It's a brand new week and a typically grey, muggy day here in Leeds. I am not a fan of heat at the best of times, but this particular brand of damp stickiness is particularly unpleasant. Either we need to get on and have a bit of a summer or admit defeat and lurch straight into the cool, crisp days of Autumn. Sort it out, weather.
Today also marks the start of my fourth week in my new role which has been full on and busy from the get-go but which is all going well so far. I feel a little bit like a hamster on a wheel, and I don't think that I will ever see the bottom of my inbox again, but at the moment that still feels OK. A few months down the line, if I am tearing my hair out in fistfuls, please feel free to refer me back to this.
Meal planning this week - I'm going to a bottomless brunch on Saturday, so it is unlikely I will still be upright come tea time. The planned curry is going to be made in the slow cooker in advance so will be there if I need it. Otherwise, a quiet week (well, it is the end of the month).
Monday: soup, as per often. Crusty bread on the side.
Tuesday: spaghetti in tomato butter sauce and with turkey meatballs. These meatballs are not, to my shame, homemade, but have been lurking in the freezer for a while and need using.
Wednesday: trout fillets, minted hollandaise (again, the hollandaise is not homemade! My foodie credentials are taking a battering today), potato salad, asparagus.
Thursday: fishcakes, but I'm thinking of going down a slightly Scandi route. This Rick Stein recipe for "frikadeller" with remoulade looks nice. I've got half a fennel bulb in the fridge that needs using, so I'll probably thinly slice that and add it to the remoulade to boost the veg content.
Friday: I'll keep back some of the tomato butter sauce from Tuesday and use that, alongside a batch of frozen dough, to put together a Friday night pizza.
Saturday: cardamom butter chicken
Sunday: a D choice - steak and chips
Hmmm not a bad selection at all, although it would be nice to see a couple more veggie options on there - something to balance out next week. Have a good one everyone, and happy cooking!
Monday 24 June 2019
Tuesday 18 June 2019
Foodie abroad: Brat, Shoreditch
Shortly before we went to Brat, it just so happened to be voted the second best restaurant in the entire country by the National Restaurant Awards. This was a happy coincidence. D had chosen and booked it months before off the back of, I believe, a glowing Jay Rayner review. But coincidence or not, it definitely added a certain additional frisson of excitement as we headed across town to Shoreditch on Wednesday night. Shoreditch is becoming increasingly trendy now, isn't it? I mean, I don't really keep track given that I am safely confined to Yorkshire for most of the year and tend to come over all Country Mouse whenever I visit London, but judging by Brat itself, and the surrounding venues, it's certainly nicer than it used to be and boasted quite the collection of hipster beards.
Brat was very nice. I enjoyed my meal there very much. But I have to start out by saying that while I have no idea what criteria the panel of the NRA were using, I disagree with their conclusion. Let's get the moaning out of the way first. I think I must be getting old because the general layout of the dining room - with tables so close together as to be practically communcal - was not particularly to my taste. Although D and I did enjoy singing a rousing chorus of "Happy Birthday" to the nice gentleman sitting next to us. Also, while I welcome the move away from the starched linen and hushed tones that accompany traditional fayne dayning, part of me does want a little bit of ritual and reverence and...well, special fairy dust, if for not other reason than to soften the blow of the inevitably hefty bill. For me, I found the atmosphere Brat to be a little frenetic and (possibly as a result) the pacing of the meal overall was not quite perfectly judged. Finally, for the love of all that is coverd in chocolate, if you're advertising a baked cheesecake on your menu then WHY would you not give it some sort of biscuit base, or at the very least, a garnish of crumbs? Why this modern trend for puddings that entirely lack textural contrast? I do not approve (although, in fairness, the cheesecake tasted very nice).
These whinges aside (and I am very aware that many people will disagree with my take on the general ambience being, y'know, not a seventy old trapped in the body of a thirtysomething) all was lovely. Brat's thing is that nearly everything on the menu is cooked on a specially designed, wood-fired gril which imbues the food with wonderful char and smoke. At its best, this makes your dinner here akin to the most amazing barbecue you've ever tasted. In common with pretty much every other person in the place, we ordered the turbot. Oh, the turbot. Brought to the table partly boned out, the pearlescent flesh tinged with flashes of gold and black, this was a thing of beauty. It is sprayed with vinegar while it cooks and then seasoned to salty perfection. A mouthful of this carried a faint memory of traditional fish and chips, as eaten next to a beach bonfire at dusk.
Elsewhere, the smaller plates were mostly miniature masterpieces. A highlight for me was the grilled bread, crunchy and blistered and smothered in wild garlic and summer truffle. And the smoked cod's roe, a current household obsession, was utterly amazing. We definitely needed a few more portions of this. It takes a brave chef to serve dishes of such simplicity, but the execution, in general, could not be faulted (cheesecake aside).
Is this the second best restaurant in the country? Subjectively speaking, if I was the head of the NRA judging panel then the answer would be no (and, also, I would be tremendously fat and have the liver of a foie gras goose). To my mind it lacked the innovation and flair and touch of quirkiness of, say, a Raby Hunt but then, the two respective chefs are aiming for completely different things and vive la difference! For the turbot alone, I will forgive Brat much. But please. Put a base on the cheesecake.
Brat was very nice. I enjoyed my meal there very much. But I have to start out by saying that while I have no idea what criteria the panel of the NRA were using, I disagree with their conclusion. Let's get the moaning out of the way first. I think I must be getting old because the general layout of the dining room - with tables so close together as to be practically communcal - was not particularly to my taste. Although D and I did enjoy singing a rousing chorus of "Happy Birthday" to the nice gentleman sitting next to us. Also, while I welcome the move away from the starched linen and hushed tones that accompany traditional fayne dayning, part of me does want a little bit of ritual and reverence and...well, special fairy dust, if for not other reason than to soften the blow of the inevitably hefty bill. For me, I found the atmosphere Brat to be a little frenetic and (possibly as a result) the pacing of the meal overall was not quite perfectly judged. Finally, for the love of all that is coverd in chocolate, if you're advertising a baked cheesecake on your menu then WHY would you not give it some sort of biscuit base, or at the very least, a garnish of crumbs? Why this modern trend for puddings that entirely lack textural contrast? I do not approve (although, in fairness, the cheesecake tasted very nice).
 |
| Burnt cheesecake with rhubarb |
These whinges aside (and I am very aware that many people will disagree with my take on the general ambience being, y'know, not a seventy old trapped in the body of a thirtysomething) all was lovely. Brat's thing is that nearly everything on the menu is cooked on a specially designed, wood-fired gril which imbues the food with wonderful char and smoke. At its best, this makes your dinner here akin to the most amazing barbecue you've ever tasted. In common with pretty much every other person in the place, we ordered the turbot. Oh, the turbot. Brought to the table partly boned out, the pearlescent flesh tinged with flashes of gold and black, this was a thing of beauty. It is sprayed with vinegar while it cooks and then seasoned to salty perfection. A mouthful of this carried a faint memory of traditional fish and chips, as eaten next to a beach bonfire at dusk.
 |
| Turbot. A heavenly thing. |
Elsewhere, the smaller plates were mostly miniature masterpieces. A highlight for me was the grilled bread, crunchy and blistered and smothered in wild garlic and summer truffle. And the smoked cod's roe, a current household obsession, was utterly amazing. We definitely needed a few more portions of this. It takes a brave chef to serve dishes of such simplicity, but the execution, in general, could not be faulted (cheesecake aside).
 |
| Grilled bread with wild garlic and summer truffle. |
 |
| Smoked cod's roe on toast |
Is this the second best restaurant in the country? Subjectively speaking, if I was the head of the NRA judging panel then the answer would be no (and, also, I would be tremendously fat and have the liver of a foie gras goose). To my mind it lacked the innovation and flair and touch of quirkiness of, say, a Raby Hunt but then, the two respective chefs are aiming for completely different things and vive la difference! For the turbot alone, I will forgive Brat much. But please. Put a base on the cheesecake.
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