My eating out highlights for August 2021

My eating out highlights for August 2021 is the latest in a series of occasional posts bringing together some of the great food and drink I’ve enjoyed recently.

I’d love to be able to write full blog reviews for all of them. But I’d have no time to do anything else!

So, here’s the highlights. Recommended independent cafes, pubs, restaurants, takeaways and street markets which might otherwise only be seen on my social media.

I hope you enjoy my eating out highlights for August 2021 and will try some of my recommended venues. Or perhaps revisit those you haven’t been back to in a while.

TOTALLY LOCALLY LEEK SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT

The first day of August found me at the Totally Locally Leek Sunday Supplement market.

Usually held on the first Sunday of the month, the Staffordshire Moorlands town comes alive with stalls of food, drink and crafts. There’s music, entertainment, and the many independent shops, cafes, bars, restaurants, galleries etc. open up too.

Of course, COVID meant that this fantastic market wasn’t held for many months up until July this year.

Although I couldn’t make the July Sunday Supplement, I made up for it by coming back with quite a haul of goodies in August!

If you wanted to be picky, you could say not all of them represent ‘eating out’. But tying them up together here makes sense to me.

PUDDING COMES FIRST

First stop was the PUNX Puds stall. I know their fab bread and butter puddings, chock full of fruit, sell out quickly. So, I wanted to make sure I got one to stash in the freezer.

Mind you, it didn’t get to stay there long. We ate it the next Sunday with lots of pouring cream added after this pic was taken.

HIGH WELFARE MEAT

Then it was on to see Helen at The Good Life Meat Company stall and pick up the items I’d ordered online.

I got coppa made with free range pork and cured with black pepper, fennel & juniper, plus some North African style merguez mutton and pork sausages.

I’d meant to add some of their ‘nduja: a spicy, spreadable salami. Luckily, there was a couple of packs left on the stall.

The merguez made a fantastic dinner a couple of nights later: the spicy North African stew of peppers and tomatoes topped with eggs known as shakshuka.

It was basically the same as my blog recipe for shakshuka except instead of using merguez spices to flavour lamb mince, I added the spices and the griddled sausages to the bubbling stew.

The sausages were lovely and spicy. And writing this has reminded me that there’s a couple left in the freezer 😋.

Talking of feeling hungry, back at the Sunday Supplement, by this time I was about due a snack.

SNACK TIME

Other half (ID) had treated himself to a freshly cooked Thai noodle dish from Nui’s Kitchen and, while waiting for it, I spotted ‘chicken toasts’ on the menu.

We decided to share a box of these little delights. Just like prawn toasts, but with spicy chicken. Yum!

After a bit of spice, what could be nicer than a bit of sugar?

SCRUMBLES CAKES

Right next to Nui’s food truck was the Scrumbles Cake Shop stall. ‘I’ll just get a couple’, I thought. Then, ‘maybe four. We can have one each for tomorrow too’.

But then I saw you got a discount if you bought six. How could I resist?

So I came back with wonderful cakes flavoured with: salted caramel, Bakewell slice, triple chocolate, milky way, jammy dodger, and milky bar.

Naughty Scrumbles, making me do that!

BEER

Next stop was the Titanic Brewery stall to top up my stash of their dark beers.

I love stout so went for half a dozen bottles including smooth and creamy Chocolate & Vanilla Stout and, channelling my inner Ena Sharples, Milk Stout.

FATIMA’S KITCHEN

Finally, before heading home I stopped at Fatima’s Kitchen with its array of homemade breads, pastries and mezze.

For lunch I got one of her mezze boxes with hummus, beetroot moutabal, garlicky yogurt, falafel and flatbread.

So enjoyable, the following week it inspired me to make my own version of Aubergine & Beetroot Moutabal.

To eat for dinner later that night, I bought two of her gorgeous feta and onion pide I’d first tried at the Castle Artisan Market in Newcastle-Under-Lyme.

Always generous, Fatima also treated me to two flatbreads: one with za’atar spices and one with herbs and chillies.

It had been great to see so many people out and about supporting and enjoying local independent food and drink.

Did you miss the August Sunday Supplement? The next one will be held Sunday 5th September 10.30am – 3pm.

Follow The Sunday Supplement on Facebook to hear about future dates.

BIRTHDAY DINNER AT THE OLD MILL SMOKEHOUSE

ID has his birthday in August and the venue he chose for his special dinner was The Old Mill smokehouse and craft ale bar in Leek.

This met with my hearty approval as it’s one of those places I’m always happy to go to. In fact, I’ve already given it THREE blog posts!

I was pretty impressed by the lunchtime burger on my first visit and had a great time at their Whisky Night held jointly with Distilled Events. During lockdown I’d had some pretty good takeaways from The Old Mill too.

Arriving early, we had a drink in the downstairs bar before going up to the restaurant with its chicken, cow and pig mural by Dr Curly.

NACHOS

To start, we shared a bowl of nachos. These come with all the fixings (guacamole, sour cream, Staffordshire cheese) plus a choice of toppings.

We went for goats cheese and smoked peppers.

Good job we decided to share, as it was a VERY generously sized portion.

The tangy goats cheese was a great contrast to the richly smoky peppers. All the lovely extras were well distributed too so there was none of my pet hate: naked nachos!

SHARING PLATTER

For our main course we had the Smokehouse Sharing Platter which turned out to be incredibly good value.

The meats were:

• slices of 24 hour smoked beef brisket: tender, great flavour.
• half rack of 5 hour smoked baby back ribs: soft meat with just the right balance of sweetness, savouryness and mild heat.
• hand pulled pork with barbecue sauce: beautifully cooked, full flavoured and a nice surprise at the bottom of the bowl (just when we thought we couldn’t eat any more) sweet and smoky pit beans
  

Non-meat goodies that came with the platter were:

• nice chunky chips
• a BIG bowl of crispy frickles (fried pickles) and juicy onion rings
• salad
• gherkins
• coleslaw

Service was swift and friendly. From our table near the tiny open kitchen, we could see the team working their socks off to send out great quality food to a full restaurant.

A real treat for us both, not just the birthday boy.

LUNCH AT PRIMO PIANO

Another great independent restaurant in Leek that had kept us going during lockdown by switching to takeaways is Primo Piano.

But it was lovely to be back in the restaurant again one Saturday lunchtime in August.

Situated on Sheep Market, the central location is a great spot for a drink and a bite to eat while shopping in the town.

I went for a glass of wine and one of their great pizzas.

You can pick any three toppings from a good range, and I chose pancetta, mushroom and goats cheese.

I prefer a ‘white’ pizza so, as I do at various places, asked for it without tomato sauce.

I said an extra drizzle of olive oil instead would be fine, but they came back from the kitchen and asked if I’d like a little bechamel sauce.

Well, that turned out to be an excellent idea! Creamy, smoky, bacony, cheesy with good mushroom favour, this was just about my perfect pizza.

As always, this friendly place never fails to please.

PERFECT EGG & BACON SARNIE

I see that my eating out highlights for August have been very Leek focussed so far. After all, it is my nearest town.

But I did venture a little further afield for the next one.

One Sunday morning, we went out to beautiful wooded Dimmingsdale to walk with the dog.

Afterwards, like many others, we regularly stop off for breakfast, brunch or lunch at the famous Rambler’s Retreat.

The family run tearoom is set in an impressive former gatehouse of the Alton Abbey Estate. This year, they’re celebrating 4o years of serving up tea, cakes, scones and more to locals and visitors.

Round the back are pretty, dog friendly, woodland gardens complete with summer houses to sit in when the weather’s not so good.

But it was a warm, sunny day so we sat in the little lawned area at a table with welcome dappled shade.

I’ll admit I was a bit disappointed that they weren’t currently offering their full English breakfast. But that soon disappeared when my egg and bacon sandwich arrived.

There were heaps of good quality bacon and a perfectly fried runny (but not too runny) egg. Like much of the Rambler’s menu, ingredients are sourced from local suppliers.

If you have a sweet tooth, then try one of their homemade cakes or scones or the legendary, mile-high lemon meringue!

BREAKFAST AT THE COUNTRY KITCHEN

Something eggy and piggy also turned up in my next eating out highlight.

After dropping the dog off at the groomers, we nipped out to the Cottage Kitchen Country Café at Winkhill for brunch.

I had very good Eggs Benedict: a toasted English muffin with lots of thick, hand-cut ham, poached local eggs and a hollandaise sauce.

ID had Eggs Florentine which is the same except the ham was replaced by lots of fresh, wilted spinach.

At the Cottage Kitchen, you always get a little sweet treat with your drink. And I don’t mean one of those plastic-wrapped biscuits.

My Americano came with a little square of their famous and fantastically spicy crumbly gingerbread.

If you’re looking for a picture though, I’m sorry. The few crumbs on my saucer are all there is to see. So tempting, I gobbled it up before I took the photo. Oops!

FALAFEL WRAP

If you saw my eating out highlights for June-July, you’ll know that I had an admirable falafel wrap from Gallagher’s Deli in Leek.

So good, I’ve since had another, this time including mozzarella. The falafel are lightly spicy and come with a fab hummus plus spinach.

The difference in August was that the wrap was from Gallagher’s new menu with smaller sized options and smaller prices to match. I thought it was a real bargain: just £3.50 but you still get lots of filling including two big falafel.

Taking a break from working in the garden, it made a satisfying lunch with a bottle of the Titanic milk stout I bought at the Sunday Supplement market.

CAN DO COCINA

On the final Saturday night of August, I went out for tapas at Can Do Cocina in Trentham.

Only open a few months, and offering familiar as well as more unusual dishes, I found it tasty and reasonably priced.

Read my review of Can Do Cocina here

BANK HOLIDAY ICE CREAM (AND ANOTHER GALLAGHER’S SANDWICH!)

Living on the edge of the Staffordshire Peak District, we have to be careful where we go for a walk on August Bank Holiday Monday.

Pick the wrong place and you could be surrounded by people and cars. But the Manifold Way is a great choice with many parts of it little known to day-trippers.

After a leisurely walk along the former railway, we headed down to Wootton and Dalton’s Dairy.

Set on the family-run Shawcross farm, Dalton’s produces amazing quality products using milk from their grass-fed cows.

I wrote about their butter and cheese in a blog post last year and on the Bank Holiday visited The Hatch: a cute shack selling coffee, cold drinks, cakes and their ice-cream.

But that weekend they were offering three sandwiches from Gallagher’s Deli too. After having had the falafel wrap only a couple of days before, I was still up for another!

We both had the Italian sub and loved it. Salami, turkey, cheese, sauerkraut, watercress, and plenty of mustard.

After that, it was time to sample the famous Dalton’s Spinner.

This is a cone of their fantastically creamy vanilla ice cream whizzed up with frozen fruit.

I had a blackcurrant one and ID had blackcurrant, strawberry and blackberry all whizzed together. Both tasted every bit as good as they look!

There’s also an honesty shop on site where you can buy more lovely stuff including small tubs of ice-cream, big tubs to take home, eggs, preserves and milk. I bought a slab of their sensational butter.

Sitting at the picnic tables, it’s a lovely spot after a walk whether you want ice cream or just a coffee.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading my eating out highlights for August 2021 and that I’ve inspired you to try some of them for yourself.

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Wherever you live, please support your local independent food and drink.

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