Category: reviews

november goodies

There’s been lots of little bits and pieces going on lately. Here’s a quick roundup of what I’ve been playing around with lately!

Chop Bloc Steak House, Chelmsford

I’ve written about this steak house before. Chop Bloc opened earlier this year in the heart of Essex, and I loved it. I recently returned as a paying customer, and it was still outstanding.

I had the rib-eye and it’s just to die for. The best I’d ever eaten. They care about the meat deeply, and have an expert on their Josper grill. If you’re in the area, give it a try.

Saltwater Kitchen Cookbook

This cookbook is full of the joys of Cornwall. Now I haven’t spent much time in the South West, not since about a dozen of us used to cram into a borrowed VW camper van in about 1985! But the food on display here is cracking, like fried fish burritos and stick toffee apple cheesecake. I made a masoor daal and it was sensational. Not what you associate with Cornwall but it was sublime.
Buy Saltwater Kitchen Cookbook from Amazon

Sugru

I’m bowled over by this invention. It’s kinda like putty but once moulded stays firm yet flexible. It can deal with temperatures from -50C to +180C so is pretty durable!

I’ve been playing about with it, and have made a bunch of “kitchen hacks”, including making little pegs to hold my tablet in place in the kitchen while I cook, fixing an annoying freezer drawer and secure a few pesky cables in place. These are just a few ideas, check the Sugru website for more info.

Chicago Town Pizzas

They’re a guilty pleasure but I like a Chicago Town pizza. A crisp base, gooey cheese, tangy tomato… And what could make it better than by winning a toy dinosaur with your pizza! Check the website for more details.

Silver Spoon Quick and Easy

The original Silver Spoon cookbook is an institution. There’s now a new volume out dealing with quick and easy recipes. To be honest I was a little underwhelmed. The recipes are quick and easy, but quite predictable. There’s plenty to get your teeth into but they’re so traditional as to be well-worn. That said, if you haven’t got a good book covering some Italian basics like saltimbocca, risotto and zabaglione then this is a good base.

Buy The Silver Spoon Quick and Easy Italian Recipes from Amazon

Hope and Glory Coffee

Hope and Glory Coffee have got some great new gifts for Christmas. They sent me a couple to try: the fruity and chocolatey Wonderland espresso, and the spicy Honduras blend. Both were excellent.

Browse the full range at the Hope and Glory website.

food product review reviews

codlo review

Sous vide is the process where food is vacuum sealed and cooked in a water bath. It’s used by professional chefs, mass caterers and is gradually making it’s way into the domestic kitchen. I’m no stranger to sous vide. I’ve been writing about it for many years, and have been lucky enough to own a full size sous vide machine for a while. But the size and cost of these gadgets can be prohibitive. This is where the Codlo sous vide gadget comes in.

Really, what do you need for sous vide? Water at a constant temperature. Not inordinately difficult with a thermometer and an insulated container (such as a cool box) but plenty of faff. Codlo us essentially a thermometer, timer and resistor all in one. By using a kitchen appliance you possibly already have, such as a slow cooker or rice cooker, the Codlo converts it into a sous vide machine.

How does it work?

Plug your gadget into the Codlo, then plug this into your socket. Then drape the probe into the water. Set your temperature and timer, and press go. Off it goes! The probe measures the temperature of the water, cuts off power to your slow cooker if it’s too hot, and lets it back on to warm it up again. It merrily ticks away like this and the timer bleeps when it’s done. Simple.

It’s a very, very pretty device. The smooth curves, smart LCD screen and cool packaging scream of a well-designed product. It’s immaculate. And because all you’re doing is dipping the probe into water there’s no cleaning up to do.

I tried a bunch of things in it to give it a proper road test. The first thing the instructions ask you to try are eggs, so I did exactly that – but scotch eggs. I’m not a huge fan of the super runny egg, so 45 minutes at 66C, followed by a brisk deep frying and a gentle bake brings them out just the way I like them – set like jelly!

Triple cooked scotch eggs. Sous vide, deep fried then baked.

A photo posted by Gary Fenn (@thebigspud) on Aug 15, 2015 at 3:46am PDT

Chicken on the BBQ can be hit and miss between anaemic raw meat and leathery charcoal. Pre-cooking avoids this and sous vide is the perfect way to ensure your meat is fully cooked before finishing them on the BBQ for that smoky edge. I tried some chicken kebabs, and then flamed them on the barbecue.

Tandoori chicken on the BBQ. That’s Monday night food. A photo posted by Gary Fenn (@thebigspud) on Jun 29, 2015 at 12:55pm PDT

It comes out gloriously juicy as it hasn’t spent ages drying out over the coals. I also cooked a bunch of mixed fish for a Heston fish pie. It was pretty epic.

Sous vide fish ready for a pie A photo posted by Gary Fenn (@thebigspud) on Jul 11, 2015 at 4:59am PDT

Top tip: fill the cooker with slightly hotter water than you think you need and let it come down to temperature rather than come up. It takes much longer to warm the water than it does to cool it down (you can leave the lid open or add an ice cube to chivvy things along). I find about two thirds boiling water from a kettle and a third water straight from the cold tap is a good starting point.

The Verdict

The results are identical to cooking in a more expensive machine. I cannot tell any difference. With that in mind I give it my strongest recommendation. If you have a water cooking gadget already such as a slow cooker and would like to try sous vide then you must give it a go.

One thing is that you will need a vacuum sealer – such as such as this one. But whether you buy a Codlo or larger unit, you’ll have to buy this anyway. The Codlo unit itself is £119, versus ~£350 for a SousVide Supreme.

And why should you sous vide? For me it’s the perfect medium for cooking many things – once you’ve tried a steak in a sous vide you won’t want it any other way. The melting middle is just what you’re after. Chicken wings and thighs also go perfectly in it. And while some may sneer at boiling an egg for 45 minutes, the margin of error in the traditional method is so narrow – I’m sure we’ve all left eggs 30 seconds too long when soft boiling – sous vide is no extra effort. And sous vide is great at cooking larger quantities too.

Want another view? Check out Kavey’s post, featuring some great steak cooking!

And here’s A Glug of Oil’s review

I was sent a Codlo to review. You can buy one from this link, and I’ll get a kickback for doing so (the price is the same to you).

Tags sous vide

food pasta reviews

food at 52 cookery school review

Post author By Gary @ BigSpud
Post date May 30, 2015
4 Comments on food at 52 cookery school review

I bought myself a pasta machine for my birthday. I had a few goes with the dough with mixed results, though I did manage to knock out some decent ravioli. What luck then just after that I was offered a Food at 52 cookery school review opportunity, in their Flavours of Italy evening class.

I’ve visited the Food at 52 venue a few times. I went back in 2010 for Tilda rice (at their previous venue), filmed a chilli recipe there and cooked with Ade Edmondson. This time I was actually going to try out their cookery classes. I was in a small group of four, two men and two women taught by one of the founders, John. The first thing that strikes you is the quirkiness of the venue. It’s a rag-tag of trinkets from travels and cookery knick-knacks. John and his family are seasoned travellers and have brought odds and ends back from every corner of the globe. That’s not to say the kitchen equipment you use is scattered; we used Global knives, Magimix processors and top quality ingredients.

During this Italian-themed evening lesson lasting three and a half hours we prepared four dishes and ate them as soon as they were ready. We started with making pasta dough. As I said it was the part I was looking forward to and it was the small tips I picked up here that made the tuition invaluable. I didn’t realise just how long you should knead it for, or how to get the ratio of egg to flour just right. It’s this stuff you can only get by being shown in person and no amount of TV chefs or cookbooks can help you here. A few days after the course I made some more tagliatelle at home and it was so much better after the tuition.

We made the tagliatelle and served it with a lightning quick pesto, slightly different to the recipe I plump for, omitting garlic and using pasta water to let it down. It gave a creamy, luxurious texture.

We followed this with a chicken soffrito, a dish of braised chicken legs over a vegetable dice. A great opportunity to practice knife skills, and learn a mean sauce into the bargain.

Lastly we made an amaretti semifreddo and cantucci with coffee.

It was a thoroughly entertaining night with great company. I walked back to the station with a fellow classmate from Essex who received the cooking lessons as a gift, and he was really pleased with the informal nature of it. There were no chef’s whites and no expectation of current effort. Everything was presented with a laid-back “have a go” attitude and everyone felt included.

If you’re looking for an informal yet intelligent cooking class where you get your hands dirty, I thoroughly recommend Food at 52. It’s entertaining and educational.

I was a guest of Food at 52 in a class of other paying clients. All those words up there are honest.

burger food restaurant review

le garrick restaurant review

Post author By Gary @ BigSpud
Post date May 14, 2015
3 Comments on le garrick restaurant review

I do love a burger. Like everyone else seems to at the moment; it’s difficult to chuck a brioche without hitting a trendy burger outlet. Whether it’s hand-reared cattle, wagyu steaks or ten patties in a bun each place has it’s own gimmick. So when it comes to National Burger Month there’s no shortage of eateries looking to join in. This includes non-burger specialists, like French restaurant Le Garrick (Garrick Street, Covent Garden).

Le Garrick has been in the well-trafficked theatre location for nearly 30 years. When I mentioned the place to a colleague they gushed about the steak they’d had there previously. It’s clear the place is aiming square at the brasserie style with it’s mahogany tables, wicker baskets and kooky alcoves. Greeted by Jacques and Martha, I took to my chair with house bread – a decent, crisp baguette – and recommended by the waiter, I started with Basque-inspired calamari rings.

The calamari rings were well cooked although I found the broth flavoured with chilli, coriander and ginger a little too spicy. It left quite the tickle in my throat. Not to say I didn’t paw at the bowl with spare bread though…

To the reason I was here: the Le Garrick burger. They would prefer it described as a steak hache of course; a blend of beef and lamb with cucumber and tomato, on a soft bun and topped with either blue cheese or Emmental (I plumped for creamy blue). The burger is meaty and tasty and the salad fresh and crunchy. The blue cheese provides a great seasoning. But the revelation is the dill-powered French dressing, the bright and piquant notes are sharp against the umami. It’s a really tasty burger and with a pile of frites on the side it makes a cracking indulgent lunch.

I was also recommended the tarte au citron by the waiter. I found it a bit disappointing. While the texture was perfectly smooth and the pastry crisp it lacked the haymaker punch of lemon I would hope for. After all it’s a French classic in a French restaurant – I’d expect it to be top-notch.

The service was great and the atmosphere convivial, and I’d definitely go back for the burger alone. During May the burger is 30% off, which means for £12.50 you get the burger with a side of fries plus a drink (house wine, beer or soft drink). Pretty good value for a hearty meal in the West End.

I dined as a guest of Le Garrick. Views are my own.

Tel: 020 7240 7649
Email: info@legarrick.co.uk