Beaches Seafood Shack

You have probably worked this out already but I absolutely love seafood. Any opportunity to eat it I will take. Today we spent the morning birdwatching on Staple Island and decided to go somewhere different for lunch in the afternoon. We decided on Alnmouth. Not far south of where we were staying and the promise of lovely views and the beach. A quick search led us to the Guardian and an article they posted last year about cheap eats in the area including mention of a seafood shack. So off we went and I am REALLY glad we did.

This place is very unassuming with a hand painted sign and hand written notes and menu outside, but it delivers in abundance.

The note on the door sealed it for me….read it for yourself….

The hand written menu inside made me grin from ear to ear, the only difficult bit was deciding what to have. Actually it wasn’t that difficult.

They had half lobster and fries for less than a tenner. Decision made. (Ten minutes later they sold out) We chose to eat in as there were three little tables inside and watched a number of people come in for takeaway. It is clearly a popular place.
My lobster and fries was perfect. That’s all I can say. It really was.

Mr Frivolitea ordered the smoked haddock Mac n cheese in a pot. He was delighted and is planning his next visit.

What a find this place was! I can’t wait to see what is on offer next time we visit.

The Parson’s Nose, Hillsborough

On a short visit home recently, mum, dad and I took the opportunity to visit the Parson’s nose for Sunday lunch. The Parson’s Nose do a great Sunday lunch offer with a set price menu of two or three courses. It offers really great value and has a lot of local produce at the heart of the menu.
For starter I chose the beetroot cured Glenarm salmon, chives creme fraiche and crispy fish cake. This was a great dish. The smoked salmon was really good and the little fish cake added a great bit of texture to the plate. My dad had the smoked haddock, bacon and scallion chowder. (Scallions are spring onions for my English readers!) The chowder came with wheaten bread and Abernethy butter which is the most delicious local butter. I highly recommend you try some. I mean Heston uses it….

For main course mum and dad had the roast beef. The beef just melted in the mouth! I had the roast fillet of hake with lobster cream sauce and charred lemon. Simple and delicious.

For pudding dad and I had the buttermilk pannacotta, spiced gingerbread madeline, and orange syrup. I really loved the creaminess of the pannacotta (dad always compares any pannacotta to the Poacher’s Pocket where I haven’t yet been. He said this was nearly as good) I also loved the spice of the gingerbread. It added a lovely warmth to the dish.

I’d certainly a visit to The Parson’s Nose. The food was influenced by local produce, was high quality and it was fantastic value for three courses.

Kingston Arms, Cambridge

A brief blog! We were in Cambridge over the weekend with friends and decided to go to their local pub, tucked away off Mill Road for Sunday lunch before the drive home. Oh how I wish our local was like this. A fantastic free house, serving great beer and with a really decent menu. The menu includes regular specials including a fish specials board. Wow. We couldn’t decide. And so shared a couple of specials.

Smoked salmon, horseradish potato salad and side salad. Simple and delicious and just right for a hot summer’s day.

A slice of cold pork and mushroom pie with chips and side salad. Another really tasty dish

Mr Frivolitea also enjoyed his sticky toffee pudding

What I loved aobut this place was it’s honesty. It serves delicious plates of food with no prevention. It doesn’t need to add anything because the quality speaks for itself and it also has a great selection of beers. What a find!

Mountain Cafe, Aviemore

For many years we have made the long (long long) trip to the Outer Hebrides. It is worth every second of the long journey but more of that another time. For the last 5 years, thanks to a recommendation, we have stopped at the Mountain café in Aviemore en route. I love this place, the walls and ceilings are decked with climbing gear and the cake counter is a thing of beauty. The café’s popularity is clear to see from the many awards on the walls and the queue to get in. The food is fresh and creative with plenty of healthy and vegetarian options.

One of my favourite dishes (the one I have usually ordered) is the New Zealand style sweetcorn fritters (the chef patron is from New Zealand).

When we visited this time I had a mild panic as it wasn’t on the menu. However, I then spotted curried cauliflower fritters with sour cream and mango chutney on the menu. Panic over. Cauliflower is my favourite vegetable and this dish did not disappoint. Wonderfully light fritters packed full of flavour. The mango chutney and sour cream really brought the dish together.

On our journey back from Lewis we stopped again, this time queuing for 20 minutes ( I told you this place was good). This time I had the special – chilli coriander haggis pakoras with minted yoghurt and mango chutney. Words cannot explained how wonderful this was. Really stunning. I’m craving them now as I type.

You need to visit here, really you do.

Le Cochon Aveugle – photo blog

I’ve written about Le Cochon Aveugle before. I love it. Josh Overington is a genius. Here’s what we had this week when we visited. ( we went for the carte Blanche option)

A peche egg ( at least I think this is what it was called but who cares it was delicious! )

Whitby crab and apple, Potato chip

Radish with fermented pepper mayonnaise

English and white French asparagus, almond gazpacho, lemon zest

Lamb tartare, oyster emulsion, cider granita

Homemade tagliatelle with wild mushroom ragu

Blowtorches mackerel, goats curd, melon veloute

Lobster ( I was so excited about this course I forgot to write down what it was!)

3 part main course – Duck consommé with beer, Foie gras, citrus jam, cracker , Sous vide Duck, aubergine, tear drop peppers, tasty paste

Strawberry, wild strawberry strawberry mousse, pistachio ice cream, cream of wasabi

Roasted pineapple, caramel sauce, Szechuan pepper, truffle ice cream, fresh truffle ( my favourite and a great way to end the meal )

The Barn Bistro, Burniston

What a find this was. We are staying at the camping and caravanning club site nearby and The Barn is a short walk away. As it is Easter Sunday we thought it would be nice to book Sunday Lunch. Boy am I glad we did. This place really knows how to provide high quality food. Sunday Lunch was £20.95 for 3 courses. An absolute bargain in my opinion.

For starter I had the seafood trio: cured salmon and crab cocktail, chilli and kaffir lime leaf fish fingers, Thai prawn and rice cake. This is my kind of food. I love seafood anyway but this was creative and bursting with flavour. The Thai prawn and rice cake was a particular favourite.

Mr Frivolitea had Chicken, pork, wild mushroom and leek terrine with poached pear and rosemary focaccia toasts. Again another super tasty dish. Even the butter was delicious!

For main course we all had Roast lamb. Well, it’s Easter Sunday so you’ve got to don’t you! It was rolled shoulder that had been clearly cooked long and slow and it just melted in the mouth. What I particularly liked about the main course was the love and attention that went in to the vegetables. This was no ordinary roast dinner. We had roast potatoes, beetroot and carrots, pea, broad bean, asparagus and leek gratin and celeriac and apple purée. All cooked exquisitely and packed with flavour.

For pudding I had orange tart and mango sorbet, just the right quantity and refreshing after a big roast.

Mr Frivolitea had sticky toffee pudding, treacle toffee sauce and vanilla bean ice cream.
The Barn is open for lunches and also has a number of themed evenings throughout the year. We will certainly be back, with that level of quality, why wouldn’t we!

Blackfriars

On our September trip to Edinburgh we went to this fantastic little place to eat called Blackfriars. On our trip to Edinburgh a couple of weeks ago we heard that the restaurant bit of Blackfriars is currently closed. It’s a real shame. The news reminded me of the great meal we had, which I didn’t blog at the time. So here it is now for you to read. The bar is still open, so go. It’s a great wee place!
What I loved about this place was the mix of great bar, serving interesting beers and small plates of food with a small restaurant next door serving a set menu. We opted to eat in the restaurant and really enjoyed the feel of the place. Casual, intimate, but exciting!

Although it was a set menu there was an element of choice in the main course and I loved the informality of the little dishes we started with:
Paprika almonds with grilled corn from the Blackfriars BBQ followed by smoked trout and smoked tomato from their cold smoker and homemade black pudding with chorizo and some onion purée. Every week the kitchen get whole trouts and cure them to use in the restaurant. I particularly loved the philosophy of this place, how they use their ingredients and present them simply so that the flavours speak for themselves.

Our second course was pan fried brill with poached langoustine tail, courgettes and sea aster. Another beautiful and simple dish.

The choice in main course was between lamb and partridge so as predicted Mr Frivolitea chose the lamb and I chose the partridge. Both came with salt baked beetroot, black cabbage and chanterelles. They were both wonderful but I think the lamb had the edge.

We finished off with pudding of apple tart ( made with homemade puff pastry) damson ice cream and damson sauce. There was also some rosehip syrup on the tart which was delicious.

So there it is. I’m hoping the restaurant side of the business reopens and they produce wonderful food like this again. The Edinburgh food scene will be richer for it.

The Coach, Marlow

Having visited The Hand and Flowers last year, we were intrigued to see what Tom Kerridge would do with a walk in only pub on the High Street. The Coach is pretty small but has a great feel with bespoke furniture and fit out that shouts quality but it doesn’t have the stiff service you can often get in a high end restaurant. This still has the feel of a pub with great service and friendly staff.

The concept of the menu is different and really interesting. All the dishes are starter size and the reccomendation is that you choose two or three dishes per person. I particularly liked this approach. We often like to try a few things off a menu and this menu design made that possible. It doesn’t lend itself to a cheap lunch out but it is certainly worth every penny.

The dishes we chose were: Rotisserie beetroot, feta, Apple, horseradish and hazelnuts

Smoked ox tongue, crispy cheek, and sauce gribiche

Chicken Kiev with cauliflower cheese

Rotisserie celeriac with honey and mustard seed glaze

Chips with bearnaise sauce

The beetroot and celeriac dishes were particular favourites of mine though everything was of a really high quality.

We finished off with a dessert each. I had lemon tart with raspberry sorbet which was perfectly zingy and the pastry buttery and really short.

Mr Frivolitea had warm chocolate tart with hazelnut icecream. A sort of chocolate fondant in a tart with wonderful candied hazelnuts to accompany.

This is somewhere I would love to go back to, not least because there are several other dishes on the menu I’d like to try. Mr Frivolitea was eying up the small but perfectly formed burger so I think that will be on his list.

LoveCrumbs

You can never have too much cake….and at LoveCrumbs they have so much cake on offer you just need to keep going back to make sure you don’t miss out on something. I’ve never come across anywhere quite like LoveCrumbs. Not only do they just serve cake and drinks but the cake menu is always really interesting.

This time I had passionfruit meringue tart and Mr Frivolitea had cherry Bakewell tart.

The other thing I love about LoveCrumbs is that even the drinks menu is exciting. Mr Frivolitea opted this time for lemongrass and marigold tea. Everything is served on vintage China and the open teabags come with a flask of hot water which is a great touch.

If you ever go to Edinburgh, make sure this is on your list!

Smith and Gertrude

I’ve been following Smith and Gertrude for a while on Twitter and after our visit to Pairings in York in January I was excited to try somewhere else that paired wine and cheese. We were not disappointed! I love the feel of Smith and Gertrude, communal tables and music on vinyl, it’s a great place to spend an evening.

We both decided to go for a ‘native’ flight of wine paired with cheese. Mr Frivolitea chose red and I chose white. A flight consists of three 75ml glasses of wine chosen for you and paired with three cheeses. The great thing about this option is that you try wine you would never have thought to choose if you were just going for a by the glass option.

My white wine flight consisted of Godello from Galicia in Spain paired with bonnet a Scottish goats cheese followed by a really interesting Hungarian wine called Mad, a dry furmint from Tokaji that was paired with Comte and finally Lugana from Lombardia, Italy paired with Ubriaco, a cheese soaked in red wine.

Mr Frivolitea’s red wine flight started with Bobal de Altas Tierras from Utiel-Requena in Spain paired with Manchego, this was followed by an Armenian wine Areni Noir paired with a mature Gouda and finishing with Barbera Superiore from Piedmont, Italy paired with Taleggio. Mr Frivolitea particularly enjoyed the Barbera and ordered another glass.

We complimented our wine flights with a charcuterie board that consisted of Milano salami, Prosciutto, Scottish salami with fennel, Coppa and Tuscan salami.

We also had the most delicious Marcona almonds, rich and buttery tasting.

I finished off the evening with the most fantastic glass of wine on reccomendation. It was called ‘Wild’ Sauvignon a Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc but unlike any Marlborough I’ve had before. It was incredible! The only way I can think to describe it is that it had the familiarity of a Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc but with a wonderful extra quality that felt almost Nordic or foraged. Almost impossible to describe but truly wonderful.

Smith and Gertrude is a fantastic place to spend an evening. Their passion for great wine shines through. We will certainly visit again next time we are in Edinburgh.