Category: reviews

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food kitchen gadgets product review

heston blumenthal kitchen wizz pro food processor review

You may have noticed I rarely do full-on review posts like this. It’s just not my thing. I’d run out of things to say too quickly. But for this gadget I’m willing to make an exception.

You know how some kitchen gadgets get used once, and even if you like them you’ll shuffle them away to a back cupboard? Or give them away? That’s not the case with this one. This one has invaded my kitchen to the point where I’ve put others away in the loft. My beloved Kenwood Prospero has been boxed up and relegated. The Kitchen Wizz Pro is the new bad boy in town.

And “bad boy” is somewhat appropriate; as I unboxed it from it’s Heston-heavy packaging Mrs. Spud said: “it is a boy’s toy, isn’t it?” and she’s right. Finished in brushed aluminium and dark greys, heavy as hell and packed with mean looking accessories, this is not your Nan’s Moulinex. If you like your kitchen toys to have a feminine edge this is not for you. It does also weigh a ton which is extremely useful when in operation but you need to know it takes effort to get it out of the cupboard.

As with many top-end gadgets, it’s the details that show you how well-crafted it is. It comes with a battery of chopping blades and attachments in their own neat box: grating blades, adjustable slicers, whisks, double choppers etc. plus a little spatula for scraping out and a cute brush for cleaning. One of my favourite gadgets is a chipper which turns potatoes into cute curved chips. Inside the chopping bowl itself is a smaller bowl you can use for working with smaller amounts of ingredients. The lid has a rubber seal so it really shuts fast. The hopper is huge (14cm!); you can fit a couple of potatoes widthways in it. The mixer also keeps a timer going as you use it so you can clock how long it’s been running.

I’ve road tested it on a whole bunch of different things: it’s taken on coleslaw, short pastry, whipping cream, cookies, whisking eggs, making onion and garlic puree, spice mixes… it’s made swift work of the lot. Pastry comes out the smoothest I’ve ever made it, all plasticine-soft. Biscuit crumbs for cheesecake bases come out like fine dust. And the sheer speed of it is terrifying. The weight keeps the gadget firmly on the counter, it’s not walking anywhere. It also cleans up as well as any other device of this nature; it is dishwasher-happy but I’d rather not put it in there to keep it as pristine as long as possible. That said water does get into the grip and I’ve no idea how to get it out of there, but it doesn’t seem to be a problem.

What are the downsides? I’d like to have variable speed on the mixing; it goes full whack (and scarily fast, but reasonably quietly) and comes with a pulse function, from time to time I’d prefer to use a slower speed. I can’t ignore the price: £399 RRP. It’s hardly the budget option but it really does feel like a Rolls Royce gadget and I can see it lasting for years (there is a generous 25 year warranty on the motor).

It’s fair to say I’m besotted with it and it’s one of the best kitchen gadgets I’ve ever used. Ask everyone to give you vouchers for birthday and Christmas and save up for one. It’s superb.

Thanks to Lindsey at MBA for sending me this to review. I’ve been road-testing it for about 7 weeks to give it a good going over. Read more about the Kitchen Wizz Pro at Sage Appliances. Buy online at Amazon

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chicken coriander cumin food paprika product review sugar

sledgehammer chicken

I’ve cooked a few whole birds on the barbecue before, such as southeast spatchcock and slathered with BBQ sauce. But with getting a drum-style barbecue this year I could try grilling a whole one for the first time.

This chicken came about from trying Sainsbury’s new chicken roaster. It’s a metal stand which holds the bird in a vertical position while it roasts. Assembled it’s rather phallic, but once you look past that you have a metal prong over a tray which all hooks together. The pieces come apart and you are able to fold it away to pretty much nothing. You’re cooking a chicken to a similar principle as a beer-butt chicken which I’ve always wanted to try but just don’t like the taste of beer (the quickest my face goes from happy to sad is noticing there’s onion rings on the menu, then spotting they’re beer-battered onion rings. Horrid yeasty aftertaste, yeeuch).

I rubbed the meat all over with a sweet spice mix and awkwardly impaled the chicken on the spike. And now it looked like it had waltzed off Peter Gabriel’s Sledgehammer video, hence the name.

I started mine off on the BBQ with the lid down, but after 70 minutes the bird had barely started to warm up and it just wasn’t feeling right. I brought it into the oven and finished it off there. The flavour was great and it had taken on some smoke so not all was lost. Carving into it the flesh was moist and tender.

Is the roaster worth it? I’m not quite convinced. You could go down the beer can route on the BBQ, and in the oven it takes up a lot of space being vertical. Being able to put liquid underneath (I used white wine) means a natural mist is retained going up into the cavity but the skin stays crisp. That said as long as time allows I’ll be sticking to my preferred Heston technique. The roaster is a fun gadget, but not essential.

Thanks to Sainsbury’s for sending me the roaster to try out.

Sledgehammer chicken (serves 4 – 6):

1 tablespoon brown sugar

1 tablespoon smoked paprika

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon ground coriander

Pinch of chilli powder

Olive oil

1 medium chicken

Splash of white wine

  1. Mix the spices together and blend with enough olive oil to make a gloopy paste. Smear all over the chicken and make a real mess of it. Impale the chicken on your chicken roaster and fill the tray with wine.
  2. Light the BBQ. Once the flames have died down and there is a thin coating of white ash over the coals, place your chicken into the BBQ and close the lid. Roast there for 2 – 3 hours until the chicken is 70°C at the thickest part (always use a probe thermometer, it’s the only way to be sure). Or if your BBQ isn’t quite hot enough, transfer to a 180°C oven. Allow to rest for 10 minutes before serving. I served mine with potatoes roasted with chorizo.
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food reviews

city kitchen british classics

Earlier this year I road tested Skinny Ones meals. I found them very filling and really tasting of “home-made” so when invited to try some meals also from City Kitchen I was more than happy to. I was sent two boxes to try: chicken, leek and bacon hash; and bangers with butternut squash and bubble and squeak.

I tried the chicken one first and it’s probably my favourite. Pieces of chicken that actually taste like they might have been near a real bird, crispy potato hash and in a lovely cheesy sauce to wrap it all up. Very filling and very enjoyable.

A few days later I tried the bangers meal. Mrs Spud preferred this one but any meal containing a variant of sausage and mash gets her vote. I didn’t go crazy for the sausages, they reminded me of kabanos. But the cider sauce was a great match for it.

Both meals are very tasty and a clear head and shoulders above supermarket ready meals. Their attitude of being choosy with ingredients really shines through, but not without a downside: they are on the pricey side. They are exclusive to Tesco and cost £3.75 each which is a shade too high for me to consider being a regular in my shopping basket. The other convenience of ready meals is to be able to freeze them, and here’s a bone of contention: I was about to put them in the freezer so I could plan out my meals for the week but the packaging actively says that you shouldn’t. I’ve since had a chat with them and been assured that you can freeze them but the guidance on the product implies you can’t. It’s a bit of an oddity and I hope they address that issue.

I thought they were very enjoyable and they actually taste of what the box describes; more than you can say of most ready meals. If I see them on promotion I would pick them up again.

I was sent these meals for free to review.

Categories
crisps food potatoes reviews

fairfields farm crisps

I was asked if I would like some samples of Essex-grown Fairfields Farm Crisps. Being proud of Essex and an enormous fan of potatoes it took me all of 8 milliseconds to tear off someone’s arm to get some. And what a treat they are.

It’s great to be able to champion a really local product. I smiled at the fact that the flavouring for the bacon comes from Wicks Manor Farm, somewhere I’ve frequented often for their amazing hams and sausages. It’s just a couple of miles from where I work in Maldon and has a lovely farm shop. I was also quite tickled with the fact that Robert of Fairfields featured on The Apprentice as a mentor and crisp expert. On to the crisps themselves and they present some interesting flavours: Butter & Mint which tastes far more minty than you think crisps could; Sea Salt & Black Pepper which is a lovely balance; Smoky Bacon which just makes me drool. There’s also No Salt which I approached with some trepidation but I needn’t have worried. The absence of extra salt just highlights how great the potatoes themselves are; earthy, full of flavour and just cooked enough so as not to destroy their potatoeyness.

There’s a bunch of other flavours too:

  • Lightly Sea Salted
  • Sea Salt and Aspall Cyder Vinegar
  • Sweet Chilli
  • Farmhouse Cheese and Chive
  • Parsnip Crisps with Essex Honey & Black Pepper

I have to try the Aspall ones too, I absolutely love Aspall’s cider. If you see them near you, try a bag out. You won’t be disappointed. Fairfields Farm Crisps are available from farm shops, delicatessens and branches of Co-op in the East of England, and by mail order via www.fairfieldsfarmcrisps.co.uk. You can say to the team on Twitter too.

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