmer’s market to get some fresh salmon and other ingredients. Going to the local markets has a sense of rightness both in the freshness of the foods and also the feeling you’re supporting locals and not just a giant company. Then we went to the giant company, Waitrose, to get the rest of our ingredients. Ha ha.

    Sushi making is a lot of fun. But the problem with sushi is that you use a heck of a lot of rice but you can only really feasibly used a small portion of your ingredients. As a result I think I ate more crab sticks and salmon and prawns than actually went into our sushi. Heh heh.

    I can’t say I’m the best sushi roller in the world – in fact I’m downright horrible as I can never get the ingredients centred and I always over-fill the sushi but you gotta admit that no matter how bad you are the end product still looks pretty. The ones that look the best are Sandra’s!

    Its fair to say we made way too much sushi – even for three people we had enough leftovers to feed ourselves for at least another meal.

    Cirque de Glace – Evolution

    Posted on by

    The greatest miracle about this performance at Wimbledon Theatre is that no one went flying off the stage or ended up slicing anyone. Translated as Ice Circus what you get is a whole lot of ice skaters taking a turn on a very small ice skating rink on stage plus a mix of dancing, ballroom and circus thrown in. It had a very slow start but once it hit its stride it was magnificent by the end of the first half, and then came back kind of flat in the second half but still had some stand out performances.

    In Cirque de Glace – Evolution, as the title suggests, you are taken through the evolution of the world from the big bang, to the eras of the caveman, ice age, fire, the wheel, man on moon, modern times (ice dancers in suits with newspapers.) It seemed to lose this theme about mid-way through the second half … perhaps because they had run out of eras we would recognise and therefore opted for something a bit weirder.

    The skill of the skaters and performers on stage was evident. On the minute rink there wasn’t much margin for error and every time someone was swung out or someone went for a double axle jump or equivalent my heart was in my mouth. Would there be a spectacular crash? Thankfully there wasn’t – an in fact I didn’t see any sort of ice skating mistake at all.

    Good costumes, good music, nice use of the lighting and for the moment a fairly unique show worth seeing. Apart from the slow parts mentioned above if there was one negative it was that there were some awkward moments when the audience weren’t sure whether it was an appropriate moment to clap and congratulate the performers – sometimes obvious cues help and this is good for the crowd and the performer.

    Era Ora

    Posted on by

    Era Ora, About Time, is a concept Italian restaurant with ingredients purportedly flown in from Italy (makes me question slightly the green agenda.) The main influence is Umbrian and Tuscany but the restaurant is not afraid to go beyond those borders. The restaurant first earned its Michelin Star in 1996 which it has kept until now.

    The exterior of the restaurant, located in Christianshavn, is very subtle. We walked by it a couple of times before realising it was the restaurant. Perhaps this was because it was fairly early on and the restaurant wasn’t quite so busy. The restaurant is filled with warm colours and fairly engaging interior decoration.

    The menu consists of a tasting menu – it is up to you to choose how many courses. Bottled water is charged on a per person charge, rather than by bottle, which is both a plus and a negative. They certainly ticked my box for making sure our glasses were constantly topped up – still for me and sparkling for Pat.

    For about £110 including service this is the food that we got:

    An amuse bouche of Fried scallops with leeks, green apple and chilli sauce. This dish looked as good as it tasted.

    Then our trio of starters. The first trio included:

    Lobster salad with filo pastry and Cicerchia beans;
    Pumpkin lasagna over fried Monte Veronese cheese,
    Plaice rolled on swiss chard, potato, sun dried tomato and Jerusalem artichoke

    The pumpkin lasagna was easily my favourite of these trios but that could be because it was warm where the other two dishes were cool. All three were very prettily presented though and involved an incredible detail in both the ingredients and the cooking.

    Next up was a trio of

    Veal tartar in love with crunchy cracker and foam of soya,
    Castagnaccio with orange ricotta, banana chip and honey caramel,
    Meat ball of venison in beans sauce with deep fried spring onion

    These were really fun to eat. The castagnaccio (the middle item that looks like a cake) was an interesting addition to the trio.

    A gorgeous Herbal risotto in scent of liquorice topped with roasted quail was up next for us. Incredibly delicate I wished that this dish would go on forever.

    Next, another of my favourites was the home made trofie pasta rolled in venison ragout and red onion. It sounds like a fairly simple dish but the taste. Simply exquisite.

    Then, sadly, we were on to our final savoury dish. I wasn’t sure I would enjoy it as involved lamb but I was quite surprised. Roasted lamb filet with eggplant composition and fried tomato was nice and not overwhelmingly lambish in flavour.

    Desserts started with a Cream of white chocolate in scent of lemon served with variation of fennel and lemon and

    the Coffee cream, cookie crumbs, dark chocolate caviar and milk sorbet.

    Both very enjoyable dessert dishes and really showed Era Ora’s commitment to maintaining the presentation and detail to the end.

    We finished our meal with tea (which came in this cute teapot which sat on top of my cup – love Danish design!) and petit fours.

    I can totally see why Era Ora has received the best Italian in Copenhagen moniker. Food is fantastic quality – I don’t think we could have had more ingredients in each of the dishes (nor plates – I thought they would run out of plates at one stage!) – and also innovative. For those who like their wine Era Ora prides itself on its giant wine cellar containing supposedly 90,000 bottles of vintage Italian wine. Service was for the main part a hit (for example, the constant topping up of water) without being in the way though it did drop off slightly towards the end when the restaurant started filling up. The only negative was that we were promised a copy of the menu on the way out (we asked for it twice) but they never handed one over …

    Copenhagen in November

    Posted on by

    Third time’s the charm!

    So 2010 is the year of repeat travel with this weekend being the third time for a visit to Copenhagen. Pat was in town for a conference so of course I piggy-backed on to his weekend in between conferences. Heh. We weren’t planning any sort of crazy weekend of running around seeing the sights since between us we’d seem most things so this weekend was about relaxing and eating our way around Copenhagen!

    The Sightseeing

    We did see some of the sights including a visit inside City Hall where they were having an art exhibition. I really liked the stuff that Soren Bjorn Maleri does especially his “On Tape” work:

    It being Christmas the “trees” had also started to come out

    One of the places I hadn’t visited before in Copenhagen was Kronborg Castle. The Castle is a fortress located in Helsingør on the sound between Denmark and Sweden. This part of the water is not very wide and therefore the fortress was an important strategic stronghold – whoever controlled the pass would have control of the revenue. A UNESCO World Heritage site the Castle is a good option for a half day trip from central Copenhagen.

    Krongborg has embraced the future with interactive elements, such as using your own mobile phone to hear the dramatisation of the life of a prisoner in the fortress and the “light”, the sounds of cannons, soldiers and horses as you walk about giving you a feel of being surrounded by activity and then the “light” show which brings the stone statue to life.

    Getting on the guided tours of both the Casemates and the Royal Apartments is worth your time. Our tour guide was especially excited and energetic in her story telling. A tour of the Casemates takes you deep underground to where the soldiers used to live. I couldn’t believe the conditions they were kept in – underground cramped conditions with little access to fresh air and terrible food. The 8 litres of watered down beer probably made it a little easier to cope but you wouldn’t think that you’d treat the people you expect to defend you so terribly. And the types of men mixing down there ranged from 12 year old boys to murderers. I don’t know how they survived mentally with nothing to do but walk for 15 hours in a 10 meter diameter circle.

    In contrast the tour of the Royal Apartments showed that life for the upper class couldn’t have been more different. Our tour guide talked about excesses and eating to the point where you were sick (it was a sign of status that you actually got to that point and they even had official tonsil ticklers responsible for shoving a peacock feather down your throat to make you throw up) and to holes in chairs so that royalty didn’t have to get up out of their chairs to stop their eating and go to the toilet.

    The castle is also renown for featuring in Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Every year the Castle hosts a version of Hamlet and our tour guide was gushing about the time Jude Law came and did his version.

    Things to look out for in the Royal Apartments are the trick tapestries and the C4 designs. The below tapestry was cool – depending on where you walk the main guy’s leg gets thinner and thinner. Cool optical illusions. There is also a lot of meaning within the tapestries and social commentary.

    As for the C4 designs, a symbol for Christian IV who rebuilt the castle, there are supposedly hundreds of these crests hidden all over the place.

    The Food

    Next to the sight-seeing, being in Copenhagen provided more opportunities to visit some more nice eating places. First up on Friday night was Reef ‘N’ Beef – I’ve never had Aussie food so posh before! The restaurant is a popular place so that even at 9.30pm the place was crowded and we were lucky to get the last spare table in the joint. Service was, as Patrick was quick to defend, typically Danish, casual, slow but friendly. Just as well we weren’t in a big rush to go anywhere! Food was excellent – great quality and very good balance in the ingredients, beautiful and thoughtful presentation as well.

    My starter was a “Oz Wildfire Wonton” (Crocodile Wonton) with a Honey and Passion Fruit Chili Drizzle. A bit of a take on sweet and sour sauce over Chinese wantons. I loved this starter but it didn’t last nearly long enough. Pat went for the “Ranina Ranina”. Panko crumbed saffron and chive spanner crab cakes with bush tomato romesco, jalapeno aioli and pickled vegetables. From all reports it was a winner with Pat though the jalapeno didn’t have as much bite as I was expecting.

    I moved on to a fish dish for my main course with the “Red emperor”: Deep sea fish with macadamia and lemon sauce, cauliflower puree and seasonal vegetables. The cauliflower puree was something special and I loved the touch of the macadamia and lemon sauce. A nice light and filling dish. Pat went for meat with “Redcliff Beef” marinated with garlic, native thyme and tasmanian mountain pepper served with potato fondant, crispy onion rings, caramelised onion puree, seasonal vegetables and shiraz sauce. Lots of ingredients and gee it looked good and tasty. Beef was cooked to perfection.

    Finally, dessert was an “Oz trilogy” for me. This consisted of pavlova, passionfruit cheescake and mango olida eucalyptus sorbet and Pat had the richer “Death by chocolate” of five individual chocolate desserts.

    If I’m ever in Copenhagen again I’d definitely come back to Reef ‘N’ Beef.

    On Saturday night we spoiled ourselves with a meal at Michelin-rated Italian restaurant Era Ora.

    On Sunday we had buffet brunch at Lele Nha Hang. Brunch in Copenhagen is very popular and this was no less evident than at Lele Nha Hang. A combination of Western and Eastern food it’s a great value for money meal. Offerings at the buffet include the usual Eggs, Bacon, Waffle etc. plus sushi, wonton, Chinese soup, porridge, satay, spring rolls, fried rice and then a giant dessert table including chocolate fondant.

    Accommodation

    We found that accommodation was actually a bit hard to find this weekend but we couldn’t work out why until we saw all these people in white going out on Saturday night. Apparently Copenhagen was hosting one of those famous White Parties. We ended up staying at the Omena Hotel which was part hostel part hotel. You don’t check in or check out – you are given a door code which locks you out strictly come check out time. Really weird! On Saturday morning there was a false fire alarm so we got to see that most people staying in the hotel were young nearly teenie boppers!

    Great weekend in Copenhagen once again.