I went to Burleigh House yesterday with BFF, just for a quick mooch round the food fair. Having been to the last one, wasn’t expecting a lot, but yesterday was better, and was pleased to meet the team from The Big Dip. This is a new business, based in Lincolnshire, that will be launching at the RealFood Harvest Festival shortly.

Having got bored of the usual dips on offer at the local supermarket, the two friends have set about creating 5 delicious dips, to help ring the changes. We had the beautifully coloured Sweet Fire, a blend of beetroot, creme fraiche, mint and honey with just a subtle backdrop of chilli. Enough to let you know it’s there, not so much that it overpowers.

In fact, we came up with a hot and cold mix at dinner, serving the Sweet Fire with my homemade tzatziki, which was a great blend of flavours, and cool and hot tones as well.

I wish them well for their venture, and hope they pick up some good stockists. I don’t think you’d find anyone ungrateful if you turned up with one or two of these as a gift to share.

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I was interested to find myself being followed by Dr Morgaine Gaye on Twitter last week, who has the fabulous title of Food Futurologist. Which is an amazing title, and in my next life that’s what I want to be!

Her website and blog are beautifully designed, and there’s some great stuff on here. I loved the post on big bold numbers on food packaging, which does seem to be a real trend. For now! I love the observation that some of these are about dictating steps to follow, and some are because they might have run out of names!

It would seem most of these are yet to come to market, but I guess if you’re trying to buy for a shallow type of foodie who wants good looks as well as good taste, then these might suit for those who want to capture a trend:

* The chutney and pickles from Jamie Oliver were the ones that came first to mind for me, as their graphic labels have been out for about 18 months. Stylish labelling, and a number of choices including this mango chutney. As you’ll get from the label this is half a pound of chutney for £4.

* Chocolate by Trish not only looks smart, but has done all the hard work, not only sourcing great chocolate, but this one gives you very tasty shards, all ready to be scattered over any dessert. There are also chocolate buttons to go at too, but definitely too good for the kids!

* Tequila seems to have been going more and more upmarket, and Calle 23 fits the bill here. Founded by Sophie Decobecq, whose background is in the cognac industry, but has gone on to produce a fine tasting, and fine looking tequila, for savouring, not knocking back!

Tasty and trendy then! Check out Morgaine’s writing for interesting stuff around food developments and trends. You’ll find me scratching my head somewhere working out how to become a food futurologist. May settle for director of curiosity/nosiness though!

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At first sight, £5 for 2 cupcakes does seem like a lot of money and, in these austere times, it is. Still, turning round in Selfridges to look at Lola’s Cupcakes, then this is not far off the mark, given that Lola’s are £2.95 a go. Putting aside my Northern upbringing, and remembering that I am particularly fond of Harry’s recipe, I travelled home with a box.

Very attractive packaging that is surely going to stand out on any shelf, you won’t be able to miss these if they go into wider distribution in the supermarkets. But, I hear you cry, what about the cakes?

Well, undeniably moist, and you have to feel virtuous when you look at the ingredients and each one is 29% vegetable. In this case, I bought a box of Chocolate and Vanilla, the Vanilla being 29% courgette. I always thought I’d like this one, as the courgette sponge in Red Velvet and Chocolate Heartache is one of my faves. Incredibly moist, but would say it came across more lemony than vanilla. Not that this is a bad thing.

I’ve made the chocolate beetroot brownie quite a few times, and it’s always one that surprises people. Sometimes in a good way. Honestly, I didn’t love the cupcake, it was just too earthy, too beetrooty, and lacking chocolate or sweetness. I think if you’re going to have a cupcake, healthy or not, it needs to taste like cake. Could do with more chocolate and a bit more sugar as well to me.

Still, if you are on a restricted diet for any reason, then these could still make a great treat. No gluten, no wheat, no dairy, and 180 calories a go, so for cake, pretty good! Interesting to see if they expand out the range, will be keeping an eye out. For now, available at all Selfridges stores.

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You can keep this one!

I love chocolate. Mainly good chocolate, with an occasional guilty lapse into a Mint Aero.

Or a Turkish Delight.

But usually I settle for a small amount of something good. But there is nothing, no amount of wrapping it up in good chocolate, that will convince me to try Marmite’s upcoming Very Peculiar Chocolate. I mean it’s milk chocolate, so not my fave. And it’s Marmite. Which I most definitely do not love.

I’m sure there will be heaps of Marmite lovers finding this in their stocking this Christmas time, which they are welcome to. I’m all up for unusual flavours, but there are other chocolates I’d rather experiment with.  And it’s not even original, as Paul A Young combined Marmite and chocolate some time ago. You can still buy the Marmite truffle, and if I wanted to try something unusual I’d try his Port and Stilton truffle.

I like Melt, and quite often survive shopping at Selfridges propped up by one or two of their truffles. Next time, if I’m feeling adventurous, then I’m going to try the Olive Caramel Bonbon. I can’t quite imagine the combination, but got to admit that black olive tapenade meeting slightly salty caramel wrapped in dark chocolate is a flavour combo to play with. I could skip out of Selfridges and head down Marylebone High Street to Rococo. And given that it’s coming up to  Christmas, then I’d see what the Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh bar had to offer.

Demarquette have beautiful looking chocolates as well, as great flavours. Whilst not in the umami realms of Marmite at all, the Tunisian Bharat is unusual sounding, with notes of Damask Rose and roasted cinnamon. You could even try it yourself at Montezuma’s, with their “Make a Kilo” option. You can combine a whole host of ingredients, but nothing that unusual. You can pep everything up with chilli as one of your options though.

So, happy to keep experimenting, but they can keep the Marmite! Look out for it from 4 October on the Marmite website and selected retailers.

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Know your audience

In a completely different context, we were talking about knowing your audience the other day, which led onto a conversation about the blog. Now, I never think of having an audience, but I guess from looking at the search terms that land people here, you can work out a thing or two about the casual reader.

So, for the first 6 months of the year, the most popular searches to land here have been

1) Foodie gifts, and various derivatives thereof. Which, given the title, is really no surprise at all, and would be rather worrying if it wasn’t that popular! Hopefully there is plenty of scope to find what you were looking for, or even for things you hadn’t even thought of looking for.

2) Bedazzled Cupcakes. Great local cupcake company, who obviously have a lot of fans out there. I’ve written about them a couple of times, as I see them regularly at local food events, and MGG tends to make a beeline for them.

3) What is the difference between a mini Melton Mowbray pork pie and a mini pork pie? Say hello to my readers from Morrisons, who have ended up here with every combination of the question, which apparently forms part of one of their NVQs. Given our proximity to Melton Mowbray, we are well versed in the way of the pie and they feature fairly regularly on the blog.

4) SW4 Gin, which I think I’ve only written about once or twice. I still owe them a review, as they kindly sent me a bottle to try, and I’m going to to do a testing with this, Gordons and another of the new London gins. Only problem has been I seem to have a lack of gin loving friends, as BFF is a gin hater and not even prepared to have a sip.

5) Cobb Barbecue – a cooking system I’ve mentioned a few times but not tried yet, but obviously quite a few people are thinking about it. Lakeland seem to be the best source.

6) Three Chimneys Cookbook – I’ve featured many, many cookbooks, but this is the one that I obviously have decent rankings for! Great cookbook, great restaurant, amazing location.

7) Marmite XO – cannot abide the stuff, can’t imagine why you would want an XO version, but it would seem many do.

Save Water Drink Wine Framed Print – my sentiments exactly, and one of my favourite gifts this year. Available from Not On the High Street, and available as a print or useful shopping bag.

9) Bread making kits – not sure I’ve written about kits but I’ve featured the Panasonic Breadmaker a few times as well as great books on bread, not to mention breadmaking courses with Richard Bertinet.

10) Innocent bee friendly seeds – I talked about these when talking about Dr T beginning his adventures in beekeeping, as well as some of the initiatives to support British honey bees. In case you’re interested, the seeds were a mix of snapdragons, poppies and cornflowers. Now you know!

An interesting mix, and interesting to look at the variations year on year. Last July was all about Delia Smith, red velvet cake and blood oranges. Ah, the fickle finger of foodie fate, in one year, out the next!

Audience photo by jot.punkt on Flickr.

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Sonoma Syrup - best foodie gift

It’s that time of year again when the Fancy Food Show has been on in New York, and the NASFT sofi Awards are handed out. Last year it was all about blood oranges, which I have seen making appearances in various forms in delis, but not in huge quantities.

And this year? Well, no such clear cut trend, although the blood orange still featured in one Gold winning product: a Blood Orange Sorbetto from G.S. Gelato & Desserts. Some interesting flavours on offer, and a tasty choice for those on dairy or gluten free diets.

A special mention for the team at Fever-Tree, as their Ginger Beer won outstanding cold beverage. Fantastic news, love their products, and love that they doing well in the US. For a place full of corn syrup sweetened sodas, this must come as a refreshing change with a bit of bite. I might need the ginger beer to take away the taste of another winner though: peach balsamic vinegar. Sounds revolting to me, and why does it need messing with? But hey, I’d give it a try, in the name of research.

American chocolate has had a bad name for a long time, and certainly the count bar type stuff is terrible, but the artisan stuff that has been going on has been fantastic. I like the sound of the Sesame Toffee Tiles from Poco Dolce, perfect combinations of sweet and salty: toasted sesame seeds, toffee, plain chocolate and grey sea salt.

Winner of their food gift category was the Extract Gift Set from Sonoma Syrup Co. This is a box of multi-purpose syrups, that you could use in everything from coffees to pouring over ice creams. The gift set contains three bottles, one each of Vanilla, Almond and Lemon. I can’t see a source for them here in the UK, so one to look out for on my next trip to the US.

If you want to check out the full list of winners, to perhaps gain points on the unusual foodstuffs in your cupboard awards, then you can see the list here. Have fun!

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Learn to put more chocolate on a plate!

Getting back from holiday and surveying the pile of post is normally depressing, just a pile of junk and bills. Not this trip! Got back to a stack of chocolate from Chocolate & Love, and of course I’ve been busy working my way through it. I promise I’ve been sharing it!

We started with Crushed Diamonds, which is described as dark truffle chocolate with cocoa nibs. Now BFF and I both really loved this, with smooth chocolate and then the crunch of the nibs. Dr T declared it a bit too sweet for him, but he does love the strong stuff. At 55% cocoa in the chocolate, it’s dark enough to be satisfying without that dry taste at the back of your throat.

For something a bit fruity, then you might like the Orange Mantra, which is dark chocolate combined with organic orange oil from Italy. Quite zesty, with 65% cocoa, so Dr T liked this a bit better. Then of course there needs to be a coffee one, which in this case The Coffee Affair. Again, this is only 55% cocoa, but the bitterness of the coffee probably makes this a reasonable level, but probably would go well alongside a strong cup of espresso.

At 71%, Filthy Rich is for serious dark chocolate lovers. It’s too much for me, but I would think it would make a fabulous chocolate mousse, and may just end up that way. Dr T says good kick of cocoa and very smooth and quite likes it, and thinks it sweeter than his fave, Green & Blacks.

All the flavours are organic with fairly traded ingredients, and the photography on the packaging is interesting. Took me a moment to work out what it was! The founders are an interesting mix, a serial enterpreneur and a former lawyer. Well, they seem to have good taste in chocolate. Their website covers their own brand of chocolate, plus chocolate from The Chocolate Tree and Conscious Chocolate amongst others.

If you want something different, then this isn’t anything radically new or unusual, but it is very tasty, not to mention good from an ethical perspective. Worth keeping an eye on I would say, I would imagine we haven’t heard the last of them!

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Well, you'd stop & look wouldn't you?

Whilst I am sure there’ll be some of you knocking down the doors at Boots tomorrow looking for the shower gel, this is actually just a clever campaign to support the release of the cereal bars. Whilst it doesn’t tempt me in the slightest, I might seek them out for the two Marmite lovers in the house.

Marmite claim these are the first in the world, in being the first ever savoury cereal bar. Quite possibly I guess. They deliver vitamins, fibre and that unique flavour that Marmite lovers adore. There was a good bit of video running at Kings Cross but can’t find it online, it just showed those very opposite reactions that Marmite gets.

If you want to upgrade the strength of your marmite, or the yuck factor, then you can buy extra strength Marmite XO online now. The XO is apparently matured four times longer for extra flavour. Deep joy.

I can’t appreciate the taste but I do love the iconic design, its Britishness (in spite of the fact it’s now owned by Unilever). The Marmite Shop has some great things like artwork for your walls, some really cute espresso cups, not to mention a special edition Marmite Dualit toaster.

It’s the closest they’re going to get me to loving it!

Photo courtesy Unilever

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Vin du Soleil from the Sun at Asda

Wandering through the twitterverse early on Sunday morning, I saw a tweet from Dom Burch, who is head of Corporate Communications at Asda, about a wine that they had created with The Sun. Now, I’ll be honest, my immediate reaction was that this probably wasn’t going to be wine I would love. Dom offered to send me a bottle to try, but I turned it down, on the basis that I was willing to give it a try but on my terms.

So Dr T was dispatched to Asda to buy the new Vin du Soleil, and then similar grape blends at the same price, one from France and one from the New World. He was in charge of making sure they were all chilled to the same temperature and all disguised from the rest of us with layers of newspaper. Given that his sense of taste has gone at the moment, he wasn’t one of my guinea pigs, which comprised Best Foodie Friend and her boyfriend, and an old friend of hers as well, who definitely knew his way around a glass of wine.

And how did we get on?

Wine A – This had floral notes, quite smooth in spite of being quite acidic. One of us thought it was lacking in depth but that it was, and I quote, very quaffable. Perfect sunny afternoon drinking wine, BFF is making a note to buy this next summer.

Wine B – Very light, no bouquet and no depth. Really not much going on and not much taste. It would not trouble those with palates not used to drinking wine, and it wouldn’t make a bad base for a kir, although you wouldn’t need much cassis was our conclusion. None of us finished our small glassful.

Wine C – BFF’s BF said this had good refraction, but he may have had more than the rest of us of the other two. This one was more of a white wine to be had with a meal, more subtle flavours than the first one but with the same floral notes. We all changed our minds having originally thought the first one was French, that actually this was French and the first one was New World.

And the names behind the paper? Well, they were all just under £5 a bottle in Asda Grantham yesterday and they were all blends of Viognier grapes. Wine A was Jacobs Creek Semillon Sauvignon Blanc Viognier, Wine B was the Vin du Soleil and Wine C was La Chasse Du Pape Chardonnay Viognier.

To be honest, I was disappointed. I’d read the piece about how it’d been developed, and I can’t for the life of me work out how you could have come up with such a tasteless wine. And, given that Asda is all about value, it really doesn’t feel worth £4.98. Even they stock much better quality wine for the same price, as either of the other two we drank would testify. So why waste £4.98 on a tasteless bottle, where you think it must be okay because your daily newspaper and a big supermarket chain has developed it.

In these days of huge amounts of choice, people are looking for shortcuts to help them make a choice, which is often what people use brands for. With a combination of the Asda and Sun brands, people would have an element of trust. Sadly, I think on this occasion it is somewhat misplaced. Philippa Carr, Asda’s Master of Wine is quoted as saying it’s a deliciously crisp white of a quality which you would never expect to find for under £5. Whilst she is eminently more qualified on the subject than me, I can only tell you what we liked, and we didn’t like this at all.

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What does it take to be cool?

Finally catching up with the stack of newspapers yesterday I came across a supplement from last week’s Observer about cool brands. Or, more correctly, CoolBrands®. Now, having been through this process before, I’m a bit cynical about what might be included, knowing that defining cool must be even more subjective than defining what makes a brand super.

And what were the results?

Well, disappointing and predictable in my view. Some interesting brands were entered, but what the final vote was for in each of the food related categories was rather dull, and not reflective of the new excitement in British food, drink and restaurants. I think the winners, whilst all great brands, are established brands, not necessarily cool, as cool does often seem to be the territory of the young! So here are my entirely biased and personal views, based on the other options that were available, or even some that weren’t!

Drink: Beer & Cider – won by Guinness, which I am quite fond of, not to mention its iconic advertising. And I think of alll the long established brands I would think it still deserves the tag of cool. Mind you, the other options weren’t very exciting, the usual suspects such as Stella and Grolsch. I think they should have been recognising some of the new microbreweries that are emerging like Sambrook’s Brewery (London beer for Londoners) or Otter Brewery from the South West. Although I don’t imagine they have the budgets for things like this.

Drink: Champagne – Won by Dom Perignon, which I guess is as good as any. I’ve nothing against Dom Perignon, although I think Veuve Cliquot have been doing some interesting things to make champagne sexy, like their travel sets. Happy to have either! And don’t forget the Bolly!

Drink: General – Now I’m going to seem churlish, as this category went to everyone’s favourite drinks company: Innocent. And I do love these guys. And they are still cool. But isn’t it time to find the next thing, isn’t that the definition of cool? I’d have loved to have seen Fever-Tree walk off with this, or even Belvoir Cordials. I love the Italian style of Illy but at least it didn’t go to Evian or, even worse, Glacéau Vitaminwater.

Drink: Spirits – Went to Jack Daniels, which is kind of the same comment as Guinness. Except I don’t like Jack Daniels. And there were so many wonderful alternatives. Hendricks Gin would have got my vote, for a great product, turning the gin category slightly upside down, and beautiful design. And the same would go for Belvedere Vodka. And Grey Goose. Then there is the joy of the advertising images of Absolut. And the list goes on, of so many other, newer, more interesting choices.

Food – so, all those categories for drink, and then all food gets one. Just the one. Which went to Green & Blacks. Forgive my cynicism, but with perhaps the exception of Innocent, the winners are all from very big companies, with very big advertising spends. If it was going to go to chocolate, I would have given it to Rococo or Montezuma’s, both of which I adore, and salute for doing different things with chocolate, particulary with flavour combinations.

It could have gone for services to crisps, and rewarded either Burts Potato Chips or Salty Dog. For services to breakfast, I would go for Dorset Cereals, not to mention bringing great design to cereals. For full on lifestyle choice, then there’s Daylesford Organic. And for sheer sweet and sticky gorgeousness then it would have to be Gü. I mean, talk about making the safe choice. And since when was safe cool?

Leisure & Entertainment: Restaurant & Coffee Shop – interesting combination, and again another safe winner in The Ivy. I know it still has the glitz and glam of its celeb clientele, but it rather ignores the renaissance in eating in the UK, and where we lead the field. I mean, The Fat Duck was in this list, and I would think what Heston was up to was much cooler. I also love what Thomasina Miers is doing at Wahaca, about as far from Taco Bell and Chiquitos as you could get. And I could carry on all night about the macaroon plate at Yauatcha. And if you were looking at something that captured the spirit of the moment, then you’d have a good look at Square Pie for comfort food. Leon obviously had more sense than to enter, but I think they’re pretty darn cool for making fast food healthy and tasty.

So I think my lesson learned from this is when the list comes out next year, I’ll just pass it straight to recycling, and move straight to proper awards to recognise the taste revival going on in the UK!

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