Category: Christmas
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How to make the best charcuterie board
It was during my first visit to see Gaylord in France that I realised how seriously the French take charcuterie. While it took me another year to eat snails, then a whole year after that I finally encountered frogs legs, charcuterie has been a weekly snack since my plane touched down in 2020. As you […]
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French cooking: Tartiflette
I’ve eaten an eye-watering amount of processed meat recently. They say a diet of processed meat is bad for you, but when push comes to shove, I bet whoever ‘they’ are would submit to that meat coma with the rest of us. I emerged from this pork-induced fog after eating four-days’ worth of rillettes, saucisson, […]
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Winter spice marinated goat’s cheese
Much like this year in general, this Christmas has been an excuse for my family to bake. My dad provided the Christmas pud in all its nutty, fruity glory, warm from his slow cooker. My sister made the post-Christmas trifle with layers of homemade sherry-soaked sponge, fruit, cream and chocolate shards, and my mum spontaneously […]
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Bacon and marmalade sandwich
Christmas Eve is the sparkly magical wait before the big event. And it’s the perfect excuse for a bacon and marmalade sandwich. Mince pies are being defrosted and dredged in snowy icing sugar, we bundle up in coats and gloves and hats and march around the local countryside for a walk, and the radio serenades […]
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A meaty dessert: mincemeat and apple jalousie
And so, it’s the countdown to a Covid Christmas! Does that sound cynical? Nowadays, Christmas requires returning home two weeks early for the obligatory quarantine. Never mind that France and the UK were both in respective lockdowns. Yes, I’m cynical and so what?! Upon touching down in London, it was like Christmas exploded. Christmas appears […]
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Nectarine and blackberry croissant cake
If a positive start to the year is an increase in productivity then mine is going badly. So far I have eaten three chocolate chip cookies straight off the baking tray and dozed in my bed, bundled under the covers like a hibernating bear, even though the sky is a perfect shade of periwinkle blue. […]
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Countdown to Christmas
And with that, it’s Christmas Eve! I don’t know about you but boy, that came around quickly. I had to double check the date the other day – it was the 21st and, terrifyingly, I wasn’t feeling festive. Sure, Christmas shopping had been accomplished but since when has that been a jolly experience? A crowded […]
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Eat the Seasons: Winter
Interestingly, the most unnoticeable seasonal change is the one leading into the harshest, bleakest of seasons. Not quite the welcome to this post as I’d initially planned. Try not to imagine Siberia outside as you read on. Maybe it seems gradual as we’re already bundled up to the eyebrows in scarfs and coats and blankets, […]
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The perfect Christmas hamper and Buck’s Fizz Marmalade
Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without the obligatory food gift. Whether it’s a caddy of fancy tea or some homemade relish, we hope to extend the period of gastronomical indulgence beyond the last week of December. Long-life preserves, granola or spiced fudge can be stored in the stuffed ‘junk food cupboard’ (which, of course, everyone has) […]
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Quichemas – Sausage, apple and blue cheese quiche
The café at which I work has a specials board. Like most specials boards it is big, black and made of slate, and to many strictly set menu-adhering customers, a cumbersome distraction to the ambience of the room. Before I worked with food I was an indoctrinated menu-follower. It is handed to you politely by […]