herbs

Fresh herbs are great, so I bought a load of shit, shoved it in some compost, and I now going to see what happens. My balcony is full of odd tubs, used tin cans and a big wooden box, I bet the neighbors love it as it looks like a rubbish tip, but they can all fuck off.

I don't have time to fanny around with pathetic needy plants which have to be taken indoors at night because it's too cold or they need a little bit of water because they are thirsty 2 times a day. I want my herbs to be like my women; always giving me a big bushy garden, especially when I neglect them. My parsley survived the winter somehow, it's my little crackhead herb who would probably suck cock for a bit of fertiliser.

Mint is a winner, it's basically a weed, but one man's weed is another man's flower or herb in this case. Minty potatoes are great with lots of butter or chopped mint in yogurt with a clove of mashed garlic, that one's a great dressing for cold meats. Cous cous. Pea salad. OK, I'll stop there. Minty magic.

Basil can be a pain in the ass (one of those needy herbs I mentioned), but so good, best indoors with lots of light, once it gets going there's no stopping it, like a big green locomotive ploughing it's way onto any summer plate.

For a continuous bit of salad garnish I find rocket wins. I tried Mizuna last year and it was a waste of time, but maybe I should give it another go.

I planted everything in a slapdash bish bosh manner, shooting from the hip like a cowboy gardener,  but lets hope I get something scoffable from my horticultural lasso.

Beer, Wine, Beer.

Yesterday I was invited to attend a brewing session with my friend's stepfather. I arrived around 11am and the whole process took around 4 hours to produce roughly 40 pints of Mild. It is such a meticulous method I simply can't begin to explain what we did, or should I say what Mark (Nick's stepfather) did, as Nick and I mainly stood around and got in the way. I'm a long way off from making my own beer as I don't have the time, space and certainly not the knowhow, but watching the process has made me think about all the intricate flavours behind the marvelous drink.

After the brewing session the master brewer gave us a master class in beer tasting and dusted off a rather special aged beer. The Thomas Hardy's Ale is probably more complex than any wine I've ever drank. Apparently it holds it's head up their with the Belgian beers, but you can buy that anymore or at least they have stopped making it. Try bidding on ebay if you fancy a swig.


Tesco Finest American Double is an amazingly hoppy beer with lots of passionfruit aroma, really worth a purchase for £2. You will only need to buy one as it's 9.2%. Brewdog is an provoking Scottish brewery which has some unorthodox branding, especially their Punk IPA. 


The Traditional Porter is alright, if you like that kind of the thing. It's basically a stout. Not much condition (carbonation or fizz), lots of chocolate, coffee, licorice and hint of cheap coke. But the aftertaste is too much like bile for my liking.




Thomas Hardy's Ale - http://www.ohanlonsbeer.com/
Brewdog's American Double IPA - http://www.brewdog.com/
Traditional Porter - http://www.harviestoun.com/




After our beery day Nick and I went into Topsham on the hunt for something warm and scoffy to soak up the booze. We didn't find what we were looking for, but what we did find was pretty good, unfortunately it came in the form of liquid again. But check this place out.

The Pebblebed Wine Cellar is a really brave idea, basically some guy converted his garage into a wine bar. The bar is owned by the vineyard and the wine is produced on the bank of the Exe, just a couple of miles away. At the moment the cellar is only open two nights a week so it is worth contacting them to see if it's open.

Nick and I share a guilty pleasure, which is sparking Rosé, so we got a couple of glasses to wash down our local westcountry cheese board. Both the wine and the cheese were excellent, but the fresh Italian olive oil which came with the cheese & bread was something else. I rarely have fresh olive oil as it's so expensive, I'm now making a pledge to buy more bottles of the grassy green grease. There were a few other cold platters on the menu, for example local smoked trout & chicken, not the biggest selection of food, but it's not a restaurant, it's a wine cellar.

Sparkling wine - £10 per bottle (Take Out)/ £15 (Drink In)

Cheese Board & other platers £5 (serves two people)

Afterwards we went The Bridge, which is currently my favorite pub. The list of beers are printed on a piece of A4 (a selection of about 7 or 8) and it is served through a doorway, the bar doesn't exist. Again, like the wine bar, they serve minimal food, just a Chunk pork pie with mustard and coleslaw for £3 and that's it. It must be a Topsham thing, no eating, just drinking. I've eaten the pie before and it's OK for soaking up booze, but that's about it. Instead Nick and I opted for a pickled egg and massive bag of salted Burts crisps. Actually, it's a good combo and works rather well.

It won't be too long before I head back and do all of that again. Devon is great, particularly when the sun is shining.

Bloody Brilliant

Last Sunday I bought some smooth black pudding at Totnes Good Food market.


Company: Native Breeds curers and charcutiers
Lydney Park Estate
info@nativebreeds.co.uk


Provenance: Rare breed free-range pork, Ragmans Lane organic apple juice, Sainthill Farm organic Jersey milk


Ingredients: Pork Blood, Pork Fat, Oats, Milk, Onions, Apple Juice, Water, Spices, Preservatives (s.ascorbate, s.metabisulphate)


Price: £1.66 (£12 per kg)

With it sitting in my fridge all week, the black beauty has been on my mind like a congealed blood clot in my brain. This morning I released the bleeding beast from its vacuum pack and gave it a new lease  of life in the frying pan. The cooking instructions on the packet suggested I poach it gently in the sealed packaging, but I wanted the texture of crispy charred edges from  it hanging out in a sizzling hot frying pan, so I invented my own rules.


To accompany the Boudin noir I fried a scoffy egg and slowly cooked some plum tomatoes with some tabasco & worcestershire sauce thrown in (bloody mary style to go with the bloody sausage). The bludding (made up word) itself was so big on flavour and richness, almost gamey with a serious sweetness going on (likely coming from the apple juice). Probably not the best thing to eat for breakfast as it's so epic in every way, but certainly the best black pudding I've ever had. Now I'm counting down the days til I can get my blood soaked hands on more of this elusive black barbarian. Next time I'll cook it as an evening meal, maybe with Puy lentils and a little orange zest (from a blood orange of course).

Cunting Corks

I think it's time to fuck tradition and get rid of cocking corks. 


About five years ago I took a little road trip down to Avignon with my sister and her family. We decided to take a detour to the famous wine village of Châteauneuf du Pape. Being English tourists, we seemed to get the cold French shoulder from everyone and found it very difficult to buy the wine, so we said "fuck you frogs" and left. On our way out of the village we saw a little shop and thought we'd give it one last try. The owner of the vineyard welcomed us in cracked open many bottles of amazing wine and we drank away. With me being a poor student I could only afford to buy a few bottles, my sister bought a few crates, but I decided to buy one very expensive 2003, which I've been saving for what seems to be a lifetime. This bottle has moved house with me four times now and I've carefully laid it down in a cool dark place on every occasion.

Because I upset my girlfriend last night I'm making it up to her by cooking a ribeye steak and thought I'd open this cherished bottle of 2003 Châteauneuf du Pape. The cunt was fucking corked. This has happened to me far to many times. Apparently 1-15% of bottles that use corks become corked to some degree. There is no advantage to using a cork, apart from in sparkling wines. So why bother?


If you do have the answer please let me know.

Jerky Off

This morning, I took a trip into my old home town of Totnes, as I'd heard there was a food market on. Actually it's called Totnes Good Food Sunday, which is a monthly market selling fine foods and it certainly isn't one of those god awful continental markets where you buy over priced stale bread, this market in like a mini Borough only without the cunts. Ok there are still cunts, just a different breed. While on the subject of breed, i bought some smooth black pudding (£1.60), which is made from rare breed pork and needs to be gently poached when cooking, should be interesting. Check out this market if you are in Totters on the 3rd Sunday of the month. Don't get me wrong, there is still the usual shit that you find at farmers markets, but this one is different, because I say so.


I can highly recommend the chorizo sausage wrap for £3, which is made with a barbecued sausage and tons of salad. This stall is always in Totnes and I've had it before, so I looked for something new. The market was small enough for me to do a loop and see everything before making my paramount selection of scoff. The Cockleshell Deli caught my eye, so I bought a brace of filo pastry pies(£2.50 each). One pork & one goats cheese, both had great flavor and were filled to the brim.


I also picked up a cheeky scotch egg from the Red Earth Kitchen (£1.75), which I'm going to eat later tonight when watching Wonders of the Universe, so I can't comment yet. Although I bet there is a planet that looks like a giant scotch egg and has a magma core made of egg yolk.

The star of the show was some spiced Beef Biltong from Howton Farm (Pictured above), it's basically a type of cured/dried meat similar to jerky. Afterwards I walked down Totnes high street in search of a pub where the biltong accompanied my pint of Admiral's Ale (Officially the best beer in the world) in the Royal Seven Stars. I sat by the roaring fire reading the Sunday papers, chomping & swigging away. Great stuff.

Coffee

Firstly, you need to download this zip file and listen to the episode of Bob Dylan's Theme Time Radio Hour on the subject of coffee - http://dl.dropbox.com/u/22454607/TTRH%20Season%201%20-%2005%20-%20Coffee.zip

This will help you get into the right frame of mind.

Ready?

I never really liked the flavour of coffee until about eight years ago when I tried a overly milky latte made with Monmouth coffee. It was pretty good, mainly because there was so much milk, the bitterness of the espresso was drowned in the creamy sweetness.

Where I work now sells Monmouth coffee and last Wednesday I went to Monmouth HQ to have barista training. Three and a half hours of intense teaching has given me the ability to produce a seriously good espresso.

Probably the most important aspect of the whole process is to grind the beans to the correct consistency, too course and the coffee will taste acidic and sharp, too fine and the coffee will taste bitter and burnt. When the grind is correct the coffee will be sweet and smooth. If you don't get the exact grind, you will never make a great espresso.

The second most important part is to stretch the milk correctly and get the bubbles to the perfect size. Always use full fat milk and never serve a coffee in a cup bigger than 8oz (I've heard Starbucks now sell a coffee larger the human stomach).

There are so many aspects to making good espresso I can't mention all of them, but the details are immense. For example the water should be exactly 91 degrees when passing through the coffee. But once you master the two points I've highlighted, grind and milk, you're on the road to making great stuff.

I was given a stove-top espresso pot for my birthday, but unfortunately it's impossible to produce a great coffee from these devices. You might as well use instant coffee and fuck off.

Fish & Chips

On a cold & wet February day what could be more depressing than visiting the seaside town of Paignton? Going to the 99p shop? Eating some greasy comfort food? Well, combining all three actually creates a fun day out.

We decided to go to the award winning Squires of Paignton for the best fish & chips in town. They probably are the best in town, although the establishment is far from stylish. My girlfriend and I both ordered the standard meal - Cod or Haddock, chips, mushy peas, bread and any 500ml soft drink, all for £5.95. Our food was served with cheap white sliced bread with Flora spread all over it (they advertised it was Flora, no cheap rubbish at Squires, award winning shit). I wasn't quite sure what to do with the bread, but because I'd paid for it, I was going to eat it and therefore made a chip sandwich laced with mushy peas (proper CHD). For a laugh my girlfriend sneakily ordered me a pickled egg, again, in proper northerner mentality I ate it because we'd paid for it. Deliciously sulfurous vinegary weirdness washed down with a Dr Pepper. Not much point in eating a pickled egg, unless it's battered and deep fried.

Actually Squires is pretty good and I shouldn't take the piss, they offer things like wheat free batter, which I assume is made from chickpea flour, and the quality of the meal was really good. But there are a few things which stop this place being good and the main problem is the clientele, at one point we over heard a chav scum-bag say in reference to the problems in Libya - "I don't know any of them, I'm not related to them, so why should I fucking care, I especially don't care when they're fucking darkies", this comment wasn't because the group of social lowlifes were having a political discussion, not that it would justify such ignorance, but the bloke was simply commenting on the BBC news which was being broadcast on a 50 inch plasma screen. I suppose the clientele can't eat unless there is a 50 inch screen in front of them. The other massive disappointment was to see 4 optics behind the counter serving some average spirits like Bells whisky and Tia Maria, again this is probably to service those lovely people who have such thoughtful opinions on global politics and come to Paignton for their holiday, because they don't own a passport.

I was also annoyed not to see any information or posters on Hugh's Fish Fight, as surely any fish shop is effected by the idiotic EU law on discards. I feel really hypocritical saying that as I had Cod, but that's not the point.

For the best fish & chips, Rick Stein's wins my award because the fish is always fresh and coated in beer batter, they fry in beef dripping, it's served with a slice of lemon and with homemade tartar sauce. That's award winning in my opinion and it cost no more than the average chippy, but best of all, you don't have to endure a 50 inch screen and the idiots which come with it.