Hassop station

Hassop Station is tucked away in the Peak District countryside, a short drive from Bakewell. The station is part of the Monsal Trail and a great place to start your walk or cycle ride. I discovered this little place in an article in the Guardian on Derbyshire cheap eats. We decided to start our day here as we wanted to hire bikes to do the trail.

We arrived first thing and ordered a Hassop Station breakfast to provide us with our fuel for the day (well that was our excuse anyway). What a fantastic place this is. The breakfast was really well cooked, with a decent amount of good quality bacon and sausage. However the highlight for me was the tomato. Normally I am happy to skip the tomato in a cooked breakfast but here they had added thyme and lemon zest. An inspired decision and one I am copying from now on.

We hired our bikes and spent the day cycling 19 miles on and near the Monsal Trail and then returned to Hassop Station.

The Station cafe opens late three nights a week serving stone baked pizzas and a small menu of simple but tasty dishes. I chose to have the fish and chips (it is often difficult for me to refuse fish and chips if they are on a menu). I am glad I did. The fish was full of flavour and the batter particularly tasty. You can tell that in this place, quality matters.

Mr Frivolitea opted for the special of local buffalo burger and chips. The burger was really tasty and it was great to see local buffalo being used on the menu.

This is not somewhere to go for a romantic meal for two but it is a great place for simple, good quality food and with the Monsal Trail on the doorstep, it is a great day out.

Established

Established has been on my list for a while. I discovered it thanks to Haptik and as you know from my post about Haptik, the fact that Northern Ireland now has a growing number of independant coffee bars that pride themelves in crafting top quality coffee makes me very happy indeed.

Established sits in the heart of the Cathedral Quarter in Belfast, an area that I am yet to explore fully (see posts later in the year!) I love the feel of this place, bright, airy, creative, the sort of place you just want to hang out for a while and drink coffee. That’s what I did. (albeit with my brother and 2 year old nephew in tow but hey they were happy to oblige!)I did my usual test of how good a coffee place is and ordered a cappuccino. It passed the test – rich and full of flavour.

The selection of cakes were very appealing and as usual I couldnt resist. I went for the white chocolate and raspberry loaf which had a fantastic fresh raspberry flavour.

My brother chose to have the Carmelita (Bolivia) filter coffee. I really liked the way it was served.

A brief post I know but there you have it. A great place to hang out, serving fantastic coffee, slap bang in the centre of Belfast. I’ll be back and next time I’m ordering brunch – just take a look at their instagram page and you will understand why!

The Harbour Cafe

If you are looking for fish and chips in Scarborough, then look no further than the Harbour Cafe in Scarborough. If you’re looking for frills, you won’t find them here, but what you will find is a proper welcome and a great plate of food.

The Cafe sits above the fish market at the Harbour and the view is fantastic. The food is so fresh that when I ordered our fish and chips I was able to watch my batter being made and then the fish being fried. The chips are not your normal ‘chippie’ chips. In fact the chips here remind me of the chips my dad used to make at home in our deep fat frier.

If you’re ever in Scarborough, go here. but make sure you go before 2pm. They’ve been open since 6am feeding fishermen so thay deserve to close and have a rest in the afternoon.

Le Cochon Aveugle

To quote Mr Frivolitea ‘a neon sign means either very good, or very bad things inside’.

We’d heard some good things about this little restaurant in York, finally got round to booking in, and we can confirm this particular pink neon is a sign of VERY good things.

I’m a fan of a tasting menu, I love having no choice and instead enjoying several different plates of food that I may not have ordered. What made things even better was the wine list. Nyetimber on the menu -that immediately puts a big smile on my face (and a bit of a dent in my bank account).

The menu uses seasonal produce, changes every week and costs £35 for 6 courses. The food is creative, interesting and challenging. If you read the menu every week when they put it on Facebook (yes, I do that) there’s always something that makes you sit up and take notice. The menu for our visit included many of my favourite things but in ways I could never have imagined.

Our first dish was a collection of little bites: Radishes with gremolata, Pain de Campagne with truffle butter and beurre noisette, a jar with goats cheese, Yorkshire rapeseed oil, provencal herbs & olive and finally burnt celeriac consommé with passion fruit. It was all beautifully presented and balanced. The highlight for me was the beurre noisette, wonderfully light and full of flavour. I was sceptical about the consommé but I can confirm celeriac and passion fruit work well together.

The second dish was textures of cauliflower with yeast, hazelnuts, pickled grape and baby sorrel leaves. Cauliflower is one of my favourite vegetables and this dish did it justice. The variety of textures really showed cauliflower at its best.

The third dish was glazed mackerel tartine (crushed almonds, Parmesan, sourdough) lemon jam, herbs and a soy based sauce. The mackerel was the star of the show and the tartine worked really well with it though I would have happily had more lemon jam.

Then we had a trio of Gloucester old spot, baby turnip, fennel foam, fennel tops and honey glazed apples. Pork and fennel are a tried and tested combination and I really enjoyed this dish.

The fifth dish was a lemongrass chilli and ginger sorbet with Italian meringue. This was really fresh and zingy and worked well after the rich pork dish.

The sixth and final dish was pate a cigarette with strawberries, rhubarb, elderflower Chantilly and elderflower oil. I love rhubarb and this dessert was wonderfully balanced.

Mr Frivolitea likes coffee equipment and he’d been intrigued by the coffee siphon from the moment we walked in the door. So, we rounded off our meal with coffee and petit fours. The coffee was a fantastic bit of theatre to round off the evening and the petit fours of passion fruit jelly, chocolate and peanut butter lollipops and Bordeaux cakes with rum and vanilla were a final reminder of the quality and creativity of this little restaurant.

So, we were done; we’d eaten well, and we were ready to go home, but Le Cochon Aveugle had one last surprise for us. Breakfast! A little parcel of banana bread for Mr Frivolitea and the best florentine I have ever had (as I can’t eat banana). A really thoughtful touch. We enjoyed our breakfast at Flamborough Head the next morning on our 12 mile walk .

We will be back and next time we will definitely include the wine pairings. £63 for the 6 courses and wine pairings with food of the highest standard – that’s fantastic value!

Harry’s Shack

If I were to say to you we were going to have dinner at a Shack on the beach you probably would be expecting reasonable food and a bit of a camping chairs and blankets sort of evening. Well not here. Harry’s shack, is in effect, a shack. A wooden building on the beach. But not any old beach. No, this shack is on one of the most wonderful beaches I have ever been to. I mean, I am a bit biased as it is a beach back home but look…… Look at the view…..

And this is not any old shack. The food here is stunning. Fantastically fresh and local food, particularly the seafood. Nothing is messed about with. It’s served simply but to the highest quality and the menu changes regularly as they serve what comes in off the boat.

We shared a starter of spiced whitebait and Marie Rose sauce. This was just perfect. The fishyness of whitebait given a lift by the delicate spice rub on the batter.

I then had then best ‘fish and chips’ I have ever had. Really. Which is saying a lot because the fish and chips at the Magpie Cafe in Whitby are really hard to beat. This was a salt water cured haddock in buttermilk batter with mushy peas and chips. It was simply amazing. I have never tasted battered fish like it!

Mr Frivolitea opted for Greencastle hake, fennel potatoes, spiced ketchup and capers. Mr Frivolitea enjoyed this so much I was only allowed the smallest of tastes!

For pudding I had one of my favourite desserts. Creme Caramel. But this was no ordinary creme caramel. This was Vanilla creme caramel with raspberries, pistachios and raspberry sorbet. The creme caramel was stunning; rich and creamy with a deep cararamel topping.

Mr Frivolitea had, what he described as, chocolate heaven in a pot. Chocolate pot, salted caramel ice cream and coconut foam.

This really is one of my favourite places to be and place as to eat. You can’t fault it.

Lost and Found

When we spoke to Johnny at Haptik about places to try on the Causeway Coast, one of the places he said we must visit is Lost and Found. It’s in Coleraine, in the main shopping area. I have to confess, I don’t go to Coleraine much, there’s not much there. However this place makes Coleraine worth a visit.

We went with our friends Dave and Becky who until recently lived back home in Coleraine. Mr Frivolitea sampled the brew bar and I did my usual taste test and had a cappuccino. It’s a great place. I love the decor and feel of the room (you can always tell it’s a place that serves great coffee by the hipster lighting it seems). The highlight for me however was the Swedish almond cake, modelled here exquisitely by Dave.

We also bumped in to George from Babushka whilst enjoying our coffee. When the owner of another local coffee bar (an amazing one at that) chooses to visit on his day off for coffee you know it’s the place to be. Oh and they use Ursa Minor Bakehouse bread. What’s not to like.

Haptik

Newtownards has a proper coffee bar. I repeat Newtownards has a proper coffee bar. Many of you will think I’ve gone mad, but if you have ever lived in Newtownards you would realise this is significant.

Haptik, opened by Johnny and Rachel last year, was influenced by their travels in Melbourne. There’s a fantastic buzz and their focus on encouraging contemporary art gives a vibrancy to the place. It’s very nicely designed: copper, exposed brick work, wood, but it is definitely not style over substance.

Coffee is the main event and it is coffee worth writing about! Square mile coffee, a small but exciting menu and a coffee bar that opens to late. What’s not to like? When visiting home, Mr Frivolitea and I now plan evening walks around a trip to Haptik.

The coffee scene (is there such a thing?) in Northern Ireland is getting really exciting. Johnny gave us a list of coffee bars to visit and I plan to work my way through them all.

Haptik are opening an upstairs art space and they host supper clubs once a month. Here’s hoping my next visit home coincides with one.

Lunch at Outlaw’s Seafood and Grill, Rock

We visited on 31st May 2013. This was somewhere that had been on my list for a some time because of my love of seafood. What made this visit extra special was the weather. The sun shone and we were able to sit out on the terrace overlooking the estuary and enjoying some rather nice wine. I’d love to revisit Nathan Outlaw’s restaurant, now relocated to Port Issac, and sample more of his creations.

Cod cakes with herb mayonnaise

Doom bar bread ( made from local beer) and Cornish flatbread with rosemary and davidstow cheddar

Hand dived scallops, olives and tomatoes, dill sauce

Cornish squid (marinaded for 12 hours in gremolata sauce, lemon zest, garlic, thyme, , parsley, rapeseed oil) on a bed of fennel and radish

Seabass, bulgar wheat and chilli, red pepper shellfish sauce

Ling, spring vegetable nage, paprika oil

Chocolate fondant tart, pistachio ice-cream cocoa syrup

Rhubarb jelly, vanilla cream, rhubarb sorbet

Paul Ainsworth at No6 Padstow

Visited 29 May 2013

Olive bread, onion sourdough, smoked cods roe topped with pork crackling, whipped Cornish butter

Sharpham dart valley reserve 2010

Cornish duck ( breast legs gizzards and heart) served with herb pasta smoked almonds and fine fettle cheese

Cornish mackerel that was torched, cucumber, Parma ham, celeriac remoulade

Sea bream with sage and onion, crispy chicken skin, brown shrimps and cucumber

Hogget, beetroots, salsa verde and ragstone cheese

Taste of the fairground (as featured on Great British Menu). Popping candy, honeycomb, peanut butter parfait, doughnuts, raspberry sorbet, marshmallow and toffee apple

Learning about bread

Last weekend, I went with my friend Liz to the Cake and Bake Show in Manchester and we had a great time. I booked into a bread workshop with Patrick Ryan of the Bread Revolution. It is amazing how much you can learn in 35 minutes. What follows is my attempt to show you how to make 3 breads using what I learned in the workshop.

Making a Poolish ( a fermentation starter)
Mix 250g of strong bread flour, 250ml water and 3g of dried yeast (5g if its fresh yeast). leave overnight. It will look like this the next day:

Making the bread dough
In a large bowl, put 1kg of strong bread flour and mix in 15g salt. It is important of mix the salt through so that it doesn’t react with the yeast.
Add in your Poolish and spike the mix with an extra 3g dried yeast ( or 5g if fresh yeast).

Add 600ml cold water ( cold water slows the yeast down so that it proves for longer and improves the flavour)

Mix in the bowl with a dough scraper until you have a rough dough

Then tip it out onto the table and knead.

Kneading
One thing that surprised me to learn was that you don’t need to knead for a long time! A little trick I learnt was that you can knead for 30 seconds leave it to rest then repeat three times and you still get a good bread. This was a complete revelation to me and a relief!!
After the first knead let it rest for the ten minutes, whilst you think about flavours.

Flavouring
For my three breads I did the following flavours:
Wild garlic pesto bread ( using my pesto recipe from the blog. Wild garlic is only in season for a short time and now is that time!)

Malted grains bread: (using a pack of malted grains I bought from Flour Bin, a fantastic stall at the show. http://www.flourbin.com/ I also bought some malt flour from them so watch this space for more bread recipes)

Toasted seeds bread: I used linseed ( from Flour Bin), sesame seeds, fennel seeds, coriander seeds and cumin seeds and toasted them in a dry frying pan. I then added a splash of soy sauce. This was a great tip from Patrick Ryan and gave the mix a great flavour.

More kneading and resting then proving
Split the dough into three, mix your flavours in to your three bread doughs, knead and rest again for 10 minutes.
Knead again and then leave the bread to prove for at least an hour thought it may take longer depending on the heat of the room.

Shaping and second prove
After the first prove knock the dough back then shape the bread.
I did three different shapes
A baguette style: I folded up the dough long ways then lined a long loaf tin with a tea towel dusted with flour and placed the dough in it for its second prove.

A swirl shape (there’s probably a better name!): make the dough into a LNG baguette shape, rest for a minute then roll up the dough one way at one end and opposite way at the other end ( it should Look a bit like two Danish swirls!)

A crown ( though I need to practice this a lot more): place a small bowl in the centre of your proving basket and rub it with a little oil. Divide your dough into 7. Roll out one of the pieces into a circle and place it over the small bowl. Roll up the other pieces into balls and place them around the bowl. Cut triangles from the circle and food over each ball and leave to prove.

Baking
Once the dough has proved a second time, put the breads on a baking tray and bake for approximately 30 minutes at 210c. Pour a jug of water into a tray at the bottom of the oven to create steam.
And….here is the result….

Still room for improvement but Patrcik Ryan said in reply to my tweet that it was ‘pretty impressive for your first go’ and my husband loved the bread. I’ll take that!
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