Author: jamesclay

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Wife of Bath

Sometimes when I get a cheese I like it, and sometimes I don’t. I seem to blog more often about cheeses I don’t like though or cooking with cheese, must change that and start to blog about the cheeses I do like.

Well this is a cheese I think is okay, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to buy again.

I was at a farm shop and they had a nice looking cheese called Wife of Bath, it looked and sounded interesting and was sold on that. I should have asked to taste some first but I thought it looked really nice.

Well.

I got home and to be honest it was quite bland and lacked substance. It reminded me of Doux De Montagne and if you recall my views on that I said:

To be honest I didn’t think that much of it. The flavour was too mild for me, though I did like the texture. If you like Edam or Port Salut then you will probably enjoy this cheese, though expect the flavour to be quite mild in comparison.

With the Wife of Bath cheese, my views are almost the same.

This is a harder cheese but still lacks “oomph”.  It might make an interesting addition to a cheeseboard, but otherwise nothing to go out and try and find.

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Mango Chutney

Watching Saturday Kitchen this morning and really liked the mango chutney which James Martin made.

A very simple recipe which sounded really easy and looked tasty.

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Pork Medallions with Apple

This dish went down very well with the family and is quite quick and simple to make.

Pork Medallions with Apple

Take some pork medallions (slice some pork tenderloin in 1″ slices or ask your butcher) in a hot frying pan, panfry on both side and then let rest.

As you cook the pork, soften half a diced onion with some pancetta in another pan.

Once you have removed the pork, add some butter to the pan and cook some apple slices, until they are soft and brown.

Remove the apple.

Turn the heat up, add some sliced mushrooms, once they are cooked, add the cooked onions and pancetta.

Add some spoonfuls of creme frache and freshly chopped parsley to make a sauce.

Slice the pork, add to a plate with the apple.

Add the sauce and serve with rice.

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Starbucks Chocolate

So there I was buying a tall americano and I thought I know I fancy a bar of chocolate, oh look there’s a bar of fairtrade milk chocolate.

Well it was okay, nothing special.

Starbucks Chocolate

But I did finish the bar and I guess that says it all.

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Amazing Food Pictures

Wow these pictures are amazing and all made from food!

Amazing food pictures

Incredibly, everything you see in this image can be found in the kitchen. Photographer Carl Warner has painstakingly captured all kinds of food in a series of still lifes.

Check out all the pictures on the BBC News website.

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Book Choice – The River Cottage Fish Book

My book choice this week is Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s excellent River Cottage fish book.

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s excellent River Cottage fish book

The Spectator said:

Simply the best and most comprehensive work on the subject I have read… a well-illustrated compendium to British fish, it is a great reference book and a good read.

It’s the book which accompanies the television series.

Certainly if you are looking for a fish book which covers some non-traditional more sustainable fish then this is the book for you.

Buy the book from Amazon.

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Green beans and carrots

One side dish I have been eating a lot recently is a very simple dish of steamed green beans and carrots.

carrots and green beans

Sometimes I add some olive oil, other times butter, usually though I leave them as is. I find that organic is the most tasty.

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Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall calls them “little beauties”

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall calls them “little beauties”, what is he talking about?

Oats

Oats!

If ever there were a humble grain, it would be the oat. Derided by the ancient Greeks as a diseased type of wheat, it was dismissed in many cultures as food for the poor, or for animals, and to this day is often undervalued. It still retains an association with dusty health food shops and sloppy institutional breakfasts. Porridge will never be glamorous. Oatcakes are unlikely to become the new blini.

Read more with some great recipes.

Photo source.

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Steak and Mushrooms

Last night I cooked a very nice (and quick) meal.

I took some sirloin steak, I actually prefer ribeye but sometimes you have to have what is available and not what you want or prefer.

I heated the frying pan without oil, the steaks were oiled though and then placed in the hot pan.

In a separate pan I fried some pancetta and onions, once they were nearly cooked, I remove them, turned the heat up and added the mushrooms so they fried rather than steamed.

Once the steaks were cooked I removed them from the pan, and put them on a warm plate to rest (really important to let steaks rest for a few minutes before serving they will be a lot more tender).

I then added the onions, pancetta and mushrooms to the steak pan and a couple of large spoonfuls of creme frache.

Then in a pan of rolling boiling water I put some gnocchi.

In two minutes the sauce was ready, the gnocchi was ready, so serve.

Delicious.

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Surely middle class people know how to eat proper?

Pupils at a school in Brighton are being taught how to use cutlery properly according to a report on the BBC.

Pupils are being taught which cutlery to use and whether to remove their jackets at dinner at an independent school in Brighton.

Brighton College introduced the classes in etiquette after a survey of company directors said graduates displayed impoliteness and poor table manners.

And this is an independent school…

Surely middle class people know how to eat proper?