WMN on Sunday - West Magazine 19 October

19.10.14

Feline cool Leopard print for autumn days INSIDE: + MEET OUR BAKE OFF STAR + GLASTONBURY, BON JOVI AND ME

DON’T MISS:

+ WIN LUXURY £30 BEAUTY PAMPER SET PLUS + BEER NEWS + PLANTING SWEET PEAS CoverFinal_Oct19.indd 1

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[ welcome [ Time for a fun competition - or two...

Tweet

of the week @wmnwest

Reasons to be cheerful: #thehappylist in @WMNWest @WMNSunday today See page 11 for details!

CONTACT: westmag@westernmorningnews.co.uk Tel: 01392 442250 Twitter @wmnwest

I don’t know about you but we love a good competition here at West magazine. This week, we’ve got two of them. One’s practical, but in a really gorgeous way: win a Simply Build It kit to make your own sturdy gardening workbench, worth £45 and up for grabs on page 5 of today’s magazine.

The other is pure indulgence: a £30 home spa set of lovely beauty products from Afyna, the luxury cosmetics company based in Cornwall. Do email us on westmag@westernmorningnews.co.uk for your chance to win either - or both.

We’re missing the Great British Bake Off here at West, but two things are cheering us up. One was the chance to meet up with Glenn Cosby, the

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larger-than-life teacher from Exeter who wowed Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood in last year’s Bake Off. Has the GBBO changed his life? Most definitely - read all about it on page 14 today.

The other cheering news is that The Big Food Show is nearly with us. Glenn is set to be compering at the show (told you his life had changed) and with its fun activities for kids, this is the perfect half term day out with children, or grandchildren. They can be happily occupied while you meet The Hairy Bikers, John Torode and many more. It’s all at Westpoint, Exeter on October 24-26.

This just leaves me space to say that the rest of the mag is packed with good stuff too! Enjoy.

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We’re missing the Great British Bake Off here but two things are cheering us up

Becky Sheaves, Editor

COVER IMAGE: Steven Haywood

MEET THE TEAM Becky Sheaves, Editor

Gillian Molesworth

Kathryn Clarke-McLeod

Catherine Barnes

Phil Goodwin 3

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A WEEKEND IN: BRIXHAM Your guide to the best Westcountry mini breaks

What I really want is a pigeon. I ask my sons on a daily basis, in a casual way: ‘Why not go and shoot a pigeon?’

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Kishanda Fulford’s Modern Manors P9

[contents[

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GLENN COSBY Meet the Westcountry’s star baker

SARAH WOODWARD Bon Jovi, Glastonbury and me: the mum of three who manages a rock band

Inside this week...

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THE WISHLIST What to buy, where to go

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WHAT’S ON

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MODERN MANORS

Our pick of the best events in the West TV toffs the Fulford family go shooting

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HOW TO WEAR...

Trend expert Kathryn on wild style

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STAR BAKER

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Exeter’s Bake-Off star Glenn Cosby on Mary Berry, chocolate cake and comedy

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ROCK CHICK Meet the unlikely rock band boss who’s a mum of three from Devon

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INTERIORS Get inspired by a chic Westcountry home

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INTERIORS Get inspired by a beautiful Westcountry home

WILD THING The latest animal print trend, and how to wear it

WIN £30 BEAUTY TREATS Luxury cosmetics to be won

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CHECK YOUR SHOPPING Decoding labels for healthy eating

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A WEEKEND IN...

Your guide to the best West mini breaks

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CAKE OF THE WEEK Kate Shirazi bakes a treat for hungry men

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LET’S TALK BEER The newest beers, and the beer news

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PARENTING

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MAN & BOY

How to learn with your children Extreme fishing at four years old

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GARDENING Plant sweet peas with Anne Swithinbank

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If you buy one thing this week...

It’s time to plant up your winter pansies.

Create a made-to-measure potting table with this clever kit from Simply Build It, using heavy-duty connectors to make your bench to the height, length and depth you want. www.strongtie.com

Win We have a Simply Build It work bench kit to win, worth ÂŁ45. To enter, email Westmag@westernmorningnews. co.uk to arrive by October 31 2014 5

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Skeletons... tikkers children’s watch, £14.99 www.watchshop.com

Dark arts Black honeycomb bauble, £5.50, Decadent Decs

The wish List West’s picks for the finest spooky fun this Halloween

FUNNY FACES Halloween decorations £6, www.clareloves.co.uk

Pumpkin nails Nail varnish £7.25, www.madbeauty

Boutique of the Week Woodforde’s Perfumery, Sidmouth Stocking a fabulous range of luxury perfumes from the word’s top independent perfumers, Woodforde’s is the must-visit shop for anyone who loves scent. Husband and wife team Jon and Jane Brewer are hugely knowledgeable about small perfume houses all over the world.

They can advise you, with a squirt or two from the delectable glass bottles which lend such charm to the shop’s old fashioned apothecary feel.

Stock changes regularly, so there is always something new to discover, along with old favourites. “We like to have guest perfumes,” says Jon. Visit Woodforde’s Perfumery, 11 Church Street, Sidmouth EX10 8LY or www.woodfordes-perfumery.co.uk 6

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Wishlist

SCARY, MOI? Steiff bat toy, £21 www.steiff.com

Magic garden Silver brooch £96, by Helen Shere at Blue Wing Gallery: Truro, Exeter, Plymouth and Padstow

SPARKLE Made in St Ives by Lesley Anne Silver £POA, www.beadsashore.com

Super cute Canape fun Skeleton Crew snack sticks, £4 www.talkingtables.co.uk

Hanging felted pumpkin, £6.99, www.elsieandfleur.co.uk

Vamp it up True Blood, Forsaken eau de parfum, £45 100ml, Tesco

Party perfection Halloween costume, £4.99, Home Stores

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Events

The hotlist: Discover the most fun and interesting events coming up soon in the Westcountry, from pumpkins to comedy clubs, and more...

Adam Henson visits Truro Thursday October 30

TV’s favourite farmer will be opening the new Patch & Acre store in Threemilestone, near Truro. The store stocks everything for horses, riders, smallholders as well as country clothing and footwear. Meet Adam at the opening event, which starts at 11.30am.

Visit www.patchandacre.co.uk for details

Tavistock Heritage Festival 24- 27 October

Talks by historian Ian Mortimer and Westcountry murder mystery author Michael Jecks are part of a packed programme of events which also includes this Regarding Eve Theatre Company’s Totally Unreliable History of Tavistock.

More details at tavistockheritagefestival.org.uk and tavistockwharf.com

Katherine Ryan

Saturday 8th November Live comedy from TV funnywoman Katherine Ryan, as seen on Never Mind the Buzzcocks and Live at The Apollo. Tickets £12, Tiverton Community Arts Theatre.

Call 01884 233741 or visit www.comedyhall.co.uk

Pumpkin Fun Day Sunday October 26

No tricks, just treats! Join in Trengwainton Garden’s pumpkin games and try your hand at pumpkin carving (£2.50), then feast on pumpkin dishes in the tea-room. 11am-3pm, near Penzance.

Call 01736 363148 or email trengwainton@nationaltrust.org.uk for details

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My life

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MODERN MANORS

Shooting squirrels

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Kishanda Fulford applies a little common sense

hat planet is everyone is on? Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, the TV cook, was recently slated for saying his 15-year-old son shoots squirrels. To some people’s horror not only are these squirrels shot, but they are also eaten. It struck me that Mr F-W’s son must be a good shot if he can shoot a blasted squirrel. Of course the reason why Hugh and his son and his son not only shoot squirrels but also eat them is that Hugh knows his onions as regards to nature and conservation, just as well as he does on food. The grey squirrel, which was introduced to England from North America, has almost wiped out our native squirrel. The grey squirrel likes nothing more than munching the contents of the nests of woodland birds, and as an aftersnack enjoys stripping the bark off broadleaved trees – which will, in the end, kill the trees. So, for every grey squirrel on a plate our native squirrels and trees have a better chance in life.

I also cannot think what planet a friend was on when I happened to bump in to her at a rural show recently. We were cheerfully discussing our booty and I showed her an elegant bag I had brought. ‘How could you’, she growled at me, ‘That bag is made of pony skin’.

I looked at her leather shoes, and thought for minute, as she gobbled a prawn canapé. I said that clearly my new purchase was not made of pony skin but old cow hide dyed to look like a brown and white ‘what’? I did not really care – it was just a bag. To her, though it was not just a bag but obviously the result of the murder of a brown and white pony. And worse, she suggested, it was probably someone’s pet! I let her continue to froth at the mouth, the tears about to

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fall down her face, when I asked her, ‘Gosh, and do tell me what are your shoes are made of ? That was the final straw. But not quite: I also asked her when she had last tucked in to a nice juicy steak. I was not surprised when she wandered off.

Perhaps, though, I got my comeuppance when we went to France to stay with a friend who was a hard-core vegetarian. It was not an easy few days. We absolutely respected our hosts’ preferred eating habits and for a week lived on

ian family for the rest of the winter.

My youngest son, who at the time had an aversion to shoes, (leather or otherwise), trod on a hornet which promptly stung him. Oh how he howled! I had to carry him through this neverending wood with little daylight coming through the canopy until we reached what I considered to be dry land.

During this holiday our host once said to my husband, ‘Do look at the Limousins!’, pointing to the plump white cattle swishing their tails in a field, ‘Is that not a beautiful sight?’ Francis commented, ‘Yes, and it is no thanks to you,’ as he helped himself to another courgette.

Meanwhile, there seems to be little disgust shown for a new sustainable fish which is sold as ‘River Cobbler.’ This fish is farmed in the River Mekong, in Vietnam. The poor things are not only farmed in one of the most disgusting rivers in the world, in which they scavenge in the mud, but they are also pumped full of injections. I would rather eat a squirrel. Though what I really want is a pigeon. I ask my sons on a daily basis, in a casual way: ‘Why not go and shoot a pigeon?’

I am waiting for the backlash: ‘Devon housewife asks her sons to shoot pigeons for supper’.

I, however, am just waiting for the pigeons. They are also quite hard to hit.

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The dense wood was like something out of Hansel and Gretel. I thought my children would be put in an oven nothing much more than cheese, courgettes and mushrooms. On a trip to search for the said mushrooms we went in to a dense wood that was like something out of Hansel and Gretel.

At one point I could literally not see the wood for the trees and I really thought a gingerbread house would appear in the clearing. And that my four children would be put in an oven. I should perhaps explain that we were not just looking for mushrooms to eat for lunch that day, but for mushrooms that would hopefully feed a vegetar-

Kishanda Fulford lives in Great Fulford, Dunsford, Devon. The house dates back to Norman times and has been continuously occupied by the Fulford family for more than 800 years.

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She sells: Natalie Sloan of Porthleven based Savour and Relish at the Falmouth Oyster Festival Fun running: Judith Caboche and dog Poppy ran the Delicious Drakes Trail from Buckfast Abbey in aid of www.chicks.org.uk

in pictures What a ride! Sarah Gaisford rode a lap of honour at Exeter Racecourse in support of the Injured Jockey’s Fund

Hot stuff: Jez Manis gets creative at Flameworks in Plymouth

Trophy haul: Anne and Will Williams’ champion Dartmoor hill ponies Liquorice, Marble and Kizzy have out-ploughed shire horses at contests this year

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talking points Sweets

Brownie Brownie points- 10 up-to-date Brownie badges which reflect modern times

1 Circus performer 2 Traditions 3 Crime prevention Sweets you can’t buy any more:

1 Treets (choc coated

4 Designer 5 Disability awareness

peanuts)

6 Number fun

2 Nutty (peanut studded fudge)

3 Spangles (boiled sweets) 4 Pacers (like Starburst, only minty)

5 Texan (‘A man’s gotta chew’) 6 Cabana (coconut and cherry

7 World traveller 8 Communicator 9 Computer 10 Science investigator

choc bar)

7 Aztec (Chocolate/nougat/ caramel bar)

The happy list

8 Caesaromagus (Colchester)

9 Fry’s Five Centre (choc covered fruit fondant combo)

10 Double Agents (boiled sweets with flavoured centres)

Driving test 10 things to make you smile this week 1 Bridgwater carnival lit-up floats on November 1st Mirror, signal, manoeuvre: the top 10 driving test fails, according to the Driving Standards Agency.

1 Observation at junctions 2 Use of mirrors when changing direction

2 P umpkins we’re carving 3 Sweets for trick or treating 4 Fancy dress the best way to get a party started

5 Life is Toff our columnist Kishanda’s family (in all their reality TV glory) on BBC3

3 Steering control

6 Madness playing at

4 T urning right at junctions

Plymouth Pavilions on December 9

5 Response to traffic lights 6 Moving off safely 7 Control of car when moving off

7 Baked potatoes with butter worth the wait 8 Village bonfires now’s the time to get rid of your burnables

8 Position in road when driving

9 Murmurations see flocks

9 Reverse parking

10 Lady Violet’s one-liners

10 Response to road markings

of starlings make art in the sky is this her best Downton series yet? We think so

Gillian Molesworth

Story of my life...

Standfirst to go here please standfirst like to leave little books around the house into which I can dip in and out. I keep them scattered around: in the kitchen, in the car, in the loo, in the garden shed.

It gives me something to do when I am waiting for a pot to boil or a child to finish gymnastics. Newspapers are good too.

For this kind of reading, you For instance: one writer asked if want something bite-sized: short hot water placed in a freezer froze stories, or small factual books. faster than cold water (as in an Not only are they interesting, they ice cube tray). True, said Michael make you feel like you’re using Davies from Australia. “The effect your time well. And they give you can be achieved when the containsomething to bring up at supper er holding the water is places on a when the kids are bickering. surface of frost or ice. The higher Some of my favourite little temperature slightly melts the icy books are from the New Scientist, surface under the container, greatamalgamations of the magazine’s ly improving the thermal contact popular “Last Word” column. between the container and the cold One book is called: surface.”

Does Anything Eat “This is a culWasps? And anothtural myth,” avows er: Why Don’t PenTom Trull, also It’s something guins’ Feet Freeze?

Australian.

“Hot to do while I’m The format is water will not waiting for a pot simple: average freeze faster than Joes from around cold water in the to boil or a child the world write freezer. However, to do gymnastics in with scientific hot water cooled questions.

Here to room temperaare some examture will freeze ples: “Why are the faster than water bubbles on Guinness white when that has never been heated, bethe beer is black?” to “If I throw cause heating causes water to a rock into the sea on Land’s release dissolved gases which End, will some part of the ripple otherwise reduce the rate of ice travel all the way to North Amercrystal growth.” ica?” or “Why do some eggs have You get this all the time – and two yolks?” that’s within the same book. The Then, experts from all over the interesting thing is that these two world supply answers: based on gents both worked at the Univerprinciples of maths or physics, sity of Tasmania. You would think animal or human behaviour studthey could chat about it over the ies, precedent or research. departmental coffee pot. Keep this The interesting thing to me is in mind the next time you read a how different the answers are from study saying microwaves are killeach other. Scientists disagree all ing us, or that we need to eat seven the time. And you can usually find portions of broccoli a day. Somesome research to prove anything where in the world will be a scienyou want. tist who can prove the opposite.

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Gillian Molesworth is a journalist and mum-of-two who grew up in the USA and moved to north Cornwall when she met her husband 11

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Trend

HOW TO WEAR IT:

Animal prints

his flirty feline print is a perennial style staple, and my African roots (I grew up in South Africa) mean that I will embrace it at any chance I get. Shameless really, but I’m in good company this season. Animal print was big news on the Saint Laurent and Chloe AW14 catwalks. And rightly so because it is the perfect anchor for those in-between day looks.

A few mornings lately have been more than a little chilly, only for the mercury to shoot all the way to the high teens by lunchtime. It’s hard to know what to wear. It’s confusing but also presents us with one last 2014 opportunity to show a more daring side and go for skirt, bare legs and heels.

Pair them with a simple tee and you’re ready for the warm afternoons, while this statement leopard print wrap I threw in the mix will keep you cosy as you queue for your morning latte.

Simples.

Animal print tends to be divisive, a bit of a love/hate affair. I think of it as ultra-feminine with a hint of danger, and I want to encourage you to give it a go this season. Here’s how. Firstly, remember this print isn’t ageist: Helen Mirren rocked a floor-length leopard print gown for the European premiere of Arthur a few years ago and stole the show, while J Lo regularly oozes latin power in feline frocks. Let go of your preconceived notions, and if you see something that catches your eye, just try it on.

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If you fear looking a little too frisky, remember that this print needn’t be synonymous with form fitting cuts.

A pair of loose harem pants roar to life with these wild spots. Pair with a black turtleneck, Michael Kors-style bowling bag and black courts for impeccable workday style credentials.

Still too much jungle on show for you? Then pick up a set of accessories that nod to the trend. You can test the water without significant outlay. These heels from River Island in Princesshay, Exeter, are just £30 and add an untamed element to any ensemble, from jeans to a black pencil skirt.

If you chant one mantra on your shopping trip, make it the word ‘cut’. A poorly tailored dress in animal print is a recipe for tackiness. But good quality fabric and clean tailored lines will allow you to prowl far from your comfort zone and remain every inch a lady.

I was a little nervous pairing this leather pencil skirt with leopard print heels and shades. Ok, I may have actually recoiled, muttering about October being the month leg shaving is allowed to drop off. But once I slipped it on, and swaddled myself in the oversize scarf, I felt more than ready for a walk on the wild side. Give it a go, there’s a lot to be said for being at the top of the fashion food chain.

[ [ In this scarf, I felt more than ready for a walk on the wild side

All the fashion featured here is available in the stores within the Princesshay Shopping Centre, Exeter, www.princesshay.co.uk

HAIR BY SAKS EXETER, MAKE-UP CLARINS, DEBENHAMS (BOTH PRINCESSHAY EXETER) PHOTOGRAPHY: STEVEN HAYWOOD

Kathryn Clarke-Mcleod goes wild with the leopard look, and finds her way through the fashion jungle

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RIVER ISLAND Leopard blanket scarf £15 Black leather-look pencil skirt £30 White oversized t-shirt £16

RIVER ISLAND Tortoise shell sunglasses £13

REISS Cadie tailored leopard-print coat £295

GET THE

look

NEXT Snake box clutch £22

REISS Dalmatian print jumpsuit £195

RIVER ISLAND Animal print court shoes £30.00 LK BENNETT Animal print trousers £155

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Photos: Matt Austin

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People

GLENN COSBY

Comedy and cake Last year, this teacher from Teignmouth starred on The Great British Bake Off. So what’s he been up to since then?

Combining stand-up comedy with cakes. Yes, really...

By Becky Sheaves

o this year’s Great British Bake-Off is over. Sob. Nancy went and won it with a depiction of the Moulin Rouge in cake form, with spun sugar windmill sails that actually turned. And this, people, is what 12 million British folk want to watch of an evening: more viewers than the number who tuned in for the last Football World Cup final. And who I am I to criticise? Like everyone else, I was absolutely gripped. We LOVE the Great British Bake Off. I wonder what this year’s finalists Nancy, Richard, Luis et al will do next? The winners, and the most charismatic runners-up, often find that GBBO is a truly life-changing experience. Many have started cake companies, written books on baking and become stars in their own right.

Last year, we here in the Westcountry were thrilled to see that one of our own – Glenn Cosby, a teacher from Exeter and Head of Sixth Form at Teignmouth Community School – was in the Bake Off 2013. I’m meeting him at a very cute little riverside café (The Welcome Cafe) because he is going to be compering The Big Food Show.

This is a three-day extravaganza planned for Exeter’s Westpoint on October 24-26 starring the Hairy Bikers and MasterChef’s John Torode. It will be, says Glenn: “an excellent chance to indulge in a little foodie fun for those of us pining for Bake Off”.

So what happened? I thought you were a teacher, I ask Glenn over a cup of tea. Once we have stopped patting his impossibly cute spaniel Molly, who has come along too.

“Well,” he says with a wide grin. “I always said

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to the kids at school: ‘don’t be your own rejection committee’. If you want to go for something, go for it. Don’t be the one to stop yourself – if others don’t like it, at least you’ve given it a try.”

Wise words. And so it was that, in February this year, Glenn decided to give up his steady, well-pensioned teaching career to become a baker/performer, mixing stand-up comedy with cake making.

It sounds a bit bonkers, but having spent the afternoon with him I can attest that he is very, very funny. And we know he can bake brilliantly. And so it is that, at 39, Glenn’s launching into a whole new (and really rather precarious-sounding) career. He’d been teaching seven years but was doing well and already in a senior post. But he’s used to trying new things - he has taught English as a foreign language and before that he worked in sales: “Everyone these days has about seven careers,” he says cheerfully. “We’ve worked out that we can manage on my husband’s salary, so I thought: why not go for it?”

Glenn’s smart enough to know that he wasn’t chosen to appear on GBBO simply on baking prowess alone. “They call it ‘casting’, and that is what it is. I was a pretty good baker, but also as a gay, larger-than-life teacher from the West of England, I guess I ticked a lot of the diversity boxes.”

Glenn adored the whole process of appearing on the show, even though it was gruelling. “We’d be up at five am, and bake all day long, for both days of the weekend. And during the week, I was Head of Sixth Form in the crucial period when the kids needed to get their exam course work in. So work was very full-on too. It was exhausting but so much fun.”

Indeed, on his penultimate week on the show, Glenn memorably broke

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‘I’m a pretty good baker but as a gay, larger-than-life teacher I tick diversity boxes’

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‘The thing is, my idea of a showstopper chocolate cake is a really massive one’

down in tears: “I know! Mortifying! Crying over cakes!” he chortles. But he had spent the whole previous week helping students with their course work, and had not had time to practise his baking recipes. “I was shattered, under-prepared and above all I was just realising that my time on the show was imminently coming to an end,” he says.

“Which was really upsetting as I absolutely loved every minute of it.”

Indeed, Glenn’s a devoted Bake-Off fan and says he had never missed an episode before appearing on it himself. “I would often have a go in the week at doing my own version of the bakes on the show,” he says. “In fact, the one series I didn’t really enjoy watching was the one I was in. Some of the shirts I wore! I couldn’t bear to look. It’s been nice this year to go back to being a viewer, and a fan.”

In the show, Glenn’s signature baking style soon became evident. He describes it as ‘more is more’. He explains: “The thing is, if I’m asked to

cook a showstopper, my idea of a fantastic chocolate cake is a totally massive one. Whereas Mary Berry would be looking for something exquisite and elegant.”

Cooking is a love that, he says, dates back to childhood: “My parents divorced when I was 11 and I pretty much took over in the kitchen. I’m a keen all-round cook first and foremost. Baking is just part of it.”

He admits that food has been, at times, an obsession – and not just the cooking of it. “I’ve struggled with weight issues over the years. I was a lot bigger last year when I was on the Bake Off than I am today. I’ve been on strict diets but the whole lot came back on afterwards. Nowadays, I just walk the dog, try to eat sensibly. I’m a whole lot happier.”

Once his TV appearances were over, Glenn found - to his disappointment – that “publishers were not beating a path to my door to write a cake recipe book”. However, opportunities did

come his way. He published his own recipe book (available from www.glenncosby.co.uk) did some food festival appearances which were storming successes. This led to a one-man comedy/ cake baking show in Tiverton, which went down a storm and an appearance at this spring’s The Big Cake Show in Exeter. He’s also about to start his own range of cakes to sell, commencing with a Rocky Road tray bake. “I quite like the idea of selling my cakes at food festivals. I think touring in a cake van and performing as I go would be really fun,” he says.

So is he missing the school, and the kids? “To be honest, the best parts of teaching were being entertaining and meeting people, and I’m definitely getting my fix of that in my new job,” he muses. “I must admit, I’m not missing the admin and workload of teaching.”

They must be missing him, I’d say. As an openly gay teacher, he had an important role to fill at the school. “I started up a Diversity Week

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People

October 24-26

The Big Food Show Glenn Cosby is compering at the Exeter Westpoint event: Here’s what to expect Banter alert! The hugely popular duo, fresh from their many TV series, will be at The Big Food Show on Sunday October 26. Get your discounted tickets in advance online at www.thebigfoodshow.com

The Hairy Bik ers

John Torode Yiou can be the judge of the MasterChef star when he appears at The Big Food Show on Friday, October 24. “I’ll be cooking steak and mushrooms. We’ll start with the basics like a T-bone and how to cook it properly and I’ll be making mushroom doughnuts with a horseradish cream.”

Fun Kitchen Bring your children along for fantastic foodie fun in the kitchen with children’s cookery workshops every hour in the dedicated Kids Kitchen Zone,. There’s no extra charge for the children’s workshops – just put your name down when you arrive at the Big Food Show.

project. Every year we’d explore Lesbian, Gay and Transgender issues. School can be a really difficult place to be different. I knew I was gay from about the age of 10, but in Teignmouth School, with 1,000 pupils, only a handful of pupils felt strong enough to come out as gay. It’s still very fraught – and after all, the word gay is used by kids to mean rubbish.”

And as for kids, he and his other half, Rob (who runs a software company in Exeter) are planning to become parents themselves before too long. “I think if you can, and you want to, you should adopt. And we want to. There are so many children - not babies but a bit older - who need a family home,” he says.

“I’ve got a lot on my plate right now, but in a few years’ time, it is something we really want to do. It would be exhausting but so rewarding, I’m sure.”

And if all goes according to plan, by the time Glenn becomes a parent, he will be selling his own range of cakes and an all round comedy star. It’s ambitious, but as teacher Glenn would have said to his sixth-formers: Why not? Watch this space.

Marcus Bean

Ping Coombes

Saturday Kitchen’s culinary expert Marcus Bean runs his own restaurant and cookery school in Shropshire alongside his wife Jenny.

He’ll be demo-ing his favourite recipes at the Big Food Show.

This year’s MasterChef winner created food so good that judge Gregg Wallace threatened to climb over the table and kiss her. Find out why with her chef demos at The Big Food Show at Exeter’s Westpoint.

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Interview

SARAH WOODWARD

I’m with the band urich, Munich, Vienna, erm, Worthing. Over the next couple of months, Sarah Woodward will barely have a moment at home in the chocolate-box Devon village, of Coombeinteignhead. It’s a place which looks more like the setting of a Miss Marple mystery than the domain of a rock music impresario.

“The only remnant from my past life is the local book club, which I love and always try not to miss,” she says.

The tour dates follow the release of a new single, Thrones, by These Reigning Days, the rock outfit from Torquay who are managed by Sarah. She also owns and runs their record label, Ecco Recordings, from her Westcountry home. This year, the band has played Glastonbury’s pyramid stage, as well as supporting top rockers Bon Jovi and The Feeling. So these are exciting times, as Sarah explains.

Blue-eyed, with blonde ringlets, it’s fair to say Sarah’s a surprising person to be orchestrating the rise (and rise) of three tattooed, guitar-toting musicians who like to play it loud – and sound pretty darn amazing when they do.

A mum of three (her kids are all in their

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twenties) her life has changed beyond measure since she switched from her career in classical music to indy rock. Managing a band that spends a lot of time on the road and running a record label is a job that, she insists, can be “as far from glamorous as you can get”. But she’s clearly having a blast, as well as making her mark within a notoriously tough – and still male dominated – industry.

“It’s fun sometimes and I can feel really privileged, but it’s hard work,” she says.

“There are other female managers, but you do come up against sexism. In the early days people would even ask which member of the band I was related to.

“I’m not sure they’d ask that question now.”

But she concedes that being a woman can have its advantages: “It’s because I’m a novelty,” she sayss. “We went to a music expo in LA and I’d say that 90% of the delegates were men, so immediately I was noticeable.”

This year, Sarah and the band (singer/guitarist Dan Steer, drummer Joe Sansome, and bassist Jonny Finnis) have spent a lot of time on the road, playing gigs ranging from local village halls to Woodstock Festival in Poland – the largest free music festival in the world, which attracted a 300,000 strong crowd.

Portrait: Steven Haywood

This mum-of-three from Devon is a music manager. This year ‘her boys’ have played Glastonbury and supported Bon Jovi and The Feeling, she tells Catherine Barnes

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The band also headlined at Russian rock-fest V-Rox in Vladivostok and, closer to home, played the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury, where they hung out backstage with Lily Allen and Zoe Ball.

Excitingly, their music formed part of the BBC’s Winter Olympics soundtrack earlier this year.

Boys will be boys, although Sarah prefers to keep a discreet lid on just how wild – or worse, disappointingly mundane – life on the road can get.

“Just as long as they do their job; that’s the most important thing. I have to be fairly easy going, or else it wouldn’t work,” she says.

“I’m with the band 24/7 on tour and if they had to be on their best behaviour in front of me all the time, it wouldn’t work. But touring’s hard graft as well as fun. They have to be self-disciplined.

When people come to watch, that’s their big night

out, but for the band it’s another working day.”

The band launched their new album Opera of Love at Torquay nightspot The Venue last month, a triumphant homecoming gig after three years of hard slog. Family, friends and not a few fairly senior relatives mingled with fans, youngsters in their teens and twenties, all rocking out. Clearly in Torquay, age is very much an attitude, not a number.

“We always knew it’s rare for a band to achieve success overnight – the industry won’t let it happen,” says Sarah. “They like to know that you’ve had the experience and taken the knocks along the way. It takes a lot of lot of time invested to break a band.”

It takes money, too, “but not mine,” adds Sarah.

Earlier in the year, she led a pitch to secure £90,000 in crowd funding, to support the cost of

[

‘I’m with the band 24/7 on tour. They don’t have to be on their best behaviour’

[

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Interview

travelling on tour and launching the album.

Hundreds of people pledged cash, which led to the band raising more than £162,000 in total – including an undisclosed sum from celebrity chef Heston Blumenthal.

“Heston’s become a big fan of the band. We played in the Alps when the band supported The Feeling and after one of gigs, Heston came and met band and ended up wrestling with them in the snow at 3am. Should I even be saying that?” she laughs.

“My one regret was my phone had died, so I couldn’t record the moment.”

No week is the same when you are managing a band on the up. Just recently they have supported Bon Jovi in Italy (where their single Too Late reached number one in the MTV rock charts) but they are still playing Friday night gigs in rural Devon village halls.

It’s a lifestyle Sarah loves, though: “The last band I managed played the Jack Wills Summer Eton vs Harrow and Cambridge vs Oxford Varsity match after-show party at Windsor.

Then the following weekend, they supported Motorhead at the Bulldog Bash in the Midlands. which is run by the Hells Angels. Talk about contrast,” says Sarah, who began her own career in publishing, after graduating from the University of Exeter.

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Interview

“That was two different worlds really, but all this work is pretty interesting. What’s most important is the fan base. Most venues will book a band even if they don’t like the music, so long as they can bring in a crowd.”

Although she plays violin “badly” and “sings a bit” Sarah says she’s passionate about music but at her happiest backstage. Her husband Marc’s a financial adviser but, she says, a musician at heart: “He was playing mandolin seven nights a week when I met him”.

Her children Jack, an architect, Tom, a doctor and Lily, who’s currently crewing yachts and based in Cannes, are all accomplished musicians too.

Sarah switched from book publishing to the music world when her friends launched a classical music label. She took the firm over when the friends relocated to the US. “Because of copyright laws, the business had to remain British,” she explains. “It was highly regarded and won a Gramophone Award.”

That business was later sold to a major music company. Sarah went on to run another classical label, on behalf of a violin dealer. Then a rock band called The Quails, fronted by These Reign-

[

ing Days singer Dan, approached her and asked if she’d help them bring out a CD. She not only did so, but became their manager. When the band split up, Sarah and Dan maintained their working relationship.

“At that point, I set up Ecco Recordings and came up with a business plan for These Reigning Days,” she says.

In the past year, Sarah’s barely had time to unpack before hitting the road again “All three of the musicians are focused on a career with longevity and so far, so good. Ours is not a musicians/boss employer kind of relationship. We’re very, very collaborative in everything.

I make the final decisions, but in terms of artistic development, I trust their talent and judgment.

It’s a partnership that works.

“But when it comes to logistics, PR campaigns, release dates and telling them where they need to

be and at what time… I’m the one in charge.”

In the past year, Sarah’s barely had time to unpack, before hitting the road again. And when she is home, then there’s a mountain of administration to be done.

“My life’s undergone a big change in the past five or six years,” she reflects. “I used to do a lot of rowing and it’s hard to keep up with that. When it comes to relaxing, it sounds really geeky, but I do love University Challenge.”

And then there’s the book club.

“We’ve just finished The Lie by Helen Dunmore – my choice – it’s set in Cornwall and about a soldier who returns from World War One. “My life now can be exhausting and every now and then it catches up, but I enjoy what I do. As long as there’s a positive forward momentum, which there has been for us, you can keep going.

“There’s always got to be something exciting on the horizon and that next step forward to take.”

[

These Reigning Days have a new album, Opera of Love and new single, Thrones, both available to download on iTunes.

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24

interiors

34

fashion

style 45

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gadgets

37

food 15/10/2014 15:04:56

[

REAL HOMES

Labour of love

Jenny Barry tells Sarah Pitt how it took 14 years to transform her historic Devon home

hen Jenny Barry moved into her home in an East Devon river valley back 14 years ago, she knew she wanted to get a bit of light on the subject.

Titford Hold at Awliscombe near Honiton dates from the 17th century, and by the early 1900s was home to one Reverend Wordsworth, grandson of poet William, who held services in a chapel that is now a bedroom. It was full of historic charm and original features, albeit sometimes covered over by heavy carpets or, in the case of a hidden staircase, a layer of masonry.

Jenny, who has always viewed houses as projects, was smitten. And so has begun a gradual process, over 14 years, of painting beams and

W

[

floors white, replacing doors, sourcing antique furniture and windows and installing mirrors to bring some light into each room.

She’s also, along the way, extended the house and says the biggest compliment she’s been paid was from the local council official who signed the building off on completion. “He told me he couldn’t tell which part of the house was new and which old,” she says.

In the drawing room, cream sofas are complemented by gilt-framed mirrors on the walls, and a herringbone patterned wooden floor. Its centrepiece is an inglenook fireplace, dating from the 1600s.

“The fireplace and the beam were completely

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Interiors

STYLE TIP: Shiny gilt picture frames and

mirrors reflect light and give the feeling of space throughout the house

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‘The best compliment came from the building inspector, who told me he couldn’t tell which part of the house was new and which was old’

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Interiors

covered with plaster so you couldn’t see the beam,” says Jenny. “I took all the plaster off, revealing the stonework, which is local Beer stone, as found in the Houses of Parliament and Hampton Court.”

There was another surprise beside the fireplace, when the removal of a shelf unit revealed a staircase, once the only way to go upstairs. “It doesn’t actually go anywhere, but it is an interesting feature,” she says.

The warmth of the wood is brought out by gilt frames around the paintings on the walls.

Gold has the effect of warming the wood. And throughout the house, both in the old part and the extension, mirrors are used to add more light and space.

There’s a mirror behind the magnificent antique French bed in one of the bedrooms in the old part of the house, which boasts its own en suite bathroom, dating, Jenny believes, from the beginning of the 19th century, with the original free standing bath. “It would have been very unusual for that time, when most people in this part of the world would have had an outdoor loo,” she says.

In the bedrooms she’s created a Scandinavian feel by painting the floorboards white, and the walls in light colours. The beams, throughout the house have either been sandblasted or painted white.

The furniture and furnishings are a mix of things that Jenny’s had for years, finds from local salvage yards and new pieces. A mirrored table in the sitting room comes from Jenny’s favourite interiors website Achica, while the stone fireplace in this room, part of the extension, was sourced by Jenny from salvage yard Fagin’s near Cullompton. Like the house’s original fireplace in the drawing room, it is of local Beer stone.

While the antique French bed was a serious in-

vestment, the rugs that go so well with it come from high street store Laura Ashley, as do the lamps beside the bed, which Jenny’s had for years.

But they all go together as if it were planned.

“I find that I pick things up and they just work together when I get them home,” she says. “It is something that I don’t even think about.”

Jenny likes to customise things. The plain white lampshades beside the four poster bed in one bedroom are edged with red gingham, to complement the toile de Jouy blinds. The Moroccan lamp which hangs in the entrance hall, meanwhile, had its shiny newness tempered by Jenny’s paintbrush and a pot of gold coloured paint.

Plain white doors inset with glass in them are lined with fabric to provide unusual wardrobe space in one bedroom, a result which is much less expensive than it looks. Meanwhile Delft -style tiles in the kitchen were in fact the result of some careful painting of blue swirls on to the corners of inexpensive white tiles.

Structurally the house is an eclectic mix, with the Victorian additions making a grander countryside residence out of the original cottage, complete with the chapel with its vaulted ceiling.

Jenny has carried this look into the extension, with custom made wooden vaulted windows as well as stone windows from a reclamation yard.

There’s even a pew in the kitchen, made comfy with cushions which Jenny made herself.

The house has been an absorbing long-term project for Jenny, 63, who moved here after a busy business career. The woman who has been attracting the question, “are you an interior de-

STYLE TIP: Mix

investment pieces with less expensive items from salvage yards, and high street stores

signer?” from house guests ever since she painted one wall of her flat red as a twenty-something, is now ready to start again somewhere else.

“After 14 years I’ve sort of exhausted what I wanted to do,” she says. “It is time to go now - I’m ready for a new project.”

• Titford Hold is on the market with Strutt and Parker (www.struttandparker.com) for £1.25 million

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Shopping Chandelier, £200, Laura Ashley

GET THE

LOOK

Keep your furnishings in the same colour palette, with an occasional contrast

Florence vase, £30, www.thewhitecompany.com

Delft tile, £18 each, www.douglaswatsonstudio.co.uk

Somerby mirror, £45, www.chandeliersandmirrors.co.uk Lou Lou bed, £995 www.loaf.com

Sample pot in ‘White Tie’, £3.95 Farrow & Ball

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Gardens

[

ANNE SWITHINBANK

Sow now for summer

[

Devon’s Anne Swithinbank, panellist on Radio 4’s Gardeners’ Question Time, says now is the time to plant sweet peas for next summer’s colour

very week throughout summer, my dad’s neighbour has provided him with a bunch of sweet peas, patiently refilling the same vase with sweetly scented pastel-shaded blooms. Amazingly, her plants carried on flowering right up until the beginning of October, since when she has brought round dahlias instead. Our moist climate here in the South West seems to suit sweet peas, which tend to frizzle and die earlier in the drier summers experienced further east. We may have had a dry summer but we do tend to have cool, dewy evenings and these, plus a rich, well-conditioned soil, the occasional extra soaking and the odd liquid feed, keeps plants going.

The fragrance of sweet peas is one of the best there is. It’s fresh, intense and almost addictive

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but free of the slightly sickly, almost malodorous undertones you can get from jasmine, lily or even hyacinth. Individually, the blooms don’t last long once cut and so are not the best value from florists. For a season’s worth of blooms, you really do need to grow your own. To keep plants productive, make sure every flower stem is cut before it goes over, rather like early dead heading, so that cutting and vase-filling almost become a way of life, for you and your plants.

The basic sweet pea Lathyrus odoratus was introduced from Sicily some 300 years ago and we can still grow similar, highly fragrant bicoloured magenta and purple flowers by sowing the closely related variety ‘Cupani’. There is a lot to be said for its colouring, simplicity and fragrance. Towards the end of the nineteenth century Henry Eckford, known as the ‘father

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of the sweet pea’ started a breeding programme that gave us the Grandiflora varieties with larger flowers and a wider colour range and these are still worth growing too. In 1901 variants with waved petals appeared in two different places simultaneously. One was named ‘Countess Spencer’ and gave rise to the modern strain of Spencer sweet peas. I have heard naysayers moan that modern breeding has removed scent from some varieties but found that, in practice, this is rarely the case. Having grown many varieties of Spencer sweet peas, I’ve found them all to be deliciously fragrant, though the Grandiflora varieties, ‘Cupani’ and similar ‘Matucana’ do have the strongest and most pervasive scent.

October is a great month for sowing sweet pea seeds because this is when nature would put them in the ground and, being tough plants, they like to germinate, sit winter out and then grow on with a really good root system in place. You get stronger, earlier-flowering plants this way. To accommodate this strong root growth, long pots or modules are a good plan and I use Root Trainers, whose rows of deep cells are hinged for ease of opening. Alternatively you can pack loo roll innards upright into a seed tray, fill them with compost and sow. I over winter my plants in an unheated greenhouse or cold frame so they don’t get too cold or wet.

Some growers like to pinch out the growing tips when plants grow over 5cm/2in tall to encourage side shoots, while others don’t on the

basis that they tend to do this naturally anyway.

Personally, I don’t think it makes a lot of difference but if we have a mild, bright autumn and plants under glass grow too much at the top, it is a good way of steadying them up.

Spring sowings still result in good plants and as they won’t be in their pots for long, I sow four seeds per 9cm/3.5in pot from February to March and plant them out as one.

Sweet success

This week’s gardening tips Anne’s advice for your garden

Anne’s tips for growing sweet peas Whether you intend growing your sweet peas against canes in a row, up wigwams or obelisks, the soil beneath should be full of rich organic matter. Now’s the time to dig compacted soil or, if it is already in good nick, spread a thick layer of well-rotted manure, garden compost or municipal compost over the ground. Come planting time, the soil will be spongy with it.

• Harvest red chicory (radicchio) and use it because plants are not reliably winter hardy, though cold weather does sweeten their flavour. Cut and leave stumps because they’ll sprout and produce more leaves.

Use in salads with grapes or orange to balance bitter flavours.

• Keep an eye on the weather and bring pumpkins under cover if

Question time with Anne

frost is threatened. They need sun to ripen their skins ready for storage but won’t like the cold.

• Lime veg beds where soil is acidic. Carry out a pH test (cheap kits are available) first to determine whether this is necessary, then add garden or dolomitic limestone to beds, especially where brassicas and parsnips will be grown.

Anne responds to West readers’ garden concerns and queries I’ve left my wallflowers in from last year but now I’m not sure if I should pull them out and plant new ones. Are they going to give me a good display?

Q

A: Technically, the wallflower Erysimum cheiri (a native of southern Europe) is described as a short-lived, shrubby perennial grown as a biennial. Translated to garden-speak, this means we usually sow them in the late spring and early summer of one year, plant out that autumn, let them flower the next year and then pull them up. The dangers of leaving them in are only that they might die off or turn woody and straggly.

But like you, I dead-head mine after flowering and they usually give me one more year. Some liquid feeding in summer and then a dressing of controlled release fertiliser in spring helps them along a bit. Why not plant some daffs or tulips in amongst them, to be sure of getting a good show? If you do pull them out, plant new ones in a different spot to avoid the build up of pests and diseases.

Q

We have a huge Swiss cheese plant which has sent aerial roots out in all directions. Is it ok to cut them off?

A: Time was almost everyone had one of these and certainly every school art room and Chinese take away! Monstera deliciosa would like to climb hundreds of feet up tropical forest trees, gripping with those aerial roots and seeking out pockets of moisture and nutrients. They stick to carpets and walls but you can either guide them to the pot or cut them back with secateurs. Just make sure the plant is adequately watered and fed to compensate. Good care will reward you with massive leaves with many of those characteristic Swiss cheese holes.

Send your questions to Anne at westmag@ westernmorningnews.co.uk

Move potted plants to winter quarters. House plants go back indoors, slightly tender ones into frost free areas and nearly hardy agapanthus and olives to unheated glass.

Clean glass to let in maximum light.

Sow tree seeds. This might sound like a long way round but you could have some beautiful little Japanese maples, Christmas trees or flowering dogwoods. Chiltern (www. chilternseeds.co.uk) seeds or Plant World Seeds (www.plant-world-seeds.com)

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Beauty

Tried

& tested

We present the beauty treats and cheats of the week, all trialled by West magazine’s Catherine Barnes, with help from daughter Tilly, 17.

Pamper sesh Cornish organic skincare brand Afyna was developed by therapist Sara Young and it’s now used in treatments available at five luxury spa hotels. Treat yourself to a pamper session at home with Sara’s three gorgeous body products from the Detoxifying range with juniper and grapefruit. Scrub gel and moisturising lotion (both £17, 100ml), bath & body oil (£25, 100ml). Or spoil yourself – or someone you love – with a box set (£30) all available at

fave!

www.afyna.co.uk.

WIN!

Deserve some me time? We have one of Afyna’s gorgeous Dextoxifying Body Trios worth £30 up for grabs. It includes a 30ml body & bath Oil, 50ml scrub and 30ml body lotion. For a chance to win, tell us which fruit is a key ingredient in the range.

Email your answer, name and address – headed ‘Afyna’ - to: westmag@westernmorningnews.co.uk by Friday October 31

ALL DAY GROOMING Shavata Brow Tamer is brilliant for keeping that groomed look maintained. It’s an instant-dry clear gel in an easy-to-use click pen, perfect for holding brows in place all day. £15.50 at

www.shavata.co.uk

Nail it!

Here’s the knowledge on prepping your nails for night on the tiles – Ciate’s Nail Taxi. Three pots of shiny paint in pillarbox red, smoky chinchilla and a sparkling midnight, all in one cute package – time to give your mani a lift. £20 at

www.boots.com

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the review This week we try:

Go for Gold Sothy’s has been inspired by Paris this autumn to create a makeover that’s elegant by day and glam by night.

Get the look with Coral Blush (£18.50), eye shadows in Emeraude and Brun Taupe (£17.50 each) and sweep of brown liner. Try beige Saint-Germain for intense satin lips (£19.50) and finish with this illuminating Golden Dust (£24.50) which comes in a classic bulb atomiser – tres Audrey Hepburn!

All at www.sothys-uk.co.uk

Scent of a Woman Find luxury brands all in one place at escentual.com – a one-stop beauty shop where you can earn ‘pretty pennies’ with every pound you spend and save up for something special.

Woman by Donna Karen combines orange blossom and spice. Is it just us, or does the the fabulous bottle seem to be channelling St Ives sculptor Barbara Hepworth? Prices start at £64 for 50ml eau de parfum.

Pulling strings Catherine Barnes gets her brows threaded a la Mrs Clooney... in Plymouth f you covet the brows of Amal Alamuddin, aka Mrs George Clooney, a barber’s shop in down-town Plymouth may not be the place for which you’d instantly make a beeline.

But appearances (which are what we’re all about) can be deceptive and when it comes to brows, Aro and Oscar at Cutting Edge are virtuosos with the thread.

No appointments are necessary, but be prepared to wait, as they briskly administer trims, buzz cuts and short-back-and-sides.

A polite notice advises that if you leave the shop, you forfeit your place in the queue. There’s no cup of tea or ‘going anywhere nice on your holiIn other hands, the process can sting days’ chit-chat – it’s all strictly down to a bit, but Aro wields the thread so deftly business. But don’t be that you don’t feel a daunted. Sit down, lean thing; just a tickle of back and open your eyes epilated hairs falling again 10 minutes later onto your lids. With the A reassuring to see the guys have perthreads rolling over your formed a mini eye-lift brows making an audible mid-session miracle, by the power of skrit-skrit sound, it’s difpeep reveals one epilation alone. ficult not to be alarmed at Practised across Asia first and wonder whether already shapely and the Middle East for you’ll have to pencil them (and much thousands of years, the back on. But it feels way tidier) brow joy of threading is commore drastic than it actuparatively new-found in ally is and a reassuring the West. For newbies: a mid-session peep reveals length of cotton thread one already shapely (and is doubled, twisted and far tidier) looking brow. pulled taut over the brow line to remove The result? Groomed, star-quality hairs at the root. As well as result in brows that really open up your eyes. Brilcleaner, more defined brows, it’s also far liant value and the perfect quick-fix pickgentler on the delicate skin around the me-up at just £5 a time, Cutting Edge, at eyes than a wax and better at fully remov- 30, Frankfort Gate, Plymouth, is open ing hairs from the follicle than tweezing. seven days a week and could make you Plus, the results last for longer. happy, if not Mrs Clooney.

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Get your brows threaded at Cutting Edge, 30 Frankfort Gate, Plymouth, for £5 31

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15/10/2014 09:41:07

Wellbeing

Healthy food shop Cut through the confusion surrounding healthy eating, portion sizes and food labelling thanks to a new app from Consensus Action on Salt and Health (CASH) t ought to be easier than ever to watch our waistlines, thanks to ata-glance nutritional information on packaging.

But while ‘traffic light’ labelling with green, amber and red coding is meant to better inform us of healthy food choices – could it also be misleading us, too?

“Is it just me who thinks that many of these labels are specifically designed to confuse you into thinking that something is healthier than it actually is?” says NHS weight-loss surgeon Dr Sally Norton, who’s behind her own online diet programme, Vavista.com and is a fan of a new

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app that’s been created to enlighten us. fat content per recommended helping size, on Health experts have warned we’ve become so fotheir box-fronts. cused upon eating low-fat and fat-free, that we’ve The app has its own traffic light system, reckonbeen consuming way too much sugar - added by ing fat, sugar and salt content per 100 grammes manufacturers to make skinny foods more flaof food, as well as ‘standard’ portion sizes. voursome. The increasing amounts we’re eating “One problem with food labelling is that por- often in ‘savoury’ products - are blamed for tion sizes can be unrealistic,” says CASH nutrirising levels of obesity, diabetes, tionist Sonia Pombo. heart problems, dental disease “A suggested portion size on and even cancer. a pizza box might be quarter, In a bid to demystify food labelwhen you’re more likely to have ling, a number of leading British half, or the whole thing, which ‘Is it just me or health institutions have formed can increase the amount of salt do many labels an organisation called CASH you’re actually eating from ‘low’ (Consensus Action on Salt or ‘medium’, to high. confuse you into and Health).

“The app will also suggest an thinking food is CASH is behind a alternative. Not ‘have a salad healthier than it smartphone app instead’ – but similar food, with called FoodSwitch. lower fat, sugar or salt.” actually is?’

Based on a system For anyone particularly keen pioneered in Austo reduce their sodium intake, tralia, it’s been the app has a dedicated area, designed to be Salt-Switch, which also suggests take with you on the superproducts for a healthier choice. market run, to identify which CASH believe that it’s so far logged up to two product offers the healthiest thirds of food items currently sold by the major choice. So far, there are around supermarkets on FoodSwitch. But if a product 100,000 items listed, including isn’t listed when you scan, you’ll get a prompt products made by leading food from the app to take a photo, which researchers brands which don’t feature ‘trafcan then use to build up the database. fic lights’ detailing salt, sugar and www.foodswitch.co.uk

[[

THE KEEP FIT COLUMN WHERE ONE WOMAN TRIES EVERYTHING:

DODGER

this week: CROQUET

THE SOFA

Mum of three Sam Taylor, 35, from Cardinham near Bodmin is behind Sofa Dodger, the website with wealth of keep-fit activities at a place near you. This week she tries: Croquet.

I couldn’t have picked a more beautiful afternoon to try a game at Cornwall Croquet Club in Porthpean, but did stand out slightly in my black tracky bottoms and T-Shirt, contrasting with the whites everybody else was sporting.

Croquet’s played with two teams of two players. The aim is to hit the ball through the hoops and, unlike golf, you do not pick up the ball, you carry on to the next hoop. First to seven hoops wins. This all seemed quite straightforward. Where’s my Pimms?

I proceeded to swing the heavy mallet into my own leg, forgetting the main principle of having your legs apart, when taking the shot.

You may not have swung a mallet into your own leg before but let me tell you, it hurts!

Chess-like in his strategy, my partner Ron was thinking three or four shots ahead, while I focused on not inflicting further damage on myself. Ron single-handedly won the last hoop and I unashamedly celebrated for being on the winning team.

GET INVOLVED: Try something new or tell the world about your own keep fit class for free at www.sofadodger.co.uk 32

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Enjoy

[Brixham [ A WEEKEND IN...

Fancy a break away? How about a visit to this beautiful and bustling sea port on the south Devon coast... hard-working harbour town with a thriving fishing industry, postcard-pretty Brixham in Torbay pulls in summer visitors in their thousands, with attractions including a replica of the Golden Hind and its annual Pirates Festival drawing on its maritime history. At this time of year, there’s still lots to see, taste and do.

A

Stay: Rooms cost between £47 and £80 a night at Harbour View (harbourviewbrixhambandb.co.uk), which also offers a holiday flat which sleeps four. Owners Steve and Stuart’s cooked breakfast includes award-winning sausages from a local farm and free harbourside parking is available to guests. Self catering? Pebblestones is perched on hill above the harbour and sleeps four, with a minimum stay of four nights costing from £274.50 at this time of year (www.classic.co.uk) What to do: The Smugglers and Pirates Experience is huge fun and located on the harbourside. Explore secret passages and see chapters of Brixham’s colourful history brought to life. It’s open year round, from 9am to 5.30pm, while anyone can eat at its licensed restaurant until 9pm. Berry Head Nature Reserve is located on a stunning stretch of coastal cliff top and open year-round for walks. Go bird-spotting at its Autumn Migration Watch on November 1. Watch the fishing boats come in at the harbour or investigate rock pools at Shoalstone beach.

Where to shop: Seafood and art are local specialities. Buy fresh fish from David Walker and Son’s counter at Brixham’s landmark new Fish Market. Brixham’s Saturday Art & Craft market runs – weather permitting – until November, while the harbourside Strand Gallery specialises in works by acclaimed local artists, as does the Nicky Stevenson Gallery in Middle Street. Ye Olde Coffin House is the town’s most unusual building: Coffin-shaped as the name suggests, it’s home to tarot and crystal shop, Destiny.

Where to Eat: Great food at St Austell Brewery’s Old Market House – including fresh local seafood and Westcountry-reared steak. When it comes to fish and chips, you’re spoilt for choice. David’s, in Bolton Street, even does a gluten-free option. Have a cuppa and a pot of whelks or cockles from Claws on the Quay. Eat in – or take out – from the Brixham Deli, or enjoy a traditional afternoon tea at the Montpellier restaurant.

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33

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15/10/2014 13:25:29

Fashion

Under wraps The weather’s finally on the turn and it’s time to think about some stylish ways to keep warm this winter

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e’ve had a great summer and the driest September since records began (or something). But with November just around the corner, there’s no denying that there’s a chill in the air and it’s time to think about getting yourself a new coat. Or blanket, or parka, or winter kimono.

Because choice is what it is all

about this season.

Boden has proved itself a great providers of winter wear over the years and this winter is no exception. This cute blue Ingrid coat is warm, well-made and has an endearing retro quality, while still being very feminine. We also love the slightly old-school look of this bright red duffle coat from F&F at Tesco, perfect for adding colour to dull November days.

But if you want something a little less, well, warm, then the new trend for wraps, throws and kimonos is a great way to cover up without breaking a sweat. We especially like this fringed winter kimono from Next. At just £32 it’s instant style at an affordable price.

There are good alternatives all over the high street right now, with this tartan number from New Look and Top Shop’s blanket-stitched version also catching our eye.

There are times, however, when you really do want to be sure you won’t feel the cold. Jigsaw’s furry-collared parka is the perfect answer to casual-but-cosy dressing. And if you want a classic camel winter coat (who doesn’t?) then Jaeger is, as always, a go-to label for enduring investment style. All in all, we think you’ll agree, you’ll soon have winter fashion all wrapped up.

Parka, Jigsaw £249 34

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15/10/2014 14:02:04

fave!

Top shop £35

Duffle coat F&F £39

Ingrid coat Boden £179

Jaeger £399 New Look £15.99

Kimono Next £32 35

Fashion_Oct19.indd 3

15/10/2014 11:38:34

Fashion

The edit

Your straight line to style. Scarf + gloves + bag = all your accessories sorted

Deichmann £6.99

+

+

+ Dubarry £199

Tu at Sainsbury’s £16

+

+ Get the Label £4.99

Miss Selfridge £25

Jaeger £95

Jaeger £350

+ White Stuff £15

leather gloves £16 Next

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Fashion_Cakes_Oct19.indd 36

15/10/2014 09:35:16

Bake NEW!

cake of the week

Kate Shirazi bakes:

Man cake Kate says: Perhaps I should explain. I made this sultana cake intending it to be just that – a sultana cake. My husband and his man chums completely appropriated it, cut it into man-chunks (it was originally round), stuffed it into their rucksacks and went off playing on their mountain bikes. They came back all muddy and cheerful and said that the cake was a great success. I gave them a withering look and told them to take their shoes off.

Serves 8-10

You will need: Serves 8–10 450 g/1 lb/4 1⁄2 cups plain (all-purpose) flour 2 tsp mixed spice 1 tsp cinnamon 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda) 175 g/6 oz/3⁄4 cup unsalted butter 225 g/8 oz/1 1⁄4 cups light brown soft sugar 225 g/8 oz/1 1⁄2 cups sultanas (golden raisins) 1 large free-range egg, beaten 300 ml/1⁄2 pt/1 1⁄4 cups milk 150 g/5 oz/3⁄4 cup sugarcubes

Method: 1.

Preheat the oven to 160°C/325°F/Gas mark 3. Grease and line a deep 20 cm/8 in loose-bottomed cake tin (pan).

2.

Sift the flour, spices and bicarbonate of soda (baking soda) into a large bowl and rub in the butter, aiming for a texture like fine breadcrumbs. Stir in the sugar and the sultanas (golden raisins). Mix in the egg and milk and stir away until you have a soft dropping consistency – in other words, it plops gently off the spoon without having to waggle it. You may need to add a little more milk if it doesn’t plop nicely.

3.

Transfer the mixture to the tin and even out the top. Bash the sugarcubes up a bit (I do it in a pestle and mortar) so that you have uneven gravel rather than sand, and scatter it over the top of the cake.

4.

Bake for about 1 hour 20 minutes or until a knife or skewer comes out clean – check after about an hour. Cool in the tin for about 10 minutes before finishing off the cooling process on a wire rack. Watch a man come along and hack it to pieces and wander off muttering about spokes.

Kate Shirazi runs Cakeadoodledo shop and cafe on Exeter’s Cathedral Green (www.cakedoodledo.co.uk) and bakes cakes of all kinds to order and send by post. Find this recipe and many more in Kate’s beautiful books Cake Magic and Baking Magic (£11.99 each, Pavilion Books)

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15/10/2014 09:35:41

My Secret Westcountry

Luke Lang Luke Lang is the co-founder of Exeter-based Crowdcube, which in 2011 became the first online platform to enable budding businesses to pitch for funding from members of the public. It has, so far, helped raise £34 million for British enterprises. Luke, 36, lives in Exeter with his partner Laura.

My favourite...

Pub: The Hour Glass, which is tucked away near Exeter’s historic quay. It’s a great place to spend any evening, particularly on a cold winter’s night. Very friendly, great food and real character has set it apart from other pubs in Exeter for some time. Although it does have some good competition now from The Fat Pig, Bike Shed Theatre and Cosy Club.

Cycle: It’s difficult to beat mountain biking on the Quantocks and Exmoor. Great views, trails and countryside.

‘Hard to beat’

Beach: Croyde has always been my favourite beach ever since I was a kid. It’s a picturesque

sandy beach nestled in the rugged North Devon coast with great surf. The Thatch has a bustling atmosphere that’s perfect for a hearty meal and drink after a day in the surf. It’s a real jewel for the Westcountry.

Event:

I recently completed a charity swim between Topsham and the Turf Locks, which is about 1.5 miles down the Exe Estuary. It was great fun. The Exeter Food and Drink Festival is also worth an annual visit to taste the best of the West’s produce.

Shop: If you love cycling, like I do, The Bike Shed in Exeter is difficult to beat. You simply cannot top the team’s knowledge, customer service and passion for pedal power.

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15/10/2014 11:18:50

People

Food festivals

The Exe

Croyde

Day out: Eden Project is a great day out all

Food: I had one of Tom’s Pies at the week-

year round but it is especially worth a trip this summer to discover the new Lost World of Dinosaurs at Eden. You can explore and track down the giant beasts that used to rule the planet, great fun for children and big kids alike!

end, which was delicious. These multi-awardwinning pies are handmade in Devon in small batches using locally sourced ingredients and have made quite a name for themselves - and rightly so. My other favourites include The Dartmoor Chilli Farm and Burts Potato Chips.

Restaurant: You can’t beat the passion for great local seasonal food that is cooked to a very high standard at Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s River Cottage Canteen in Axminster. River Cottage raised a £1 million investment on Crowdcube in June to expand the restaurant chain further – it was great to be able to help them.

Venue or live act: Exeter Phoenix, which is bang in the heart of Exeter, is an amazing venue that hosts hundreds of events each year including music, art, film and comedy. It is organising a pop-up cinema in Haldon Forest, showing dark and atmospheric screenings of classic thrillers this November, which sounds like a lot of fun.

Tipple: The Westcountry has a very strong tradition of brewing real ales. Another business to get funding through Crowdcube is the awardwinning Quantock Brewery based in Somerset, which I find pretty tasty. The full bodied Jail Ale from the Dartmoor Brewery or Proper Job, the powerfully hopped authentic Cornish IPA from St Austell Brewery are other favourites of mine.

The cider isn’t bad either!

For more information visit www..crowdcube.com

[ [ ‘The Westcountry has a strong tradition of brewing real ales and the full-bodied Jail Ale from Dartmoor Brewery is a favourite of mine. The ciders here in the South West aren’t too bad either’

Tom’s Pies are handmade in Devon

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15/10/2014 11:19:20

[

Pea Green Boat Café

By Becky Sheaves

uch to my deep, deep chagrin, we had to say goodbye to our au pair Maria just recently. She had been over from Spain for her university summer holidays, helping us out on the farm with the kids and housework and generally making life easier for all concerned.

Especially me.

One evening, I asked her when her university term started. She looked a bit shamefaced: “about two weeks ago”. What! It was time to go back. And we did all have lots of tears at the airport. She was such a nice kid.

Anyway, we decided to take her out for a meal to say goodbye – and my mum came too, as they had got on like a house on fire. “I have never seen anyone laugh so much as Maria when she saw me testing the eggs,” says mum. It is quite funny – when our dozen chickens go into overdrive, before you know it you have about 40 eggs in the kitchen and (inevitably) we haven’t dated

M

EATING OUT

them so we don’t know which are fresh. So mum bobs them in a big bowl of water. If they sink, they stay, if they float, they go on the muck heap.

We really must remember to pencil the date of laying on them when we collect them every day.

We decided to go to the Pea Green Boat Café in Sidmouth because it’s by the sea and it was a beautiful evening. Very English, very Westcountry, one to remember for Maria when she was home in Murcia.

It’s a tiny little place, but very popular, squeezed in between the grander hotels and bars on the Sidmouth seafront. On warm days, it is nice to sit outside but on this autumnal evening we had a good table indoors. We started with Italian olives (3.50), which were excellent, and some very good warm and fresh-baked rosemary focaccia bread.

For our main course, Maria ordered a beautiful-looking Pizza San Marco with goat’s cheese, spinach, caramelised onion, basil and tomato (£11). It was an authentically thin pizza, and absolutely enormous, so we all tried some. Very good, apart from the fact that the pizza base was not crispy enough. It’s hard when you don’t have

[

a proper pizza oven, pizza dough needs to be so hot when they are cooking.

My husband John ordered the special, pork belly with mash (£11) and liked it a lot. The meat was cooked so that it was crispy on the outside, tender inside, with rich dark gravy. Luke (12) ordered the house special: Pea Green Boat hamburger, which was huge and cost £11.50. He managed to get through most of it. Luckily he had come straight from a school rugby match and had a good appetite. It was served in a groovy way on a wooden board, with a focaccia roll and all sorts of trimmings. And the burger itself was homemade by the chef.

Mum, William (nine) and I all ordered the fresh fish and chips with mushy peas. Oh my goodness: this must be the best fish and chips for miles around – and there’s a lot of competition along the Devon coast. The fish was the locallylanded fish of the day, gaspingly fresh, in a light and crispy tempura batter, accompanied by great homemade chips and fabulous minty peas.

It was outstandingly delicious and only £11. Why isn’t all fish and chips this good?

For puds, John and I shared a chocolate brown-

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15/10/2014 14:33:33

4 of the best Tiny eateries

1 Sienna, Dorchester

ie (£6 and scrumptious) and the kids had sundaes – one chocolate, one strawberry, £6.50 each – which came in toweringly tall glasses and were amok with piped sauce, ice cream, cream etc. Heart attacks in a glass really, but they loved them. A bit OTT for my liking.

Our service was friendly and forgiving – even when John left to get Luke from school, and Luke turned up to eat in rugby kit, the smile of our waitress did not falter. Nor did she flinch when the chef made a chocolate sundae for Luke instead of a toffee one, meaning they had to make a toffee one as well.

I tried to persuade Luke that one foot-high ice cream extravaganza was as good as another, but our waitress insisted on changing them for him, which was very good of her.

It was a quiet Thursday night in out-of-season Sidmouth but the restaurant was packed. I’m not surprised. What a little gem of a place it is.

The next day it was time to drive Maria to Exeter airport for a flight to Alicante. We are missing her and her cheerful smile. And we’ve all, as a family, had to get used to doing all our own domestic chores again: walking the dog, unloading the dishwasher, doing the laundry and all the rest of the relentless housework of a busy household. Which will do us good, I like to think. As a reward, though, we will go back to the Pea Green Boat again before too long.

Can’t wait.

Just 17 people can fit in this bijou towncentre restaurant, which is the smallest in the UK to have a Michelin star. Run by husband and wife team Elena (front of house) and Russell (chef) Brown, the food is, as you’d expect, out of this world.

Dish of the day: Main of wild sea bass with prawn and blood-orange salad Prices: Two-course dinner £38.50 Contact: 01305 250022 www. siennarestaurant.co.uk

2 No 4 Peterville, St Agnes

Bijou bistro in a former Cornish cottage, serving good local ingredients cooked simply but well. A new eatery that’s gaining a reputation in this north Cornwall village.

Dish of the day: Starter of scallops with crispy belly pork and calvados Prices: Mains around £16 Contact: 01872 554245, www. no4peterville.co.uk

3 The Conservatory, Exeter

A little restaurant on Exeter’s North Street that’s serious about the food it serves (pictured above). The menu features local ingredients in French, Italian and British dishes.

Dish of the day: Cornish day-boat cod, oven-roasted with lemon beurre blanc Prices: Mains around £17 Contact: 01392 273858, www. theconservatoryrestaurant.co.uk

4 The Wheel House, Falmouth

How they scored...

Food



Atmosphere



Service



Price

Dinner for five was £121.10

There are just a few tables in this retro-style restaurant, run by a husband-and-wife team. Shellfish is the speciality here: the entire menu is simply mussels, scallops, crab and prawns served with chive butter, chips and salad.

Dish of the day: A big dish of mussels and a glass of wine Prices: Mains around £15 Contact: 01326 318050

The Pea Green Boat Café, Sidmouth sea front, 01395 514152 www.thepeagreenboat.com 41

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15/10/2014 13:16:21

Ingredient of the Week

Salt

with Tim Maddams e all know one thing about salt, it’s being from France was excitement enough. But bad for us. It will make us die young the fact it was grey and moist was the icing on leaving mourning families across the cake. the land. “Why did he have to eat These days we have salt in so many different so much salt?” they will wail. “He forms it can be confusing. We have pink salt from knew it was going to do for him, poor boy”..... the Himalayas, sea salt from the Maldon estuWell yes, salt is bad for us. But it’s also good ary, fabulous Cornish sea salt (I may be biased for us. We actually can’t live but I’m allowed to be), smoked our lives without at least some salt, curing salt and even spiced salt. Deprived of it, we would salt to choose from for our daily quickly become delirious and seasoning needs. But which to go lose consciousness. for - and when? Well that’s up to When I was at But let me tell you a little you of course but I’d advise using catering college thing. To my mind, salt is danfine or rock salt for general use in gerous when you don’t know cookery when boiling pans of veg there were three it’s there: like black ice. Procor making stews and sauces. Save types of salt: essed, manufactured foods the fancy flaky stuff for finishing fine, coarse and always have salt in them and dishes where its crunchy texture not just the things that taste can be shown off. Be aware of salt dishwasher salty. The thing is that salt that’s going in in disguise – for makes things taste better. Food example, if you add a lot of bacon manufacturers know this, so (which is pork cured in salt) to watch out and read the packs. a stew, you won’t need to add Or better still, cook something yourself. much, if any, salt to get the desired level of salinWhen I was at catering college (shortly before ity. The bacon will share its salt with the dish. the invention of the wheel) there were three A more important question than what type of types of salt. Fine, coarse and dishwasher. Once I salt to use is how much salt to use. The fact is emerged, vaguely able not to cut myself and turn that the line between well-seasoned and salty is up for work on time, I was introduced to another one of personal preference and that is why I am type of salt, grey salt from France. Back then just a strong advocate of salt and pepper being on the

W

[ [

table. Some arsy-pants chefs might think it’s an insult to their cooking. But I know what I like better than they do. @TimGreenSauce

Worth your salt

To understand the effect of salt as a seasoning (rather than a preservative) get to know it a little, and study its effect. Try eating a piece of bread dipped in olive oil, then do the same but add a little salt. Try that with different salts and different amounts and see the effects that it has on the taste and texture. This will help you to become more salt savvy and be a better cook for it.

A few tips on the use of salt in cooking:

• Always use a little salt in the water when boiling and steaming green veg.

• Never put salt in the water when cooking dried pulses, season at the end to avoid toughening them.

• Try a little salt with sweet things, it will enhance the flavours.

Tim Maddams is a Devon chef and writer who often appears on the River Cottage TV series 42

Tim_Beer_Oct19.indd 42

15/10/2014 11:49:29

Drink

Darren Norbury

talks beer ren’t life’s small pleasures some of the best? The smell of a newly opened jar of coffee, the hazy sunset over St Ives on a crisp autumnal evening, watching a preoccupied traffic warden ambling toward an open manhole cover.

For a beer geek, though, there’s little to trump getting your hand into a bag of fresh hops, rubbing the cones between your fingers and savouring the fruity, earthy, pungent notes that drift upwards.

Hops, it is often said, are to beer what grapes are to wine. To a degree this is true, in that different varieties have different characteristics.

The cones of the hop plant (which is in the same family, Cannabaceae, as cannabis, incidentally) have wide ranging levels of alpha acid content.

The higher the percentage of alpha, as it is colloquially known, the more pungent and bitter the flavour that will come from the hop.

In Britain, our traditional varieties like Fuggles and Goldings have not been high in alpha hops, and give the gentle bitterness we know in our typical brown beers. In recent years, though, high-alpha foreigners have infiltrated our borders. Now, American and New Zealand varieties are in big demand from craft brewers eager to add vivid fruit character, in both taste and aroma – often citrus or tropical fruit notes, and spiciness or pepperiness – to their new wave beers.

Some UK growers are now experimenting with new varieties like English Cascade. Cascade comes from America and is higher in alphas to give that US beer bite, although still only middling on the grand scale of things when compared to mouth puckering varieties like Citra.

English Cascade meets the traditional British hop variety and the more bitter US style half-way.

Another newbie is the Endeavour hop, grown in Herefordshire and gaining in popularity, offering blackcurrant, dark berry and spicy notes, as is Jester, which gives tangy grapefruit notes.

We have just come to the end of ‘green hop’ season. Generally hops are harvested and dried to build their intensity, and stored for later use.

Green hop beers use the hops wet and fresh, some brewers harvesting the cones in the morning and brewing with them in the afternoon to make a short-lived but fresh-tasting autumnal

A

brew. For a good local example, try Hoppy Days (4.2% ABV) from Torbay’s Bays Brewery, which might just still be around when you read this.

Hop growing in this country declined from 50,000 hectares in the 1950s to just about 1,000 hectares at the start of this decade. As a nation, we have learned to love hops in our beers. Now we need to love them as a crop, too.

Darren Norbury is editor of beertoday. co.uk @beertoday

Beer of the week

Good for us?

Xanthohumol, a compound found exclusively in hops, may be good for our brains, new research shows, helping spatial memory and flexibility. The thing is, next week there’ll be a story saying alcohol is bad again. The answer, as ever, is everything in moderation. (And my wife would definitely disagree about the memory thing.)

Born from the former Organic Brewhouse on The Lizard, Cornish Chough Brewery beers are well worth seeking out. My favourite, and perfect for the chillier days now, is Fire Raven porter (4.7% ABV), a warming roast malt brew with lovely coffee bitterness and a smooth body.

Falmouth calling Falmouth Beer Festival returns on Thursday (October 23) until Saturday at the Princess Pavilion. More than 200 real ales plus 60 or so ciders await the thirsty visitor, with the brews available in third as well as pint and half-pint measures. Follow #falbeerfest on Twitter.

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15/10/2014 11:50:44

Living

[

[

PARENTING

The key to learning A new book by former children’s laureate is full of inspiration to help children - and parents - to learn, finds Lisa Salmon

hen a child asks a factual question, the automatic response from any parent is to answer it - if they can.

But often, argues the former children’s laureate Michael Rosen, instead of simply being told the answer, a child can learn a lot more by finding out the answer themself.

So if a child asks, “Why is the sky blue?” his mum or dad - even if they know the answer might do well to say: “I don’t know. I wonder how we can find out?”

Bestselling children’s author Rosen explains that much of children’s learning should be about the world around them. Parents can make learning about that world much more exciting and learn a lot themselves in the process - if they point children in the right direction to discover

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[

more about it.

To help show mums and dads what he means, Rosen has written a book - for adults, rather than children - called Good Ideas: How To Be Your Child’s (and Your Own) Best Teacher.

In order to be such a teacher, Rosen stresses that the message parents need to give to children is: “Be curious. There’s nothing out there, whether it’s knowledge, culture, high-brow or low-brow things, that you’re not entitled to.

“The way to knowledge is through parents listening to children’s questions, so they build on their interests and confidence.”

Rosen says that when he was young, like many children, he used various memory techniques to learn things off by heart.

The book is crammed full of good, practical ideas and games

[

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gadget notebook 19 October 2014

tech tips: Cool kit

Our pick of the latest gadgets for kids (and adults)

Electric paintpen This Electric Paint Pen is ideal for enquiring minds of for all ages to discover, play and design with electronics. Non-toxic, solvent-free and water-soluble, it can used as both a liquid wire and a conductive glue on paper, plastic and textiles. £8, www.sciencemuseumshop.co.uk

Cinemagic But he points out: “It didn’t teach me how to find things that I really wanted to learn about.

“It didn’t take me down interesting side-alleys where I would find things that I didn’t know I would be interested in until I found them.”

He says such “invisible learning” helps children massively at school, as such a breadth of general knowledge is always useful.

As its name suggests, his book is crammed with good, practical ideas, plus games and activities, for parents to capitalise on life’s learning opportunities in a way that’s fun for both them and their children.

It’s asking, explains Rosen: “Where is the stuff we might want to know?” And the answer is everywhere. Take the kitchen, for example. Most people understandably think of the kitchen as just being a place to prepare food. But Rosen, a seasoned father-of-five, points out: “Your kitchen, whatever it’s like, is the best classroom ever invented.”

He explains that kitchens are laboratories, as cooking uses physics (heat, light, microwaves, refrigeration), chemistry (mixing), biology (ingredients), and maths (weighing, measuring, timing, buying, calculating,estimating).

And on top of the science, there’s culture and tradition, and the opportunity to share stories about family - as Rosen often does in his book.

Not forgetting, of course, the actual cooking, where literacy is needed to read recipes, as well as some improvisation within the chemistry of creating dishes.

There is a multitude of other questions children or parents can ask and find out about in the rest of the house and garden - the bathroom is another lab, for example, with its toiletries, mirrors, heating and water all a potential source of intriguing fact-finding - plus that “great scientific playground”. Otherwise known as the bath.

Turn a day out or ramble into your own documentary! Pop your handset into the Smartphone Projector and watch your snaps play out on the living room wall. Self-assembly and suitable for use with iOS and Android compatible smartphones - who’s making the popcorn? £15.50 at www.TheGreatGiftCompany.co.uk

Step on board Once they’ve learned to ride a bike, the next step is finding out how to fix a puncture, too! Show them how with the Gentlemen’s Hardware Bicycle Tool & Puncture Kit (£19.99) from www.hintonshome.com

fave!

Pliers

please

Get making and doing together: This handy organizer will help you organise your work space, with room for all pliers great and small.

Wooden tool rack, £18.65 www.etsy.com

Good Ideas by Michael Rosen is published by John Murray Publishing, priced £16.99 45

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15/10/2014 11:45:07

My life

[

MAN AND BOY

Gone fishing

[

Phil Goodwin and James, four, find themselves hooked... hen it comes to father-and-son activities fishing is hard to beat. In fact, it has to be right at the top of the male bonding wish list: the grizzled, old hand, adept with rod and line, handing down skills which have been honed through the generations. How does the old saying go…give a man a fish and feed him for a day…teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime? Angling has the lot. It is outdoorsy and healthy. Manly, even, in a Hemingwayesque nature-and-life-and-death kind of way.

Unfortunately, growing up with a single mother after my dad died when I was a toddler, I was denied the pleasure of afternoons spent at the riverside.

It also means I am a relative novice in the field. Now this deficiency had never been an issue up until recently. But thanks to the Geordie television star and one-time singing soldier Robson Green, I find myself with a problem.

Those not familiar with Channel 5 may not be aware, but Robson, who shot to fame (as the old cliché goes) in the 1990s series Soldier Soldier, then became a pop sensation when he released the single “Unchained Melody”, is actually more than a dab hand with the old rod and tackle.

Of late, his globetrotting TV series Extreme Fishing has become an evening staple in our house. Young James has long been fascinated by all things underwater and managed to discover the rather disturbing programme River Monsters, which looks at some of the most terrifying fresh-water fish. Now he has graduated to adventure fishing and loves nothing better than watching Robson battle with huge marlin, barracuda, dorado and even sharks as he tours the world’s most exotic locations and famous sport fishing spots.

Catch phrases from the show such as ‘fish on’ and the slightly cheesy X-factor-style signing of the title (cross your forearms, imitate a

W

cast then wind the reel as you spell out Extreme Fishing) have now entered our household vernacular.

Naturally, as a devoted and conscientious father, I have tried to extract the maximum educational value from the hour-long episodes, which often eat into our already eroding bedtime deadlines.

I explain why the small fish are put back, why native peoples and poor villagers tend to keep what they catch and have gone into the whole thing of hooks and bait. Naturally, the lad now wants to experience the sport first-hand. So I retrieved my old beach-caster rod from the shed (ten years old, unused for nine) and dusted down my copy of Fishing Skills in preparation for a fishing trip.

However, it now appears reinforcements may be required.

“We need to get Robson Green to come with us,” James declared from the sofa, as the affable North Easterner grappled with a great silvery denizen of the deep on the deck of a fast boat somewhere off the coast of Cuba.

“Erm…I don’t think that’s going to possible,” I told him.

“But he’s an expert,” he went on, matter of fact, still looking straight ahead.

“Yes, I know that. But I don’t know him. I can’t exactly call him.”

“We need to get Robson Green to come with us because he is an expert,” he repeated in a raised voice, now looking at me, eyes burning.

Of course, as a member of Her Majesty’s Media, I do – in theory – enjoy some access to the world of fame and celebrity. But Robson Green?

Does he have a connection to the Westcountry? I can hardly call his agent and ask him to take me and my son fishing. If you’re reading this Robson (you never know) and you’re down this way anytime soon do get in touch. We need expert help.

I retrieved my rod (ten years old, unused for nine) from the shed. A fishing trip beckons

46

ManandBoy_OCT19.indd 46

15/10/2014 13:17:24

Christmas and New Year at

Our superb Christmas Party Nights…

Bodmin Jail

12th and 19th December 2014 Small or larger parties are welcome to join together for one big festive banquet and entertaining night to include full menu and a DJ!

Christmas Menu Day or Evening - La Scala Function Suite or Restaurant (Pre-order required)

£22.95 per guest

Entrees Thick Vegetable Broth Served with Fresh Bread Boneless Tandoori Chicken Thighs Served with a cool mint yogurt Tomato and Pepper Crumble Salmon Mousse Served with Melba toast

New Years Eve Party Medieval Menu

Music by ’Mass-Affect’ with an amazing ‘Laser Light Show’ to take you through to 1am - Prizes for the best fancy-dress!

Full tickets at £35pp - Door tickets only (with no food or table reservation) £10

Main Courses Traditional Roast Turkey American Pot Roast Beef Above two main courses are served with Pigs in blankets Stuffing and Yorkshire Pudding Tuna Steak Served with a Lemon Butter

Starters Hunter’s pot vegetable soup Fresh bread Game Keeper’s warm meat pie Served with gravy Poacher’s Potted Shrimps In Mace butter Served with toast

Homemade nut roast

Main Course

All above main courses served with our famous roast potatoes and three seasonal vegetables

Shepherd’s Lamb Shank Braised in Mead sauce

Home made Dessert Courses

Peasant Spit Roast Pork Served with Cider sauce

Christmas Pudding and Brandy Sauce

Salmon poached in Monk’s Ale Served with Tarragon butter

Santa’s Steamed Chocolate Pudding Served with White Chocolate Custard Fresh Fruit Salad Homemade vanilla ice cream Tea & coffee offered

Main course followed by mince pies £12.95 Two courses followed by mince pies £17.95 Three courses followed by mince pies £19.95 One & two course menus lunchtime only (12 – 4 pm) Full menu available all day (12 – 9 pm) Please remember to book and pre-order your meals Non-refundable deposit required: £5 for Main course & £10 for 2/3 course per person Gratuities not included. Special Dietary requirements catered for

Tel: 01208 76292 www.bodminjail.org

ManandBoy_OCT19.indd 47

Preacher’s Lentil and vegetable Bake Served with Tarragon butter All main courses served with root vegetable pie and jacket potato

Desserts Fair Maiden’s Creamy Custard Tart and fresh cream Village Idiot’s Fruity Steam Pudding and custard The Bishop’s Cheddar Cheese and Apple Tea & coffee offered

Berrycoombe Road . Bodmin . PL31 2NR

15/10/2014 11:25:51

ENS P O AY 7 D EEK AW

For everyone who lives and loves the country life Stocking everything for horse and rider, country clothing and footwear, pet food, treats and bedding, farm supplies and garden essentials.

TRURO Store GRAND opening with Farmer and TV Presenter

Adam Henson Thursday 30th October from 11.30am

Threemilestone Industrial Estate, Truro TR4 9LD | 01872 246123 | www.patchandacre.co.uk

CF 11276 Patch&Acre 1Truro launch ad 280x230+bleed.indd 1 BackCover_Oct19.indd

30/09/2014 11:08 15/10/2014 09:42:11