Asparagus

Two years after walking away from the Quarryman’s things couldn’t be looking rosier for us, we’ve had a stream of really positive trip advisor reviews (no we don’t please all the people all the time, but we try) a great write up in Devon Life magazine, Paul was absolutely bowled over with it and a great review on, standard issue magazine,  “a smart and witty online magazine for women by women” but with an appeal to men, they do like to know what we’re up to and talking about.

The first bank holiday of the year saw glorious weather and a major influx of visitors to the area, hampers were raffled, eggs for the children, extra football games played, a few pink bodies and great to meet some real characters, all in all Easter was amazing and things haven’t let up since.

Since my last ramblings we have been lucky enough to take on a new chef to enable me to go “ front of house “ a bit more, to help train and encourage the young staff we now have. So a massive welcome to Tom, we do hope you enjoy your time with us, and by the looks of things he has a little fan club that have all come to see how he’s doing, new converts for The Swan maybe?

I must say that I have had a week of feeling extremely miffed, some of the afore mentioned reviews and comments from customers whilst being front of house have driven me crazy. (feeling slightly invisible) Occasionally I forget that the catering industry is a male dominated world (some years ago applying for a chefs job, I was offered a waitress position, because there were only men in the kitchen!!! What did they think I was going to do to them?)  But the recent fawning over Paul (yes he is pretty amazing, but don’t tell him I said so) and everything that he does that is so amazing, they forget that its most definitely a team effort, no one person could possibly do all the prep work and cooking in the kitchen, as well as all the other things related to running a business, bills to pay, cleaning, potting the plants, decorating, rotas, ordering, the list is endless, Jamie and Gordon aren’t cooking in all of their 100s of restaurants every night.   Rant over.

Next week sees us hosting our first ever ‘Devon Chefs Club” dinner, the menu has been changed more than a few times and Paul and I are very excited about it, through the power of Twitter and Facebook the numbers are growing and there is much interest, I’ll report back next month. Along side this Paul has been asked to cook with Michael Caines and Mark Dodson from The Masons Arms for a Trencherman’s Dinner at Kentisbury Grange next month, exciting times indeed.

We have now entered an exciting time for food, lovely English fruit is appearing, great veg is more readily available and as the waters calm fish is becoming much more available and more reasonably priced.

An old classic is asparagus (which is so new season and trendy) with hollandaise sauce, fish also take this sauce very well and with the addition of tarragon creates a béarnaise sauce for a great covering for a juicy rump or ribeye.

Donnas’ Quick and Easy Hollandaise Sauce(the cheats way)

2 Egg yolks

8oz Butter

1 tsp mustard

1 tsp vinegar

Salt and pepper

1   .  Place egg yolks, mustard, vinegar and seasoning in to a bar blender or food processor

2   .  Melt butter in microwave or in a pan, just melted, be careful not to burn

3   .  Set mixer on highest setting and gently and slowly add the butter

4   .  You should end up with a beautiful creamy sauce

Should the sauce split or be to thick, take half out of the blender, add a couple of spoonfuls of boiling water whilst mixing on full setting, then add the rest of the mix.

This recipe has served me well over the years and is a long way away from the time consuming and arm breaking way we learned at college, add what you like to this or grill on top of a dish, enjoy

Proud Moments

Just a quick bee update from last months column, I’ve been reliably informed from Humphrey himself that the bees I saw actually have a colony in the church and swarm every year, so I apologize to Humphreys well behaved bees and have learnt something new in the process.

I’ve been reminded these last few weeks of things you miss when you’re children grow up, ‘the teenage years” and actually it’s a bit sad. The end of term, sees a flurry of activities, school reports, fetes and fairs, discos and sports days, do you remember beaming with pride as your little ones ”take there marks” for the first time? There are always some major disasters; the egg falls off the spoon, falling over or the sacks to big, in the sack race and that’s just the parents, who always seem to be so much more competitive than the children! I’ve been lucky enough to witness two of Bampton Schools leaver’s assemblies which are notoriously emotional, the children are given a brilliant send off to there new schools with a mixture of heartiest praise and lists of achievements, both good and bad in there years at primary school. The well-planned event by the amazing staff and teachers is full of giggles and roars of laughter, well that way some dads and us mums can disguise the tears as tears from laughing too much. The children are always made to feel good about themselves and some how seem to stand taller when they leave to a huge round of applause. Of course you end up with the obligatory shirts scrawled with well wishes that you must promise to never wash. So even though these are hectic times and you’re not sure how you’ll ever manage to fit it all in, enjoy.

Its strange the things you do as a parent, but what we all want is the best for our children, as a group of parents demonstrated this week as they took matters into there own hands and spruced up the children’s play park, maybe a bit of an understatement as 10 bin bags later they were still going strong, but what an amazing transformation, you should all be very proud that your little one can now play safe. So LITTER BUGS BEWARE!

Another group of people that should also feel proud are the residents of Bampton themselves and the team from Bampton In Bloom, as judging commenced this week there seemed to be a flurry of activity in the pruning and watering department, not that a few last minute tweaks can detract from all the hard work that has been going on for months. Which I’m sure the judges could see for themselves. We often hear or have comments made to us in the pub about how beautiful and cared for Bampton looks, with the wonderful array of baskets, pots, planters and troughs through out the village. Our baskets and pots are at their prime at the moment and our small outside terrace is looking stunning, it really does add a touch of cheer and a wonderful splash of color. Honestly whether you win anything or not all your hard work has definitely been noticed so you can all pat yourselves on the back.

These last two weeks we’ve been playing with our Chocolate Brownie recipe, week one saw the addition of Oreos and this week had Jaffa Cake and orange, strange my kids hung around for the tasting of these mmmmm

CHOCOLATE BROWNIES

400g plain chocolate

300g unsalted butter

250g caster sugar

4 eggs

100g plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

Method

1.   Set oven to 180o/ gas mark 4. Lightly butter a 20cm baking tray and line with greaseproof paper

2.   Melt 175g of chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a saucepan (or microwave) Chop the remaining chocolate into chunks and leave to one side

3.   Once melted and the butter and stir till blended

4.   Remove from heat and stir in the sugar. Add the beaten eggs and mix well

5.   Mix the sieved flour and baking powder until all combined

6.   Stir in the reserved chocolate chunks

7.   Pour mixture into the prepared tray and bake for 25-30 minutes until firm

8.   Leave to cool a little, then turn out on to a cooling rack

9.   Cut into squares and serve, approx 12 portions

We replaced the chunks of chocolate with the oreos/jaffa cakes, but instead of mixing in we placed them on the top. I recon you could try almost any of your favorite sweets, suggestions have been, smarties, peanut m&ms and rolo, what will you try?

The Great Sausage Roll Off

This week Donna and myself trotted off to london for "The Great Sausage Roll Off" that was being hosted at the @RedLionBarnes(twittername)  The Red Lion Barnes  

We had devised a sausage roll of Pork and leek sausage meat from Heal Farm, Pork cheeks from our local Butcher in the town, Devon Blue and apple.
along with a well practised pasty from Donna, she had opted for flakey pastry, it was just crisp enough.

So some 20 odd chefs mostly from around london gathered and believe me they can all cook.
Angus the Landlord had organised Some Tough Judges Kate Spicer (a journalist and producer of documentary's , Charles Campion a food writer for a many a Newspaper and a judge on Master-chef , and Johnnie Mountain chef/proprietor Of The English Pig and author of the cook book "Pig"

All hosted by the Melissa Cole's author of "Let me tell you about beer"

                                                             The Judges Table 

There were many a sausage cooked all in heats and we were in the final heat, we had to roll out the pastry and apply the filling and had 25 mins to cook in the oven. Personally we could of done with another 5 mins cooking, the key was the crispness of pastry in practice it had been so crisp, no soggy bottom.    

Straight out the oven onto a board and off the to the judges, 

It was out of our hands now, 

Sadly it wasn't good enough to make the top Three , but I think we can hold our heads high, we had come from Devon and everything had come from Devon.

To be fair we were getting some high praise from the other chefs in the kitchen who thought it was a serous contender.

Congratulation to The Winners and a big Thank You to Angus. 

But I cant help wonder if they had tried the really spicy one to last!.   

Until the next time ,we shall be Back