Flavour South West Issue 59

for people who love local food

South West | Issue 59

www.flavourmagazine.com

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Prizes - including an overnight stay at Bovey Castle!

INSIDE

Your regular Greenliving edition

Schools Revisited

Catering qualifications, cookery competitions and more

Afternoon Tea

Follow us @FlavourMagazine

Celebrate this quintessentially British tradition

Get ready for summer

with Bradley’s juices and drinks

Single variety 100% apple juices

• No added water, sugar, sweeteners or flavourings • All made using the very best handpicked apples and pressed in small batches on the farm in Somerset • Taste the freshness of apples in a bottle • Gold Star winners at Great Taste 2012 with our Cox and Bramley, Apple and Rhubarb and Apple and Ginger juices

Quench, quaffable, handmade juice drinks

• Ginger Beer; naturally brewed using fresh root ginger • Elderflower Presse; exquisite and delightfully refreshing drink

• Traditional Sicilian Lemonade; a luscious, zingy, lemony flavour • NEW Sparkling Lime and Ginger and Apple and Raspberry complete the range.

You can also enjoy our great-tasting natural orange juice!

www.bradleysjuice.co.uk

Call: 01934 822356 Email: info@bradleysjuice.co.uk

Editor Emily Knight Email: emily@flavourmagazine.com Art Director Becky Hamblin Email: design@flavourmagazine.com

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Advertising Miranda Coller, Director of Sales Email: miranda@flavourmagazine.com Maggie Fox, Account Manager Email: maggie@flavourmagazine.com Photography Jeni Meade

welcome

Contributors Martin Blunos, Tom Bowles, Nick Harman, Duncan Shine, Megan Owen, Mitch Tonks, Laura Roberts, Angela Mount, Rob Magnuson Smith Flavour Magazine 151-153 Wick Road, Brislington, Bristol, BS4 4HH Tel: 0117 977 9188 | Visit: www.flavourmagazine.com For general enquiries Peter Francomb Email: peter@flavourmagazine.com For competition entries Email: competitions@flavourmagazine.com © Copyright 2013 flavourmagazine.com All rights reserved. Material may not be reproduced without permission of flavour. While we take care to ensure that reports, reviews and features are accurate, flavourmagazine.com accepts no liability for reader dissatisfaction arising from the content of this publication.

The opinions expressed or advice given are the views of the individual authors, and do not necessarily represent the views or policies of flavourmagazine.com

flavour magazine provides effective communication through design. We specialise in brochures, corporate identity, advertising, direct mail, marketing and design for print.

We have a reputation for clear, creative solutions to communication problems for a number of corporate, sports, financial, charity and leisure industry clients.

We maintain the highest of standards throughout each individual project and our client relationship.

We pride ourselves on delivering distinctive designs and ideas that will get you noticed.

For more information, please contact Peter Francomb Tel. 0117 977 9188 Email: peter@flavourmagazine.com Visit: www.flavourmagazine.com Competition Terms & Conditions In addition to any specifically stated terms and conditions, the following applies to all competitions.

All information forms part of the rules. All entrants are deemed to have accepted the rules and agree to be bound by them. The winner will be the first entry drawn at random from all the entries sent back after the closing date and will be notified by either post, email or telephone. The prizes are as stated; they are non-transferable and no cash alternative will be offered. All entrants must be at least 18 years old. Competitions are open to UK residents only. One entry per person. Proof of postage is not proof of entry. flavour accepts no responsibility for entries lost or damaged in the post. Entrants agree to take part in any publicity material relating to the competition. The name of the winner will be published in the next edition. The judge’s decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into.

Prizes do not include unspecified extras (such as travel). All prizes are subject to availability.

Please state if you do not wish to receive any further correspondence from flavour or competition organisers. You may be required to collect your prize.

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Inside...

10 In Season

Tom Bowles brings us the best of the season’s produce 19 Barbecue Summer

Enjoy some outdoor grilling action this summer 33 Festival Season Our roundup of this summer’s top food and drink festivals 45 Everything Stops For Tea Celebrate this quintessentially British tradition in style 52 Kilted Chef, Bath

Emily Knight samples Dougie Bonar’s contemporary British menu 67 Healthy Education Revisited

Catering qualifications, cookery competitions, schoolgrown produce and more

Summertime is finally with us – although from the lack of sun recently, maybe we’re being a little optimistic…

One thing we do know is that festival season is most definitely upon us. Our festival round up (page 33) is all you need to ensure that you make the best of the South West’s great foodie events this summer – there’s a lot going on!

We’ve joined others in dusting off our barbecues to celebrate this great British summer tradition, and our barbecue feature (page 19) should provide you with some top hints and recipes to make your barbecue go with a bang.

Speaking of great British traditions, there really is nothing like indulging in sandwiches, cakes and scones for a good old-fashioned afternoon tea. Our tea feature (page 45) should whet your appetite and give you some ideas of great local places to enjoy such a treat – even with a glass of fizz, if you fancy!

Healthy schools are back with a vengeance (page 67), and you’ll also find a wedding guide (page 59) alongside our regular features.

And – last but not least – we’re keen to get your feedback to find out how we can make flavour better. By filling out our reader survey, you’ll not only contribute to improving the magazine, but will have the chance to win a bundle of cookery books. Simply visit www.tinyurl.com/ flavoursurvey to take part.

Happy reading!

Emily

EMILY KNIGHT

If you have any news or events that you would like to share with us here at flavour then email enquiries@flavourmagazine.com

this month Jon Thorner’s Champion Pie Local pie producer Jon Thorner’S has won a stream of top prizes at two pie competitions

The Pylle-based butcher’s Beef and Guinness pie took champion status in the ‘Beef and any flavour combination’ category at the British Pie Awards, hosted in Melton Mowbray last month, while at meat industry EBLEX’s ‘England’s Best Steak Pie’ competition, Jon Thorner’s received awards for every pie they entered. Their Beef and Red Wine won gold in its category and will now go through to the final round of judging to find the overall champion. The other winning flavours were Beef and Stilton, Steak and Kidney, Steak and Butcombe Ale, and Beef and Guinness.

John Emery, the head chef at Jon Thorner’s said, “The British Pie Awards has entries from all over the country, so to be awarded the best pie in a category out of all those entries is just fantastic and then to find out we have won five more at another national pie competition, just confirms we are making great pies!” www.jonthorners.co.uk Pic: Jon Thorner, left, and head chef John Emery with the British Pie Awards trophy and winning pie.

Bristol Street Food Comes of Age A group of street food traders have come together to launch a range of exciting new free evening events in Bristol. Bristol EATS – or BEATS – launched its first event at Lakota in St. Paul’s on the evening of April 25, with plans to run at Lakota on Thursdays throughout the summer.

BEATS is a true Bristol-based street food collective, created by a group of street food traders including Bagel Boy, Kebab Revolution, Meat & Bread, Pizza Monkey, Vee Double Moo, CUPP and Viet Vite.

BEATS aims to build a unique reputation on the national street food scene by offering the best in street food alongside the region’s best up-and-coming music, artists and performers, plus licensed bar facilities to create a free street food party event for Bristol.

Commenting for BEATS, Bridget Pilkington from Vee Double Moo said: “We want BEATS events to capture the atmosphere of a carnival or street party. BEATS and

Lakota is an exciting combination – great music, drinking and some of the best fresh new street food on the South West scene.

Free entry, great local food, drinking, music, art… We have a feeling our events are going to be right up Bristol’s street!”

Adding to the permanent Thursday night market at Lakota, BEATS will also host a street food area as part of the Big Green Week Market on 22 June. St. Stephen’s Street will become BEATS HQ for the day, giving hungry visitors the opportunity to spend the whole day sampling the range of fresh, delicious food available. A bar and music stage will be provided by Mr Wolf’s to provide a complete outdoor socialising experience. Again, entry is free.

BEATS will also be coming soon to The Apple on Welsh Back for regular Friday night food parties.

More information is available online at www.bristoleats.co.uk or @Bristol_Eats on Twitter

COMPETITION WINNERS

Congratulations go to Lucy Greenberry from Bristol, who wins a luxury escape to the Exeter Festival of South West Food and Drink Congratulations also go to Liz Keeping from Blagdon and John Coombe from Bristol who have each won evening tickets for VegFestUK

Well done!

as

The Science of Spice @ Meluha

Wine OF THE

MONTH

Indian cuisine gets the molecular treatment from Cobra Good Curry Guide Chef of the Year Stephen Gomes.

Placed in the beautiful location of 51 Park Street everything in Meluha is designed with a journey through the senses in mind. The menu is presented in chapters, to lead diners through an exploration of flavours and scents and for the adventurous, Meluha’s Gourmet Taster menus are a fivecourse ‘blind serving’ of the chef’s choice; a profusion of bubbles, foam and clouds of spices.

Winner of the Cobra Good Food Guide chef of the year 2007/8, 9/10 and 12/13 Stephen Gomes was born a third generation chef. Raised and trained in Mumbai he travelled throughout the Indian sub-continent before attending Westminster College.

Speaking about the opening of Meluha he commented: “I always wanted to evolve my commitment to Indian cuisine when the time was right, and we felt the food scene in Bristol was perfect for this. When using food science alongside authentic Indian dishes it is a little more difficult as there are a lot of spices and it’s all about balance. I wanted to ensure the result was as delicious as it was visually enchanting, after all that’s the beauty of India itself!”

Meluha 51 Park Street, Bristol BS1 5NT Call 0117 930 4693 www.meluha.co.uk

Tim McLaughlin-Green, sommelier and wine consultant of Sommelier’s Choice, was shortlisted for the Harpers & Queen Sommelier of the Year award. His philosophy is to search for and work with family-owned wineries, producing high-quality wines in small quantities, aiming for something really special.

This month’s wine choice is most definitely influenced by my wife. Sometimes you just have to be obedient! Many years ago, sharing a first growth claret with friends, my wife said, ”I don’t like this,” as you do. We proceeded to present her with a bottle of 1979 Stag’s Leap Cabernet Sauvignon, and we had one very happy lady. Well with this experience in my memory, and recently celebrating a milestone birthday for my wife, I decided to order an American wine. What a find, I just had to share it with you!

L’Ecole No41, 2009 Cabernet Sauvignon Walla Walla Valley from Washington State. I can honestly say I ordered a case immediately; the wine is new to the United Kingdom, only a few discerning wine merchants have their hands on some bottles.

The L’Ecole 2009 has an elegant old world structure. So many American reds are just blockbusters and have no charm, but this is completely the opposite. This is a sophisticated Cabernet Sauvignon that is immediately showy, the first aromas are very pleasing with dark fruit and fresh herbs. The palate is a continuation of the aromas with blackberry and plum fruit with notes of leather, a richly structured finish is very rewarding.

The dilemma I had was that my wife wanted T-bone steak and I ordered turbot - this wine was not out of place and seemed to accompany both dishes. Perhaps I was enjoying the wine so much that I didn’t care whether the wine worked with the food or not! I do recommend that you decant this wine and enjoy.

Stockists General wine of Liphook, Handford wines, Planet of Grapes and Philglass & Swiggot. RRP £40.80

All wines available from:

www.sommelierschoice.com

> flavour this month

Local food and drink suppliers ‘raleigh’ around Bike Bath 2013 Described as a cycling weekend to remember, Bike Bath, now in its second year, will take place on June 22 and 23 and is championed by Charles Stanley Direct and their friends from the world of fund management.

Registration is now open through the Bike Bath website for rides of 20, 30, 60 and 100 miles.

The routes on Saturday head to the south of Bath and the course is described as ‘rolling’ and will all incorporate Britain’s longest cycle tunnel which recently opened in Bath. £1 from every rider is being donated to Sustrans, the charity behind the tunnel. All routes will have a series of feed stations which feature gourmet produce from local food and drink suppliers and first aiders and mechanics will be on hand should there be any problems.

On Sunday, routes of 30, 60 and 100 miles head north to the Cotswolds, with another array of fantastic feed stations.

Those completing the Bike Bath Gladiator (both 100 mile rides) will receive a congratulatory gift from Bath Ales, and Michelin-starred chef Rob Clayton will again prepare the end of ride food available to all riders.

You can register for the event by visiting www.bikebath.co.uk or emailing info@bikebath.co.uk 6

Chef’s Diary Gordon Jones is head chef at Bath’s Menu Gordon Jones – a restaurant offering ‘surprise menus’ for lunch and dinner. Flavour caught up with Gordon to see what’s currently on the agenda…

We’ve been in business now for almost a year and a half and are so pleased with the reception we have had! The Good Food Guide has listed us as the frontrunners to win the best restaurant in the South West, I’m so chuffed!

After such a hard year and a half, I also thought it would be about time to show appreciation for our lovely staff, Felix, Sarah and Melisa, which is why we are having our very first team building day in May! This also provides us with an opportunity to say thank you to our hostess Sarah, who is now leaving us for Geneva. Jacek Milczarek of the Michelin-starred Manor House at Castle Combe, who worked with me for years at The Royal Crescent Hotel, is starting with us soon in the restaurant manager role and we cannot wait to see what he has up his sleeve!

I, on the other hand, have been engrossed with the arrival of lots of spring produce: Wye Valley asparagus, wild garlic and soon gull eggs! Hopefully I can do all this produce justice and create some exciting new dishes in the coming weeks. I would tell you exactly what dishes these will be but that would take away the surprise! But just so you know, I doubt that it’ll be an omelette. www.menugordonjones.co.uk

> flavour this month

Karma Korma Raises over £4,000 for Bristol charity FRANK Water.

The Seahorse in Dartmouth crowned as The Good Food Guide Readers’ Restaurant of the Year for the South West

To celebrate World Water Day on 22 March, Bristol-based charity FRANK Water launched Karma Korma, their first fundraising campaign of 2013. FRANK Water asked people to cook up a curry for their friends in return for the price of a takeaway to support FRANK Water’s clean water projects in rural India. Dozens of supporters signed up to host their own Karma Korma curry night and received a spicy fundraising pack complete with recipe and authentic spices, donated by local company Bart Ingredients.

The event spread as far afield as Singapore and the French Alps, where a whole village got together. Back in Bristol, the biggest party was at The Adventurists’ head office, which involved live Bhangra music, a dance troupe, two tonnes of sand and food and drink from the Thali Café and Kingfisher!

The award-winning Thali Café also donated £1 per customer on World Water Day, while Bath-based spice experts The Spicery and tea aficionados Tea Pigs showed their support by donating a percentage of their sales to FRANK Water throughout the month of March.

The event raised a total of £4,006.60, but FRANK want to bump up the total to be able to fund a complete clean water project that typically costs around £5,200.

If you’ve been inspired to host an event, you don’t have to wait until next year. Visit www.frankwater.com/karma-korma to sign up. Or to swim a mile or run a marathon for FRANK Water, email hello@frankwater.com to find out more.

Photo: HARRY BORDEN

FRANK Water founder Katie Alcott said: “We are thrilled with the response to our first Karma Korma, the idea that fundraising can be about sharing food and spending time with your friends has been really popular. We’re already starting to think about how next year can be even bigger and better.”

Becoming one of the regional winners in the awards is a prestigious accolade for The Seahorse as the awards are based on nominations from tens of thousands of members of the public who support their favourite local eateries.

Mat Prowse and Mitch Tonks, owners & chefs at The Seahorse, were delighted to win the award, commenting: “How wonderful to have the readers of one of the most respected food guides vote for us as the best restaurant in our whole region. We’ve worked together for over 12 years and still love what we do, so we are very lucky that others love it too, thank you to all who voted for us.”

The Seahorse is one of ten regional winners from around the UK, one of whom will go on to be named as the overall Good Food Guide Readers’ Restaurant of the Year 2014. www.seahorserestaurant.co.uk 7

© philscoble.co.uk

Fir Mount House · Higher Contour Road · Kingswear · DEVON · TQ6 0DE · 01803 752943 · mannafromdevon.com · info@mannafromdevon.com

facebook.com/mannafromdevon

@mannafromdevon

Flavour_BFC_mar13.pdf 05/03/2013 Woodfired Ovens · Bread Making · 12:24:54 Fish Cooking · Mediterranean Food · Asian Cooking · Family Classes

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Flavour Giveaways

> flavour giveaways

Be in with a chance to win some tasty treats in our giveaway draws this month

WIN a meal for four and a hamper from Bill’s in Bath!

“Relaxed and inviting” is how flavour described Bill’s Restaurant in Bath in a recent review – and one lucky winner will get the chance to enjoy a great prize!

For your chance to win a meal for four (worth up to £100) at Bill’s in Bath plus a hamper packed full of fantastic Bill’s own label products, simply email competitions@flavourmagazine.com with Bill’s Competition in the subject header and your full contact details in the email body. www.bills-website.co.uk

WIN a stay at Bovey Castle flavour has teamed up with Bovey Castle to offer one lucky reader the chance to win a one-night, mid-week stay in a luxurious Classic bedroom for two people, including full English breakfast and champagne afternoon tea on arrival.

WIN tickets to Croissant Neuf Summer Party Croissant Neuf Summer Party is the greenest festival in the UK after recently winning the title for the third time at the UK Festival Awards. With a line-up of music, crafts, circus and more, flavour have a pair of tickets for the Monmouthshire festival to give away.

The festival takes place between August 8 and 11– to enter, email competitions@flavourmagazine.com with Croissant Neuf in the subject header and your full contact details in the email body. www.cnsp.co.uk

A stay at Bovey Castle is a unique experience of true English luxury.

From the tailored tweed plus four trousers worn by the hotel concierge to the apples and sloes gathered from the estate to make traditional cider and gin, Bovey Castle draws its contemporary and luxurious appeal from the manor house’s rich heritage and the surrounding ancient moorland.

Afternoon tea is a dramatic feast of traditional English and continental delicacies, complemented by fine teas and toasted with Champagne – Bovey Castle’s modern interpretation of this elegant teatime affair.

Served in the Cathedral Room or out on the sun-soaked South Terrace, it is truly unmissable.

To enter, email competitions@flavourmagazine.com with Bovey Castle in the subject header and your contact details in the main body of the email.

Terms & Conditions: Subject to availability. Sunday–Thursday only. Excludes bank holidays, school holidays, Valentine’s Day, Christmas and New Year.

Transport to and from Bovey Castle can be arranged at additional cost. Any additional purchases and services taken during the stay will be charged for on departure. Prize must be taken within six months.

Deadline for all giveaway entries 22 June 9

> flavour in season

Elderflower As the weather starts to warm and the surrounding countryside starts to fill with colour once again, one wild flower worth seeking out is the elderflower. Towards the end of May the elder tree starts to blossom, yielding its elderberries as well as the extremely sought-after creamy yellow flowers. Elder trees are fairly widespread around Britain so with a bit of luck you should be able to find some.

The flowers are best used as a flavouring and are most commonly used to make summer cordials as well as Champagne for those looking for a bit more of a kick.

The flowers should never be eaten raw as, like elderberries, they are mildly poisonous so it’s well advised to use them only in cooking!

Elderflowers are in season from late May all the way through to July in the typically warmer months so be sure to stockpile for your elderflower cordials. You don’t have long to savour this flower!

At their best

right

Rocket

This leafy salad adds a real peppery punch to any recipe and stars in any dish. Rocket leaves are usually picked young and have a dark green shade. They are a great source of vitamins A and C. Rocket is pretty easily grown at home but won’t always look as perfect as the packet variety although it will always be unrivalled in flavour. These leaves are perfect served with fish, replacing basil in a peppery pesto or just drizzled in olive oil on the side. Pick deep dark green leaves that are not wilting. Wash well particularly if growing your own or to perk them up a bit too.

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> flavour in season

Asparagus Asparagus tends to arrive on our plates from late April to early May. It may be the relatively short season ­— running from May to June — that makes this plant so popular, but it is hard to deny the unique flavour that it has too. Britishgrown asparagus, in my unbiased opinion, is the finest in the world.

When picking asparagus look for stalks that are firm but tender at the tips with good deep colour. It is not a vegetable that stores well so it’s best to eat on the day of purchase or as close after as possible. A good tip is to store it with a damp tea towel around the stems in the fridge. When preparing, snap the woodier part of the stem off before cooking. There are numerous fantastic ways to eat asparagus but my favourite is lightly steamed and served with a bit of butter, some salty Parmesan shavings and a poached egg — unoriginal but rarely beaten!

We all know that eating with the seasons makes for healthier bodies and tastier dishes. Each month Tom Bowles from Hartley Farm brings you all you need to know about the best produce of the month.

now

Hartley Farm Shop and Café is located just outside Bath, selling a fresh and colourful selection of local, seasonal produce. Visit: www.hartley-farm.co.uk Follow Hartley Farm on Twitter: @hartleyFarm

Rhubarb This is the time of year when outdoor rhubarb replaces its more delicate, younger sibling that is forced rhubarb. Outdoor rhubarb will typically be a deeper shade of red and gets more coarse and sharp in flavour as the summer goes on. Make sure you choose stems that are more rigid when shopping or picking. Wash and trim before preparing, and be sure to discard the poisonous leaves. The outdoor variety also needs a bit more cooking than forced, but still makes for a good pie or crumble. Just add a bit more sugar too to reduce the tartness.

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In Season Recipes OUTDOOR GOURMET’S

British asparagus with balsamic mushroom and feta salad A great recipe for the Kamado Joe outdoor oven Serves 4 Ingredients • 12 asparagus spears, trimmed and peeled • 1 quantity balsamic mushrooms (below) • 1 medium ripe avocado, peeled and diced • ¼ cup lightly roasted pumpkin seeds • 150g feta, diced • 2 handfuls mixed salad leaves • Salad dressing of your choice • Salt and pepper to taste Kamado Joe roasted balsamic field mushrooms • 6 large field mushrooms • 50ml balsamic vinegar • 125ml olive oil • 2 sprigs thyme • 2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped Method 1. Toss the mushrooms with the rest of the ingredients and season to taste. Marinate for 2 hours.

2. Place on the Kamado Joe grill and cook for 4 to 6 minutes at 425ºF–500ºF, turning them a few times.

Asparagus Use the Kamado Joe heat deflector plate and place your asparagus on the grill. Cook for 1 minute, turn over and cook for 1 more minute. Remove and set aside, season.

Assembly Combine the salad leaves and pumpkin seeds in a large bowl, add a little of the dressing of your choice plus the avocado and feta, mix well.

The Better Food Company’S

Rhubarb with lentils and potatoes Serves 4 Ingredients • 1225g red lentils • 2 medium potatoes, roughly chopped.

• 1 tbsp olive oil • 2 garlic cloves, sliced • 2 tsp ground coriander • 2 tsp ground cumin • 1 tsp chilli powder • 1 tsp fresh ginger root, grated • 225g rhubarb, sliced, and 150ml water • 50g sugar • 50g desiccated coconut • Salt and pepper to taste Method 1. Cover lentils with water in a pan. Bring to the boil, reduce heat and simmer.

2. Once lentils are simmering, add potatoes and simmer until tender. Remove from heat, drain and set aside.

3. Heat oil in a pan, fry garlic, coriander, cumin, chilli and ginger for about 1-2 minutes.

4. Add the rhubarb and water. Bring to the boil, reduce heat and simmer until just cooked (about 10 minutes).

5. Add the sugar, coconut, salt and pepper to taste.

6. Stir in the potatoes and lentils and heat through gently.

The Festival Elderflower ComPANY’S

Elderflower Collins At home and at festivals we serve our elderflower in the way we’ve been drinking it since we were kids – diluted with chilled sparkling or still water.

It’s also delicious as a hot drink, perfect for when the English summer is doing that ‘chilly’ thing it sometimes does! But if you like your elderflower drink with a bit more kick, check out our take on a well-known cocktail, the Elderflower Collins.

1. Stick 50ml of gin, the juice of half a lemon and 25ml of elderflower cordial in a cocktail shaker with loads of ice.

Divide salad mixture among 4 plates.

Place the balsamic mushrooms on top and finally add the asparagus. Pour more dressing around the salad and serve.

7. Garnish with coconut and serve with rice or crusty bread and chutney.

Our rhubarb comes from The Community Farm in Chew Magna, just 8 miles away.

2. Give it a good shake and strain into a glass. Top it up with soda water. Garnish with a sprig of mint. Cheers!

Visit www.outdoorgourmet.co.uk

Visit www.betterfood.co.uk

www.facebook.com/festivalelderflower

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> flavour in season recipes

Penny Brohn cancer care’S

Super-Greens Salad with Chicken A tangy and peppery, nutrient-dense green salad that is packed with vitamins, minerals, protein and healthy fats.

The inclusion of nuts and seeds adds crunch and provides the essential minerals magnesium, manganese, iron, zinc and selenium. The roasted chicken, for additional protein, can be omitted or replaced with some tinned beans.

Serves 4 Ingredients • 115g each watercress, rocket leaves and baby spinach leaves • 60g alfalfa sprouts • 60g mung bean sprouts • 2 skinless roasted chicken breast fillets • 1 ripe avocado, sliced • 60g Brazil nuts, roughly chopped • 30g pumpkin seeds • 1 nori sheet, crumbled Nut dressing • 125g cashew nuts • 1 garlic clove • Zest and juice of 1 lime • 2 tsp spirulina or chlorella powder (optional) • 2 tsp nutritional yeast flakes (optional) • Freshly ground black pepper Method 1. To make the dressing, soak the cashew nuts in water for 20 minutes, then drain.

Put them into a blender or food processor with all the other dressing ingredients.

Add 125ml/4fl oz/½ cup water, season lightly with pepper and process to make a light pouring consistency. Add a little more water if necessary.

2. In a large bowl, toss together the watercress, rocket, spinach, alfalfa and bean sprouts. Toss in a little of the dressing to just coat the leaves, if you like.

3. Slice the chicken. Serve the salad with the avocado slices, nuts, seeds and the chicken slices, and the nori sheet crumbled over the top. Drizzle over a little extra dressing. (Store, without dressing, in the fridge for up to 2 days.) Pour more dressing around the salad and serve.

Recipe from Nourish by Penny Brohn Cancer Care: buy online at www.shopatpennybrohn.com 13

RING O’BELLS A traditional country pub in Somerset

Julie and Nigel Bourne welcome you to our lovely 14th-century inn in Wookey.

We serve great beers, great ciders and food to satisfy – all in a traditional country pub setting.

Our lovely terrace catches the sun from morning till late afternoon.

We pride ourselves on quality; quality service, quality drinks and quality food.

We source as much of our ingredients l o c a l ly a s possible — s u s ta i n i n g n o t o n ly t h e l o c a l fa r m i n g c o m m u n i t y, b u t our customers as well.

We don’t do ‘fine dining’, but we do serve fine food in a lovely setting.

People say we serve the best pub food they’ve ever had. Our chef, Carl Mitchell, is renowned as one of the finest in Somerset.

We have a discreet private dining room seating 16, which is also available for small meetings. Our large function room is perfect for celebrations and other gatherings. The Ring O’Bells is a family-friendly pub. We welcome children and we’re also dog friendly.

Ring O’ Bells, High Street, Wookey, Somerset BA5 1JZ Telephone 01749 678079 www.ringobellswookey.co.uk / www.wadworth.co.uk/wookey/ring_o’bells

Yo u r h o t e l i n t h e

h e a r t o f S o m e rs e t

Tw o - c o u r s e d i n n e r i n t h e A r t D e c o Bow Bar & Grill, accommodation i n o n e o f t h e C a s t l e ’s l o v i n g l y decorated rooms and an award winning breakfast from £199 per couple, per night. w w w. t h e - c a s t l e - h o t e l . c o m

The Castle at Taunton l Castle Green l Taunton l Somerset l TA1 1NF l 01823 272671

> flavour fab foodie reads

fab foodie reads For bookworms who love nothing more than cooking up a feast for family and friends, our monthly selection of new releases is enough to keep anyone entertained!

Pick of the Month!

Melt

Claire Kelsey, Simon & Schuster, £18.99 Festival-goers may recognise Claire as the purveyor of ice cream at Ginger’s Comfort Emporium, a beautiful retro-glam ice cream van selling award-winning ice cream to the public.

If you’re bored of the traditional ice cream varieties, there’s plenty for you to try here.

Divided into chapters including creamy, fruity, spicy and boozy, expect varieties such as olive oil and smoked sea salt, melon and chilli, or even Guinness and gingerbread.

We’ll definitely be giving some of these a go!

Cook With Love Pete Evans, Murdoch Books, £20

Nourish The Cancer Care Cookbook

The Hedgerow Cookbook

Penny Brohn Cancer Care with Christine

It’s amazing how many great recipes can be made from ingredients sourced from local hedgerows, woods and lanes. The Hedgerow Cookbook celebrates all things foraged, with 100 recipes for preserves, drinks, savoury dishes, puddings, cakes and more.

Elderflower Champagne, wild garlic pesto, chocolate and chestnut terrine, wild rose Turkish delight… this cookbook from Ginny Knox and Caro Willson, who make a living from their jellies, relishes and fruit cheese, is great for those looking to make the most of what’s on their doorstep.

Bailey, £12.99

Bringing together 150 of chef Pete Evans’ favourite recipes, Cook With Love is a collection of simple, unfussy and delicious recipes alongside tips and advice for both novice and experienced cooks.

From ‘things with drinks’ such as pumpkin, sage and Parmesan fritters, to family feasts including Balinese roasted chicken, Pete’s recipes are accessible and accompanied by beautiful photos, and demonstrate influences from all over the world.

Bristol-based cancer charity Penny Brohn Cancer Care have launched their first cookbook, featuring 70 easy-to-prepare recipes; all containing healing, nutrient-rich foods which can help support your body following a cancer diagnosis.

Nourish shows you how to create simple meals, snacks and drinks that are packed with nutrients to support your body – even including desserts such as the chocolate beetroot traybake – and also explains how eating well can support people at all stages of the cancer journey.

Buy from www.shopatpennybrohn.org

Wild at Heart, Pavilion Books, £16.99

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flavour Looking to try something a little different? Have a look at our round-up of products we’ve recently tried and loved for inspiration...

Liberté strained Greek-style yogurt Crafted according to authentic straining methods, Liberté uses twice as much milk than a regular yogurt, which is then strained to remove the whey, leaving a thick and creamytasting yogurt which is free of fat and rich in protein.

Thick enough to eat with a fork(!), Liberté is not only great as a snack or dessert, but can be used to make sauces, curries and dips. We also love the Blueberry Harvest and Strawberry Fields flavours!

Liberté is available at larger Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Morrison’s stores nationwide, all RRP £2.19.

Visit www.liberteyogurt.co.uk

Oakhouse Foods Melksham-based Oakhouse Foods is a ready meal company with a difference. Over the last 10 years they have developed a range of 300 meals and desserts containing no artificial colourings, flavourings, MSG or hydrogenated fats, using local ingredients where possible.

Sold via home delivery and local branches, the product range includes a roasted vegetable lasagne: the winner of a Financial Times taste test in January this year. A rich and warming combination of roasted vegetables, red wine, herbs and Cheddar, it’s a great option for a speedy meal.

Visit www.oakhousefoods.co.uk

> flavour loves

Wolfy’s Porridge If you’re looking for breakfast on the go with nothing artificial included, these great little porridge pots from Wolfy’s are perfect. Each cardboard pot contains not just porridge, but a little pot of natural preserves to make your porridge even tastier.

Bradley’s Juice: Sparkling Lime & Ginger The Quench range from Bradley’s are handmade drinks made the traditional way – in small batches with the ingredients list kept to the minimum.

Made locally at Box Bush Farm in Somerset, the range can be purchased in most good delis in the South West area, along with many farmers’ markets.

The new drink launched this month is the sparkling lime and ginger – a lovely, refreshing alternative to mass produced soft drinks. The perfect accompaniment to your summer barbecue!

Bradleys were the overall winner with their drinks at the Bath Good Food Awards 2013 for the Best Non-Alcoholic Drink.

Visit www.bradleysjuice.co.uk

Paradise Cakes

Available in three different varieties (creamy porridge with berry pot, nutty porridge with honey pot and spiced porridge with pear and ginger pot), it’s great to find a new breakfast option that is not only wholesome and natural, but tasty too!

Visit www.wolfys.co.uk

As Patsy, owner of Bristol’s Paradise Cakes, says, “Cakes aren’t just for birthdays!”

Patsy has been running her business from her kitchen for the last three years, offering the people of Bristol a range of whole cakes and traybakes, with free delivery in central Bristol.

Her signature traybake is Paradise Cake: think Bakewell Tart, but incorporating sultanas, cherries and walnuts into the mix. Deliciously moist, it’s apparently universally loved amongst men… certainly true in our office!

Buy 8 for £10, 12 for £18 or 30 for £24 – a great gift or treat!

Visit www.paradisecakesbristol.co.uk

The Pelagonia Range If you’re looking for meze with a difference, this great product from The Pelagonia Range is sure to suit.

A traditional Macedonian product, Aivar will be well known to anyone who has visited or lived in the area. Every September, families make their own Aivar by roasting red peppers over fire, removing their skins and grinding them together with aubergines and spices.

The version from The Pelagonia Range is a simple blend of peppers, aubergines, sunflower oil and spices. The sweetness of the peppers is fantastic with salty cheese such as pecorino or feta, or makes a great dip or marinade. Fantastic!

Buy from Waitrose (£3.59) or Arch House Deli (£4.50).

Visit www.pelagonia.co.uk 17

h apple awns wit r p y ic p S chutney yogurt & mint

Have a super healthy summer

A c ook ’s b est frie nd

Our O% Fat Natural Yeogurt is a brilliant, healthy cooking ingredient – perfect for tasty BBQ dishes, like these Spicy Prawns with Apple & Mint Yogurt Chutney.

FOR THIS RECIPE & LOTS MORE, VISIT: WWW.YEOVALLEY.CO.UK/OUR-RECIPES

YF6245_Flavour_Mag_Ad_PR01.indd 1

10/04/2013 11:00

Barbecue Summer Summer or no summer, we know that some of you will still be getting the barbecue out whatever the weather!

We’ve put together our barbecue guide to help you with some great recipes, butcher recommendations, top tips from world barbecue champions and more‌

> flavour barbecue summer

Grilled Cornish mackerel are so simple to prepare and taste fabulous with this delicious mustard dressing. Mackerel are an excellent source of essential omega-3 fatty acids – vital for our health and wellbeing.

Serves 4 Ingredients • 4 whole Cornish mackerel, cleaned and gutted • 1 tbsp olive oil • 3 tbsp lemon juice • 2 tsp wholegrain mustard • 2 tsp fresh basil, chopped • 1 tsp honey • 150g (5oz) Yeo Valley Natural Yogurt

Method 1. Preheat your barbecue (or grill).

2. Make 4 diagonal slashes across the mackerel on each side, cutting down to the bone. Mix together the olive oil and 2 tbsp lemon juice. Rub the mackerel with the oil mixture and season lightly.

3. Place on the barbecue and cook for 6-7 minutes on either side until the skin is crispy and the flesh is just cooked.

4. Make the dressing by whisking together the remaining lemon juice, mustard, basil, honey and yogurt. Once the fish is cooked, spoon over the dressing to serve.

For more recipe ideas from Yeo Valley visit www.yeovalley.co.uk

Sizzle this Summer with our fantastic BBQ range ‘Wow’ your friends and family with our:

The Kamado Joe is a ceramic charcoal barbecue which offers fine 21st-century dining. It’s so versatile that most dishes are within its capabilities.

Spatchcock Piri Piri Chicken Fantastic variety of homemade sausages and 100% beef burgers

The Kamado Joe will grill, smoke and oven cook to the very highest standards and the men who traditionally barbecue may well find themselves elbowed aside as wives, partners and even daughters grab the aprons to show their skills. Recently Outdoor Gourmet listed the Kamado Joe as one of the top-selling items at their shop in Buckfastleigh, Devon, and were delighted to have master chef Peter Gorton demonstrating how to cook belly pork, mushrooms and locally smoked salmon.

For more information Call 01364 644965 Visit www.outdoorgourmet.co.uk 20

Tasty range of BBQ, Hot & Spicy and Chinese pork ribs Tailor-made BBQ packs on request (for 4-40 guests)!

Dry-aged peppered minute steaks

Opening times

Tues, Thurs & Fri 7-5pm Weds & Sat 7am-3pm

Call us today

01454 773 213

62 Bradley Avenue, Winterbourne, BS32 1HS www.buxtonbutchers.co.uk • email nigel@buxtonbutchers.co.uk

flavour barbecue summer <

Makes: 4 large burgers Preparation time: 20 minutes, plus 30 minutes chilling time Cooking time: 15 minutes

For the burgers: • 2 tablespoons olive oil • 1 small onion, chopped • 1 clove garlic • 1 teaspoon cumin seeds • 2 x 400g chickpeas, rinsed and drained • 1 tablespoon harissa paste • 150g chargrilled aubergines, drained and chopped • 50g fresh breadcrumbs • 1 egg • Grated zest + 1 tablespoon lemon juice • 2 tablespoons freshly chopped coriander • 2 tablespoons freshly chopped mint • Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method 1. Cook the onion, garlic and cumin seeds with 1tbsp of the oil for 2-3 minutes.

2. Tip into a food processor with all the remaining burger ingredients, season and pulse until combined. Divide the mixture into 4 and shape into burgers. Chill for 30 minutes.

3. Preheat the grill to high. Brush the tops of the burgers with the remaining oil. Cook for 6 minutes on one side, carefully turn and cook the other side for 4 minutes. Top each with a Halloumi Burger Slice and grill for 3-4 minutes more.

4. Serve in rolls with lettuce and salsa.

For more information visit www.yamasdairy.com

• 4 Yamas! Halloumi Burger Slices • 4 large buns • Crisp salad leaves • 4 tablespoons tomato salsa

While meats, marinades, breads and salads are important for any barbecue, don’t forget about the drinks! Here’s a great summery recipe from Buffalo Trace bourbon to accompany your food…

Ingredients • 50ml Buffalo Trace • 12.5ml sugar syrup • 4 fresh mint leaves • Lots of crushed ice

Method 1. In the julep cup, lightly muddle the mint leaves with sugar syrup 2. Fill with crushed ice, add the Buffalo Trace 3. Top with more crushed ice and garnish with a sprig of fresh mint For more information visit www.buffalotrace.co.uk

British BBQ Association President Ben Bartlett shares his top tip: apple juice.

My favourite mop is simple unsweetened Cox’s apple juice applied with a misting spray. The plastic sprayers available from garden centres are ideal.

Spray every few minutes and this will help keep any meat moist and give it a lovely caramelisation.

Smoking wood chips can be added to charcoal BBQs and are available in a number of flavours including oak, cedar and pecan and very smoky woods such as mesquite and hickory. These can be soaked in apple juice to prolong the smoking and give a distinct flavour to your food.

For more information visit www.bbqben.co.uk / www.bbqa.co.uk

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> flavour barbecue summer

OUTDOOR GOURMET

Barbecues, Food Smokers, Garden Ovens, & Accessories

Specialists in high quality BBQ and outdoor cooking equipment Lower Dean, Buckfastleigh, Devon

01364 644965 www.outdoorgourmet.co.uk Jon Thorner’s

Butcher • Farm Shop • Pie Maker

JON THORNER’S CAFE

01749 838938

SPRING LAMB NOW IN STOCK

FANTASTIC VALUE BBQ PACKS NOW AVAILABLE

We sell... West Country meat We are... award winning We make... handmade pies We use... local suppliers We bake... our own cakes We support... Somerset farmers Bridge Farm Shop, Pylle, Shepton Mallet BA4 6TA 01749 830138 www.jonthorners.co.uk Butchery counters - Farrington’s Farm Shop, Frome Valley Farm Shop, Radstock Co-op Superstore, Street Co-op, Whiterow Country Farm Foods

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FREE WIFI OPEN 7 DAYS A WEEK OAP MENU £5.95 FRESHLY GROUND COFFEE HOMEMADE CAKES

flavour barbecue summer <

1

Many of us are very lazy about buying meat and don’t think twice about picking up portioned pieces that cost the earth. It’s time to get back to basics and reclaim some basic knife skills that mean you can prepare it yourself and save a fortune. For the cost of two prepared chicken breast fillets you can buy a whole bird, so here is a quick lesson on how to go about carving it up.

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First of all – stand the chicken up on the end of the drumsticks [1] so you can take a look at its anatomy. This might sound like a strange thing to do but seeing it like this not only reminds us that it was a living creature that deserves our respect, but allows you to see the connections between the legs, breasts and wings and where the joints are so it makes sense when you portion it up.

2

Now lay the chicken breast side down on your chopping board and cut down each side of the backbone with a sharp knife or kitchen shears [2]. Remove the backbone (and keep for stock) [3]. Now turn the chicken over and open it out like a book (this is known as spatchcock chicken and is the best way to barbeque it as it cooks more quickly and evenly through the bird). Next cut right through the breastbone so that the chicken is in two halves [4 & 5].

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Take one of the breasts and pull the leg out a little so you can feel the seam joining the leg to the breast [6]. Make a cut separating the leg from the breast [7]. Cut each breast in half [8]. Take the wings off the breasts by cutting through the equivalent of the elbow joint so you leave the first part of the wing attached to the breast [9]. Remove the tip of the wing from the last joint and keep it for stock.

3

Finally you need to attend to the leg. Feel it to find the joint and cut straight through the joint to separate the drumsticks from the thighs [10].

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Now you have 10 pieces: two thighs, two drumsticks, four breast pieces and two wings for a fraction of the price of pre-portioned pieces.

Keep any bones and the bits of wing and put them in a bag in the freezer. Once you have collected the bones from several chickens, put them in a large pan of water with an onion, a bay leaf and some peppercorns and boil for half an hour. Strain and you have some great chicken stock to make soup or gravy. If you are not making anything straight away then freeze the stock by the half litre.

4

5

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Method and photos taken from COOK by Richard Bertinet (Kyle Cathie) £19.99 www.bertinet.com

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Jon Thorner’s

the

butcher’s

tip

How to Butterfly a Leg of Lamb A leg of lamb doesn’t just need to be for roasting, it’s a delicious choice for your barbecue too.

To butterfly a leg of lamb means the bone is removed and the meat is opened up to make it a more even thickness for a quicker cooking time. Marinate the meat overnight or for at least a couple of hours with rosemary, garlic and olive oil. Get your barbecue nice and hot and sear for about 5–7 minutes each side, until blackened slightly, then turn down the heat and cook for a further 20–30 minutes, turning once halfway, depending on how you like your lamb. Leave aside to rest for 15 minutes, and then carve.

1. Source a good quality leg of lamb from a reputable butcher.

2. Using a sharp knife you first remove the aitchbone from the top end of the joint.

If the weather doesn’t allow you to cook this on the barbecue, just pop it under the grill or roast in the oven for the same delicious results.

3. Make an incision down the narrow leg section and remove the shank bone. Start to open up the meat without cutting through completely.

We are now in spring lamb season, so the lamb is also fabulously tender.

All good butchers will butterfly a leg of lamb for you if you ask, but if you fancy having a go yourself, follow our step-by-step guide.

Watch the video in full on YouTube on the Jon Thorner channel or scan this code on your smartphone.

4. You now need to remove the main leg bone and kneecap.

Jon Thorner is the founder of Jon Thorner’s Ltd and is South West Chairman of the Q Guild of Butchers association.

The award-winning businessman has a farm shop near Shepton Mallet, five butchery counters across the South West and makes fantastic pies...

Jon Thorner’s Bridge Farm Shop Pylle, Shepton Mallet, Somerset BA4 6TA 01749 830138 www.jonthorners.co.uk Facebook: Jon Thorner’s 24

Twitter: @JonThorners

5. Once all the bones have been removed, start to slice the thicker parts of meat in half and open up. You want to try and achieve an even (ish) thickness of meat, but keep the meat attached so the joint stays whole.

> flavour martin blunos

MAI THAI OR YOUR THAI, IT’S THAI My knowledge of Thai food is pretty minimal — I like what I know and know what I like and that’s about as far as it gets. Trying to read up on the subject is limited — the ideal thing would be to emigrate and be amongst the food, people and culture: fine in la-la land but in the real world, the better half and kids wouldn’t be too happy about the old man shooting off to the other side of the world to get first-hand knowledge of the workings of a red curry paste.

So it’s lucky for me that I’m now heading up the food offering at Seaham Hall Hotel in the North East. In these early days of recruiting a team, planning a kitchen and menus for the hotel there is the added attraction of an Asian-themed dining room named the ‘Ozone’ (all bamboo and black lacquer) that is attached to the hotel’s Serenity Spa, which is established and already a rockin’ and a rollin’ — it’s there that I get the opportunity to work with Thai chefs using Thai ingredients, adding my twist to their dishes to create something unique. I call it ‘East meets West and back again’.

First thing in the morning, the deliveries start to arrive and soon the prep kitchen smells amazing. Knives are wielded, destroying garlic cloves into creamy paste.

Pestles are doing their thing in mortars filled with small red chillies, galangal and ginger root. It gets even better when the cooking starts upstairs in the restaurant’s open kitchen – the wok burner roars and the sizzle of food hitting hot oil fills the air with fragrant aromas.

I’m learning that Thai cooking is all about simplicity, from the ingredients, cooking processes (fried, steamed or raw) to the presentation. This is cooking from the heart. Weighing scales are seldom used, with lots of tasting as you go, adding a little more of this and a little less of that.

This cuisine is more an understanding; a lot of heart and soul comes into play.

Here is a recipe, that addresses all of the above but is measured for you — adjust as you see fit, make it sweeter/hotter/ sharper for a versatile dressing that works especially well with fish but can heighten florets of hot steamed broccoli and transform a crisp salad.

Nam Jim Dressing Ingredients Ingredients are available in Asian supermarkets, but if hard to source alternatives have been listed.

• 4 limes (for their juice) • 4 tbsp nam pla (fish sauce) • 65g jaggery (can use palm or caster sugar) • 2 cloves garlic, peeled • 4 coriander roots (can use fresh coriander stalks) • 3 red chillies (the bigger they are the milder – so if you like the heat buy the small fellas) method 1. Either blitz the jaggery, garlic, coriander and chillies in a food processor – or use a pestle and mortar for more of a workout.

2. Mix in the lime juice and fish sauce.

3. Set aside till needed or store in a small lidded tub in the fridge.

Follow me on Twitter: @martinblunos1

One of the South West’s most talented chefs, Martin Blunos was born and brought up near Bath, his parents having come to England from Latvia just after the Second World War. He has held two Michelin stars for more than 15 years and appears regularly on television and radio with slots as guest chef on BBC1’s Saturday Kitchen with James Martin, BBC Market Kitchen, ITV Daily Cooks and ITV’s Saturday Cooks.

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> flavour Larkin Cen

flavour speaks to this year’s Bristol-based MasterChef finalist …

Larkin Cen H

ere at flavour, we were glued to our seats during this year’s MasterChef competition… and being a South West magazine, it was 28-year-old Larkin Cen from Bristol that we were rooting for!

Solicitor Larkin wowed the judges with his Chinese menu in the MasterChef final, but lost top spot to Natalie who was crowned the overall winner.

However, the experience has taught him a lot and given him opportunities that he has never had before.

“I sort of knew I had a natural ability in cooking,” says Larkin, “but I didn’t know for sure as I never had any chance to use that ability. The way you cook at home is far different from the way you cook in the competition. I wanted to be judged by people who knew what they were talking about, to see if I was any good or not.”

A passion for food is obviously in Larkin’s blood. His grandfather opened a Chinese takeaway in Cardiff in 1982, with the same restaurant now being run by his parents.

It is Larkin’s grandfather who provides the fondest memories of his childhood: “My earliest food memory was eating my late granddad’s roast pork belly with crackling.

Literally the crackling was so crispy and there was so much flavour in the meat!

“My childhood heavily influences my cooking, using flavours that I grew up with,” says Larkin, “but I can’t help but do my own thing with them!

I also love watching chefs cook on TV programmes, like The Great British Menu – I would love to cook at that level.”

It’s great to see that Larkin is a champion of local produce – something that we at flavour are very passionate about! “I love 26

using fresh ingredients from the market,” he says. “We are lucky in the South West because we have such great seafood here. I’m a big seafood lover so I always try to get the best ingredients. I’m a big believer in supporting our local suppliers.”

When it comes to dining out, it’s “good honest food” that does it for Larkin – as he says, “Anywhere that does good pub grub is a winner for me!” Having never dined at a Michelin-starred restaurant before the MasterChef competition, he’s also keen to try some more of our top local restaurants – with brothers Peter and Jonray Sanchez-Iglesias the top of his hitlist. “A bit higher up the scale I would love to try Casamia in Westbury-onTrym – I just haven’t had a chance yet!”

So can we expect to see more of Larkin in the future, or is it back to law now the competition is over? “I do want a career in food,” he says, “whether it is as a chef or owning my own catering business, I’m not sure yet. I have got ideas and plans in the making. I also want to be able to showcase Asian food, as it is something that I am really passionate about.”

Larkin will be appearing at the BBC Good Food Show Summer which takes place at the NEC, Birmingham, 12–16 June. To book tickets to see Natalie, Dale and Larkin visit BBCGoodFoodShow. com or call 0844 581 1341. The new book MasterChef: The Finalists is due out in October 2013 (Absolute Press £20.00, hardback).

Find Larkin on Facebook at www.facebook.com/larkincenfoodie or on Twitter @LarkinCen

> flavour romy’s kitchen

Romy Gill is a chef, businesswoman, writer, wife, mother and runner!

She focuses on the nutrition and healthy aspects of Indian cooking.

Grated Paneer Serves 4 Passionate about good health, Romy has lost a great deal of weight and has devised her healthier versions of Indian recipes to complement her own branded range of pickles and sauces.

Paneer is a traditional, full-fat soft cheese used in Indian cooking.

A fast-ripening cheese, paneer is made by adding lemon juice or vinegar to milk – meaning that it is suitable for vegetarians. Paneer is also a great source of protein, it makes an excellent meat substitute, does not melt during cooking, and takes on the flavours it is cooked with.

Romy has given cookery demonstrations at food festivals all over the world and is a presenter on a local radio station Thornbury FM.

To prepare paneer, lemon juice or vinegar is added to full fat milk to separate the white curds from the whey. The curds are then drained in a muslin cloth, before being put under a heavy weight for a few hours to compress the cheese.

She is proud to be heavily involved in youth culture and gives talks and cookery demonstrations in schools and cookery classes, where she discusses how food is grown, the importance of eating seasonal food and its impact on the environment.

Visit Romy’s site at:

www.romyskitchen.co.uk Follow Romy Follow Romy on Twitter @romyskitchen Find Romy on Facebook under Romy’s Kitchen

Paneer is readily available in most supermarkets but can easily be made at home. There are lots of great, quick recipes that involve paneer – try this grated paneer recipe either in a wrap or with a salad.

Ingredients • 225g grated paneer (available from most supermarkets, or you can make your own!)

• 1 large onion, sliced • 2 tsp grated ginger • 1 small tomato, finely chopped • 1 green chilli, chopped • 8 curry leaves • 1 tsp black mustard seeds • 1 tsp cumin seeds • ½ tsp ground turmeric • 1 tsp ground coriander • 1 tsp rapeseed oil • Salt to taste

Method 1. Heat a non-stick pan before adding the oil.

2. Add the mustard seeds, cumin seeds and curry leaves. Once it starts sizzling, add the onion and cook on a high heat for 4 minutes, stirring continuously.

3. Add the ginger and chilli, and cook for another minute.

4. Add the chopped tomato along with the remaining spices and mix well. Cook for another 2-3 minutes.

5. Stir in the grated paneer, cover the pan with a lid and cook on low heat for another 10 minutes before serving.

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> flavour The Talbot Inn

Angela Mount heads to Mells for a taste of traditional village life …

T

hroughout the rolling hills and varied landscape of England lie hundreds of sleepy, scenic villages, steeped in history. The tapestry of English life has at its heart the traditional village, in which centuries of communities have grown and developed, forming the framework for our culture today. From the Saxons through the Tudors, from war-torn Britain to this day, village life has formed the bedrock of society across the ages, encompassing all cultures and demographic profiles from the poorest of peasants to the richest of landowners.

At the very heart of each of these villages lies one constant that binds the community – the village pub. For centuries, the village pub has been the meeting place and hub of life for villagers – a warm, welcoming place with good beer, roaring fires and, more often than not, hearty food. With the gastropub craze of the last decade has come the danger that many of these traditional values would disappear in a sea of muted Farrow & Ball paintwork and evermore complex menus.

Therefore, it was with great interest that I ventured forth into the remote Somerset countryside to discover the Talbot Inn’s take on tradition and village life.-The sleepy, ridiculously pretty village of Mells lies about 30 minutes outside Bath, and is about as quintessentially ‘villagey’ as

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THE TALBOT INN you can get! Mells is also the home of Babington House: the smart, luxurious country bolthole for jaded city folk, and it’s ex-Babington general manager Matt Greenless who is now working his brand of magic on this very different venture.

The Talbot Inn, an historic 15th-century coaching inn nestled on the Asquith estate, has been at the heart of the tightlyknit Mells community for centuries as a traditional local. This year, however, it has undergone a total make-over at the hands of new owners, Charlie Luxton and Dan Brod, the team behind the award-winning Beckford Arms in Wiltshire who, with Matt, have brought a sense of heritage and the traditions of a bygone-era back to this spectacular venue.

Their focus is firmly on recreating the sense of community and conviviality of the great pub tradition, setting the Talbot Inn at the heart of village life, even including an in-house cinema on Sunday nights for communal film and TV watching. With no nod whatsoever to the god of gastropubs, their vision is firmly on rekindling the sense of ‘belonging’ for both locals and visitors alike.

Walking through the long, arched entrance, we found ourselves in a ‘piazza-like’ environment, almost a village within a village, with various rooms, snugs and bars dotted around the cobbled-stoned

courtyard; charming, and in perfect keeping with the beauty and historic feel of the village. The pub was heaving, packed with locals and a few Babington weekenders who fancied a more traditional Somerset evening, with local cider and Talbot Inn’s own brand of beer on tap.

One of the most exciting aspects of the Talbot Inn is the new Coach House Grill Room, a long building at the rear of the courtyard that used to be a drab, magnoliapainted venue for village weddings and functions. More than any other part of the Talbot Inn, this room epitomises the values and the feel that the new owners are trying to create – a sense of community, and of relaxed enjoyment. With heavy beams, lead and pewter chandeliers and generations of the Asquith family gazing down from portraits that adorn the traditionally painted walls, the room is filled with a bar, a giant open wood fire, and most importantly four long oak tables, creating not a refectory environment, but more the sense of communal village life, with just a hint of the magnificent Hogwarts’ dining room. It reminded me of hillside winery estates in Tuscan hamlets, where the villagers come together to eat in a room that has become the hub of the village. In olden days, the same tradition was true in England.

The ethos of the Coach House and Grill is simple; straightforward food, cooked very

> flavour The Talkot Inn

well, focusing on local English ingredients.

It was a wintry March evening when we visited, but it wasn’t difficult to picture the scene on a warm summer’s evening, with the doors of the Coach House opening onto the cobbled terrace, and the inviting aromas of the barbecue wafting through the air.

The menu is small, and the ingredients are the heroes; no rich, complicated sauces or garnishes, just high-quality meat, fish and produce cooked on the open grill.

I started with crispy chargrilled squid infused with chilli oil; textured, soft and flavoursome; while my dining companion’s spatchcocked quail was simply sublime — a delicate, tender, very simply cooked little bird. Quail is often disappointingly overcooked, but this was perfect, with sweet, succulent textures and flavours.

The star of the show, however, was undoubtedly the main course, served on a huge wooden platter. All the fish, meat and vegetables are cooked on the open grill, and served simply with fries and a watercress salad — simple, hearty and flavoursome. There are chargrilled vegetables and a daily fish dish; on the day we visited it was monkfish, chargrilled with mint and lemon, and delicious in its meaty richness. We opted to share a platter of moist, juicy chicken and an array of red meats, including venison, veal chop,

and the real hero, a simply grilled 42-day aged back rib steak. Make sure you are hungry when you go – portions are more than generous.

Cheese and desserts are simple – three local cheeses, and a treacle tart and custard tart, once again following the ethos of simplicity, but delectable in flavour, the custard tart perfect in consistency, and the treacle tart combining just the right amount of chewy sweetness and flavoured with ginger and lemon.

The Grill House is open on Friday and Saturday evenings and Sunday lunchtimes; the challenge for the new owners is to get the vast room filled and for people to be happy to share tables and benches. If your idea of heaven is the perfect chargrilled piece of meat or fish simply done, then wind your way down to the Talbot Inn before too many of the Babington weekend residents hear about this.

Personally, I can’t wait for the sun to come out, and to experience the Coach and Grill House experience on a balmy summer’s evening. You can’t help but relax in this little oasis of tranquillity and understated style.

The Talbot Inn Mells, Somerset BA11 3PN Call 01373 812254 Visit www.talbotinn.com 29

> flavour duncan shine

The Bell Inn Bath

A regular contributor to CAMRA magazine Pints West, Duncan Shine visits a Bath pub with a remarkable story to tell

A

n all too familiar tale these days is the sad demise of another pub.

Each month local authorities’ planning departments receive more and more applications for ‘demolition of existing public house to make way for residential development’. Others are being converted to supermarkets or convenience stores as the rush for a quick profit tramples over another important piece of heritage.

It’s a depressing picture indeed.

What a joy, then, to hear how one pub in Bath has been saved from that fate.

The pub in question is The Bell Inn, in Walcot Street. A magnificent 18th-century coaching inn, it’s a three-storey building complete with original windows and inlaid ledges and an elaborate entrance.

For years it has been a bustling place as welcoming to musicians as it is to real ale aficionados, tourists, students and dogs.

There is a long main bar, showcasing a bewildering array of real ales.

So when the longstanding owner, Ian Wood, decided to put the pub up for sale and move to pastures new, there

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was a real concern that the pub may have been bought by a national pub chain, or even by parties who only saw it as potential residential revenue.

A campaign was launched to raise enough money from customers and the local community to fund a buyout and create Bath’s first community owned pub. Pub manager Patrick Cave and the team behind the campaign estimated that they would need to raise £500,000, with the remainder of the asking price being secured via a bank loan.

But there was such a tremendous response from individuals, businesses and even a fair smattering of celebrities that the campaign raised close to £800,000.

This meant much less was needed from the bank, and an offer was made and accepted on the pub.

There are still some legal details to be sorted out, but it looks as though a dedicated group of individuals have, through an astonishing level of determination and commitment, saved one of Bath’s most characterful and welcoming pubs.

The Bell 103 Walcot Street, Bath BA1 5BW Call 01225 460 426 Visit www.thebellinnbath.co.uk

askachef: Q

I’m looking to buy a mixer to use for bread and pasta dough as I’m tired of doing it by hand – what should I look for when choosing? Blake Woodham Mixers are a versatile workhorse in any kitchen. Kenwood or Kitchen Aid are the best in my opinion; look for a machine that has all manner of optional accessories from citrus press to mincer.

Always buy a higher-quality mixer as they will last longer especially if you want to make bread or pasta on a regular basis.

Personally I don’t think you can go wrong with a Kitchen Aid, they also look good as well.

Q

Do you have any gluten-free recipe ideas that my whole family (including an eightyear-old and a two-year-old) can enjoy? We love strong flavours but need recipes that are easy and cost effective. Kerry Kilmister, Chippenham Focus on cooking with foods that are naturally gluten free. Once a month prepare your favourite gluten-free mixes - make and freeze gluten-free pizza and pie crusts which can become convenience foods and will be ready when you need them.

Develop a dependable gluten-free recipe – this will save you not only money but time and disappointment. I have to be constantly growing my gluten-free recipe file so I know what recipes work and have great taste. If you would like to email me I will send you some tasty recipes. peter@petergortonchef.co.uk

Peter Gorton Peter Gorton is a Masterchef of Great Britain and Chef-Proprietor of Gorton’s Restaurant in Tavistock. His career to date has been illustrious, with television appearances, a book and years of Michelin-star experience under his belt.

Q

We have a glut of rhubarb in our garden and we’re sick of crumble!

Any suggestions as to what we can do with it? Timothy Cook, Taunton I seem to have the same problem, so I make a rhubarb parfait and freeze it – it’s very handy in case of any unexpected guests and it’s a very quick and easy dessert. Please email me and I will send you the recipe. peter@petergortonchef.co.uk

Q

I never know whether to season a steak before or after I cook it.

Does it make a difference?

Joanne Fraser, Melksham Over the years I have cooked steak in every way possible. When it comes to seasoning some chefs like to salt a steak well in advance of cooking, while some salt it right before and others salt it after it has been cooked. Believe it or not there is no right answer.

I use a generous sprinkling of sea salt and cracked black peppercorns which I apply ten minutes before grilling or frying my steak. I find this gives the steak a savoury crust and robust flavour characteristic, remember to rest your steaks for five minutes – this is an important part to having a delicious steak.

Gorton’s Restaurant, 19 Plymouth Road, Tavistock, Devon PL19 8Au • 01822 617581 • www.gortons-tavistock.co.uk 31

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FORAGING & FOOD WORKSHOPS... THEATRE & PERFORMING ART... INSPIRING SPEAKERS & CONVERSATIONS...

CREATIVE CRAFTS & COLOURFUL ART CLASSES, WOODLAND ZIPWIRE & OUTDOOR ADVENTURES...

MUSIC MAKING & STORYTELLING...

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WILDLIFE WATCHING & WALKS...

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LATE NIGHT FIRES & DANCING...

AND MUCH MORE...

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T IGH N N & AY FER A BLE D H TA F EAC ILL O TIMEES & W ING VITI ESH TI PIR FR INS OF ACIOUS FOOD IC IC DELRGAN O

A long weekend in Devon, a few hundred people, rolling fields & ancient woodland. An abundance of ideas, fun, food & friends.

Reg charity number: 1094893

Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s reached the time of year where almost every weekend will see a food or drink festival taking place somewhere across the UK. Flavour has put together a handy guide to the foodie festivals not to be missed this summer!

festival season

> flavour festival season

Taste of London, the world’s greatest restaurant festival, will celebrate its 10th anniversary with the best lineup ever. To celebrate the milestone, the event will be jam-packed with exclusive new restaurants, worldclass chefs and tantalising fresh features. The festival takes place on 20-23 of June in London’s Regent’s Park, and is not to be missed. Taste of London 2013 will take the theme of collaboration and reunion and bring it to life with UK and international chef talent to celebrate 10 years of culinary magic from the food capital of the world.

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Taste of London

Taste of London 2013 will present a series of culinary exclusives including three generations of the Roux dynasty – Albert Roux, Michel Roux Jr and Emily Roux - cooking together. Foodie fans can purchase a ticket right-now to London’s hottest summer social event, set to welcome the finest chefs in the world, innovative collaborations and reunions from a raft of gourmet heroes including top London talent Raymond Blanc, Ben Tish, Pascal Aussignac and Bruno Loubet.

The capital’s hottest new restaurants feeding the appetites of visitors for the first time will include stylish Sushisamba, trend-setting Duck & Waffle, Peruvian hot ticket LIMA and fish specialist The Angler to name a few. Additionally restaurants back by popular demand will include Le

Gavroche, Gauthier Soho, Opera Tavern and Tamarind. The incredible line-up illustrates the diversity of culinary offerings the city has, and perfectly demonstrates London is the greatest restaurant scene in the world!

British Airways returns as headline sponsor of the event, once again offering a first-class service in their executive club lounge for British Airways gold and silver executive club members. This year British Airways will also be offering all Taste visitors a sneak preview of what will be served on its new A380 aircraft which will be flying to Los Angeles and Hong Kong.

As part of a worldwide Taste Festivals collaboration, Electrolux are a sponsor of Taste of London and partnering on global Taste events. The Electrolux Taste Theatre will host an array of

flavour festival season <

Taste of London promises gourmet paradise featuring some of the world’s best chefs and restaurants in its 10th anniversary year!

world-class chefs showcasing their culinary skills. Brand new for 2013 is Electroux Chefs’ Secrets, offering visitors the opportunity to get up close and personal with culinary legends in an interactive cooking demonstration.

their BBQ masterclass as well as the professional and amateur BBQ championships. S.Pellegrino will be returning with a water, wine and food tasting feature, plus a private dining experience and Italian-inspired cafe.

Laurent-Perrier will be educating guests in the most stylish and delicious fashion with their brand new Grape to Glass masterclass that delves into the journey of the world’s finest Champagne, from picking the grape to the first sip, with accompanying food pairings. Guests looking for an oriental flavour can enjoy Taste of Thailand from the Royal Thai Embassy. Visitors will enjoy a selection of London’s best Thai restaurants, music, entertainment and cooking, alongside over 30 Thai exhibitors. Weber will be the official BBQ partner of the festival, bringing

50,000 visitors are expected to dine from 40 of the capital’s top restaurants, serving a mix of British, French, pan Asian, Japanese fusion, South American and Italian cuisine, shop from 200 boutique food and drink stalls, enjoy fine wine tasting and watch some of the world’s finest chefs demonstrate their skills.

Treat your taste buds at the world’s greatest restaurant festival and one of London’s chicest social events of the summer. Tickets available online now at www.tastefestivals.com/london 35 35

> flavour festival season

Fairford & Lechlade Food & DRINK FESTIVAL 9 JUNE

Somerset cider & CHeese Festival Somerset Cider and Cheese Festival, 22–23 June

Lechlade Market Place – Sunday 9th June The fourth annual Fairford & Lechlade Food & Drink Festival brings together a huge selection of local food, wines and ales in a traditional marketplace setting.

This year there are several new and fun stalls such as traditional English fruit cocktails from Bombillo, fresh fish from New Wave Seafoods, North African Berber cake from The M’Hencha and homemade Scottish butter tablets courtesy of The Old Chapel Fudge Company.

Hot food ranges from Indian to hog roasts, while live music will keep your toes tapping and a Tomato Trail competition will keep the children happy.

The Food & Drink Festival is held on Sunday, June 9, from 10am till 4pm. To find out more, email admin@flbc.org.uk or visit www.fairfordlechladefoodanddrink.co.uk

This June, Nether Stowey will be the place for cider and cheese connoisseurs who fancy a tipple and a nibble of Somerset’s finest exports with live music on tap.

Enjoy ciders from producers such as Orchard Pig, Tricky Cider and Sheppy’s, with local cheese producers including Cricketer Farm and the Exmoor Blue Cheese Company contributing to over 30 cheese varieties available at the festival.

With live music, hog roasts, cheese and cider games and their Sunday Slowdown Farmers’ market, this two day festival is not to be missed!

Tickets on sale now at somersetciderandcheesefest.co.uk

Photo: www.bryanfarrell.co.uk

Croissant Neuf

Croissant Neuf Summer Party: 8-11 August 2013 Buy tickets now for the award-winning, totally solar powered Croissant Neuf Summer Party. Taking place near Usk, Monmouthshire, from 8–11 August, the organisers have delivered on their promise to provide an eclectic mix of folk, roots, ska, jazz and world music from well-loved established acts and exciting new bands and artists. Times and days will be announced closer to the festival, as will the headliners that CNSP are currently keeping up their sleeve!

Music will be blasting out of three venues this year – all of them totally run on solar energy. The main venue, the Croissant Neuf Big Top, will recently have returned from heading the Greenfields at Glastonbury Festival, while Croissant Deux and The Verge provide more intimate music venues without compromising on green credentials and sound quality. Two brand spanking new pubs serving delicious local ales and ciders will also host live music and other musical happenings will be taking place all over the site for guests to discover over the course of the weekend.

Music is not the only thing on offer at the beautiful site, nestled in the beautiful Monmouthshire hills. With a packed programme of circus, games, crafts, workshops and therapies there is something for everyone, and every age, to get stuck into.

Visit www.cnsp.co.uk 36

Foodies Festival

flavour festival season <

The UK’s top festival of food and drink returns to Bristol Harbourside, from Friday 12 until Sunday 14 July

WIN TICKETS!

We’ve teamed up with Foodies to offer five lucky readers the chance to win a pair of tickets, valid on any day of the festival. To be in with a chance of winning just email competitions@flavourmagazine.com with your contact details and ‘Foodies Festival’ in the subject line.

If you’re not lucky enough to win, take advantage of our exclusive 2-for-1 ticket offer by visiting www.foodiesfestival.com or calling 0844 9951111 and quote ‘FLAVOUR241’.

T&Cs: prize is non-transferable, non-refundable and no cash alternative is available; prize does not include travel.

Foodies Festival is delighted to return to Bristol Harbourside this July. The UK’s largest celebration of food and drink will see visitors flock from the surrounding areas to feast on the vast array of culinary activities for the third consecutive year in Bristol.

Food-lovers can watch top chefs in action in the Chefs’ Theatre, including Michelin-starred Martin Blunos, Rachel Demuth from Demuths, Ronnie Faulkner from Ronnies, Romy Gill from Romy’s Kitchen, Richard Davies from The Manor House Hotel and Chris Staines from The Allium Brasserie.

Food writer and Daily Telegraph columnist Xanthe Clay, who will also host food and wine matching demos each day, will compere the theatre.

After being inspired to make new dishes, visitors can then stock up on a vast array of artisan produce in the extensive Producers’ Market.

An exciting addition to Foodies in 2013 is the Cake and Bake Theatre incorporating a ‘bake-along’ where members of the audience will be invited to participate. Decadent steampunk baker Emilly Ladybird will be showing how to make a gin and tonic cake in conjunction with Hendrick’s Gin. Also demonstrating is Manisha Parmar of Great British Bake Off fame and there will be sugarcraft classes with Ann Pickard as well as hands-on baking bread-making sessions. And as if that wasn’t enough, chocoholics will love the new Chocolate Theatre with daily demonstrations from Divine Chocolate and Coeur De Xocolat.

New for 2013 and certain to appeal to those who love al fresco dining is a specially-designed BBQ arena, hosted

by Broil King, featuring BBQ classes and competitions all designed to make you expert at cooking in the great outdoors.

Food geeks will love Homeware Village offering the latest in gadgets and gizmos guaranteed to excite.

Taste the best local restaurants’ signature dishes in the VIP and dining section. Complement your meal with wonderful British ales and ciders from the countryside bar, or step aboard the bus bar, a converted open-topped double-decker bus, and enjoy views across the site.

Take a class with some of the UK’s most talented sommeliers, mixologists and drink experts in the Drinks and Cocktails Theatres including renowned journalist and regular wine expert on BBC 1’s Saturday Kitchen Susy Atkins who will be presenting wines with Beaujolais.

Also there over three days will be TV’s Charles Metcalfe and beer blacksmith Melissa Cole. Discover and taste new wines in the dedicated village where you’ll find producers and wine regions from across the world.

Street Food Avenue is back! Enjoy a huge selection of ready-to-eat hot and cold food from around the globe including hog roasts, exotic meats, tapas, churros, burritos, Moroccan tagines, South American prime beef, continental sausages, pizza, Jamaican and Thai street food.

The inspiring Children’s Cookery Theatre, run by local cook school Kiddy Cook will again educate and entertain youngsters with a range of gastronomic experiments.

The whole family can chillax at City Beach on a deckchair with an artisan ice-cream or an afternoon tea, or even build a sandcastle. Superb specialist tea, coffee and fresh juice vendors can be found around the site.

The entertainment stage features lots of great live music acts performing every day until 8pm.

Ticket Information 1-day adult ticket £12 (£10 concession) 3-day adult ticket £18 (£15 concession) 1-day VIP ticket £38 All children aged 12 and under go free to all Foodies Festivals when accompanied by an adult. Open from 11am until 8pm.

2013 Foodies Festivals tickets are available from www.foodiesfestival. com or by calling 0844 995 1111.

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flavour festival season <

The Best Of The Rest…

Looking for a local food festival this summer? Use Flavour’s handy guide to what’s coming up in the next few months!

30 May–2 June

Sunrise Festival

near Frome, Somerset

www.sunrisefestivals.co.uk 9–16 June

Bridport Food Festival Bridport, Dorset

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15-16 June

Crediton Food and Drink Festival Crediton, Devon

www.creditonfoodfestival.co.uk 21-23 June

Rock Oyster Festival Rock, Cornwall

er th e wea ther!

www.rockoysterfestival.co.uk 13–14 July

Dorset Seafood Festival Weymouth Harbour, Dorset

www.dorsetseafood.co.uk 19– 21 July

Gloucester Quays Food Festival Gloucester

Fishstock Brixham Brixham, Devon

www.fishstockbrixham.co.uk

££’s

Discounted ticket prices available online until noon Monday 29 July

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7 September

Stroud Food Festival Stroud, Gloucestershire

www.stroudvalleysfestivals.co.uk 18–22 September

Tetbury Food & Drink Festival Tetbury, Gloucestershire

www.tetburyfooddrinkfestival.com 21-22 September

Weston-super-Food Festival Weston-super-Mare, Somerset

westonsuperfoodfestival.co.uk 27–29 September

Cornwall Food & Drink Festival Truro, Cornwall

www.cornwallfoodanddrink.co.uk

Chilli Plants, seeds and sauces expert Talks on Growing Chillies Demonstrations on Cooking with Chillies Chilli eating Competition Best Chilli sauce Competition Beers and Ciders Chilli Plant Competition refreshments and Market stalls Good Music, Great Food Kids entertainment

greatdorsetchillifestival.co.uk

St Giles Park, Wimborne St Giles, Dorset BH21 5ND 39

With obvious links to the railway, The Old Station features an old Pullman carriage as its restaurant, which has been lovingly restored to all its former glory.

Al fresco dining with a woodburning stove and barbecue is available in the warmer months and dining under the stars on our deck is a must for the romantic.

We are open seven days a week for lunch and dinner, open all day Fridayâ&#x20AC;&#x201C;Sunday. Meals served all day Sundays.

Telephone 01761 452228 Wells Road, Bristol BS39 6EN

www.theoldstationandcarriage.co.uk

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> flavour drops by

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Southville Deli in Redfield

Paul Wick is a man for whom great produce matters. The owner of North Street’s popular Southville Deli, he has now opened a second outlet on Church Road in Redfield.

cheeses (plus some more exotic varieties), cured meats, bread from Herbert’s Bakery and Abu Noor, plus fresh sandwiches and organic Fairtrade coffee to take away.

“I opened the original deli because I lived in the neighbourhood and found it hard to source everything that I wanted to buy locally,” says Paul. “I’ve always been aware of Church Road as a great shopping street, and it was shops such as greengrocer Dig In’s success that gave me the confidence to open a second shop here.”

Customers are also able to take away bags of various grains, filled from huge hoppers within the shop, and can take advantage of Southville Deli’s Ecover refill service.

“We try and have a focus on local or organic produce,” says Paul. “We’re very much driven by what the customers want – and if there’s anything that we don’t stock that a customer requests, we try and supply it if it fits our remit.”

The Redfield shop opened on April 17th, offering a similar range of produce to the Southville store. A slightly larger range of meat sits alongside organic and local

Those with special dietary requirements will also find a range of products that cater to their needs, from milk substitutes to gluten-free cakes and biscuits.

“We’ve been very enthusiastically received,” says Paul. “It’s a bit like the North Street shop – not a big shop, but people know that they’ll find all the ingredients of a good meal in here.”

Southville Deli Redfield is open from 8.30am to 6.30pm Monday to Friday and 8.30am to 6pm on Saturday. ■

Southville Deli 259-261 Church Road, Redfield, Bristol BS5 9HT Call 0117 941 2061 www.southvilledeli.com 41

> flavour talking shop

flavour meets bill Angela Mount talks shop to ‘Bill’s’ Bill Collison

It was my dad who got me started on this journey. I grew up on farms and allotments; my dad bought a nursery near Lewes, and then later on opened a garden centre on the South Downs. I grew up on the land, and it was brilliant; like being on holiday permanently, although we worked hard and learnt about the seasons and how things grow. I started off in a small shed near the high street selling fruit and veg, which was what I knew about; many people did that, but I could always make my displays look better than anyone else’s.

I found that as well as hard work I had a knack for making things look good. Today I’m still always involved in the look and the design of each of our restaurants – it’s my job is to make the places look amazing.

seeing someone with a huge pot of tea, who stays for two hours with friends or just taps away on their laptop. To me, that signifies that they are happy, comfortable, and likely to return. Whether they are having lunch, dinner or just a morning or afternoon drink, it’s all about the people and the atmosphere. That’s what made Bill’s work in the first place, and is still at the very heart of what we do. It’s all about our customers; there is no bigger thrill for me than to walk in and see the restaurants full of happy people. I love seeing customers enjoying what we have created.

That’s why our staff are so important – knowledgeable and efficient, but above all else, friendly and enthusiastic. They are the essence of what Bill’s is all about.

2001 is when it all really started. Actually it started with the flood that swept through the town in October 2000, destroying many, many houses, including mine, and also my shop. That brought about a true ‘community’ spirit, with the entire town pulling together, just as though Lewes were a warzone. We set up a stall in order to keep trading through the winter and then reopened, but as a café as well as a greengrocers. Our customers willed us to do well, and helped every step of the way.

We make food that people can relax with and enjoy – I stand firm in the belief that Bill’s needs to be true to its roots – good quality seasonal dishes and produce, served in a relaxed and laid-back atmosphere. No pretension, just great food including traditional favourites and a few quirky ideas. The menus change about five times a year, varying with the seasons.

I want to work with ethical, sustainable producers, and one of the most satisfying elements in the current expansion of Bill’s restaurants, is that we are still working with some of the producers that we started out with 12 years ago, who have supported us all along the way, even when times were very tough. We sell a wide variety of products, including chutneys, jams and confectionery, and many of these are from producers I knew from the early years.

We opened in Brighton in 2005. We were only open during the daytime, another simple venture focusing on what was in season, a real ‘quiche and fairy cakes’ place, serving soup, salads, smoothies, and a few quirky lunchtime dishes. By this time, both the Lewes and Brighton cafés had grown a huge following and were always packed, with people popping in throughout the day for coffee, tea, lunch, or to take something home to cook that evening. Menus were decided based on what seasonal produce we had in the shop at the time. It all took off from there.

I want people to feel at home in my restaurants. I love nothing more than 42

My favourite dishes on the menu are still the old stalwarts – a good, well-seasoned burger is hard to beat, and customers also love our traditional fish pie. But we have always pushed the boundaries, combining unusual produce and ingredients – we put fruit on pizzas and sprouts in salads in the early days! My desert island food product

would be eggs, so it will come as no surprise to hear that the scrambled eggs on the menu are also a firm favourite.

Life is a bit of a rollercoaster right now. No two days are ever the same; we now have 19 restaurants and I spend time in each, prior to them opening, designing the look and feel of the place – that is what I have always been able to do, even when it was just arranging a basket of apples and pears in my greengrocer’s shed. It’s important to me that we retain the aura of the early days that brought the local customers in.

I want to inspire the next generation; I want to inspire my team of staff.

Work hard, and remember that you are nothing without your customers.

Give it your all, have fun, and be consistent in what you do. The Bill’s family is the biggest asset we have.

I am a very lucky man. I didn’t plan this, it just snowballed. I wanted to create something that was fun and wacky and was all about people. I wouldn’t have done half of this if it hadn’t been for my wife, her sister (who was the partner in our original Lewes café), and so many of the people around in the early days who showed incredible passion and commitment to help us succeed when all we were about was a little café that sold great produce, fantastic cakes, and pretty good soup and quiche.

Bill’s Bath 7-8 Cheap Street, Bath BA1 1NE Call 01225 424262 Email bath@bills-email.co.uk Bill’s Bristol 67-69 Queens Road, Bristol BS8 1QL Call 0117 929 0035 Email bristol@bills-email.co.uk Visit www.bills-website.co.uk

> flavour talking shop

43

Situated between Bristol, Bath and Wells, The Old Station Inn and Carriage Restaurant has sealed its reputation as one of the best fine dining destination pubs in the area

> flavour advertorial promotion

The Old Station Inn and Carriage Restaurant Head chef Neville and wife Debbie have transformed the hotel into a hive of memorabilia from yesteryear â&#x20AC;&#x201C; and with a nod to its railway heritage, the extensive garden even features an old Pullman carriage which serves as its restaurant.

Brains Pub Of The Year in 2012-2013 (the second time in four years), The Old Station is open seven days a week for lunch and dinner, and all day Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

With ample parking, head over in the warmer months to enjoy al fresco dining. The large beer garden includes a polytunnel in which Neville and Debbie grow some of the produce regularly featured on their menu, and a large decking area that is perfect for dining or drinking while the sun is shining. Alternatively, head over in the evening and enjoy dining under the stars â&#x20AC;&#x201C; perfect for those with a romantic streak.

Neville has over 25 years of experience in some of Europeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s best hotels, as well as a culinary career spanning the US, Bermuda and the Pacific Rim. Neville calls on his international experience when creating his menus, mixing flavours and textures for a true gastronomic experience.

On warmer days, the barbecue is fired up, along with a wood- burning stove that produces delights such as baron of lamb, roast dinners, haunch of venison, leg of pork and more.

The Old Station Inn and Carriage Restaurant Wells Road, Hallatrow, Somerset BS39 6EN Telephone 01761 452228 Visit www.theoldstationandcarriage.co.uk

The Pullman carriage is available for private hire for weddings, birthdays and other functions, with tailored buffet menus available for guests to enjoy both inside the carriage and out in the garden.

www.theoldstationandcarriage.co.uk

g n i h t y r e v E a e t r o f s p sto

Nothing says ‘quintessentially British’ like a good afternoon tea.

Whether it’s a cream tea, a traditional afternoon tea, something with bubbles or something more savoury, have a look at our round-up of some of the best in the area…

> flavour tea time

Barnsley House Once home to the renowned garden designer Rosemary Verey, Barnsley House is now a stunningly beautiful Cotswold hotel. With 18 individually-designed bedrooms, a Spa & Skincare Centre and a restaurant that overlooks the fabulous garden, it is quite simply a perfect location for afternoon tea.

Served between 3 and 5pm daily, subject to availability, this most British of traditions may be enjoyed in The Potager Restaurant or in the Morning Room. In the summer, afternoon tea al fresco on the terrace overlooking the garden is simply idyllic, and chocolate and beetroot cake could be on the menu... yes beetroot – it’s amazing!

During the winter months, tea may be served in front of a roaring log fire and with winter Pimms on the menu as well as homemade sausage rolls, our Winter Afternoon Tea is a real treat.

Oh and don’t forget to have a wander around the gardens before or after your tea and collect your complimentary membership to our garden club!* *Terms and conditions apply, please see a member of staff for details.

Barnsley House Barnsley, Cirencester, Gloucestershire GL7 5EE Call 01285 740 000 Visit www.barnsleyhouse.com

Calcot Manor A former English Cotswold farmhouse (set next to a pretty courtyard of lime trees and ancient stone barns and stables), Calcot Manor is the perfect rural retreat. Surrounded by beautiful gardens and its own 220-acre estate, the hotel has foresworn floral patterns and swags in favour of a ‘countrymodern’ decorative style that’s compatible with a sophisticated country roost.

Calcot conveys the sense of a smart and stylish — yet extremely relaxed — private home and so is just perfect for traditional afternoon tea. Served in The Conservatory Restaurant or in the lounge in front of a log fire, or if weather permits, on the terrace or in the garden, prices start from £18 per person. Enjoy a selection of sandwiches, a homemade scone with clotted cream and strawberry jam and cakes of the day, with tea or coffee… or upgrade to include a glass of Champagne for extra decadence!

Calcot Manor Tetbury, Gloucestershire GL8 8YJ Call 01666 890391 Visit www.calcotmanor.co.uk 46

> flavour tea time

The Castle Bristol Tea at Taunton Company Afternoon tea at the Castle at Taunton is a special yet relaxed occasion. Served in the Castle Bow Bar from 3-5pm, seven days a week, the offering ranges from the Castle Cream Tea at £8.50, great for the peckish – homemade scones, jam, clotted cream and a choice of tea; to the Champagne Afternoon Tea at £25, a fantastic alternative for a more substantial treat. The afternoon tea consists of your choice of tea, a selection of homemade sandwiches, cakes, scones, jam and clotted cream, and, of course, a glass of chilled Champagne!

In the warmer months you’ll be able to enjoy these delights in the Castle’s Norman Rose garden. This hidden gem is a beautiful and tranquil place that you wouldn’t expect to find in the centre of a county town.

It is advisable to pre-book afternoon tea by calling 01823 272671. Gift vouchers can be purchased online at www.the-castle-hotel.com/gift-vouchers.php

The Castle at Taunton Castle Green, Taunton, Somerset TA1 1NF Call 01823 272671 Visit www.the-castle-hotel.com

The Bristol Tea Company is an independent company offering a selection of finest organic and Fairtrade loose leaf tea.

We import direct from estates in India and Sri Lanka.

“Sourcing the teas direct from estates like Makaibari in Darjeeling and Greenfield in the Uva Highlands of Sri Lanka ensures we can guarantee the highest quality whilst getting to know those who grow and produce the tea. Gaining an understanding of the challenges they face in creating such a fantastic product is an integral part of the Bristol Tea Company’s journey. We’re also able to see for ourselves the social, economic and environmental benefits of Fairtrade and growing organically. It is a thrill to be the link between these wonderful estates and those who enjoy great tea.” James Gillam – The Bristol Tea Company

Bristol Tea Company Visit www.bristolteacompany.co.uk

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> flavour tea time

Bristol Hotel

The

It’s not every day you get to relax in the afternoon, take time for yourself and indulge in a sumptuous afternoon tea. It’s time to spoil yourself!

Traditional afternoon tea is served at The Bristol Hotel in the relaxing surroundings of the River Lounge. Served with a range of Clipper Estate loose-leaf teas or freshly brewed Suspension Blend Clifton Coffees, enjoy a classic afternoon tea with a selection of finger sandwiches, mini cakes and newly baked scones served with jam and Cornish clotted cream.

Why not add a Hendrick’s Gin cocktail or a glass of house Champagne for an even more decadent experience?

Larderhouse

The

Enjoy an indulgent afternoon tea at Southbourne’s The Larderhouse, served from 2.30pm to 5pm daily.

All cakes, breads, biscuits and scones are baked in-house, with afternoon tea bookings including unlimited crafted coffee and looseleaf teas. Teas are served in a glass with tea timers and guidelines on achieving the optimum flavour, and there is even a chocolate indulgence package available for those with a sweet tooth!

For yet more luxury, opt for the ‘Master Crafted’ afternoon tea, which includes drams of fortified wines and crafted spirits.

The Larderhouse 4 Southbourne Grove, Southbourne, Dorset BH6 3QZ The Bristol Hotel The Harbourside, Prince Street, Bristol BS1 4QF Call 0117 923 0333 Visit www.doylecollection.com

Call 01202 424687 Visit www.thelarderhouse.co.uk

Cotswolds88 Hotel Set in the heart of the historic village of Painswick, Cotswolds88 is an imposing 18th-century Palladian mansion with panoramic views across the Cotswold’s Hills. The eclectic interior and traditional exterior create a unique venue in idyllic surroundings.

Enjoy breakfast, lunch, dinner and the ultimate afternoon tea in the multi award-winning three AA Rosette Restaurant Juniper or on the terrace. With an emphasis on local and seasonal produce Cotswolds88 aim to offer the best of the Cotswolds.

Each of the 17 rooms and suites have been individually designed, furnished and decorated to an exceptionally high standard.

Many have their own unique character, whether it is the designer wallpaper, extraordinary antique furniture or superb views across the valley. The hotel also boasts ‘Britain’s Sexiest Hotel Room’ voted No.1 by The Times 2013.

Cotswolds88 Hotel Kemps Lane, Painswick, Gloucestershire GL6 6YB Call 01452 813688 Email reservations@cotswolds88hotel.com Visit www.cotswolds88hotel.com 48

Signature 88 Tea FOR TWO Selection of freshly prepared sandwiches Scones served with clotted cream and jam Selection of fresh homemade cakes Tea or coffee £24.95 Afternoon Delights Selection of homemade cakes and scones, with tea or coffee £11.95 (for two) Homemade scones with clotted cream and jam £4.95

> flavour tea time

Tea Studio Steenbergs Teas the art of tea Created and hand-blended in rural North Yorkshire, this new range of light, refreshing afternoon teas from Steenbergs is perfect for taking time out and savouring the moment.

Whether you choose the Regency, China or Indian, you’ll be able to enjoy high-quality loose-leaf teas, beautifully presented in stylish black caddies with pretty vintage labelling.

Try out these delicious teas (and many others!) for yourself, with 10% off your UK order online until 31st August 2013 at www.steenbergs.co.uk (just quote Flavour2013), and be inspired by the organic spices and blends, baking extracts and flavoured sugars too! .

Tea Studio is a specialist supplier of over 20 of the world’s very finest leaf teas and tisanes. A love of art together with a passion for amazing tea gives this company an original creativeled brand used as a platform for artists to showcase their work.

Tea Studio offer two exceptional first flush Darjeelings, with a special offer available for flavour readers: Receive a 20% discount on all tea throughout June and July when ordering online at www.teastudio.co.uk Enter coupon code FLAVOUR20 to redeem.

Steenbergs Trade enquiries call 01765 640088 email sales@steenbergs.co.uk Visit www.steenbergs.co.uk

Tea Studio Email info@teastudio.co.uk Visit www.teastudio.co.uk

Hartley Farm Shop and Café

Hartley Farm is tucked away in the Cotswold countryside inbetween Bath and Bradford on Avon just off the B3108. The fifth generation farm, run by the Bowles family, produces great tasting and award-winning food for the farm shop and kitchen.

The kitchen prides itself on the food it produces and none more so than its Hartley Farm Cream Tea! Each scone is baked using British flour and organic buttermilk from Ivy House Farm (also run by more of the Bowles family) and topped with Ivy House Clotted Cream and Rose Farm Raspberry Jam. Enjoy with a pot of whole leaf tea in their green oak barn overlooking the farm or out in the garden when the sun is shining. A real British treat in a true British surrounding!

Reader Offers

Exclusively to Flavour readers, Hartley Farm are offering two homemade cream teas for just £10 (normally £6 each) anytime from 2pm, Monday - Saturday. Just quote ‘flavour mag’ to redeem. So bring a friend and enjoy in our new barn! Offer ends 16th June

Hartley Farm Shop & Café Winsley, Bradford on Avon, Wiltshire BA15 2JB Call 01225 864 948 Visit www.hartley-farm.co.uk 49

> flavour tea time

Tart Café Everyone loves cake and a good old fashioned tart, and Tart, on Bristol’s Gloucester Road, know that perfect pastry pleases.

Tart offer a range of afternoon tea options — including those for diners who don’t have a sweet tooth. In addition to their classic cream teas and afternoon teas, you will be able to enjoy a savoury cream tea, with cheese scones, cream cheese and chutney. Or try the innovative Tart Afternoon Tea; a selection of sandwiches, homemade pâté and pickles, chicken pasties, sausage rolls, cheese scones, chutney and cream cheese.

Chin! Chin!

Bar & Kitchen

Chin! Chin! has developed a fantastic reputation over the past few years since its launch for using quality, regionally sourced great British produce... and with a Michelin-star-trained head chef at the helm their afternoon tea has been noted recently for excellence too!

The afternoon tea includes a selection of finger sandwiches, a delicious scone with Devonshire clotted cream and artisan jam, and an artisan cake selection with a choice of delicious real-leaf tea infusions or amazing coffee provided by local coffee experts Clifton Coffee, all served on vintage china. There’s also a range of fizz and cocktails to take advantage of too!

Chin! Chin! will soon be offering a ‘high tea’ (tea, finger sandwiches and scone) from just £8.95, contact them for more details!

Chin! Chin! Bar & Kitchen 155 St Michael’s Hill, Kingsdown, Bristol BS2 8DB Call 0117 973 9393 Visit www.chinchinbarkitchen.com

Tart Café & Foodstore 16 The Promenade, Gloucester Road, Bishopston, Bristol BS7 8AE Call 0117 924 7628 Visit www.lovelytart.com 50

A stunning location, with food to match

A short distance from the city centre, leave the real world behind...

Open for breakfast every day from 8:30am.

Food served all day, seven days a week.

The Hare

Hounds, Lansdown Road, Bath BA1 5TJ www.hareandhoundsbath.com reservations@hareandhoundsbath.com Tel 01225 482682

> flavour Kilted Chef

The Kilted Chef

flavour’s Emily Knight visits the contemporary British restaurant …

“We cook for you, our customers, and not for accolades,” proclaim Bath’s Kilted Chef. The dream team of interior designer Sue Chalmers as front of house director and chef Dougie Bonar in the kitchen are certainly working wonders in the basement restaurant, formerly the home of the Michelin-starred Moody Goose.

Chef Dougie Bonar has certainly come to Bath with a wealth of experience. His great-grandmother was pastry chef to the Queen Mother at Glamis Castle, and a passion for great food is obviously a family trait. Dougie’s career history includes at stint at The Savoy in London, before opening his own Edinburgh restaurant in the mid-’90s, where he gained a Michelin Red M and double rosettes.

Sue’s interior design background has transformed the vaulted venue beneath Kingsmead Square into a chic and stylish dining area, full of muted tones and feature walls, and a nod to Dougie’s heritage in the wall lights fashioned from what appear to be antlers. Smaller dining areas offer the opportunity of private dining, with exclusive use of the restaurant also available for private functions.

Menus range from the pre-theatre lunch option to full à la carte, with a taster menu also available if pre-booked. Dougie’s Sunday brunch menu is also a treat not to be missed. While contemporary British in nature, Dougie’s menus also include a nod to the French and certainly pay homage to his Scottish roots.

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In a previous interview with flavour, chef Dougie told us, “People eat with their eyes, so sure, you want their food to look attractive, but it also has to have taste. There’s no point in beautiful food that tastes like cardboard.” The Kilted Chef’s kitchen, as we were to discover, turns out food that not only manages successful pairings of intriguing flavour combinations, cooked perfectly, but produces fantastic-looking dishes that is almost a shame to destroy by eating them.

An amuse-bouche of warming Cajun and ginger spiced pumpkin and carrot soup was served with a fondue tart with the lightest of pastries, topped with a rich tomato, spinach and cheese filling; the perfect teaser for what was to come.

Choosing from the à la carte menu, I began with a carpaccio of beetroot – thin discs of both the gold and purple varieties circling beneath a perfectly cooked wedge of tempura Camembert and crisscrossed with two meaty spears of asparagus. A roasted walnut and orange dressing lifted the dish and cut through the richness of the cheese in a wonderful balance of flavours.

The main course certainly saw Dougie harking back to his Scottish roots – a beautifully pink cassis roasted loin of venison atop a bed of braised leeks. The ‘sweet chilli pomme Berny’ was a new discovery for me – essentially a spherical potato croquette combined with a sweet chilli sauce, crumbed and fried – a hearty touch that sat alongside beautifully

presented bundled green beans and a selection of seasonal veg.

It was the vanilla-infused Scottish langoustine that was the star of the show in this dish for me, an espresso cup stuffed with tender chunks of langoustine in a wonderfully creamy sauce… and a humorous touch in the head of one crustacean looking as if it were trying to escape from the dish.

For dessert, the most beautifully presented apple and frangipane tartlet – sweet, sticky and caramelised on the top and paired with a zingy oriental ginger ice cream. It really was a work of art, decorated with icing sugar-dusted fruit, chocolate-enclosed pools of fruit sauce, a spun sugar basket, a chocolate curl and spherified fruit juice.

This is a restaurant team to whom attention to detail really does matter – in the décor, the service and also in the food.

Dougie Bonar is a chef who knows how to create a masterpiece that not only looks good, but tastes fantastic. We’ll be back.

Kilted Chef 7a Kingsmead Square, Bath BA1 2AB Call 01225 466 688 Email tasty@kiltedchef.co Visit www.kiltedchef.co

> flavour Kilted Chef

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> flavour matthew jukes

Discover 100 Best Australian Wines

Angela Mount meets Matthew Jukes

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atthew Jukes – best-selling wine writer, wine columnist for the Daily Mail, author of 14 books, and with more accolades to his name than many wines have awards – brought his ‘100 Best Australian Wines’ Roadshow to Bath last month, with a lively evening at the Great Western Wine Shop. The shop was filled to capacity, as over 60 guests tasted their way through a selection of 50 wines and listened to Matthew’s witty and entertaining chat about some of his favourites.

Angela Mount is a wine expert, writer and presenter. Probably best known for having her taste buds insured for £10m by her former employers Somerfield, she is passionate about helping wine drinkers discover new and exciting wines. She also writes and presents events about wine and food matching, judges at all the major UK wine competitions and chairs the judging panels for the Bristol and also the Bath Good Food Awards.

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Celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2013, 100 Best Australian Wines was originally conceived as an idea to help sommeliers and independent wine stockists who couldn’t travel to Australia to discover the wines for themselves. Matthew, previously a wine buyer for top London restaurant Bibendum but now a well-established wine writer and author, knew how difficult it was to make choices in selecting from the tidal wave of Australian wines that were hitting the UK. With a self-confessed obsession for Australian wine, Matthew decided to help the trade buyers by narrowing down the range, offering his top tips, and distilling a confusing mass of wines into a snapshot of the very best that Australia has to offer.

Today, Matthew Jukes’ Best 100 Australian Wines is an eagerly awaited annual event, launching in London each May, and has moved from a useful tool for busy sommeliers and wine shops to a respected and popular guide for lovers of good Australian wine all over the UK. The roadshow now covers 12 venues across

the country, with Matthew visiting, giving talks and tasting through his top wines, with a captive, attentive and, in the case of Bath, very lively audience, offering wine drinkers the opportunity of tasting and also of asking every question they could possibly think of – which they did at Great Western Wine, continuing way past the 9pm finish time. I even spotted Matthew answering yet more questions whilst attempting to get back to the train station after the event! Bath certainly knows how to make wine writers feel welcome!

The search and decision-making process for this exercise isn’t a simple one, although many readers will undoubtedly envy the required visits that Matthew has to undertake! Ever passionate about Australia, he visits for three weeks in August/ September to taste the new vintage whites, then returns in November for the reds. In February around 1,000 bottles of new wines rock up on his doorstep, so that he can taste finished samples and make his top 100 selection (this means that he already knows what his top 100 for 2013 will be, but we have to wait until late May to find out!).

Matthew is passionate about the quality and also the value of great Australian wine. “Australia rules the wine world in the £12-£15 price bracket,” he told me.

“What is exciting is that wine drinkers are now realising, through tasting and experimenting, that Australia has every single climate and almost every single style of wine within its shores, and they are learning the wealth, richness and depth of variety that Australian wine offers.”

> flavour matthew jukes

Matthew’s selection of wines covers just about every style and every price point possible – I tried to find out his own personal favourite styles, but it was impossible to pin him down to one, such is the enthusiasm, fascination and excitement that he has for what is happening in Australia right now. “Mornington Peninsula Pinot Noir is fast becoming an obsession right now,” he said, “and with its cool climate, truly rivals many Burgundies.

“Chardonnay is the best value wine in the world, in my opinion, and the most improved grape variety because winemakers know what they are doing with it now, and do it superbly.” He paused, “And Clare Valley Riesling 2012 is sensational, you can almost buy any, it was a spectacular vintage. If you don’t like Clare Valley Riesling, you might as well give up and go back to cider.”

And with that he was off, wading into the crowds in the shop to regale his avid audience with stories about each and every wine on show, and transporting them with him to those distant vineyards and sunnier climes.

MATTHEW JUKES’ FAVOURITE WINES FROM GREAT WESTERN WINE Some tasting notes from ‘100 Best Australian wines 2012’.

Skillogallee hand-picked Gewurztraminer, South Australia, £15.50 “On the palate this wine speed-skates across your taste buds, scattering potpourri and crystallised ginger notes asunder. It is bone dry and lithe and quite unlike any Gewurz before it. Drink this slinky pixie with Asian-influenced cuisine.” (Matthew Jukes) Henschke Julius Riesling, Clare Valley 2011, South Australia, £23.50 GWW “It possesses the most extraordinary amplitude of luscious, cool, near-tropical flavours on the palate. Its delightful trajectory of glistening fruit zooms along briskly to a crisp, bright, enlivening finish and you are left gasping for more.” ( Matthew Jukes) Glaetzer Anaperenna , Barossa, 2010, South Australia, £43.50 GWW “A piece of inspirational wizardry from winemaker Ben Glaetzer, this blend of two of the most unusual grape varieties is a mercurial delight. Spicy and herbal notes punctuate the lusty blueberry and blackberry palate and it keeps you guessing with every sip.”

(Matthew Jukes) Other top Australian wines that Matthew rates Heartland Dolcetto Lagrein 2010, South Australia, £13.50 GWW “A piece of inspirational wizardry from winemaker Ben Glaetzer, this blend of two of the most unusual grape varieties is a mercurial delight. Spicy and herbal notes punctuate the lusty blueberry and blackberry palate and it keeps you guessing with every sip.” (Matthew Jukes) Mount Langhi Giran ’Billi Billi’ Shiraz 2009, £9.95 GWW From a great producer of Shiraz, Billi Billi is soft, approachable, brimming with blueberry and blackberry fruit, hints of mocha, and a rich, silky finish. Bursting with flavour and incredible value.

All wines are available from Great Western Wine Shop, Wells Road, Bath Call 01225 322810 Visit www.greatwesternwine.co.uk 55

> flavour Menu Gordon Jones

menu gordon jones

Angela Mount visits one of Bath’s most talked about restaurants …

W

hen the acclaimed head chef of the Royal Crescent upped sticks and set up on his own in a tiny ex-café on the corner of a hilly, southern suburb of Bath, critics and food lovers alike were hesitant as to the viability of this new venture. Small, out of the centre and not in the most scenic part of town, how great would the pull of this mildly eccentric and extraordinarily talented chef be, to drag both Bath residents and food-loving visitors up the steep hill of the Wellsway?

16 months on, straight-talking Scotsman Gordon Jones is laughing. With Saturday nights fully booked until December and a three-month waiting list for Friday evenings, Gordon has certainly made a swift impression. With plaudits, accolades, and most importantly, happy diners galore, it’s been a busy year, culminating with the selection of Menu Gordon Jones as one of the four restaurants competing to represent the South West in the annual Good Food Guide Awards. At the time of going to print, votes had been cast, but no results were known. An impressive achievement for such a new venture.

Gordon’s cooking is thrilling, eccentric, off-beat and confident, without doubt one of the most exciting dining experiences in Bath at the present time. In his tiny, open plan kitchen he creates culinary magic whilst simultaneously chatting to

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his assembled guests… if he feels like it.

The size of the venue means that guests inevitably become part of the whole alchemy and creative genius that is going on in the kitchen. No hiding behind thick kitchen doors, this is a chef who is happy to be on show and reveal exactly what is going on in his tiny kitchen… just him and his assistant, creating waves of magical flavours and visions of exquisiteness in his carefully assembled dishes.

A true risk taker, Gordon is so confident in his ideas and creativity that there are no menus for his five-course lunch sitting (£35), and a six-course dinner option (£45).

He is refreshingly frank when asked why: “I cook with whatever I choose from my suppliers on the day. On Tuesday, I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to cook on Wednesday. We started off with a menu, but since we were such a tiny team and it changed daily, we just didn’t have the time to keep changing it and printing off new versions. So guests get what I decide to cook; we take all dietary requirements into consideration of course, but essentially if you book in for dinner, you’ll get six courses of food that I’ve decided on pretty much that day, depending on what’s in season and what I’ve bought.”

This is what is so exciting about Gordon’s cooking – no rules, no menu. I could eat there every day, and never have exactly the

> flavour Menu Gordon Jones

same dish twice. It’s all down to what’s in the bag of shopping and what’s in season!

The doll-sized restaurant is run, with style and efficiency, by the ever-smiling Sarah, a charmingly knowledgeable front of house who not only takes guests through a detailed description of the multi-faceted dishes, but also provides invaluable advice on the right wine selection or guides them through the wine flight – a small glass to accompany each different course at dinner.

All wines are either organic or biodynamic, and are selected to complement the individual dishes on offer that day.

Every Gordon Jones experience starts with an espuma, and on the day I dined there it was parsley root: a light, creamy, delicate concoction with a herbaceous flavour, enhanced by warming cardamom complexity.

Next up was Gordon’s take on ‘Full English Breakfast’ – a lavish cornucopia of flavours and textures, served on a simple black slate. A soft, foamy scrambled pheasant’s egg sat in its shell beside a medley of bold primary flavours – crispy pancetta, mashed purple potatoes, spicy saucisse de morteau, baby mushrooms — all mingling together beautifully, and lifted to a higher plane by the fresh acid kick of pan-fried tomatoes with a hint of chilli.

On to the fish course: arguably my favourite, and one of the most beautiful-looking.

A slab of moist, tender roasted hake, cooked to perfection, sitting atop a bed of cider-braised soft, plump Puy lentils, and contrasting crunchy, mint-infused fennel, alongside a pool of cauliflower purée in which were nestled some sweet, golden raisins.

A delicate spear of Wye Valley new season asparagus trembled on the parapet of this concoction; the flavours were sublime.

Course number four was a riot of flavours and ideas; roast Creedy Carver duck, meltingly tender and succulent, served with confit leg of duck, braised duck heart and with a celery and wild garlic risotto, which was done up in a little deep-fried parcel.

As with all of Gordon’s dishes, one of the most exciting elements is the juxtaposition and contrast of textures, and this dish showcased this perfectly.

The pre-dessert palate cleanser was possibly the most intriguing and polarising – blackberry sorbet with marinated cucumber and cabbage water; on paper this shouldn’t work. On its own, the little phial of cabbage water which Sarah was about to pour over the jewel-coloured sorbet, smelt, quite frankly, vile. Yet, she did, and despite every instinct telling me otherwise, it was incredible. It shouldn’t have worked but it did; fresh and vibrant, with the sweetness of the blackberry lifted by the fresh acidity of the cabbage and the cucumber. A little touch of genius.

Finally to the dessert, and another exquisitely presented slate carrying the softest, fluffiest rhubarb soufflé, served with coconut sorbet, mini carrot madeleines, and an unctuous chocolate cremeux. As a non-dessert eater, I was converted – utterly heavenly.

There is a delightful list of teas, including energising Oolong with ginger, cinnamon and lemongrass. The wine list is short, and given the nature and style of the menu (or rather lack of it), could maybe do with a little more information; fine if you have the wine flight, but otherwise potentially leaving customers confused to choose a bottle when they have no idea of the food they are going to be served.

This is impressive genius at work. If you like a simple steak and don’t like being told what to eat, don’t go. If you like a trip into culinary fantasy land, then this is the place for you.

Menu Gordon Jones 2 Wellsway, Bath BA2 3AQ Call 01225 480871 Visit www.menugordonjones.co.uk 57

Jersey Luxury Michelin Experience with Travtel

Try all three of Jersey’s Michelin-starred restaurants in one mouthwatering gourmet break.

The Jersey Michelin Star Experience is a three-night stay for two people at either The Atlantic Hotel, The Club Hotel & Spa or Grand Jersey on a bed and breakfast basis and includes a fine dining experience in all three restaurants, one on each night of the break.

Atlantic Hotel and The Ocean Restaurant

Club Hotel & Spa and Bohemia

Art deco architecture and breathtaking bay views make this chic cliff top hotel a stunning luxury retreat. The Atlantic Hotel is a member of Small Luxury Hotels of The World – the only one in Jersey!

The Ocean Restaurant at The Atlantic Hotel teams modern British cuisine with refined style, superb service and an expertly crafted menu of exquisite local produce. With a Michelin star since 2007 as well as four rosettes in the 2013 AA Restaurant Guide, Ocean is one of the highest-ranked restaurants in the British Isles.

This boutique bolthole is the perfect escape for urbanites looking for a chic retreat. In the heart of St Helier, The Club Hotel & Spa comes with the added benefits of a Michelin-starred restaurant and an award-winning spa.

The Bohemia Restaurant at The Club Hotel & Spa has a dynamic and innovative menu that puts local produce in the spotlight and packs a punch when it comes to delivering contemporary and creative dishes. Awarded a Michelin star a year after opening in 2004, Bohemia is listed in the 2013 Good Food Guide’s top 40 UK restaurants and holds four AA rosettes.

Grand Jersey and Tassili

The Luxury Michelin Experience with Travtel is priced at £712 per person (available 24th May–29th September 2013)

This beautiful five-star Victorian-style villa has kept its grand features but upped the glamour with lush décor. Grand Jersey’s elegant setting overlooking the sea is home to an easy relaxed luxury — you won’t want to leave.

Tassili at Grand Jersey offers an exquisite modern British menu with a decadent twist. Awarded a Michelin star in 2011 along with three AA rosettes and featured in the 2013 Good Food Guide, Tassili is known for its quality cuisine with a strong emphasis on premium ingredients, combined and cooked with flair and served with style.

This price includes: Three nights in either an Ocean View room at The Atlantic Hotel, a Studio room at The Club Hotel & Spa, or an Executive Sea View room at Grand Jersey Hotel & Spa • Dinner for two at each of the three restaurants during your stay; Ocean Restaurant, Bohemia and Tassili • A delicious breakfast each morning • Full use of the spa facilities • Return travel from national and regional airports across the UK. Price based on London Gatwick departures, supplements may apply for departures from other airports.

Please call 01534 496640 to book

Weddings

> flavour cookery schools

If you’re starting to think about where to hold that special day, you’re spoilt for choice in the South West. We’ve done the hard work for you and put together some fantastic venues to make the big moment in your life just perfect...

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> flavour wedding venues

Charlton House

Make Charlton House your very own home and enjoy the most intimate and spectacular wedding for up to 160 guests.

Situated in beautiful Somerset and surrounded by the Mendip Hills, this stunning country house retreat can be yours for your special day. From intimate and small weddings, to exclusive hire of the whole hotel and its grounds, this very special occasion will certainly be a day to remember for both you and your guests.

Boasting 28 bedrooms, including the spectacular Bridal Suite, your guests can make this their home for your special day, helping to provide a wonderful setting to catch up with friends before and after the celebrations.

We have recently launched three new wedding packages, starting from £75 per person.

Each wedding package includes at least one arrival drink, canapés, a three-course meal with wine, a drink to toast the speeches and evening food, meeting all your food and beverage requirements throughout the day. Bespoke wedding packages are also available on request.

Exclusive use of Charlton House is a popular choice for couples trying to create that ‘home way from home’ atmosphere for their wedding. This is exactly how Mrs. Bull felt about her daughter’s wedding in 2012 explaining, “From checking in with ‘the dress’ on Thursday until we checked out on Tuesday, Charlton House felt like home, particularly when we spent Tuesday in our dressing gowns and the four of us stood in the doorway and waved everyone off. I’m sure that there are not many hotels in the UK where we could have done that.”

Space for a marquee to hold up to 200 guests is also available for hire in our walled garden.

The marquee can be used for non-exclusive weddings and exclusive weddings.

To arrange a tour of the facilities, contact our event manager Hollie today on 01749 342008.

Charlton House Shepton Mallet, Nr. Glastonbury, Somerset BA4 4PR 60

Call 01749 342 008

Adelle and Luke married at Charlton House in March 2013 and agreed, “It was the best day of our lives and we couldn’t have asked for a more homely, beautiful venue where everyone felt very relaxed.”

Visit www.charltonhouse.com

Huntstile Farm

> flavour weddings

Wedding industry experts award winner for best small venue 2012 (under 150 guests) also listed in the top 50 venues in England by The Independent newspaper.

Huntstile is an award-winning Somerset wedding venue with a fabulous dining marquee – a beautiful working farm nestled in the foothills of the Quantocks. We are passionate about locally grown, well-produced, seasonal food and have our own kitchen garden producing salad, vegetables, soft fruit and herbs around the year for the café and venue. Sunday lunch at Huntstile is a particular treat, with lovely homemade puddings, locally raised beef and some delectable vegetarian dishes. We also hold themed events throughout the year which are great fun, serving fare from other countries and times gone by and various courses on beekeeping, pig keeping and sausage making.

As well as just over an acre of productive kitchen garden and mixed orchards, there are the Gloucester Old Spot and Oxford Sandy and Black pigs reared for meat, and our flock of organic chickens that lay the very tastiest of eggs. We also have four very friendly pet goats – they love to say hello to our visitors.

The farmhouse features nine delightful and individually decorated bedrooms, finely furnished with newly fitted en suite shower and bathrooms, tea and coffee making facilities and flatscreen TVs. Our comfortable beds have soft, snuggly duvets and pillows, cotton sheets and pretty, soft furnishings. The farm also has extra accommodation

in the form of a very sweet original bow-topped Gypsy caravan and a lovely pale blue Shepherd’s hut trailer with a huge super-king-size bed. All our guests are free to enjoy the pretty gardens and children are very welcome here – we have a large trampoline just for them.

There are some spectacular walks along the Quantock Hills with footpaths there from the farm gate and walks to suit every taste.

There is a little stone circle at the top of the farm that has been used for several humanist wedding ceremonies – it’s a tranquil and peaceful place, offering stunning views spanning Glastonbury Tor, Brent Knoll and the Bristol Channel across the surrounding countryside.

Open Farm Sunday on 9th June is an annual free event when we share with you the world of organic farming, the crops we grow, tractor and trailer rides around the farm, games, face-painting, stalls – and not to forget the scrumptious strawberry cream teas we serve in the café. We would love to see you here!

“Sweet and cosy rustic bedrooms, Jacobean panelling and delicious organic food on your plate.

Huntstile is an organic dream.” Alistair Sawday

Hunstile Organic Farm Goathurst, Nr Bridgwater TA5 2DQ Call 01278 662 358 Email huntsile@live.co.uk Visit huntstileorganicfarm.co.uk 61

> flavour wedding venues

Queens Catering

Caterer of the Month

Renowned for offering a quality that has been recognised by numerous national and regional awards, The Queens Arms in Corton Denham has a team dedicated to exceeding customers’ expectations. The team’s aim to produce innovative and stylish cuisine using the very best local and seasonal produce (much of it coming from the village itself) was recognised by the AA in 2012 by the awarding of a rosette, making The Queens Arms the only pub in the area to receive such a commendation.

Under the Queens Catering name, The Queens Arms has been delivering catering services of the highest quality for the last 10 years in the Dorset and Somerset region. The dedicated catering team can help plan and deliver the perfect, tailored solution to any of your catering needs, whether a wedding breakfast for hundreds of guests, a hog roast or barbecue in a field, canapés for drinks parties and corporate receptions, a kids’ party or an intimate dinner party.

The Queens Arms has a full service mobile bar that can be used as an integral part of whatever event you are planning. This professional mobile bar can be used to cater for any number of guests, and with its own marquee it will impress guests and deliver quality beverages in a professional and stylish manner.

From the directors to the waitresses, all Queens staff are dedicated to delivering a quality of service that will enhance any event or party. The head chef has previously worked in Michelin-starred restaurants in the UK and run successful team building cooking events for the likes of Vodafone in London, while all waiting staff are taken through a thorough induction and training programme to ensure that all events run smoothly and efficiently.

Providing you with an event that is delivered to your specifications, you will be dealing with a dedicated event co-ordinator from your first call; a team member who will ensure careful planning to suit both your needs and your budget.

This bespoke approach with full consultation with the chef and events co-ordinator will allow you to delight your guests with a quality that will enhance any occasion.

Queens Catering Corton Denham, Sherborne, Somerset DT9 4LR 62

Call 01963 220317

Visit thequeenscatering.com

Charingworth Manor The Cotswolds

The perfect Cotswold manor house hotel in warm Cotswold stone, Charingworth has commanded views over idyllic rural Gloucestershire countryside for 700 years. Every one of the 26 bedrooms has recently been carefully refurbished to the highest standard; offering contemporary style, all-new beds and duvets, plasma TVs, tea and coffee facilities and, most importantly, fabulous bathrooms.

With its stunning location, Charingworth Manor is an exceptional location for your special wedding day in the Cotswolds.

The hotel is fully licensed for civil ceremonies for up to 85 guests, and the choice of three different function suites means they can cater for wedding parties from an intimate gathering of 30 to wedding receptions for up to 120. The variety of wedding menus and packages will help you find the one that suits you.

Pose for photographs in the stunning gardens with views unparalled anywhere in the Cotswolds, and for summer weddings, make the most of the special event marquee.

Best of all, they are there to help you with all your plans. Call the Events Manager who will take you through all the details of the wedding packages, and work with you, right up until the moment you leave as husband and wife.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;We would like to thank everybody at Charingworth Manor who made our wedding just the most perfect day.

We had such a great time and so did our guests.â&#x20AC;?

Charingworth Manor Charingworth, Nr Chipping Campden, Gloucestershire GL55 6NS Call 01386 593555 Visit www.classiclodges.co.uk/Charingworth_Manor_The_Cotswolds 63

> flavour wedding venues

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Aldwick Court Farm &Vineyard

> flavour wedding venues

Aldwick Court Farm & Vineyard is a beautiful new wedding venue nestled at the foot of the Mendip Hills, with beautiful views and surrounding countryside yet only 20 minutes from Bristol city centre.

The new barn offers the scope for a wedding breakfast and/or reception for up to 200 guests, whilst the adjoining 17th-century barn offers charm and warmth for your wedding ceremony.

Aldwick boasts the largest vineyard in Somerset, an ideal location for romantic photos, while offering guests the opportunity to try our English-produced still and sparkling wine.

The venue is yours exclusively for your special day.

“We cannot recommend this venue (and the staff) enough.

A very professional, relaxing and personal experience.

Thank you so much for making our wedding the best day.”

Aldwick Court Farm & Vineyard Aldwick, Redhill, Bristol BS40 5RF Call 01934 864404 Email weddings@aldwickcourtfarm.co.uk Visit www.aldwickweddings.co.uk

Winford Manor Award-winning Winford Manor is a stunning hotel with 22 rooms, set at the head of the beautiful Chew Valley. After restoration, Winford Manor is a blend of old and new, sitting comfortably together in a relaxed and peaceful environment – a perfect venue for any wedding with an emphasis on environmental awareness and accessible services.

Sitting in 7.5 acres of stunning parkland, it has ample space for a marquee if desired, breathtaking scenery for your precious photographs and extensive car parking for all your guests.

As every wedding is unique, their dedicated wedding coordinator will meet with you to discuss your requirements in detail. From the moment you arrive, the friendly, professional staff will be on hand to ensure that the day runs smoothly and that your special event is truly memorable.

Winford Manor has a ceremony licence and welcomes even the smallest of ceremonies. Visit the website for details of their special all-inclusive offers – a few dates available for 2013.

Winford Manor Winford Manor Hotel, Winford, Bristol, BS40 8DW Call 01275 472292 Email reservations@winfordmanor.co.uk Visit www.winfordmanor.co.uk 65

MEZZE RESTAURANTS INJECTING NEW LEASE OF LIFE INTO COMMUNITIES THE GREEN DRAGON - DOWNEND 0117 914 1101 T H E R O YA L G E O R G E - T H O R N B U R Y 0 1 4 5 4 4 1 4 0 3 0 THE SHIP & CASTLE - CONGRESBURY 01934 833 535 T H E WA R W I C K A R M S – C L U T T O N 0 1 7 6 1 4 5 1 2 0 0 A N D N O W AT THE ANCHOR - HAM GREEN 01275 372253 www.mezzerestaurants.com At the heart of every community you will find a community hub and Mezze Restaurants aims to fill that void by offering good quality, reasonably-priced family-oriented venues away from the city centres.

Mezze injects a new lease of life into old country pubs and in turn helps to revive their communities. This year is particularly exciting for the Mezze group with the recent launch of The Anchor in Ham Green, and another new development, Mezze at The White Lion, Portishead, opening in July.

These venues join our other new Mezze Restaurant in Clutton which offers extensive children’s play and our popular and well-established Congresbury, Downend and Thornbury Restaurants, which each also offer landscaped gardens with flame-lit lanterns after dark for al fresco dining.

Each restaurant serves a wide and interesting selection of Mezzés (tapas) for informal dining along with a wellbalanced A La Carte menu, which has a scattering of old favourites. For pudding we have a range of delicious treats to tantalize your taste buds and even homemade ice-cream is available at some of our restaurants boasting their own ice-cream parlour.

At The Ship & Castle, Congresbury we also have six boutique guestrooms in our AA 4 star rated hotel and have recently launched eight Boutique hotel rooms at the Warwick Arms, Clutton, making them both an ideal overnight spot for traveling from Bristol Airport with combined highly competitive airport parking rates. What better way than to start your holiday with an overnight stay, a delicious dinner and a hearty breakfast before jetting off on your adventures!

COMING SOON The White Lion – Portishead FDM03673 - Mezze Flavour Mag.indd 1

21/05/2013 15:31

Your children may eat healthily at home… but do you know what they’re eating while at school?

In issue 58 we showed how a number of schools in the South West are raising the bar when it comes to encouraging healthy eating amongst their students.

Healthy eating doesn’t just take place in the school canteen; read on to find out how catering qualifications, cookery competitions, fruit and veg grown on the premises and cookery classes help our children to learn about and appreciate good food.

HealthyEducation

revisited

healthy schools

Hanford School Hanford is a special place where excellent results are achieved, but where childhood is still magical.

Hanford is a leading girls’ prep school set in 45 acres of rolling Dorset countryside. The girls spend a lot of time outside amongst the trees and in the paddocks and they are often seen running around in jodhpurs and games shirts, chasing each other amongst the daffodils or playing with the ponies, dogs and chickens.

Hanford is famous for its ponies. The emphasis of all riding instruction is to teach the children to do as much as possible themselves and the girls love to get ‘stuck in’ to grooming and mucking out. Children ride out on the hills and in the summer they ride in the early morning before breakfast.

Another favourite activity is to go for an early morning run, often up nearby Hod Hill, and Hanford girls are currently the small schools’ county and national cross country running champions.

Free playtime is important at Hanford and afternoons are arranged so that the children have time to play on the playground and on the lawns. Children quickly learn to play without the need for constant adult encouragement or direction, although benign supervision is constant.

Games sessions also take place every afternoon. The courts and pitches are set within the extensive grass lawns, which provide Hanford with its blend of informality 68

and rural charm. All school teams achieve high standards, and the Under 12s Netball are the IAPS South West champions and in April went to the nationals where they came fifth.

Active girls need lots of good food. Hanford has a large walled garden in which fruit and vegetables are grown and supplied to the kitchens where the fantastic catering department whip up glorious crumbles filled with rhubarb and apples, pies full of meat from the local award-winning butcher, bowls of seasonal vegetables and delicious sponge cakes, adding to the feeling of living in a family house.

Fresh flowers from the garden are always on the dining tables and around the school. Lemons are grown in the greenhouse and picked on Shrove Tuesday to accompany the girls’ pancakes. In season, raspberries, black and red currants arrive. The ‘green vegetables’, potatoes, lettuce and tomatoes arrive without air miles while the fruit trees are loaded with apples, pears, plums and damsons.

Hanford School Child Okeford, Dorset DT11 8HN Call 01258 860219 Visit www.hanfordschool.co.uk

healthy schools

Photos: Jon Craig www.freelancinguk.co.uk

Prior Park College, Bath

Open Morning

Saturday 12 October 2013 Prior Park College in Bath is in celebration mode.

Headmaster James Murphy-O’Connor explains: “I am pleased to announce five exciting new initiatives in teaching and learning, sport, pastoral care, boarding and catering. These initiatives demonstrate our confidence in the future and our commitment to providing our students with a first-class education.”

The five initiatives include the building of a new sports centre in 2014, the opening of a new girls’ day house, an upgrade of information technology systems, expansion of boarding provision and, last but not least, a catering excellence initiative.

This latter initiative has in part been spearheaded by the arrival of new Head Chef, Mr Peter Solet. Originally from Hungary, Peter brings a wealth of experience to the position of Head Chef at Prior. He trained for three years at the four-star Budapest Hotel in Romada and, after winning a number of competitions and accolades, he moved to the USA where he worked for Hyatt Regency Hotels. During this time he had a three-month stint in the White House. Add to this impressive list time spent at

Gundel, one of the most famous restaurants in Eastern Europe, where he cooked for the Queen and the late Pope John Paul II, and at five parliamentary restaurants where he served the then PM, Tony Blair.

However, Peter does not see much difference in cooking for the Queen and other dignitaries and cooking for students and staff at the College. His motto is that food should always be delicious and nutritious with balance and variety no matter who the diner is. The passion for what he does is obvious as day after day Peter and his team serve up tantalising breakfasts, lunches and dinners to satisfy even the toughest teenage food critic.

Over and above his ability to cook is Peter’s desire to mingle with the students and staff in the dining room, asking their opinions on the dishes and encouraging them to try different things.

Prior Park College Prior Park College, Ralph Allen Drive, Bath BA2 5AH Call 01225 835 353 Visit www.thepriorfoundation.com 69

healthy schools

Bruton School for Girls Girls Go Green

Bruton School for Girls takes full advantage of its enviable location in the beautiful Somerset countryside close to the Dorset and Wiltshire borders. The emphasis on the outdoors, green issues and healthy living permeates the whole school from the youngest pupils at Sunny Hill Nursery and Prep School with Forest School and the John Muir outdoor education programme to the Eco Squad in the senior school, Bruton School for Girls.

The school is one of only 27 schools in the country which hold the Eco Schools Ambassador Award, an award that requires green issues to be embedded in the ethos of the whole school. Recycling points around the school encourage pupils to dispose of their rubbish responsibly and you will often find girls tending the school’s own raised beds, which provide fresh, low-food-miles produce such as lettuce, herbs and spinach to the school Catering Department.

Melissa Atkins, Catering Manager, sources meat and vegetables locally and works hard to minimise waste through careful menu planning, understanding what the girls like and reusing food where acceptable.

Melissa says, “We source local produce wherever possible and help pupils to appreciate that you don’t have to go far to find great tasting food.”

Somerset’s favourite fruit, the apple, has also been given a boost by the school recently with an orchard on school 70

land being replanted with help from funds donated by the Parent Staff Association, and it is hoped this may provide BSG apple juice in the future.

The showcase for the school’s commitment to the green agenda is the weeklong ‘Girls Go Green’ programme, which takes place every autumn. By far the most popular session this year was Hedgerow Cookery; an opportunity for girls to forage for produce in the countryside, garden or allotment and to turn it into mouthwatering dishes in the school’s Home Technology Department.

In the past, this week has included a Sustainable Living Fair, working in collaboration with local community groups and businesses to raise awareness of green issues and showcase solutions for everyday life. In autumn 2012, the week included hard-hitting films on the effects of climate change, demonstrations by local businesses on their efforts to be sustainable and in Textiles an opportunity for girls to ‘upcycle’ items from their wardrobe to create exciting new pieces that means they will get more wear out of them.

All pupils at the school take part in Home Technology lessons, where the benefits of locally produced food are reinforced. For Sixth Form students the prestigious Leiths Certificate in Food and Wine is available as an extra-curricular activity, but provides the pupils with a recognised professional qualification. Produce used in these classes is sourced through a local farm shop

healthy schools

where appropriate. This award from the world-renowned Leiths School of Food and Wine equips girls for life whether they chose a career in the food industry, take a gap year or just enjoy entertaining with friends.

Headmistress, Mrs Nicola Botterill, says, “Raising the girls’ awareness of global concerns is key to a wider understanding of the issues that affect us all. Through our Eco Squad, Home Technology Department and opportunities for outdoor education, our pupils learn the value of protecting the environment for future generations. Our values are key to the girls’ successes in later life.”

This unique opportunity to develop creativity in the pupils through outdoor learning, highlighting green issues and focusing on the benefits of local produce through the curriculum and extra-curricular activities helps the girls play their part, however big or small, in promoting a sustainable lifestyle.

An interview with Bruton headmistress, Nicola Botterill.

How popular is your Leiths qualification, and how did it come about?

Leiths is hugely popular and we have over half the Sixth Form cohort following it each year. Leiths has been running for over 10 years and a strong collaboration has been built up with this prestigious organisation.

How important is it to you to teach children the origins of their food from an early age?

Very important indeed, so that they appreciate the landscape they live in and the way in which farmers manage it for our benefit. It adds an extra dimension to their lives, including a spiritual element, grounding them, and helping them to see the importance of the seasons. Values in education are so crucial, and they help our young people to make sound judgements about, for example, healthy living and lifestyles.

You offer many extra-curricular clubs and activities relating to food and drink - what do the students think of these?

They wouldn’t be running if they didn’t see the value in them as they would vote with their feet! They are hugely popular, and it just shows how successful we are in promoting the values we hold dear.

Bruton School for Girls Sunny Hill, Bruton, Somerset BA10 0NT Call 01749 814400 Visit www.brutonschool.co.uk 71

healthy schools

Milton Abbey School

The Hospitality Department of Milton Abbey School prepares pupils for a career in the hospitality industry by providing them with a great qualification as a starting point. At Milton Abbey, pupils are able to study the BTEC Level 3 Hospitality qualification, which gives them the opportunity for great employment prospects.

Past pupils have progressed to Les Roches and Glion, with one former pupil currently training to be a sommelier at a world-renowned London hotel.

How long has the BTEC Level 3 Hospitality qualification been running?

For as long as girls have been coming to Milton Abbey School: seven years.

How popular is the qualification?

Very popular, roughly a third of the sixth form are studying BTEC Hospitality.

What sort of feedback have you had from students taking the qualification?

Students are very positive. They enjoy the mix of practical lessons underpinned by the theory classes.

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What are your biggest success stories from the qualification?

There are many: only yesterday we had an email from an ex-pupil who has just set up his own catering company: Replete Catering, which is owned by Guy. Students study hospitality qualifications at higher education in this country and abroad. Next week a former hospitality pupil will be giving a presentation about his career to date. He left Milton Abbey School five years ago and is training to be a sommelier at a world-renowned London hotel.

Do students get work experience at restaurants as part of the programme?

Yes - students are actively encouraged to do work experience during the school holidays.

Milton Abbey School Blandford Forum, Dorset DT11 0BZ Call 01258 880484 Visit www.miltonabbey.co.uk

healthy schools

The Cotswold School The Cotswold School is a highly popular 11-18 academy school set in beautiful rural surroundings between Cheltenham and Oxford.

The school has a superb reputation, consistently appearing amongst the country’s top state schools and offering an impressive curriculum enrichment programme with flourishing facilities.

Part of those facilities is a new, state-of-the-art, commercial-style teaching kitchen made possible by generous funding received from the Savoy Educational Trust. The teaching kitchen has meant that a new Catering GCSE has been introduced, more students are involved in cooking across the school, and interest and awareness has been raised in the wider community.

The new kitchen provides space for 24 students to be taught at a time. “Our kitchen designers, Space Catering, have done us proud.” says Mr Matt Smith who is, with the help of his equally enthusiastic colleague Julie Franklin, driving the school’s Food Technology Department forward. “The layout works brilliantly, not just for our timetabled classes but for a variety of other groups too: introductory cooking for primary schools; competitions and cooking demonstrations; as well as our Year 11s who catered for around 100 senior citizens at Christmas!”

The larger facilities have meant that the school’s burgeoning Let’s Get Cooking Club has doubled in size. Miss Julie Franklin explains: “Let’s Get Cooking encourages confidence, sees students producing delicious, nutritious meals and learning valuable life skills. At the end of each term, the club cooks and serves dinner to invited VIP guests.”

“The local branch of Rotary International is a fantastic support,” says Miss Franklin. ‘Rotary’s Young Chef Competition has been extremely popular and our own Amy Brown reached the national semi-finals last year. Amy has represented the South West region as a spokesperson for these competitions and has gone on to inspire younger students to get involved. We are now Rotary’s District Heat venue.”

Professional chefs are also taking an interest.

Gloucestershire College Chefs Shaun Naen and Gareth Crwys Williams have provided coaching and advice as has ‘The Cotswold Chef’ Rob Rees MBE, who officiated over the opening of the new teaching kitchen.

Mr Smith concludes: “The impact of these new facilities is extraordinary. Just last week, Stroud College confirmed that we will be the North Cotswold hub for their catering apprenticeship courses which will begin in the new academic year. We couldn’t be more delighted.”

The Cotswold School The Avenue, Bourton-on-the-Water, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL54 2BD Call 01451 820 554 Visit www.cotswold.gloucs.sch.uk 73

healthy schools

Bryanston School Ask anyone what is best about Bryanston and pretty soon they will mention the food! That’s not surprising given the effort and talent that goes into producing the school’s exceptionally varied and healthy menus.

Catering Manager Mike Thorne was named Catering Manager of the Year at the Educatering Awards in 2010, and the main meals are served in a fantastic new dining hall designed by former Bryanstonian Sir Terence Conran.

Mike Thorne explains his secret recipe: “It’s important to listen to the pupils and find out what they like and what they don’t like. Eating is an experience, you’ve got to make food interesting with lots of nice choices.

Then you can be really enthusiastic about getting pupils to try new ideas. I often stand in the lunch queue and try to inspire them to try new things and it works.”

Great care is taken to provide varied, appetising and well-balanced menus which include meat, fish and vegetarian dishes, self-service salads, desserts and ample fresh fruit. The sheer abundance of choice is amazing.

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A typical term-time lunch menu for one day could be as follows: French onion soup with homemade bread and accompaniments.

Honey glazed gammon with roasted new potatoes, parsnips and fresh sautéed cabbage.

Potato rosti with poached egg and béarnaise sauce.

Fruity vegetable curry.

Jacket potatoes with a selection of fillings.

Pasta ‘light bites’ bar.

Farmhouse sponge pudding.

Selection of cold desserts, such as jellies and mousses.

Fresh fruit salad and yoghurt with homemade granola.

healthy schools

One spectacular feature aside from the main offer is the food ‘theatre’. Three chefs cook while you wait using a selection of fresh ingredients. Dishes often include stir fry, curries and omelettes. One favourite is a Lebanese wrap using marinated chicken, harissa or tahini sauces, halloumi cheese and a lemon-flavoured green salad served in a seeded flatbread.

“It’s all about presentation and re-inventing things with a new twist. We don’t just serve soup, we’d offer it with some seeds, croutons, flavoured oils, maybe some nice cheese,” explains Mike, who says he gets a lot of inspiration from street food.

“Pupils love food being made in front of them so they can choose what goes into it.”

The pupils themselves play a central part in selecting menus. They run their own Food Committee which comments on the food and suggests recipe choices.

Mike and Roux-trained Head Chef Vince Carr then work hard to respond and interpret their ideas.

“Presentation is key. We use wooden boards for display, some nice china and avoid the stainless steel catering trays where we can. We recently held a special training day just to brainstorm presentation and serving ideas. That’s what makes top-class school food; presentation and effort,” adds Mike.

Knowledge and appreciation of good food and how it is made reaches beyond the dining hall. Pupils can join a bread-making course and learn to make a range of artisan

and gourmet breads including foccacia, ciabatta, baguettes, fendu, plaits and other novel shapes of wholemeal and seeded breads, with onion and other flavours.

The bread-making course is so popular that pupils are building their own wood-fired oven and making bread to raise money for community causes. A group of sixth formers raised over £350 by taking part in a mass bread bake, baking 80 loaves and a range of other breads for the school’s charities weekend.

Bryanston School Blandford, Dorset DT11 0PX Call 01258 452411 Visit www.bryanston.co.uk 75

healthy schools

The Good Cook School The Good Cook School runs cookery parties and holiday cookery workshops

equipment are provided (as are party bags!) and we can run the party at our venue in The Create Centre, Bristol or come to your home.

Parties

Summer Cooking Workshops at Café Create, The Create Centre, Bristol

Try one of our cooking parties and experience a fun and creative way to entertain your child on their birthday! The Good Cook School can run your child’s cooking parties for you; no need to shop for party food or hire an entertainer! The children will make their own fun and make their own food too!

Your child can plan their own menu so that they and their friends, under supervision of fully trained and friendly staff, can create their very own feast. All ingredients and

At these 90-minute sessions, under close supervision, children will be making delicious treats to take home. £16 for schoolaged children.

Workshop times, 9.30, 11.30 and 1.30 Thursday 25th July and Thursday 1st August Jammy biscuits, vegetable Cornish pasty and chocolate ice cream milkshake

A world~class education in the heart of Bristol

Thursday 8th August and 15th August Veggie or meat sausage rolls, Zoo animal cupcakes and Knickerbocker glory For further information please email sophie@thegoodcookschool.co.uk or phone 07769 665020 or 0117 903 1201

Badminton nurtures intellectual curiosity and challenges enquiring minds in a supportive community.

Our girls’ enthusiasm for the arts, sport and their many activities keeps the School vibrant – come and see for yourself!

To find out more, contact our Admissions team.

T: 0117 905 5271 E: admissions@badmintonschool.co.uk www.badmintonschool.co.uk

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healthy schools

St Edward’s Junior School Cheltenham

A partnership between parents and the school is at the heart of the approach St Edward’s Junior School takes to ensuring all the children have a healthy and positive engagement with food. All the food is prepared at the school each day using fresh and seasonal ingredients.

Head of Catering, Mrs Nicola Elvin, starts her day by preparing bread which could be a wholemeal loaf, cheese and chive or onion. Mrs Elvin is convinced that high-quality food that looks appealing is key to children learning to enjoy food.

The school always welcomes parents into lunch and each year runs a tasting menu evening so parents can see exactly what is on offer. School meals at St Edward’s Junior School always include a hot lunch, vegetarian option, pasta, jacket potatoes, soup, a hot and cold pudding and fresh fruit. The catering team and staff encourage the children to try a variety of different things even if it’s only a small taste, and for many this really extends the types of food they will eat.

In addition to enjoying school meals, the children all look forward to their cookery lessons whether part of the curriculum or during cookery club.

This term they have enjoyed making bread which included bagels and focaccia. Lin Davis runs the Cookery Club and she says, “An appreciation of good food and an understanding of a healthy diet, starts with enjoying cooking. It’s lovely to watch the children’s participation and thrill at seeing bread rise. It is particularly rewarding that so many boys are part of our cookery club.”

St Edward’s Junior School London Road, Charlton Kings, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL52 6NR Call 01242 538900 Visit www.stedwards.co.uk 77

CANFORD BOARDING AND DAY • CO-EDUCATIONAL • 13-18

www.canford.com

Outstanding academic performance ...

• A Level 2012

88% A*/B and 65% A*/A grade 26% of all grades A*

• 31 Oxbridge offers in the last 2 years

Scholarships at 13+ and 16+ Bursaries may be worth up to 100%* of fees

*(Means-tested)

... plus excellence and opportunity beyond the classroom • Rowing - Girls’ Quads National Schools’ champions and Henley finalists 2012 • Hockey - Title holders in all 6 County championships (boys’ and girls’) for the 2011/12 and 2012/13 seasons • Maths - Senior National Maths Challenge finalists • Art - Upper Sixth pupil Roche Art regional winner and National finalist • Music - ABRSM cello qualification for Lower Sixth pupil • Physics - Upper Sixth pupil among top 15 Physicists in the UK in National Schools’ Olympiad • Community Service - an active programme of work in local communities both at home and in Argentina, India and Tanzania

For further information please contact the Admissions Office: 01202 847207 or email admissions@canford.com

|

Wimborne, Dorset BH21 3AD

healthy schools

Canford Catering for a Boarding School

As a co-educational boarding school, Canford takes its catering very seriously and is proud of the food it offers.

Last August, the school chose to bring its catering inhouse so that it had full control of the operation from a staffing perspective and gave it the ability to efficiently and quickly respond to the individual needs of the school.

Suppliers Canford now uses local and regional suppliers as far as possible and believes this enables it to provide a very high-quality end product, as well as supporting the local community. As Caroline Proctor, General Operations Manager, says: “The sourcing of food is felt to be vitally important on many different levels. Finding good, high-quality, nutritious produce enables the school to offer a quality product on the plate for our pupils.”

Additional Provision As well as dining in the Great Hall, there are kitchenettes in all the boarding houses, plus a school tuck shop, ‘The Grubber’, which sells drinks and snacks. It was the location for the discovery of the Assyrian Frieze in the early ‘90s so has historical as well as nutritional significance!

Pupils have their say The Canford Food Committee gives pupils the chance to express their views on the food and to make suggestions as to how it could be improved.

The topics vary at each meeting. Says Caroline: “Discussions recently asked where we source foods from and the carbon footprint of these companies. It is a great opportunity for the pupils to have their say and is also seen as a chance to explain and educate pupils about seasonal produce and healthier choices.”

Pupils are encouraged to have open dialogue with senior catering staff at any time between the food committee meetings, which offers pupils an opportunity to voice their personal feelings openly. The school is able to cater for individuals with regard to specific diets and requests.

Chefs and Menus The talented brigade of chefs has input into the menu writing process, and they are keen to reflect the latest eating trends. Breakfasts include a hot offering and also plenty of healthy cereals, fruits and yoghurts. Daily lunch during the school week is homemade soup, three main courses including a vegetarian option, baguettes, jacket potatoes, and

pasta and salad bars. A typical lunch menu includes roast vegetable soup, sweet chilli chicken, beef goulash, mushroom rice and a selection of fruit or puddings. Evening meals include three main courses with vegetables, and favourites such as Dorset apple cake or sticky date pudding.

Caroline is mindful of the pastoral issues surrounding food when boarding: “As a boarding school, the chefs are aware pupils might miss some typical weekend dining experiences at home, so Saturday evenings are now often a themed ‘take-away’ night, where Indian, Chinese, Thai and surf and turf options are served on a rotational basis.”

Healthy Eating Care is taken with regard to high fat in food and in cooking procedures. Chips do appear in the menu cycle, but not regularly. The use of salt and sugar is minimised and herbs and spices maximised.

During the meal times we focus on making the food look as appetising as possible.

What the Inspectors Say The ISI inspectorate conducted a full inspection of the school in January 2012 and praised the quality of Canford’s catering: “The school provides an excellent range of healthy food options. This and the many opportunities each week for exercise and physical fitness help pupils to develop healthy lifestyles - pupils feel able to express their opinions and views through the school council and food committee and confirm that their opinions are listened to and considered.”

“The overall quality of the boarding experience is excellent. Boarders report that the quality of food on offer is very good and nutritious.”

Canford School Wimborne, Dorset BH21 3AD Call 01202 841254 Visit www.canford.com 79

Your lifestyle guide to all things eco...

Bristolâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Biggest Bike Ride The event celebrates its 20th anniversary

The Severn Project An organic food producer with a difference

BIG Green Week Details Including a great ticket pass competition

www.greenlivingmagazine.co.uk

greenliving

Bristol’s Biggest Bike Ride June 16 2013

2013 is a very special year for Bristol’s Biggest Bike Ride as it celebrates its 20th anniversary on Sunday 16 June. It has grown into one of the largest and most popular events in the local cycling calendar, attracting families from across the city and beyond.

It’s completely FREE to enter and offers something for all ages, with 5 different routes to choose from to suit individual levels of cycling ability and experience.

All routes start and finish at Millennium Square in Bristol, and provide an ideal opportunity to experience what it’s like to cycle en mass along traffic-free streets in Hotwells and along the Portway; as well as taking dedicated cycle routes out to the surrounding countryside. Families with young children can opt for the easy-pedal Family Fiesta route (9 miles) that runs alongside the Avon Gorge and beneath the iconic Bristol Suspension Bridge. There’s freedom to roam with plenty of space for cycling in groups and places to stop off should you need a breather.

Shirehampton; the Sustrans Portishead ride at 24 miles and a test for real cycling enthusiasts known as the Clevedon Challenge – a demanding 38-mile trip.

New this year is a special anniversary ride ‘the Tyntesfield 20’: 20 miles through stunning countryside that includes a section at the beautiful National Trust property, Tyntesfield House. Cyclists arriving at Tyntesfield are entitled to a 20% reduction on admission to the House and in the café and shop. It’s a perfect location to picnic and enjoy its historic surroundings.

For the more confident and experienced cyclists there are several longer routes; the 14-mile Avon Gorge Loop through

To register for the event visit www.betterbybike.info/bikeride, where you can find everything you need to know about taking part, including maps of the routes, start times and general information.

Safety is a watchword for Bristol’s Biggest Bike Ride and the event is well marshalled throughout the day. All types of pedal bikes can be ridden at the Biggest Bike Ride and you will see a whole host of colourful and ingenious machines, flags and brightly decorated trailers. There are bike mechanics on hand at the start to give your bike a last-minute check and to assist further along the route.

Take a journey back in time with travelwest

As well as the Biggest Bike Ride, the Festival of Nature is also taking place over the same weekend at Harbourside and Millennium Square, and fittingly it will be celebrating its 10th birthday.

Photo: Gilded silver statuette of Amun-Re. From Karnak, Egypt. c. 1069-727 BC © The Trustees of the British Museum

King of Egypt A BRITISH MUSEUM TOUR

16 March – 21 July 2013

Go by bus and save 10% on your entrance ticket.

Cyclists returning at the end of their ride will have the opportunity to visit the Festival which is the UK’s largest free natural history event offering wildlife enthusiasts of all ages the opportunity to explore and enjoy the natural world in the heart of the city. The vibrant programme features interactive, hands-on activities including appearances by the BBC Natural History Unit and Bristol Zoo, plus a marketplace packed with local produce and much more.

Terms & conditions: 1 Cannot be used with any other promotion or offer 2 Only valid when presented with bus tickets for travel on the day of visit 3 Offer runs from 1 May – 21 July 2013.

Not valid on free days (17 May, 21 June,19 July) For full T&C’s visit www.bristol.gov.uk/museums

Bristol Museum & Art Gallery Queens Road Bristol BS8 1RL Tel: 0117 922 3571 www.bristol.gov.uk/museums

In partnership with

Full price exhibition tickets Adults: £5/£4 concs Children: £3 (5–16yrs, under 5s free) Family ticket: £10 (2 adults and 2 children, or 1 adult and 3 children)

Pharaoh: King of Egypt is supported through the generosity of the Dorset Foundation.

For help planning your journeys

www.travelwest.info

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Visit the Cycling Hub at the Festival to find out more about cycle routes in your area and for advice including how to get back in the saddle, information on types of bike and where to find local bike shops and cycle training courses.

Bristol’s Biggest

greenliving

Bike R de Sunday 16th JunE

BRISTOL’S BIGGEST

sunday 16th june www.betterbybike.info/bikeride

5 routes from easy to challenging For more information and to register FREE online www.betterbybike.iNfo/bikeride

Neal’s Yard Remedies greenliving

15% Off

*

Ethical Organic Health & Beauty Boost your wellbeing the natural way, with award-winning pure natural and organic health and beauty.

A pioneer of ethical beauty since we began, over 30 years ago, today we have the UK’s largest range of certified organic products, over 170 – nearly all handmade at our eco-factory in Dorset, and we’re proud to have helped launch Fairtrade Foundation certified beauty in the UK. Pamper yourself with a treatment in our tranquil Therapy Rooms, in the capable hands of highly qualified practitioners.

Treatments include: Acupuncture Alexander Technique Counselling Herbal Medicine Homoeopathy NYR Organic Holistic Facials Nutritional Therapy Rejuvanessence Facial Technique Reflexology A wide range of massages. *Offer applies to everything in-store between 15th – 23rd June 2013 only and excludes sales of Gift Vouchers, Therapies and Courses.

Pop in-store today for a FREE skincare consultation, FREE mini facial or FREE cup of herbal tea.

126 Whiteladies Road, Clifton 0117 946 6034 nealsyardremedies.com/bristol-store

greenliving

Combat Rising Water Prices To help combat rising water prices in the UK, Bradleys Surfacing Systems has developed an effective rainwater harvesting system designed for domestic properties and suitable for any size garden.

Lawns are converted from natural turf to synthetic turf with a modular grid system and tank underground to store the water, which is then made available above ground when required, either locally in the garden or inside a property.

Benefits of the system include a sustainable way to use water at home, an effective way of reducing flooding and all the benefits of a normal synthetic lawn; no need to own a lawn mower, or mow the lawn, leaving you with a clean and perfect looking garden all year round. For further information about the new system, download the brochure at http:// www.surfacingsystems.co.uk/pdf/water_harvesting.pdf

Before

The Severn Project The Severn Project is a community interest company that was started in May 2010 to use organic local food production as a means of providing education, training and employment for socially excluded individuals in Bristol and the surrounding areas.

Beginning on four acres of waste ground in Keynsham, Steve engaged a small number of clients and set about clearing the land. Through his hard work and commitment, and that of volunteers and most importantly clients, what was once waste ground is now a thriving horticultural social enterprise.

After

Call: 0121 449 2824 Email: info@surfacingsystems.co.uk

www.surfacingsystems.co.uk

Schumacher Research Conference:

A New Social Contract for Sustainability?

5th Floor of Arnolfini 20-21 June 9.30am–5pm How can we simultaneously address environmental issues, widespread social inequalities and an ongoing financial crisis – globally and locally?

Join us to explore new forms of dialogue and agreement among government, business, civil society and citizens.

Speakers include Sir Graham Watson MEP, Anna Coote from NEF and Leo Hickman from the Guardian.

Contact: emmelie@schumacherinstitute.org.uk

Book tickets:

newsocialcontractforsustainability-eorg.eventbrite.com

The original Keynsham site includes a successful organic market garden, supplying salad and vegetables to restaurants such as The Pony and Trap and River Cottage, as well as to independent grocers. The new Temple Meads site gives The Severn Project an extra half-acre of year-round growing space, while the premises in Whitchurch is also taking shape. With a farm shop, café, teaching rooms and a market garden all planned for this new site, the scheme has grown exponentially over the last few years.

For more information and to order visit

thesevernproject.org

greenliving

BIG

Green Week The UK’s festival of eco ideas, art and entertainment is back in the centre of Bristol from 15 to 23 June. Join more than 40,000 visitors who will start early and stay late to enjoy two weekends of free family entertainment and nine days of inspiring talks, workshops, art, music, poetry, comedy and films.

Bristol’s BIG Market

See the historic centre of Bristol transformed on Saturday 22nd June by over 200 stalls for Bristol’s biggest-ever market day. Food direct from producers, local artisan products, crafts, vintage and ethical with buskers and entertainment, this vibrant, bustling, open-air event has it all.

Discover over 200 exciting stalls selling everything from locally made artisan produce to vintage curios, arts and crafts, Fairtrade products and much more. Enjoy many themed areas – indulge in delicious street food, sit back and listen to local music, relax in the rejuvenation area, make something amazing at a workshop in the family area – and shop `til you drop!

The market features the ‘Best of the South West Food Hall’, where local business Mullion Cove will be showcasing a wide selection of local and regional produce.

Located in Corn Street, expect lots of local producers with stalls selling mouthwatering local specialties such as pasties, cider, ice cream, local cheeses and meats as well as lots of other foodie delights.

Producers from as far as West Cornwall will be demonstrating just why the South West is renowned for some of the finest produce in the UK. On June 22, St Stephen’s Street will be packed with street food from Bristol’s amazing international community. Enjoy the sights and smells of food from around the world, as they cook up a fabulous array of dishes to choose from. The BIG Green Week team are working on a number of ways to make the street a great place to hang out and meet up with friends and family.

greenliving

Bristol’s BIG Green Week Festival kicks off on the weekend of 15 & 16 June on Bristol’s Harbourside, celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Festival of Nature and the 20th year of Bristol’s Biggest Bike Ride.

GIP Pass Competition BIG Green Week are offering visitors the chance to buy a limited edition GIP Festival Discount pass – which, in 2012, could have saved visitors up to £80 during the festival. Only 400 GIP Festival Discount Pass tickets are available in 2013, and Discount Pass tickets are only on sale before the festival starts on 15 June.

GIPs not only receive 20 per cent off festival tickets where they see the 20 per cent sign, but will receive money-saving discounts at a range of cafés, bars, hotels and shops throughout the festival. They will also receive a limited edition Festival ‘inspire’ wristband and cotton goodie bag (to be collected from Festival Reception between 15 and 23 June only), containing free gifts from Green and Blacks, Ecover, Lush, May Gurney and Pukka, among others. For a full list of discounts and offers, visit www.biggreenweek.com. flavour have teamed up with BIG Green Week to offer two readers each a GIP pass for the festival. All you need to do to enter is email competitions@flavourmagazine.com with the subject line ‘GIP pass’: winners will have tickets sent to them by email, and will need to pick up their goodie bag from the Festival Reception when they visit.

For more information visit

biggreenweek.com

South-Sands-Flavour-ad-v3.indd 1

24/10/2012 11:14

> flavour bed & breakfast

Bed&Breakfast of the month

Weekend Away Enjoy the elegance of staying in a Georgian house with 21st-century comfort and within only two miles of the centre of Bath

Poplar House, Bath

Poplar House offers three en suite double guest rooms, furnished to a very high standard with all modern amenities including Freeview TV and Wi-Fi. Visitors also have access to the guests’ lounge — ‘the Yellow Room’ — on the first floor, with its original stone fireplace and scenic views across the Avon Valley.

Poplar House is a boutique bed and breakfast, newly opened in a large 18th-century Georgian house with free onsite parking and within easy reach of Bath city centre.

Every morning you can enjoy a breakfast buffet with the choice of a cooked English breakfast made from our own organic eggs, served al fresco on the terrace (weather permitting), or in the dining room. Poplar House is a great place to relax, either in the gardens, or take a stroll to the pubs on the banks of the Avon.

Poplar House is a house of great character, history and charm, giving you a rare chance to experience living in a Georgian house with access to modern comfort and amenities.

The house retains its Georgian style and character with examples of original features.

Call 01225 852 629 Mobile 07792 286 255 Email poplarhousebath@gmail.co.uk Visit www.poplarhousebath.co.uk

Poplar House The Batch, Batheaston, Bath BA1 7DR

89

> flavour nick harman

Yes, I ate brilliant oysters at just 20p a pop, but ...

Nick Harman misses home ...

I’ve just come back from a fortnight in France. Cue 300 gushing words on how the French do everything better and cheaper when it comes to food right?

Wrong, I couldn’t be happier food-wise than to be back in the UK. It’s true that wine costs less in France, a lot less, but you look long and hard to find any non-native wines. The first thing we did when we got back to Blighty was crack open a bottle of Argentinian Malbec and it was delicious after drinking nothing but French wine. The French, of course, still steadfastly refuse to admit the existence of any wine production outside of their borders, although they do sometimes allow a small New World section in the bigger supermarkets, mostly for the Anglais expats to browse and buy.

What about all the lovely little shops selling cheeses and nice things? And the local bakers? Well in Paris of course and major towns and the Cotswold-like ‘départements’, but out in the countryside­ — and France has a lot of countryside — the hypermarkets have caused a cull of small shops.

The French, just like everyone else in Europe, are in love with cheap prices and one-stop, fill the trolley (chariot) shopping. In many small villages, only the baker survives to sell baguettes that are twice the price of the supermarket’s offering. The butcher, if there is one, does mouthwatering local meat but at eye watering prices, especially for us Brits with our terrible Pound against the Euro exchange rate.

Bars? Well the gorgeous smell of Gauloises has gone with the ban on smoking while draconian drink-driving laws mean anyone indulging in more than one pastis is likely to be pulled up by les flics, especially if he or she has not used the mandatory breathalyser kit all cars in France have to carry. So outside of big towns, the French find it easier to stay at home.

And despite my very long love affair with France, I’m beginning to feel the same way. Yes, I ate brilliant oysters at just 20p a pop and had some good lunches in those bistros still offering food not out of a freezer, but here in the UK we can, in general, eat better and cheaper almost anywhere in the country. I’m not saying adieu, not yet, but for now it’s au revoir to France and hello food UK instead.

Nick Harman is editor of www.foodepedia.co.uk 90

dard 2 Stan ets tick 5, for £p3 to £21

35)* gu savointe FLAVOUR (qu

Celebrating 10 years

The world’s greatest restaurant festival 20-23 June 2013 Regent’s Park

Create your own perfect tasting menu from 40 of London’s premier Restaurants and culinary hotspots

Boutique Food Market

Electrolux Taste Theatre

Try and buy from over 200 artisan producers and premium brands and source all those essential ingredients

See internationally renowned chefs in action and discover their kitchen secrets with delightful demos and competitive cook-offs

Laurent-Perrier ‘From Grape to Glass’ Masterclass Indulge yourself with a Laurent-Perrier masterclass – discover the heritage of this prestigious champagne

2013 Restaurant line up Alyn Williams at The Westbury Bar Boulud Barbecoa Benares Club Gascon Duck & Waffle Gaucho Gauthier Soho Le Gavroche LIMA Maze Opera Tavern Spice Market Sushisamba Tamarind The Cinnamon Club The Savoy Grill Theo Randall at The Intercontinental and many more!

Book tickets at tastefestivals.com/london or call 0871 230 7132

*Ticket offer valid for Thursday and Friday sessions on advance booked tickets only. Offer valid until 22 May. Saving based on the on the door price of £56 for 2 standard tickets. Calls cost 10p per minute plus network extras. Booking fee applies.

40 of London’s Top Restaurants

THE

FOX AT BROUGHTON GIFFORD

It’s a relaxed atmosphere and a nice mix of visitors Nestling in the heart of this popular and picturesque village, The Fox at Broughton Gifford is an important addition to the Wiltshire dining scene.

A selection of two permanent ales, two rotating guest ales and a substantial wine list courtesy of Bath’s own Great Western Wines.

so that we raise our own pigs to produce our own house charcuterie, air-cured hams, wet-cured hams, sausages and even bacon.

Our chef has created a seasonal, British inspired menu with some classical touches, working in conjunction with Broughton Gifford’s very own Church Farm Meats to secure the highest quality and most locally sourced meat as possible.

We also bake a substantial amount of our own bread. What we don’t produce in-house we source from The Thoughtful Bread Company.

The team at The Fox are committed to seasonal and local produce, so much

This country pub, just 10 miles from Bath city centre, is busy with locals and visitors alike, enjoying an evening meal or pint at the bar. Not to mention our famous Sunday lunch!

01225 782949  www.thefox-broughtongifford.co.uk THE FOX  THE STREET  BROUGHTON GIFFORD  MELKSHAM SN12 8PW

Follow us on twitter @thefoxbroughton