Season Magazine: latest posts

The F Word search for local restaurant

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 17:19:16 +0100

We want you to tell us about the place where you love to eat. A well known hotspot or a hidden gem – anywhere you think deserves to be crowned F Word’s Best Local Restaurant. Plus, once you've nominated you'll be able to apply for a seat in The F Word restaurant Please visit www.channel4.com/food/f-word/nominate now to give us your suggestion as soon as you can. Nominations close at midnight on July 17th. And please spread the word – we want the whole country to get involved.

Food for Thought

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 15:35:35 +0100

Dispelling the myth that you should never work with children, Kate Kilburn is an enthusiastic chef given a big mission – to teach young enquiring minds about the world of food.

Kate’s work at Orford Primary School is facilitated by EastFeast, an educational charity promoting gardening, arts and cookery as a vehicle for wholesome holistic learning across the school curriculum. Under their employ, Kate is working with Richard Dedicoat, animated supporter of the EastFeast mission and headteacher at Orford Primary School, alongwith his equally keen team of teachers, staff, parents and volunteers.

Joining a group of budding eight year old Nigellas and Jamies, season spent a morning in the school’s brand new kitchen classroom, enabling 10 pupils at a time to prepare raw ingredients and cook them into their own hearty healthy lunch. February was not a great time to see their fabulous gardening plot in any form of lush glory so Kate was relying on great produce from the village butcher, local farms and other regional foodie artisans, showing the children that there is definitely more to food than the local supermarket.

On the two course menu that day were Orford pork sausages, garlic mash, Peakhill Farm wilted kale and onion gravy followed by pancakes with High House apples in a cinnamon-cardamom fudge sauce. As well as the obvious benefits of teaching these hungry food loving youngsters about where foodstuffs come from, what good food tastes like and how much fun it is to get cooking, each lesson identifies the core skills imparted during the lesson – in this case it would be sieving, whisking, peeling, cutting, slicing, baking, measuring and egg cracking.

The EastFeast link up at Orford Primary School (Church of England Voluntary Aided) started in January 2007, with the development of their own productive garden for fruit, and vegetables as the first phase. That growing season culminated in a bumper feast prepared for the local community from the natural bounty, developing the school’s ties and involvement with the village.

One interesting development from the polytunnel in the grounds has been the pupils’ own salad supply company, Luscious Leaves, which even recently featured on CBBC’s Newsround programme. Catering for the likes of David Grimwood at the Froize in Chillesford and Garry Cook at the Crown in Snape, they sell their lovingly harvested leaves to local chefs and restaurants.

2008 saw the arrival of artists on a regular basis to work with the youngsters to link the outside and inside, using the growing medium and the produce as edible natural subjects for creative study. Now in 2009, Kate’s arrival as resident EastFeast cookery teacher and the creation of the kitchen classroom, funded by the Diocese and outside agencies are clearly very exciting developments for the school and all those aspiring chefs. Special mention should be made of Louise Holland, Jamie Oliver’s deputy, who privately took it upon herself to source support from a range of very generous donor companies to fully equip and furnish the very practical kitchen.

Asking Richard why he thought the whole soil to plate exercise worked so well for his pupils, he talked of a broad learning base, far wider than more channelled academic subjects, a sensory enriching activity which calls for as much physical and emotional engagement as mental capacity. Even children who might find intellectual elements in school a harder challenge than most often flourish when they can demonstrate their non-cerebral talents off to the fore, developing life skills and motor neurone techniques as well of course their vivid imaginations.

Every Tuesday and Wednesday the doors open to Years 3 to 6, so 7 to 11 year olds, with each novice chef cooking every three weeks and this will continue throughout the school year. The pupils get to do everything from scratch, constantly guided and watched by Kate and three volunteers but only being helped if things are particularly dangerous or heavy - they cook it, they eat it! After proper risk assessment and due diligence, it is positive to see even stoves and sharp knives being used by all.

Come lunchtime the hungry children lay up their own special dining table in the canteen, with a written menu, proper plates, cutlery and serviettes, which really gives them a sense of pride and achievement.

The adults say

“We are delighted that we can now take this valuable green project to the next stage and enable the children to not only plant, grow and farm their own produce but to learn how to cook using their own ingredients” Richard Dedicoat, headteacher

“I was really keen to get involved with the project as it was a completely new and very exciting idea and the perfect job for me, cooking, which I love, and working in the school which my children go to. I get so much back - seeing the real enjoyment from every child in the class - they absolutely love cooking at such an early age, and it is wonderful to see them trying different types of food they wouldn’t normally go for, like russian kale, savoy cabbage and roast parsnips. The best moment is when they come back for seconds!! When each child returned for the next lesson there was already a vast improvement in their skills, they were much more confident. My funniest comment from a pupil was “my Mum’s bread and butter pudding never looks like this, hers is always burnt!”.” Kate Kilburn, cookery teacher

“Suffolk has a strong network of local food producers, which makes this a really important project for EastFeast. We hope its success will help more children in the country to enjoy cooking. ‘Its fantastic to see the schools garden flourishing, knowing that children will be using its produce to cook their own seasonal menu - all within just a few minutes from garden to table. We would like to say a huge thank you to everyone at Orford and to all those producers and businesses who have helped bring the project to life. We are now seeing it go from strength to strength now, as children grow their confidence and expertise in such an authentic way” Clare Chacksfield, EastFeast director

The children say:

“A nice change from mum and dad making our food, we get a chance to do it ourselves” Charlie - Year 5

“I can’t wait to get home and cook it for the family” Harry - Year 6

“It’s all about being independent and learning news skills” Elli - Year 5

“ It gives us as children a chance to eat something new, to test our taste buds, learn about safety and what ingredients you can and can’t mix” Jamie - Year 6

Cultivating Creative Learning

A creative team of professional gardeners, artists and teachers, EastFeast helps schools deliver more effective learning based on working a school allotment through the seasons, culminating in a community feast. We work with pupils and teachers to develop the outdoor classroom, cultivating shared learning about the world in which we live through food and art.

How do we do what we do?

EastFeast (EF) brings experienced creative practitioners in gardening, art, cookery and the

like into schools to work in partnership with teachers. The EF method is based on children working a neighbourhood allotment or alternatively garden space in the school grounds through the seasons.

Based on a pilot project completed in Aldeburgh in 2005, we currently work in 18 schools in Suffolk and Essex, across a diverse range of contexts, including primary schools in urban and rural areas, a pupil referral unit and two high schools. Over 20 artists, 8 gardeners and now Kate, our first cooking instructor are involved in the project to date with many local parents and volunteers helping to make each EastFeast year a growing success in their local community.

The facts

EF is an educational charity, (currently applying to become a charity) with funding from a range of sources including Creative Partnerships, Arts Council, Esmée Fairbairn, The AONB Sustainable Development Fund and Local Food. A number of local businesses give essential support to the local work including, Southwold Pier, Thorpeness and Aldeburgh Hotels, Notcutts and the Adnams Charity.

We have just been working as one of eight National Field Trials in the country, commissioned by the Innovation Unit and the Training Development Agency for Teachers to explore the theme of ‘ Communities for Learning’ with us as the only third sector organisation involved, which is significant.

Creative Partnerships, the government flagship project for creativity in schools has commissioned Eastfeast to run learning enquiries in 10 schools in Suffolk and Essex .

We have just worked with Tastes of Anglia at Feast East, their regional food festival, running the education area which was a great success and so we hope to build on this relationship, working on other future projects too.

EF hopes to work in a further 50 schools between 2010 -2014 with its new programme ‘To know our world through a plot of land’. This will link local food producers, food artisans and schools together and enable us to sustain our work with Suffolk Anglia Ruskin University whilst a research study with Professor Jules Pretty of Essex University will also support the learning process.

Clare Chacksfield, EastFeast Director

Contact EastFeast

For further details, to find out more about being involved with EF’s work or to order a copy of our DVDs, contact us on 01728 454532, or click onto www.eastfeast.co.uk.

For anyone interested in the professional development aspect of what we do, a week long Summer University is taking place at Belstead House, Ipswich from 27 – 31 July 2009. Places are available for teachers, artists, gardeners, cooks and others. The week will include a range of practical activities using the beautiful grounds there.

Six of the best for Summer eating!

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 15:31:31 +0100

The Boathouse Restaurant

Row row row your boat! A gentle paddle up the Stour admiring those famous Constable landscapes will surely work up an appetite.

Mill Lane, Dedham near Colchester, Essex

T: 01206 323 153

W: dedhamboathouse.com

Jimmy’s Farm

A real family feast, explore the butterfly house, nature trail and woodland walk, animal enclosures, visit the rare breed butchery and then stop off in the Field Kitchen for a light bite. You might even meet the TV farmer himself!

Pannington Hall Lane, Wherstead near Ipswich, Suffolk

T: 08444 938088

W: jimmysfarm.com

Cookies

It might be amongst the wilds of the North Norfolk sea marshes, but walkers and cyclists flock in to this famous seafood diner, so book before you set off. And don’t forget the wine and beer…

The Green, Salthouse near Holt, Norfolk

T: 01263 740352

W: cookies.shopkeepers.co.uk

Tickell Arms

Michael Burgoyne’s celebrated fine dining restaurant is well known in these parts and sits just a mile or two from the Imperial War Museum, one of the world’s finest aeronautical destinations.

North Road, Whittlesford near Cambridge, Cambs.

T: 01223 833128 W: thetickell.co.uk

Cafe 103

Chefs Brendan Ansbro and Sam Hanison are well known around Norwich (formerly Bawburgh Kings Head and Tatlers) and they have taken over what Zuckerman’s, turning it into a inimitable tapas bar-deli-bistro all day operation, great after a city walk around the two cathedrals.

103, Unthank Road, Norwich, Norfolk

T: 01603 610047 W: 103unthank.com

Butley Orford Oysterage

Pinney’s is a legendary name in seafood around these parts and since the Sixties the family have been serving and selling wonderful smoked fish, their own harvested oysters and other shellfish at this charmingly simple iconic eatery in the depths

of the rustic East Suffolk coast.

Market Hill, Orford, Suffolk T: 01394 450277

W: butleyorfordoysterage.co.uk

Drink with Pride

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 15:25:05 +0100

Here in this region wine growing is coming of age, no longer can English wine and in particular East Anglian wines be dismissed. We are bottling vintages which can compete with some of the world’s best loved alternatives.

In the past, Romans used the fertile East Anglian lands to grow vines and ferment wines for their troops but it is thought that the climate at that time was generally warmer than it is now. There are a few references to vineyards in this region in the Doomsday Book but they all disappeared in the middle ages.

In the 1960’s a few pioneer vineyards appeared at Felsted and Cavendish. Now, after a slow start, the regional acreage devoted to vineyards is expanding and the wines we now produce are winning National and International awards. This being the driest and warmest part of the country we have an enormous advantage over our western colleagues and now the label “East Anglian Regional Wine” has become a recognised quality category within the European wine regime. To attain this level, the wines must pass an analysis test by a government chemist and satisfy a judging panel of Masters of Wine. There is a more rigorous assessment of the wines if they wish to use the category “English Quality Wine”.

Sadly our wines are still hard to find in supermarkets as production is still small, but seeking them out locally in specialist retailers or from the vineyards themselves is certainly now a rewarding quest.

East Anglia will see extensive new plantings planned for this year and the first fruiting of vineyards established three years ago. Most of the recent ventures have been to develop production of quality sparkling wine. Two south coast vineyards, Nyetimber and Ridgeview Estate have produced excellent sparkling wines which have won gold medals in “Champagne” competitions and East Anglian producers now have products available to equal them in the challenge.

Carter’s Vineyards near Colchester produces an excellent sparkling wine called “Carters Brut” which is biscuity and crisp having spent two years cellared on its yeast. New Hall Vineyard near Maldon, our region’s largest vineyard established in the late 1960s, also has a top class sparkling wine. Sandyford Vineyard at Great Sampford in Essex and Wissett Vineyard in north Suffolk also offer fine sparkling wines.

Fresh, dry, fruity examples are characteristic of the region’s still white wines. These make an excellent accompaniment for fish or chicken. Great Bardfield in Essex and Shawsgate in Suffolk both produce wines in this style. Chilford Hall Vineyard near Cambridge is long established offering several styles of white and rose wines and makes for an interesting visit. Similarly Wyken Vineyard near Bury St Edmunds has a superb shop and restaurant where their well known wines can be enjoyed too.

Global warming is now an established fact and must be the reason we are seeing amazing red wines being produced by some of our vineyards. Ickworth Vineyard uses the benefit offered by high brick walls in the old vegetable garden of the National Trust’s Ickworth House to ripen its red grapes to full maturity, producing a world class rich ruby red which is available at the National Trust shop there. Carters Vineyards first produced red wine in 1996 using French oak barrels for ageing and in 2006 won the first accolade of “East Anglian Wine of the Year” with a red wine. They produce a fruity red blend called “King Coel” and a red varietal Pinot Noir wine called “Boudicca”.

Check out the region’s vineyards on our East Anglian Winegrowers Association website:

W: eastanglianwines.co.uk where all the vineyards’ details can be found. Many of the vineyards will sell their wine on line but you will find it much more enjoyable to visit them and taste the fruits of their labour in situ for yourselves.

Selections of East Anglian wines can be purchased from W: winehub.co.uk.

Thanks to Ben Bunting at Carter’s Vineyards, Boxted, Essex for his help in arranging this article – W: cartersvineyards.co.uk – open for summer tours.

Ploughing his own furrow

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 15:13:45 +0100

Stuart Oetzmann is a happy man, as contented as one of his happy Gloucestershire Old Spot piglets in the proverbial. And it’s all down to his new stylish epicurean address, the Metfield Café at Snape Maltings, that splendid Suffolk shopping-leisure-cultural emporium set in all its rustic reed-bed glory on the banks of the river Alde. The Gooderhams’ latest phase to rejuvenate this impressively imposing pile (once one of the UK’s largest flat floor maltings) has been to build a collection of townhouses and apartments as well as giving much more space over to their high brow lessees at Aldeburgh Productions making the Snape Maltings Concert Hall and the extended studio complex a European ‘creative centre for music excellence’.

Aiming just as high on site in his own inimitable virtuoso performance, Stuart’s chic but relaxed ‘eatery’ is striding its own path, opening to foodie acclaim last September in a contemporary mezzanine overlooking the House and Garden store at the heart of the building. Stuart’s geniality and trademark relaxed yet impassioned manner belies his achievements, his business quickly evolving from making pork pies renting space in someone else’s bakery seven years ago to having five different businesses including another farm on the way. The building block of the group is the Metfield Bakery now based in Dereham in West Norfolk, which he bought a few years ago to merge with his existing artisan bakery and food manufacturing business, bringing the brand, distribution and expertise alongwith it. Alongside it is his mother’s family farm, a 20 acre smallholding where he breeds Gloucestershire Old Spot and Oxford Sandy and Black pigs, producing him 200 porkers a year for his two deli-cafés. Flocks of traditional East Anglian poultry such as Embden geese, white ducks and Ixworth chickens also range freely, pecking as they go.

The catering side of Stuart’s business encompasses two new deli-cafés as well as an outside catering arm taking his produce on the road to country fairs and food festivals such as Snape’s at the end of September. The first of his estimable Metfield Deli and Cafés is in Norwich’s Upper St Giles Street within the atmospheric setting of a converted Edwardian butcher’s shop. Snape has provided the second with his Metfield Café there, joined by the all new Deli opening up on Tuesday 31 March downstairs in the Maltings’ food hall selling direct all the wonderful foodstuffs Stuart and his chefs are serving every day. That means of course his toothsome pork pies, artisan breads, his farm reared meat cuts, charcuterie, ready meals, mostly British cheeses and Alder Carr ice creams alongwith local fruit and vegetables.

To understand his trademark cuisine, one has to grasp the ethos behind Stuart’s business. He has dedicated his career to understanding regional food, to promote native breeds and enthuse the public to eat seasonally (and locally whenever it’s good). Perhaps best summarised in ‘joining plough to plate’, Stuart’s furrow runs deep and looks like it will be a long one, such is his refreshing attitude to truly appreciating real food. That gastronomic learning curve is just as much about looking back to the grande dame authors of cookery’s yesteryear, flicking through the volumes from Eliza Acton or Hannah Glasse as gleaning from the likes of modern food heroes such as Fergus Henderson and Simon Hopkinson. He quotes Dorothy Hartley’s Food in England book as the most influential on his attitude to ingredients and how farming and terroir can influence their very flavours and textures. These give rise to regional specialities such as native meat breeds so no surprise to find Suffolk Red Poll beef and Norfolk Horn mutton on the menu. One culinary heroine Stuart talks of is Mrs Marshall, who was the Nigella of her day, even patenting an ice cream machine back in the late 1800s.

Very much in stark contrast to traditional ‘fine dining’ at Metfield Café it is far less constrained. If you want boiled eggs at soldiers at 3pm you can have it or the famous ploughman’s for breakfast – the brunch selection also covers indulgent muscovado porridge with sultanas; Lancashire rarebit with apple chutney; buttermilk pancakes, sausage and maple syrup; and grilled Yarmouth bloater. Come midday is when it starts buzzing, the lunch choice lending itself to communal grazing, ladies-who-lunch often sharing the gutsy earthy flavours on a selection of starter-sized plates from a typical choice of nine. But if three courses is more your thing, six choices for main and four for afters are on offer.

As the provenance of the ingredients is the backbone of the cooking, the dishes are understandably simple, complexity coming from the depth of flavour, perhaps just three or four elements on a plate, letting the quality and idiosyncracies of the foods sing out. Asking Stuart to choose a signature meal was never going to happen, such is his love of everything he cooks but he picked out a springtime showcase as starting with a warm salad of skate wing with sourdough croutons, capers, watercress and sherry vinaigrette, followed by pink griddled ox heart with purple sprouting broccoli, white beans, Berkswell shavings and a mustard dressing, ending with rhubarb posset and shortbread. Other menu highlights might include salt beef hash with fried egg or duck liver paste with toast and pickles for starters and roast Gloucestershire Old Spot pork belly with red cabbage and mash or grilled rabbit with wilted chicory and lentils. And make sure you leave room for decadent plum and almond tart with thick custard or proper Cheddar with whisky laced fruit cake perhaps.

Metfield Café and Deli at Snape Maltings

Snape near Aldeburgh T: 01728 688303

W: snapemaltings.co.uk

Norfolk's hidden gem

Fri, 22 May 2009 09:55:36 +0100

For the Broad House, half a mile might be ahundred miles such its world away from the bustling main street of Wroxham and Hoveton. Next to the driveway of the Norfolk Broads Yacht Club, the rural approach belies its location and the 24 acres of wooded parkland and river frontage it sits in.

The Broad House is a charming Queen Anne building, in the main dating back to the early 1700s – think quintessential sash windows, red brick architecture and slate roofs. Converted in 2007 and opened just eighteen months ago by Philip and his wife Caroline, it previously had been a private home and the feeling of being guests at a house-party and the privacy of seclusion and tranquillity remain. Few hotels have a similar array of public rooms downstairs; along with four intimate dining areas used as restaurants, there is a library, drawing room, bar and garden room to choose from, when guests seek a quiet retreat.

Outside in the grounds, the Broad House, probably uniquely for East Anglia, can boast their own boat charter in the grounds. Owned by Katie Hanger, who works as an events co-ordinator for the hotel when not on the water, Lola Charters run a 45 foot twin deck river cruiser from the Broad House’s own boathouse. Philip even manages to escape down river to steer it whenever he can, guests enjoying the likes of picnics, wine tastings, dinner parties and full dinners aboard, with alfresco heated dining for 10 people.

Run on a very separate exclusive basis with the nuptial party taking the whole hotel for two nights, discerning weddings are a major part of the event activities at the Broad House. Opening for the start of the busy season in May, a grand vaulted thatched barn and glass fronted bar is currently being finished, catering for bespoke parties of up to 150 guests whilst the current Ballroom will sit smaller celebrations for up to 60 people. Another very key difference about the hotel is its own fully working kitchen garden, which come the lush growing season, keeps the kitchen self sufficient for specialist baby vegetables and salad ingredients. For example for six short weeks in late Spring, their inherited asparagus bed will produce 300 bundles of superb ‘sparrowgrass’. Plot to plate being so quick will see the lucky diners enjoying it at its finest (as like peas, the natural sugars quickly turn to starch).

The two full time gardeners work in consultation with Philip and his new executive chef, Andy Parle to choose the ideal crops for exploiting the most productive use from the different growing areas as well as securing the best tasting and high yielding varieties of each. Even over the winter, the glass houses have given a good supply of tender salad leaves and will boost the new potatoes and early tomatoes with a real head-start.

Upstairs the house with its nine very different cosseting bedrooms offer a huge variety of shape, look and luxuries, one for example in the timbered attic has twin stand-alone baths side by side along with a walk-in shower in the bathroom. But all share the beautiful views over the parkland and many look out towards the Broad river basin.

The restaurant experience is now the primary focus of Philip and Caroline’s attentions, recruiting Andy earlier this year, a well known Norfolk chef previously at Itteringham’s Walpole Arms. This builds on the firm foundation of a year’s efforts since opening from chef-lecturer Steve Thorpe on sabbatical from his role as Head of Norwich Hotel School at City College. Alongwith head chef Tom Brace, Andy is planning menus around their own home-grown produce and of course the local Norfolk ingredients such as cheeses Mrs Temple’s Walsingham or Ellie Bett’s Dapple, Aylsham smoked goods, Swannington Farm pork and Brancaster mussels.

Now open for lunch as well as dinner, lighter options served at lunchtime might be salmon fishcake with proper tartare sauce; sauté of jointed guinea fowl with lyonnaise potatoes and sprouting broccoli; and finishing with orange and croissant bread and butter pudding with chocolate brownie ice cream. In the evenings, things hike up with canapés, sorbet and petit fours offered alongside the three more elaborate courses, which could be treacle cured gravadlax on a buckwheat blini with beetroot relish, crème fraiche and garden leaves; saltimbocca of pork loin with butternut squash and sage risotto; ending with white chocolate and stem ginger cheesecake with poached rhubarb.The Broad House really is a seductive bolt hole in the country, well away from the hordes elsewhere on this famous stretch of inland waterways, just right for weekenders wanting to escape the stresses and demands of busy lives.

The Broad House, The Avenue, Wroxham,

Norfolk T: 01603 783567 W: broadhousehotel.co.uk

No April fool

Tue, 21 Apr 2009 12:37:04 +0100

The late Jane Grigson didn’t think much of St. George’s mushrooms in her book The Mushroom Feast. She felt their flavour to be too strong and mealy for most tastes. Other chefs have told me that they need to be infused with something else to impart any sort of flavour at all. I am here to defend what I consider to be one of the tastiest mushrooms of the year and as a bonus, the first of the year, sometimes fruiting as early as the first week in April.

Collected when young and fresh in a wet spring, a basketful of St.George’s will permeate the whole kitchen with a strong almost perfumed fungal aroma. This smell is retained in the flavour of the mushroom when either sliced raw or after cooking. I suspect the young dirty fresh ones imported from Europe may have been sitting around chilled too long in boxes and as a result, after cleaning, lose most of their vibrancy. As these poor imported specimens are generally the only ones available to restaurants, this may explain the accusatory flavourless charges levelled against them.

If this mushroom is allowed to mature in the ground around late May, the texture becomes leathery and the smell, although just as strong, develops a musty intensity which is not altogether pleasant. These are the ones I suspect Jane Grigson may have tasted when she delivered her verdict. Collect just enough young fresh ones for your requirements and treat yourself, using any recipe that calls for mushrooms.

For a real treat, try this recipe (see recipe pages) kindly given to me by Norfolk’s latest Michelin starred Chef, Kevin Mangeolles, owner of The Neptune Restaurant with Rooms in Old Hunstanton – W: theneptune.co.uk

Clive Houlder is a professional greengrocer and forager, responsibly and sustainably harvesting wild food from Norfolk’s fields, woods and coast supplying some of the county’s best chefs with wholesome natural provender in season.

T: 01328 738610

season wedding list

Fri, 13 Feb 2009 16:37:10 +0000

To plan your stylish nuptials you need venues and chefs who appreciate that the entertaining is as important as the day. Well cooked high quality ingredients, tasty dishes with imaginative flavours and of course wonderful wine and champagne to wash it down.

Whether you want the background of your photographs to be the sun-kissed sea and dunes of a coastal wedding, the cosmopolitan pzazz and architecture of a city reception or the rural air and lush fields of a country ‘do', then our season Wedding List has some suggestions for you.

In addition besides venues and caterers, there are lots more businesses on your doorstep who can add even more local flavour to the proceedings, vineyards making East Anglian fizz to toast the bride and groom, chocolatiers and their wonderful favours, cake makers with huge magical creations and of course great food producers for superb seasonal ingredients, so make sure you ask for what you want. Just click on to W: tastesofanglia.com to find out more about our

home-grown producers.

If you and your new spouse time it right for

a honeymoon

in the sunshine of this great holiday

region of ours, you really can have a green local wedding and your big day needn't cost the earth...

The Dark Side

Fri, 13 Feb 2009 16:36:39 +0000

In the first of a two part series on fine chocolate, season publisher Simon Tooth reflects on his recent week long tour to Ecuador studying chocolate production from farm to factory.

Ecuador grows just 3% of the world's cocoa crop, but one estimate suggests it grows the beans for half the world's fine chocolate. The UK market for quality dark chocolate, high in cocoa solids and low in just about everything else, is booming. Brands like Green & Black and Montezuma - and even some of the supermarkets (the Coop's good own-brand and Fair Trade dark chocolate for example) - have helped re-establish chocolate as more than an over-sweet confection.

And for chocolate, like so much else that we eat, the quality and provenance of the raw ingredients have a real influence on the flavour of the end-product.

Ecuador, the South American country that astrides the equator, was identified as the cradle of the cocoa bean when three scientists established

in 1832 that the plant originated in the Amazon basin. The national variety - Arriba - is still widely grown although the crop was ravaged by disease in the early 20th century and a hybrid was developed. The high-yielding CCN51 has been widely planted since the 1950s, but although yield can be four times that of Arriba and disease-resistance is much greater, it lacks some of the flavour and subtlety of the old variety.

So while the hybrid is well-suited to big-scale farming where the crop is destined for mass-market confectionery (or cosmetics), it's Arriba that will provide the raw ingredient in chocolate for connoisseurs. And government-backed research is developing new strains of Arriba which will show some of the characteristics of the hybrid with no compromise on flavour.

The agricultural landscape of Ecuador was redrawn in the 1960s when the military dictatorship in power at the time confiscated the large haciendas, broke them up into small parcels (typically 1-2 hectares) and gave them to the workers. The move created thousands of small-scale producers, now second or third generation, who exist on low incomes. A typical grower, probably supplementing his main crop income with fruit production, can expect to earn about $US200 a month (the US dollar is Ecuador's currency).

But the policies of the recently elected socialist government are supporting the country's growers through a package of aid directed at the

rural economy. Financial help is being made available through tax breaks and greater access

to low-cost credit while support in kind is offered through training, through the establishment of supply chains more favourable to growers (many now market their crop through cooperatives) and through developing strains of Arriba with better yields and greater disease-resistance.

Ecuador also has in place a highly effective export agency - CORPEI - and cocoa and

cocoa products are recognised as key export commodities.

In late spring we will be showcasing the artisan creations of East Anglian chefs and chocolatiers using Ecuadorian couverture.

Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit!

Fri, 13 Feb 2009 13:03:30 +0000

When Glyn invited me to come and catch my supper, I must admit I was quite excited by the prospect. When I discovered that I would catching rabbits, it at first seemed slightly less adventurous than possibly some other game pursuits or methods of hunting. I was very wrong, true it was not glamorous, but exciting it was...

We met early on a glorious sunny December morning and drove quite a distance through winding frosty country roads to a rural farmstead. On the journey Glyn gave me a quick run down on what to expect and explained that it was a very serious business. He also explained that it might not be pleasant, the killing of any animal is something confrontational even if just out of respect for the beast. With a little trepidation instilled, we arrived at our destination; a beautiful sun-kissed frosty orchard on a large country estate. I was introduced to our experts (although I was reprimanded for calling them that!), the very modest Simon and Steve. They were working on the farm to keep the rabbit population down as they can be very damaging to any crop and are particularly partial to tender young fruit trees. Already busily laying nets around the burrows when we arrived, we quietly remained at a distance to watch these country gents busy at their craft.

Simon places a purse net around the entrance of each rabbit hole, some 15 on this particular warren. Next he surrounds the whole area with a stand-up long net to ensure no rabbits escape. Simon was very patient with me, explaining every detail along the way as he encouraged me to participate. Once the nets were laid, the ferrets were called in, Simon selecting one or two out of his ‘cast' of ferrets (a group of ferrets also called a business or fesnyng) from their travelling boxes. The job of the ferret is to bolt the rabbits out of their burrows and into the nets. Simon also had two beautifully trained working lurchers who "point" the holes where they detect the rabbits, giving Simon an indication of where to work.

After a few minutes of waiting, I felt a thumping between my feet, Simon whispered this was rabbits drumming a warning and also running around the warren. Shortly after a rabbit flew into a net and was quickly restrained. Immediately, Simon carefully removed it from the net and humanely despatched the rabbit by painlessly breaking its neck in one swift motion, holding it by the back legs and pulling its head backwards and sideways simultaneously. In fact, so quickly I didn't realise it was all over. Later on, I got to do the despatching myself and it surprised me how natural and unstressed it was, so much different to the long journeys and lengthy process our farmed animals can face to the abattoir. I was proud to have had the courage to do so, as I feel that if you wish to eat a creature you should have the nerve to kill it. Knowing that this food was produced as the by-product of pest control made it all the more ethical and the tasting of it all the better for knowing the provenance of a truly wild beast. Afterwards, the rabbit was ‘bladdered' ie the urine pushed out so as not to taint the flesh and I was given the task of carrying the bag as we caught it in the bespoke game sling over my shoulder.

I was extremely impressed with Simon and Steve, who were true professionals in every sense and I was sad that the day's hunting had finished but it was back to a warm kitchen to prepare the bag. I had a fabulous time in the frosty sunshine learning an age old trade from two masters. What better way to catch your supper.

Now on to the cooking..... Thankfully Simon did the hard work by gutting and skinning my rabbits in the field, so all I had to do was to clean and then joint them. With Glyn's help, I slowly braised the meat with local cider, leeks, apples, prunes, shallots, mustard and thyme for a couple of hours on a low heat in the oven, then finished it with a splash of cream. Served up with root vegetable mash, buttered kale and honey roasted parsnips - delicious!