The four days of Christmas gluttony

As a lover of food I look forward to the Christmas period for months, ancticipating all the delicious food I get to eat at all the separate celebrations with different family and friends. Speak to me around 29 December and it's a very different picture, when all I want is some raw spinach and some steamed rice. Just please don't show me another roast potato.


As I write this, I am sat on the train from Edinburgh to London and I am enjoying the experience of not eating. I have set myself the challenge of not eating for the entire journey. This is how people end up on the 'detox' in January – a binge/abstain pattern that a moderate like me just can't sign up to and claims for health benefits have been roundly discredited. Nevertheless, I shall draw the feasting season to a close with a round-up of my best festive meals.


Christmas day
Celebrated at my mum's, and documented well last year, this is, on paper, the most traditional of the dinners. But my mum is an intuitive and imaginative cook and Christmas dinner has become an increasingly ambitious affair. Last year we were proud to have 12 dishes on the table – this year, 14. And with a few new twists and innovations. Brussel sprouts this year were fried up with chorizo and chestnuts, last year's pear and parsnip croquettes recipe was refined – drier cooking helped preserve their structure, as did mixing in pureed walnut and garlic, a little bit of ginger was mixed into the carrot and orange, which was a bit more salad-y.


This year we started with quite un-Christmassy dishes – sauteed frogs legs, just butter, garlic and a bit of parsley. And then some 'sunshine soup' – all peppers, butternut squash, paprika, tomato.



Our bronze feathered organic free range turkey was delicious and juicy, and our small plates approach looks particularly awesome on my brother's OCD plate.







The twists continued into pudding – not one for convention, my mum made her own spin on a trifle, with a base of amaretto soaked apricots, topped with amaretto soaked amaretti biscuits (v sweet!), custard and grated chocolate. The classic chestnut whip (sweetened chestnut puree, whipped up with cream) was also served.





Boxing day
To my dad's, where his partner was doing most of the cooking. She prepared a starter of Stornoway black pudding, which was so soft, smooth and nicely spiced. Stornoway has a reputation for the best black pudding – I can confirm that it lives up to the hype.





The main course was beef wellington – a classic, and more and more popular. As a pastry, pate and beef lover, I couldn't hope for more. Marilyn cooked it nicely, the meat was perfectly pink in the middle, and the combination of flavours and textures was great.



In the evening my dad took us out for Thai food at a restaurant near his work. It was a little quiet a first and we got a royal treatment. The food was excellent and great value – I particularly enjoyed my duck in a spicy, tangy tamarind sauce.


The 27th
It's tradition among friends is to celebrate Christmas together on 27th December. This has always taken place at Afsi's family home, where they've always had a huge amount of leftovers (usually from three separate roasts) needing gobbled up by helpful and hungry young'uns. Major changes this year as Afsi now has her own flat. Taking a star-turn as hostess, Afsi had friends and family all round for a slap up meal, sitting around in her immacutely retro furnished flat, weighing up our homemade crackers, supping on G&Ts.


After a starter or chilli fried haloumi and tofu, we enjoyed a turkey wellington and a massive roast ham. Both were delicious, but special commendation goes to the turkey wellington, which was perfectly presented and no end of effort had gone into making it as delicious as it was. The pate was a home-made with porcini mushrooms and marsala wine, and the cranberry stuffing sinside the turkey was also home-made and delicious.





To top it all off, Afsi had made three puddings – a fruit bomb (very retro, one of my granny's classics), a chocolate torte and a Christmas cake. Impressive stuff.





The 28th
And on the fourth day of continuous eating we headed down to the Borders to my grandparents' house for a wider family meal. As a child, Christmas was always at their house – the only house big enough to host four generations of family, different in-laws, partners, and other family and friends. At its largest, there must have been upwards of 20 people in and out their doors on the day, with two meals to accommodate everyone. As some get older (I still have a living great grandmother!), other units break up, others expand and new families form, they've found themselves visiting other dinners and doing less of the hosting.


I love the trusty familiarity of my grandparents' cooking – it's simple and accomplished, with recipes and techniques fine-tuned over the years, and a few new influences and ingredients making their way into the mix. This year they cooked an Aberdeen Angus beef, with all the trimmings. It was a nice beef, well-cooked, simply seasoned and served with yorkshire puddings, potatoes, parsnip and carrots.





Pudding is my granny's particular forte, I think, and her lemon meringue roulade was just spot on. Perfectly light, flawless rolled. Everyone agred it was the best pudding they'd had over the Christmas period. A testament to years of making and refining delicious puddings.




So that was Christmas 2011, then. Time to eat a bit more healthily now.

Going Greek

I'd love to chart every cuisine served within 2 miles of my flat. It'd be a fun exercise - and may help focus my efforts on local eating out. A project for a rainy winter's day perhaps?

What I find most interesting is thinking how the age and cuisine of restaurants can reflect waves and patterns of immigration, as well as different food fads. Blackstock Road, not too far away, and on my old route to work, is a scruffy, ungentrifiable strip, and host to many different communities at different points over the last fifty years. There's a little patch, half way between Finsbury Park and Highbury Barn, where there is a collection of rustic, but bright Sardinian trattorias, a pre-Wahaca-and-burrito-fetish-era Mexican restaurant, and a drab and austere-looking Greek taverna. I like that the patch is completely understated, without any of the hype and crowding of Upper Street or Church Street. It's a locals' spot.

With the nights long, the wind blowing cold and warm sun a distant memory, Greek food couldn't be more appealing. Greek restaurants are too often shrouded in the clichés of plate-smashing, belly dancing and ouzo shots; sometimes you just want to have some mezze and souvlaki without all that fuss. I'd never cycled past N5's Olive Tree and seen hen or stag parties, and a bit of googling found a few glowing reviews from proud locals.

Inside, there's a sense that it's been there since the 1970s (it's not - more like late 90s) - slightly austere green, plain walls, starched table cloths, a bit of cladding by the kitchen. It's a family affair, and at least three generations seem to be involved in front of house, kitchen and management. All very nice and keen to please you. We had superb banter with the waitress who I guess was about our age and told us that we reminded her of someone very clever from a TV show we hadn't heard of, and how excited she was to get off her shift and out some make-up on.

The menu offered a fair priced a la carte with a wide range of Greek meals and grills. But there's a set menu which seems to be available most of the time (including Friday and Saturday nights) which does 3 very decent courses for £10.90. It's mostly the classics - very well made dips and gorgeous pita breads, mains of moussaka, haloumi, baked aubergines and some more basic grilled meats, and a small selection of desserts (greek yoghurt and honey, honey cake with ice cream).

We opted for the set menu, doing a bit of topping up from the a la carte. And got a bottle of pretty nice white wine too. The dips and starters were really good - top houmous and reminded me of the differences between the Greek and more Middle Eastern versions.



I ended up opting for moussaka - an old favourite and something I'm rarely motivated to cook (too many stages, too many pots) and was very pleased, nothing to fault with it's creamy cheesy top, the olive oil soaked potatoes and aubergines or the aromatic lamb mince. Portions were very generous, and we over-ordered by getting a large Greek salad to go with the mains. A doggy bag for lunch the next day.





Overall, the Olive Tree was great for a hearty taste of Greece, decent, good-value portions and warm and homely service. Sure, it's not going to win any Michelin stars for innovative cooking, but what an excellent neighbourhood spot for a no-fuss, honest Greek meal.

Balls balls balls

In terms of the food blogosphere I'm usually pretty late to get 'on trend'; same applies in most walks of life really. Though in comparison to the rest of the population, including my super clued in workmates, I can still be ahead of the game when I need to be. The latest example is with trend foodstuff meatballs. Apparently they are the dish of 2011, obviously I didn't find out til October, but when I heard tale of Luca's Meatballs hitting Dalston, I was bounding around the office and taking orders for a Thursday cycle order up to Ridley Road.

Ridley Road market seems ungentrifiable. A fantastic thing, in a part of Hackney where new concept stores are popping up almost weekly. It's a full on, stinky, bustling hub of West African diaspora - all dried fish, chilli peppers, broiler hens and music. You can get the cheapest super fresh veg you can imagine - three butternut squash for a pound anyone? Anyway, that a much-hyped meatball shack was opening up had people talking: was this the start of the Broadway Marketisation of Ridley Road? Surely not!

I roll up at Luca's expecting to see a queue of hipsters, DSLRs at the ready. Actually nobody was there, just Luca getting things ready. I started reeling off my order and asked if I worked nearby. I explained that I'd cycled up from Old Street (only two miles) and was very excited. I was rewarded with a tiramisu on the house. Nice one! Luca was incredibly charming and excited about his business, and later tweeted a photo of me with my haul.

The menu is simple - there are (beef) meatballs and spinach and ricotta balls. You can have them on a ciabatta (with tomato sauce, provolone cheese, lambs lettuce) or atop tasty polenta with a range of sauces: roast tomato, spicy tomato, mushroom/cream, gorgonzola. The base price is £3.50, but for an extra 50p you can have an extra ball or a small portion of veg - when I went it was braised baby beetroot.



As we tucked in back at the office, it was thumbs up all around. I'd opted for the ciabatta and it was just wow. The meatballs were splendid, perfectly formed, simply and subtly spiced with just a hint of fennel. The tomato sauce, again, simple and pure, combined perfectly with the smoky provolone. I was just about in heaven. My colleagues had the polenta boxes: one, a veggie, had 4 of the spinach and ricotta balls, the other went half and half. Both were blown away with theirs, particularly appreciating how well done the polenta was. I had a sample of the veggie balls and was surprised at their pungency. Will definitely be going half/half next time.





Luca's offer is expanding - it's positioned outside the newly licensed Wu's Market Bar, which is all tropical and bright inside. Luca will be serving up meatballs late into the night as well as anti-pasti platters and more. I'll be back.

Brunchin' brunchin' #3

Brunch options just get more and more plentiful. I'm now well and truly spoiled for choice in my neck of the woods, as the joy of breakfast food spreads deeper and deeper. In recent weeks, still in my post Masters joy, it's been a steady stream of brunch dates.

So what's new?

Well, Barden's Cafe is fairly new. It's on the main drag in Dalston, formerly a grotty but charming basement venue, now forced overground by the clubbier club The Nest (always looks a bit dancey for an indie boy like me). A big old space, all high ceilings and sleek lines. But rolling up at an unfashionably early 10.30am we were able to get one of the best spots, a whole sofa area all for two. Sorry.

My brunch default is eggs benedict, because I'm rubbish at poaching eggs neatly and can't be arsed making hollandaise. But I was sorely tempted by the idea of french toast, bacon and maple syrup. Happily, Barden's had just the dish - french toast, bacon, poached eggs, maple syrup and cream. It sounded fishy - poached eggs with cream and maple syrup? Bacon and maple syrup and cream? HMM. I pondered for a good 10 minutes and then plumped for it. It arrived, a little pot of cream and a little pot of maple syrup sat separately. I didn't hold back in pouring it all over, and tucked in.



Wow. It actually really worked, just a great combination of flavours. Bits of saltiness here, sweet there. Oi oi. And only £6 too, so you can't complain.

From one side of Hackney to the other: my next brunch was at Bistroteque, from scruffy hipster to coiffured fashion set. Bistroteque is in a warehouse-y space in the badlands south of London Fields and north of Behtnal Green, just off Cambridge Heath Road amid strips of strip clubs. It's an ugly area, but achingly hip. In contrast with its bleak surroundings, Bistroteque is an amazing, stylish space, all white, high ceilings big windows and smart, trendy, efficient staff. A pianist does tinkly cabaret style piano covers of cheesy 80s and 90s pop - our finely tuned ears pick out Steps, Tiffany and S Club 7. Nice.





The brunch menu was fairly trim, but with some tasty sounding options: potato rosti with smoked trout and poached egg was tempting, but I ended up going for eggs benedict, just because I love 'em. But I was a bit disappointed with Bistroteque's offering - for one, one of my yolks was firm. That's not what you expect for £8. And the portions for the trout/rosti dish were very small. The ingredients were unmistakeably good, and the dishes nicely presented, but the disappointment of the yolk and portion size may have left us a little bitter.

From mega chi-chi to down at heel, our most recent brunch was at Acoustic Cafe 'round the corner on Newington Green. It always makes me happy when I walk past, seeing all the nice young couples of Newington Green sitting outside with their broadsheets and big plates of breakfast. It had a bit of an eastern Mediterranean vibe, a sign of its time in the first wave of brunchification, and a few twists on the brunch norms - turkish sausage, feta, olives, etc.



I ordered the Eggs Romano, which was scrambled eggs (my fave way of having eggs) mixed with feta, peppers, basil, onions, in a crisp pancake, served with CHIPS and salad. Petite and on trend it isn't, but it sure does the trick when you're a bit hungover and sleep deprived.

Small plates make me hungry

Continuing the theme of small plates (and I even did a tapas evening for friends on Saturday), I wanted to make note of the delicious meal I had at Opera Tavern, on the day I booked my trip to Spain. The Opera Tavern is the sister restaurant of the more well known Salt Yard, and they both specialise in tapas or small plates from Italy and Spain. Getting a table at a few day's notice was tricky - an online booking system makes it all the easier for everyone else to get in there, so we ended up with a very un-Mediteranean 6.15 start time.

The menu covers a range of cured meats, meat off the grill and fish, vegetable and meat based small plates. We staggered our order, savouring a small amount of flavours, musing and then ordering a couple more. First up was a chorizo and squid skewer topped with a tangy pomegranate seeds, cucumber and green tomato relish. The chorizo was clearly top notch and, chargrilled, went perfectly with the meaty squid. Very good.



This was followed by more squid, however, this time as battered rings with battered purslane too. It was my first purslane and a totally new taste, very salty and somewhere between seaweed and spinach.



After all that protein, we craved vegetables. A super green broad bean, tenderstem broccoli, gnocchi and pesto small plate was incredible. The pesto was particuarly fragrant and sweet, and every last spot was mopped up.



I'm a sucker for courgette flowers (and that's all my courgette plants were good for this summer - not the end of the world, seeing as they cost £3 a flower from Borough market) and particularly enjoyed Opera Tavern's, which left the flower attached to the baby courgette and was stuffed with a light, smooth goats cheese and drizzled in honey. Classic combination.



After a board of impeccable quality sliced chorizo, we climaxed on the Opera Tavern's most famous, and perhaps most unlikely dis - the Iberico pork and foie gras burger. It's a diminutive dish, but packed full of rich flavours, a velvety bite, and a perfectly formed little brioche bun. I ate it as slowly as I could, appreciating every last bite interceded by meat, bun, cheese and caramelised onions. Mmm.



We finished on a little plate of truffles, biscotti and a glass of dessert wine. Classy.

I'd definitely recommend Opera Tavern for the food, and it's possible to have a not-too-pricey meal there, although it's definitely in the 'treats' category. Atmosphere-wise, we were in the dining room on the 1st floor, and it was busy without being buzzy. The clientèle were clearly quite well off, but I didn't notice anyone as excited about the food as I was. Maybe that's what it is to be classy, eh?

Cadiz, if you please

I wanted to see everything in Andalucia. I was tempted by the palaces of Granada and Cordoba, the small villages along the Costa Tropical, the faded glamour of Malaga. I wanted to see the sea and the mountains. But with only a week to play with, I decided on Cadiz as the other side of my first adventure in Andalucia, coaxed by the returns of its Google Image Search, it's sea-locked situation and tales of its slightly end-of-the-road atmosphere. As a destination for a couple of days, it didn't disappoint - and we managed to scale the length of the city quite a few times, chasing the sunset to the Cadiz's southwesterly tip at the Castillo de San Sebastian.



Just too dreamy.

Being sea-locked and all, Cadiz is famed for its fresh fish. Particularly fried. Tapas is also popular, but clearly not to the extent of Seville - there were times where we'd be roaming the streets for block and blocks trying to find open tapas bars, especially later on in the evening, and even in key plazas. It shows you can try too hard to the 'authentic' thing (late night tapas binges, you'd think) and sometimes that just doesn't work. Tapa prices were notably cheaper in Cadiz though and in some places you were given a plate for free with drinks, just like in the movies.


We had a couple of very memorable portions of fried fish. The first on our first lunch after the train ride from Seville. It was at Meson La Cartuja, just off the main square in the old town. A whole platter of fried fish, including white bait, sardines, cuttlefish and cod. For about 10€. Pretty amazing. We ordered a salad to go with it as we were afraid of death by protein - our salad also came topped with tuna. It was incredibly fresh and the batter was very light compared to that in British chippies.



We also tried the most popular freidura (fish and chip shop, basically), which is on Las Flores - a pedestrian street with lots of flower sellers. Lots of happy families strolled past, children armed with tall flowers, on their way home. Inside it was like a Spanish version of the British chippy, slightly weary, down at heel but full of all walks of lives tucking in to yummy fresh fish and other raciones. We had fat and juicy prawns fresh out the Atlantic, and some croquettes for substance. The prawns were delicious, so meaty and sweet.



Our top tapas was at La Marina, overlooking the market square. We had a tripe stew with chorizo and chick peas - my first time eating tripe and boy is that a pungent taste. Almost a bit too much for me, but the chorizo flavours helped to soften the blow. We also had tuna cooked in a sweet onion and oloroso sauce (delicious), kidneys in sherry and 'salad' which was basically potatoes with more tuna. All were delicious, and as you can see from our spread, we were a bit more mezze than tapas, having them all at once. The olive oil based sauces were so moreish, we really had to ration our bread soaking them all up.



We also had tapas at Le Gorda Te Da De Corner, a cheap, bright, studenty tapas restaurant, where all the tapa were 2€ or under. It wasn't all fancy pants, but the pork with an almond and cream sauce was tasty.



Some of our fanciest tapas was at snazzy Sopranis, just around the corner from our hostel. It was incredibly stylish, and the proprietress was pure Almodovar as she strutted around, taking care of her guests in heels and leather trousers. We just had a couple of dishes - duck ham with an orange zest and pine nut chutney, and a sardine and red pepper empanada, which was such a winning combination of flavours - definitely one to try at home.



Our final meal for the holiday was in Jerez, where we flew back from. Jerez is a sherry town - the air is thick with the smell of it - and has a comfortingly stuffy and conservative feel about it. Our guidebook told us that the sherry dynasties bred a local elite who like to ape the customs of the British upper classes, playing polo, wearing deck shoes, chinos and starched shirts.

Our lunchspot was right in keeping, Restaurante Alcazaba, a faded traditional restaurant, all yellow walls, wood panelling and lots of big hair (ladies) and slicked back hair (men). That's not to do it down though - a bit of olde worlde charm in an olde worlde town is just right. And all the Jerez slickers were onto something good - 4 courses and wine for €11! The first was a potato salad tapa to share, I had Revuelto - Spanish scrambled egg with wild mushrooms for a starter. It was all about the mains though - mine was slow-cooked oxtail in a rich gravy and sautéed potatoes. Pete had pork steaks in a roquefort sauce.





So that was it. The last of the sun for 2011, but a great introduction to Andalucia and authentic tapas. I'm all inspired to try out some of the dishes on friends and go back and see more of the region.

El Tapeador!

As a (final) post-dissertation reward, boyf and I took off to Andalucia for 5 days of roaming the streets of Seville, Cadiz and Jerez in search of excellent, authentic tapa, sherry and warm autumnal sunshine. The only time I'd been to Spain was a trip to Barcelona with my mum in 2000 - a lifetime ago. Most of my 'grown up' travelling has been to the Eastern Europe (inter-railing for 6 weeks in 2004), Eastern Med (Bosnia, Croatia x2, Montenegro, Turkey, Greece) and Portugal, land of my forefathers. But some delicious meals at Moro and other tapas bars, reading the Moro cookbooks and hearing friends' tales of amazing times in different parts of Spain got me tantalised.

We went to an amazing array of tapas bars in our 5 short days there, so these are just some of the greatest hits from Seville - Cadiz and Jerez to come.

Salmorejo is the gazpacho of the south - it's thicker and smoother than the traditional gazpacho. It's topped with jamon and egg and lots of olive oil. We had quite a few of these over our stay - we loved the fresh taste of the raw tomatoes and then fruity acidity of the top notch olive oil. This was my favourite one - at bright and cheery Duo Tapas bar just off Alameda de Hercules:



One of the most fun things about kind of understanding Spanish is that you kind of know what you're going to get but the actual form and presentation is a total surprise. Or so it was when I ordered Tostada Bacalao, which I imagined would be toast with salt cod. What arrived was a lot fancier - thin crisps and subtle salt cod, fried together and modelled, with egg, as a patty topped with alfalfa sprouts. It was from Kiosko Los Leones, in the middle of Alameda de Hercules, which was great for people watching with a glass of Cava.



My favourite tapas bar was hands down El Rinconcillo, apparently Seville's oldest tapas bar. We rolled in after getting a bit lost in the winding alleys (it's very easy to lose your sense of direction), and it was still lively with locals at 11pm on a Monday evening. I ordered Espinacas con Garbanzos (spinach and chickpeas) and Bacalao con Tomates, which was salt cod served with a sauce of slow cooked tomatoes and peppers with lots of olive oil.






The bar itself was stunning - you could just feel the history and imagine it not being hugely different 300 years ago...



Another favourite in Seville was Meson del Pulpo, a galician restaurant in the centre of town. We had one of our most luxuriant lunches there - gobbling up a racion of Pimientos de Padrón, salty fried mini green peppers, a tapa of pork steak in an almond and sherry sauce (LUSH!) and a silky Galician octopus served with a confit potato. That one was totes simple, but so fresh and tasty.







And finally for Seville, an old favourite - Gambas Al Ajillo. This one reminds me of childhood holidays in the Algarve - spitting hot olive oil, sweet, sweet garlic sauce and perfectly fresh Atlantic prawns. We ate this one in an atmospheric little plaza in Triana, the old gypsy barrio. A band entertained us with shanties while I sipped a cool Manzanilla. I used bread to soak up every last spot of the garlicky, prawny olive oil.



Afterwards we caught an authentic flamenco performance at Casa de Anselma, one of the best places for low-key, passionate and gritty flamenco - which doesn't even open til midnight. It was the perfect way to an end our enchanting stay in Seville. Next stop: Cadiz!