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Minute Steak and Fries

We headed to Cabot Circus to have a celebration meal. The place that was chosen was the Coal Kitchen.

Though it took me a while to work it out, the last time I had been to Coal, was over ten years ago, in January 2013, when it was called Coal Bar and Grill and I had a burger.

It is now called the Coal Kitchen. We had booked, but were still given a choice of tables. They have quite an extensive menu, but also a set menu. I went with the set menu and started with the chicken tacos.

This was followed by the Steak Frites from the set menu.

Minute Steak and Fries

A 5oz minute steak served pink, garlic butter, with skin on fries.

The steak was cooked well and was pink. The garlic butter was quite strong, but complemented the steak. The fries were nice and crispy.

I finished the meal off with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and an espresso. The ice cream was nice, the coffee, not so much.

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Not all scones are equal

One of the interesting things about visiting National Trust properties is that though there appears to be commonality and consistency across their cafes, the reality is that they are dependent on who is in the kitchen, more than most. As a result, one way to compare the different experiences is to look at something that is common across many of the menus and compare them. Once such common item found on lots of menus is the cheese scone.

On a recent visit to Kedleston Hall in Derbyshire I stopped for lunch and had a leek soup and a cheese scone.

Kedleston Hall is one of the finest and most complete examples of an 18th-century show-palace and parkland in Britain. Step inside and discover the Curzon family’s collection of fine art, furniture, and Asian objects.

The cafe is in, what was the kitchens of the Hall. I do like it when the cafe is in the main buildings, rather than a converted cow shed. I really liked how Chirk Castle’s cafe was in one of the towers for example.

The service was friendly, you placed your order and then your food is brought to the table.

The scone was lovely and fresh, soft, and delicious. It was full of flavour. I really liked it, so much that I nearly ordered a second scone.

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These weren’t the tacos I was expecting

We headed to Cabot Circus to have a celebration meal. The place that was chosen was the Coal Kitchen.

Though it took me a while to work it out, the last time I had been to Coal, was over ten years ago, in January 2013, when it was called Coal Bar and Grill and I had a burger.

It is now called the Coal Kitchen. We had booked, but were still given a choice of tables. They have quite an extensive menu, but also a set menu. I went with the set menu and started with the chicken tacos.

two soft tacos, marinated chicken, lettuce, tomato, pickled chilli and harrisa yoghurt

This description from the set menu shows what it was supposed to be, two soft tacos, marinated chicken, lettuce, tomato, pickled chilli and harrisa yoghurt.

However not sure where the tomato, chilli and yoghurt went, I certainly didn’t have any on my tacos.

As a result they were a little dry, but I did still quite enjoy them. 

Obviously they took the menu away after we ordered, so didn’t realise until I was posting a photograph of my food to the Instagram and copying the description, that I realised three components of the dish were missing. If I had known I would have probably asked about it.

Checking the Coal Chicken Instagram feed they actually had a photograph of the dish from the (new) set menu.

two soft tacos, marinated chicken, lettuce, tomato, pickled chilli and harrisa yoghurt

Well mine certainly did not look like that!

I do find it frustrating when restaurants (usually) chains, don’t follow the recipe for their dishes, resulting in this kind of experience. Had a similar experience with a hotel in Salford.

The real result is that it puts me off going back to the restaurant again. It had been ten years since I last went to Coal, it might be sometime before I head there again for something to eat.

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Homemade Mexico City Nachos

Having really enjoyed the Mexico City Nachos from Wahaca, I have now been making this dish quite often myself.

Homemade Mexico City Nachos

I used some tinned black beans, to this I added some tortilla chips, and then dressed the dish with chopped fresh red pepper, avocado, guacamole, sour cream, grated cheese, a homemade tomato salsa, and some homemade pickled red onion.

It was a really nice and fresh dish, and was a good copy of the dish I had in London.

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Nice coffee at the Marina

Portishead Marina

It was a nice sunny day, so we headed to Portishead to have a walk around the marina (and probably stop for a coffee).

We ended up at Cafe Mokoko which has a few branches across the West.

I had a cortado and an almond croissant.

They were served in weird cups; I think they were bamboo. Despite that the coffee was excellent.

I really liked the almond croissant. Usually when I have an almond croissant it consists of a croissant stuffed with almond paste and almonds on top. Though this croissant had almonds on top, the croissant itself had a delicious almond taste as though the paste was incorporated into the dough before baking.

Really delicious.

Certainly a place I would try again.

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Illy Cortado

I had enjoyed the Capo Triestino I had had at the Illy Cafe up in Clifton. So on a recent visit to the area, I visited the Illy Cafe and this time I ordered a Cortado.

It probably wasn’t a Cortado, as this is a Spanish drink, and it wasn’t on the menu, when I looked. However the staff said they could make a Cortado. I took a seat and they brought the coffee over to my table.

Cortado

It was a very nice coffee.

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A disappointing chicken karaage

I was in London and looking for lunch, it was raining, so the Leather Lane street food market was struck off my list of possible places as I didn’t want to get too wet. In the end I went to K10 and looked over their menu of hot food.

I decided I would have the chicken karaage. Chicken karaage is inspired by Chinese fried chicken recipes, karaage is a delicious izakaya or bento box favourite, comprised of crunchy, deep fried pieces of marinated chicken.

My food arrived promptly and I took it back to the office.

chicken karaage

The box was a bed of rice with chunks of deep fried chicken, chunks of cooked onion and pepper with spring onion and sliced chilli. This is then covered in a sticky sauce.

Alas, though I was looking forward to the dish, I was somewhat disappointed. The chicken was over-cooked and had dried out as a result of probably hanging around for a while. 

The accompanying onions and pepper were better, though I think they should have been cut up into smaller pieces.

I also ordered a side dish of prawn katsu. What I got was panko prawns, on shredded cabbage and carrot, with a sweet chilli sauce.

Overall I was quite disappointed with the food and I think I would have preferred to have got wet and got much better food from Leather Lane.

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Made some paella

I made and cooked a paella, or a Spanish inspired rice dish.

paella

I diced an onion and a pointed red pepper.  In a hot large frying pan, I put some olive oil and I cooked off bacon lardons, and some diced chorizo.  I then added the diced onion and pepper. When this was softened, I added some sliced mushroom. Once this was stirred in I added 250g of paella rice.

To this I added some paella seasoning, paella seasoning, Carmencita Paellero Paella Spice Mix.

This is according to the description the number one selling spice mix in Spain.

I ensured that the rice was coated I added a splash of sherry. I then added some chicken stock and water. Stirred once and left it to cook.

I added some more water as it cooked.

Before serving I added some cooked sliced chorizo, freshly chopped parsley, and some chunks of lemon.

I served this with some freshly cooked fish and salad.

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Breton Fish Stew

I was staying in Ealing and having been disappointed that Reineta was closed I went to Côte. Reality was I did walk around Ealing to see what else was there and looking at various menus. So, in the end I ended up at Côte.

I had the Crab Maison for my starter. I stayed with seafood and I had the Breton Fish Stew for my main course.

This is a traditional coastal stew from Brittany with mussels, prawns, squid, seabream, in a tomato, white wine and chilli sauce. It was served with some French baguette.

There was a lot of seafood in this dish, yes it was mainly mussels, and there was only a single piece of seabream. There were plenty of prawns and squid rings.

I enjoyed the sauce, it was though similar to a soup rather than a sauce. The seafood was cooked well and wasn’t overcooked, which I did think it might be.

The bread was two slices of sourdough baguette. I think I would have preferred a more traditional French flute type baguette over the sourdough slices. 

I had wanted to try this dish for a while, and I enjoyed it. However it wasn’t amazing, so it probably wouldn’t be a dish I would order again.

To accompany my meal, rather than wine, I had a bottle of Meteor lager, which was crisp and refreshing.