Food & Drink Round-Up November 2019

In this post I share some of my food and drink highlights from last month, bringing together the best of the blog and my social media during November 2019.

Includes a controversial chilli, sustainable meat eating, tapas, South East Asian, Indian and Pakistani food and lots more.

Chai Spiced Biscuits

As I wrote in last month’s round-up, on my most recent appearance on BBC Radio Stoke’s foodie show The Takeaway, I enjoyed some chai spiced cake from my fellow dinner dater Josef of The Quarter Cafe in Hanley.

I’d already made a chai spice version of my Spiced Fruit Sourdough but, inspired by Josef, the first of November saw me making these chai spiced biscuits.

They may not be the most neatly decorated biscuits, but they tasted wonderful!

I the biscuits using my Basic Biscuit Dough recipe, adding chai spices to the mix. Sandwiching three together with vanilla buttercream, I dipped them into melted white chocolate. I sprinkled more chai spice over before the chocolate set.

The sweet buttercream and white chocolate were a great contrast to the peppery chai spices.

Forget Brexit: Chicken Chilli divides Britain

Okay, that’s a slight exaggeration. But my Chicken Chilli recipe did draw a couple of quizzical comments.

Someone suggested it sounded more like a korma than a chilli. And I was told by a Facebook follower that their son had made it, loved it, but was going to call it Mexican Curry.

Although so-called ‘white’ chillies, without the traditional tomato base or beef, are popular in the USA, they haven’t reached most people in Britain yet. Hence the confusion. But I think it’s got the potential to be a bit hit here.

My version has cannellini beans and sweetcorn as well as chunks of chicken. There’s a little cream, coriander leaf and lime juice too, which I think makes it lighter and more refreshing than your usual chilli. The flavours are definitely Tex-Mex, so I think a chilli is the best way to describe it.

I’d love more people to try my recipe and tell me what they think.

La Casona: Spain comes to The Moorlands

The Olive Tree on Buxton Road (formerly Sera & before that the Moss Rose), just outside Leek, closed in September. But it’s now a Spanish tapas restaurant called La Casona. Other half and I popped in one Sunday lunchtime to share a few dishes.

We enjoyed our garlic prawns, creamy chicken, patatas bravas, tender lamb chunks with spicy sauce, seafood paella and beef meatballs. We had a couple of simple desserts too: cheesecake and orange cake.

Prices were reasonable with most tapas dishes £5 – £6, seafood a little more.

It was pretty full when we went, so word is obviously getting out. We’ll definitely be going back, and I really recommend you give it a go.

The Good Life Meat Company

I’d been following The Good Life Meat Company on social media for a while and finally got around to buying some of their produce at the November Totally Locally Leek Sunday Supplement market.

Based in Sugnall, Staffordshire, they produce charcuterie and meat from their own traditionally reared livestock.

I sampled some of their gorgeous sausage and bought a pack, along with some spicy merguez made with mutton and free-range pork. Some fantastic looking pork mince from their Tamworth pigs went into my shopping bag too.

I used the merguez sausages in a shakshuka, pictured below. Shakshuka is a spicy North African stew of peppers and tomatoes with eggs baked on top. The merguez had a good hit of chilli and added great flavour to the stew.

I used this shakshuka recipe which includes merguez-spiced lamb meatballs. But the method is basically the same with sausages too. If using merguez instead of meatballs, make up the spice mix as directed, but instead of using it to flavour lamb mince just add as much as you like to the sauce instead of the listed cumin, coriander and paprika.

I used half the pork mince to make burgers flavoured with sage and garlic. I’ll be posting the recipe on the blog soon. UPDATE: get the recipe for Pork Burgers with Sage, Garlic & Stilton here.

A Bit of Christmas Preparation

Christmas isn’t a big deal in our house, but I do like a good mince pie. And for me that means making my own Christmas Mincemeat.

Mincemeat needs a few weeks to mature, so I made mine at the beginning of November.

It’s incredibly easy. First off, soak the ingredients overnight. Besides dried fruit, in mine there’s orange, lemon, spices, apple, nuts, suet and brandy. Next day, put in a low oven for a couple of hours.

I stir in another glug of brandy before popping the mincemeat into clean, warm jars and that’s it. Leave until mid-December and make the best mince pies ever.

Used Cookery Books

Do you love finding evidence of previous owners in used books?

Maybe just a neatly written name on the flyleaf and some underlining. Or, in cookery books, splashes of sauce or perhaps recipes satisfyingly ticked off as the owner cooked them.

In November, I shared my favourite find, from an old copy of French Country Cooking by Elizabeth David.

I thoroughly enjoyed writing that piece and want to make time for more of this type of post alongside my more regular reviews and recipes.

Read Used Cookery Books: A Window Into Others’ Lives here

Breaking the Preserve ‘Rule’

Last month I discovered a jar of Pear & Walnut Chutney, dating from June 2016, hiding at the back of the cupboard. I decided to have some of the sweet-tart preserve spooned over Stilton on toast where it was a great contrast to the salty, strong cheese.

I joked that this was two fingers to all those annoying homemade preserve recipes that say ‘use within a year’. That oft quoted ‘rule’ really is nonsense and just encourages waste.

A proper chutney like this needs at least two to three months maturing before you’d even think about eating it. I reckon it’s still only a teenager at the twelve months mark.

Picturedrome Macclesfield

As someone who loves old films almost as much as food, I knew I’d be an early visitor to Picturedrome in Macclesfield which opened at the end of October.

Inside this converted cinema dating from 1911, you’ll find a food hall with a range of independent food and drink companies.

While not at the budget end of the market, Picturedrome shouldn’t break the bank either. There’s quality food, handmade and with careful choice of ingredients.

Actually, I almost feel guilty posting again the image above of the delicious Florentine bar I ate at Picturedrome. One of my regular correspondents, a former professional baker, has been working her socks off trying to replicate it, but it’s so far eluded her (to her meticulous standards anyway). My advice: head over to Macclesfield and buy one 😁.

Read my blog post about Picturedrome Macclesfield here

Wat Wok at The Bank House Hixon

Wat Wok serves up authentic, incredible-tasting South East Asian food. They’re regulars at street food events with their pop-up kitchen, but right now you can enjoy their exquisite dishes in a restaurant setting during their residence at The Bank House, Hixon on Friday and Saturday nights.

I was invited to try them out and loved it. There were old favourites like spring rolls and chicken satay taken to a new level of deliciousness, as well as dishes new to me cooked by Cambodian chef Lina.

I highly recommend them. Read my review of Wat Wok at The Bank House Hixon here.

Meat: A Threat To Our Planet?

The day after it aired, I caught up with the BBC programme Meat: A Threat To Our Planet? and could immediately see why it was causing such heated discussion.

I agree with those who say the programme rightly highlighted the devasting effect industrialised, global meat production is having on the environment, biodiversity and so forth.

But my problem is that the worst intensive farming practices, such as those in the USA and Brazil, were presented as if they are the norm for meat production everywhere. They aren’t.

It certainly isn’t how the meat I buy from local British farms, and which I recommend on here, is raised.

Consequently, I thought the programme was utterly unbalanced for a British audience. Other than not eating meat at all (and I wonder whether this can be done sustainably with no animal inputs such as manure), the programme’s only solution seemed to be: raise your own chickens, hit them on the head with a stick, then break their neck. Really?

Ironically, a couple of days before I watched the programme, I’d posted this picture on my social media:

It’s what I’d bought from my latest visit to Denstone Hall Farm Shop where I regularly stock up for the freezer. It includes free range pork, chicken and eggs as well as grass fed beef.

Pretty much all of this produce is from my local county of Staffordshire. The one exception may be the black pudding. But even the grapes for the bottle of wine were grown in Staffordshire!

I don’t know how long this lot will last, probably a good while, along with lamb from Troutsdale Farm. Main meals in our house tend to be Monday: fish, Tuesday: vegetarian/vegan, Wednesday: vegetarian/vegan, Thursday: chicken, Friday: fish, Saturday and Sunday: any of the above, but at least one will usually be red meat.

I don’t think that’s excessive. And I’ve yet to be convinced that produce like this, consumed in moderate amounts, can’t be sustainable.

Great British Game Week

Another meat not produced by the methods shown in the BBC programme is wild game.

The week of 25 November – 1 December 2019 was Great British Game Week and I took the opportunity to re-share my recipe for Venison Stew with Suet Dumplings.

The stew is rich, comforting and a good introduction to game or perfect for those who don’t like a strong gamey flavour.

Soup Season Continues

Although the astronomical start of Winter doesn’t come until the solstice on 22 December 2019, the meteorological Winter started the day I’m writing this, 1 December.

That’s a roundabout way of saying there’s still a fair way to go before we’re out of soup season.

My latest favourite is Roasted Red Pepper & Borlotti Bean Soup. Making use of jarred roasted peppers that capture some of the Summer sunshine, this vibrant and nutritious soup has a little warming heat from chilli plus smoked paprika. It’s proper comfort food with some crunchy garlic croutons and grated cheese over each bowlful.

Brioche

I baked some brioche, which is dough enriched with butter and eggs, for the first time this November. For some unknown reason I also decided to give myself the extra challenge of making it into a plaited loaf.

The brioche wasn’t exactly how I’d like it; I’d prefer it lighter and a bit less sweet. But I was still pleased with my first effort.

Guess I’ll just have to keep making – and eating – it!

Master Chef inspired Schnitzel Holstein

Fans of MasterChef: The Professionals may have seen a recent skills test of schnitzel Holstein. It reminded me that I hadn’t made schnitzel for ages, so I thought I’d have a go at it.

You’ll probably have heard of wiener schnitzel which is a slice of veal, flattened then coated in flour, egg and crumbs prior to frying.

This version, new to me, is chicken cooked the same way but with a fried egg on top plus a butter sauce with capers in it. There should be anchovies on the plate too, but I decided to ‘melt’ them into the sauce instead.

Nice, but the egg and sauce did make the crumb less crispy.

Kitchen Chronicles

On the last day of November, I had some wonderful food which left me both happy and sad.

Happy because, following a recommendation from a Facebook follower, I had some wonderful Indian and Pakistani food at Kitchen Chronicles in Stoke on Trent. It included the heavenly Grazing Platter you see below.

But I was sad when I learned they were in the process of moving to Stockport, much further away from me.

I’ll be writing more on the blog when they’re up and running, but I had to include them here as they really were one of the top highlights of my November, along with Wat Wok.

The Grazing Platter (incredible value at £7.50) included Dahi Puri (puffed pastry with potatoes and yogurt), Sev Puri (pastry with onions and tamarind chutney) and Bhel Puri (dish in the centre: underneath the puffed rice and crispy pastry there’s potatoes, soft chickpeas and juicy chutney).

But as well as the wonderful food, as with Wat Wok, I again met some incredible people. I had an interesting chat with co-owner Amina and the passion for what she is doing was so impressive. She even made me a sublime milk pudding, not on the menu, to take home!

I’m sure I’ll see Amina and her husband again soon, and I definitely recommend you give Kitchen Chronicles a try if you’re in reach of Stockport. Watch this space for further details.

I hope you enjoyed my highlights for November. Follow me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to hear about my December food & drink.

All images © Moorlands Eater & not to be reproduced without permission