Eat a Pitta

I think St. Nicholas Markets in Bristol is seeing the birth of a new food success story - Eat a Pitta.

The Glass Arcade at St. Nicholas Markets is a consistently popular place for Bristolians to eat, with good reason. Caribbean, Italian, Portuguese, Moroccan and English food is on offer.

And now the latest addition, Eat a Pitta. Who's success seems to rest on a 75 year old Algerian recipe for falafel. Dan Levy, owner of Eat a Pitta explains,

"The falafels are my grandmas recipe which she has held for 75 years. She is originally from Algeria but now resides in France. The recipe has always been in the family so it was natural for me as a chef, to go back to my roots as this is the kind of food I grew up eating. I do think this kind of food is street food so when the stall became free in St nicks I jumped at the chance."

Taking a chance like that is a big step, and one that Dan receives help with from The Princes Trust. I asked Dan how they support him,

"The Princes Trust were able to help me get my business off the ground early in 2011. I was unemployed at the time. They gave me advice and a lot of help with my business plan, although their help is not financial. I have a business mentor through the trust with whom I meet every couple of months for advice and support."

It is definitely a successful combination. Eat a Pitta seems to have the longest queue in the food court on any day of the week and Dan is pretty pleased with that,

"The business has got of to a great start. A lot better than I foresaw in fact. I would like to grow the business, perhaps even into a franchise, I feel it has the potential to achieve that."

It is hard to argue with that. Eat a Pitta seems to be the right thing at the right time. Although if you're Dan the right time would seem to be being at Grandma's for tea,

"As good as mine are, she somehow seems to always make them that little bit better than me. That's grandma's touch I guess."

And so, to the falafels themselves. They're constantly frying them so they're perfectly cooked, crispy on the outside and moist and light in the middle. To make sure that the falafels are as fresh as possible, Dan and his team give away free samples to anyone who wants one. 

To go with the falafels there's a choice of freshly prepared salads. Huge platters of colourful carrots, red and white cabbage and onions. Dishes of hummus and tabbouleh, and a selection of pickles and chillies. And on top of that a choice of tahini, chilli and olive oil and lemon dressings. There's also the extra chilli jam for the brave.

It's a delicious and satisfying meal that is completely guilt free.

When you listen to the news or read a newspaper it seems like there's nothing but bad news at the minute, so it's great to see a new business start so successfully. I hope the success continues. 

A salad of nectarine, feta, mint and seeds

Talk about hot off the press, I'm writing this straight after having eaten this fantastic salad, whilst waiting for my missus to cook our main course of gnocchi with sage butter. We're keeping things simple tonight!

This salad is very, very tasty and can be made in minutes. For 2 people I used:

2 Nectarines
A bit less than half a block of feta (DOP of course)
A few leaves of fresh mint, finely chopped
Some freshly toasted sunflower seeds
A good drizzle of lemon juice
Same again of olive oil

Take the flesh off the nectarine as neatly as possible, if you want to plate up something that looks attractive at least. Arrange the slices on a small plate. Sprinkle over a little freshly chopped mint. Crumble over some feta, don't be shy, the dish needs the salty taste for balance.

Then drizzle over some lemon juice and olive oil, I'd use more olive oil to help make things savoury. If your nectarines are really ripe they're going to be very sharp and sweet so the feta and olive oil are really important.

Finally, scatter over some toasted sunflower seeds, hopefully whilst they're still warm, and serve.

The mint works really nicely with the nectarine and seems to calm any flavours which might be too sharp. Both the mint and the nectarine contrast nicely with the feta and olive oil. The seeds give a satisfying nutty crunch.

There we go, job done. Just in time as well - dinner is served!

HK Diner - Bristol

I've been getting itchy feet again. The missus and I spent most of this morning talking about getting away again and almost craving to be in Malaysia. During our travels of 2010-2011 we ended up spending a lot of time in Malaysia as we used Air Asia for getting around which has Kuala Lumpur as its hub.

I was initially quite worried about eating in Malaysia and South East Asia generally. I've got a really bad nut allergy and have been hospitalised with a severe reaction before. I've had to jam an inch long needle into my thigh after unexpectedly eating nuts at a wedding in Castle Combe which is a few miles away from ambulances based in either Chippenham or Bath. Having a similar experience abroad would not be pleasant.

I found the first couple of days in KL quite stressful and became convinced that I was going to eat nuts, if for no other reason than most of the food would be cooked in nut oil. Eating in normal restaurants felt impossible. However, we got very lucky with the staff at our hostel who spoke excellent English and understood the whole nut allergy thing. They explained that most places now use palm oil for cooking, as a result of Malaysia being the prime producer of palm oil. They also wrote me a note to give to waiters to explain my allergy. This opened up a whole new world.

After getting a bit more relaxed I dove right in, eating from hawker stalls and nasi kandar places with confidence and great satisfaction. The food in Malaysia is fantastic. There's searing hot curries from the Tamil Indians, rich and varied regional cuisine from the Chinese population and the deeply satisfying dishes of Malaysian cuisine including Nyonya dishes from around Melaka. I was in heaven. If it didn't have nuts in it, I ate it. There were times in some kampung buffet restaurants where we had no idea what we were eating, revelling in strong new tastes, eye-watering sambal, rice cooked with coconut and pandang leaves and jungle greens.

It was a struggle to come home when we did and we have both yearned to return ever since.

And so it was that today we spent most of the morning today getting very excited at the thought of heading back to Malaysia, if only for a couple of weeks, in the new year.Which, naturally, led to a huge craving for the sharp, sour, sweet and hot taste tastes of Asian food.

We decided to walk into town as today the Portway was closed for Bristol's Biggest Bike Ride. It seemed like a non-event but it did mean we could walk in to town with loads of traffic noise.

We couldn't decide where to go and eat and ran through the options as we strolled along. We considered the Vietnamese place on Gloucester Road but didn't think it would be open. We thought about eating at a Thai place but that wasn't really what we were after. And then we remembered the place on Park Street that does Malaysian food - which turned out to be the HK Diner.

My missus loves Nasi Lemak so her mind was made up pretty much before we even sat down. I took a bit longer to decide. Until I get familiar with a place I need to be careful because of my nut allergy and so didn't feel I could be as adventurous as I would like. What did immediately spring out at me as Achar Awak - pickled spicy vegetables which are a Nyonya cuisine staple. To go with that I went plain and simple - rice with 3 meats.

Although my first serving of Achar had been sprinkled with peanuts it was swiftly changed to one without. And it was delicious. The missus was transported by her generous portion of Nasi Lemak, with authentic tasting coconut rice.

My meat with rice was very good. The duck was the most tender duck I've ever had and melted in the mouth. To say I was pleased by getting a whole duck breast would be an understatement, and it went really well with the spicy, sour pineapple from the Achar. The BBQ pork was moist and tender and delicious, and the crispy belly pork was really rather good as well. The portion was quite literally more than enough.

The sounds, smells, tastes and sights took us right away from Bristol, back to Malaysia. 20 quid on lunch seemed well spent for such a journey.

Do Ottolenghi recipes work?

Like most people who like cooking I've ended up with an Ottolenghi cookbook. I'm very happy about this. The recipes sound enticing, the pictures look great and the heritage is all there. But actually cooking the recipes, that's a different story.

My first venture was marinated turkey breast with cumin, coriander and white wine. In the little bit of blurb that goes with the recipe it suggests that the same sauce would work very well with lamb. The first clue that all may not be as it seems is that sentence, "would work very well with lamb", not 'does work very well with lamb'.

And it didn't. The marinade hadn't penetrated the meat at all despite the recommended 24 hour marinading time. In fact, the marinade seemed to have diminished the taste of the lamb. Heating and reducing the marinade to achieve a sauce wasn't successful either.

Maybe my mistake was to try this with lamb rather than turkey, but the recipe did say it would go well with either. Perhaps I'll try it with turkey one of these days, but turkey just isn't a meat I think about eating very often.

Undeterred I had a crack at another Ottolenghi recipe from the same book (Plenty) - Puy lentils with sour cherries, bacon and Gorgonzola. It's not an everyday sounding dish, but not one which demands the use of unusual ingredients that are hard to get a hold of.

Again, the write-up is rich with promise - "the sweet, sour and salty flavour...make a heady starter". All very enticing, and simple enough to make. But the end result just doesn't deliver. Interestingly this dish does not receive the glossy photograph treatment, perhaps because it doesn't look great - essentially a bowl of lentils with some blue cheese on top. The flavour? What you'd expect, sort of. You can taste everything, the lentils, the bacon, the sour cherries and the cheese. But I'm not convinced that they work together as a dish. I wouldn't cook it again, let's put it that way. 

Madhur Jaffrey's Sri Lankan Beef Smore

The subtitle for this could be "When recipes go wrong!". Or maybe, "When recipes aren't tested", or even "Make sure you proof read".

We got this recipe from Madhur Jaffrey's Curry Easy book. It's well presented with pictures that just make you want to cook the recipes. And the titles of the recipes are pretty good as well. Sri Lankan Beef Smore - sounds exotic, unusual and right up my street.

The recipe:

Braising beef - chuck, blade or brisket
Salt and pepper
4 teaspoons coriander seeds
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
1/4 teaspoon fenugreek seeds - we used ground as we didn't have the seeds
4 tablespoons oil
5 cm stick of cinnamon
1 large onion - chopped
5 cm piece of ginger - grated
4 cloves garlic - chopped
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
350ml stock - beef or chicken
1 teaspoon cayenne
250ml coconut milk

All good so far, as long as you've got a decent store cupboard. The problem lies with the instructions. The recipe calls for the toasting and grinding of the seeds. No problem. But then it doesn't tell you what to do with them! A bit of an oversight.

So we decided to treat it like the Jamie Oliver brisket chili recipe, and rubbed the ground seeds into the meat. Then it's into the pan to brown. Whilst that's doing fry the onion, ginger and garlic with the cinnamon.

After a few minutes and the vinegar, stock, cayenne, salt (lots of salt) and then the beef. Bring to the boil, cover and put in a low oven until the meat is tender - which will depend on how much you're cooking. For 2, about 2 and a half hours, for 4 more like 3 and a half. Add the coconut milk 10 minutes before the end of the cooking time.

In the end it turned out ok. Not great, not fantastic and not really very hot. But ok. If I did it again I'd have to throw some chillies in there. Hot ones. But there's other things I'd do before doing this again - no doubt the subject of my next blog posts!

The Rummer Hotel - Bristol

As I get older (and this weekend I got whole year older in just 1 day!) I find that my taste in drinks and places to drink is changing. I find myself less and less inclined to drink pint after pint in some crowded pub and favour something a bit more...cultured.

Cocktails. When it comes to a spot of cultured drinking there really isn't anything quite like cocktails. I guess their cost puts younger drinkers off, and you need a good few years drinking under your belt to really appreciate a vodka martini or a proper (raw egg whites included) whisky sour.

The Rummer Hotel in Bristol was the perfect place for me to start celebrating my birthday with a few cocktails. If you don't know it is an unassuming little place on the edge of St. Nicholas' Market. And if you know the market you know it's not the first place you'd expect to find a smart, slate-floored, laid-back cocktail bar which also offers great food, courtesy of chef Greg McHugh.

We started with the current house special, a Japanese inspired mix that I can't actually remember the name of! What I do remember is the drink which was perfumed, slightly sweet with a fruity, lingering dry finish. Excellent on its own it would have enhanced some good sushi.

To follow we chose from the food menu. Not necessarily the first place you'd look for a cocktail, but The Rummer have done a very cool drink matching menu where every dish of every course has a suggested drink match.

I had been wanting to try the intriguing starter of Cornish Scallops & Braised Pig Cheek with Passionfruit, with the suggested Pink Spritzer cocktail. Meat and seafood isn't an unusual pairing, but the passionfruit had piqued my interest and I was keen to see how good the match was.

Individually, everything on the plate was great. The pig cheek had been braised and pulled apart then formed into a sort of terrine with some fresh tarragon. The deep, meaty taste of the cheek set off nicely against the aromatic herb. The scallops were as sweet a taste of the sea as you'll get and cooked with care and consideration. However, eaten with the pork the meat dominated and the scallop got a bit lost. And unfortunately the Passionfruit proved to be too difficult a trick to pull off. Passionfruit has a heady, powerful taste and to compensate the chef has put very little on the dish, to the point where it was barely worth having on there.

The drink match was not a success. The Passionfruit was completely out of focus in the background somewhere so all I got was a rose wine spritzer. Nice enough, but never a drink that was going to complement a braised pig cheek. As unexciting as it sounds, some sherry would have worked well here. The salty, sweet and dry flavours of a good fino would have been ideal.

The missus chose the Twice Baked Butternut Squash Souffle with Black Pepper & Hazelnut Tuile, Red Peppers, served with its suggested drink match - a cocktail of Tezon Reposado (Tequila), Crème de Noisette and Prosecco. It was a similar story to my starter. The souffle was excellent. The peppers were okay. The tuile was not - almost saccharine in sweetness it did the dish no favours at all. The sweet souffle and sweet peppers really needed a counterpoint, something savoury to round things out. The drink match was not a success either.

Which really is a bit of a shame because I really like The Rummer.

After our starters we left and headed down to The Glassboat which was a real disappointment. It was the idea of smoked eel which had tempted us to go, but the eel was a let down, the Primitivo I had was tasteless and the staff were politely indifferent. We didn't linger and instead headed back to The Rummer for another great cocktail.

Kedgeree and Riesling

Kedgeree

It just sounds like something you want to eat doesn't it, Kedgeree? If I didn't know what it was I'd want to find out.

We'd had the house to ourselves for the weekend and the opportunity to cook a curry really could not be missed. We decided on fish curry but couldn't decide on exactly what kind of fish curry. But then we remembered that we'd bought some smoked haddock for a risotto in the week and decided to use a bit in this Kedgeree, which if you don't know, is a dry curry, like a biryani or a pilaf.

It's a dish that came back to England with the colonialists and historically used to be a breakfast or brunch dish. And it does make a good breakfast/brunch, particularly if you like curry, and even more so if you've just been for a swim at Portishead Lido.

It is simple to make, it could be a one pot dish if you didn't have the boiled eggs. But you should have the boiled eggs, cos the boiled eggs are good. Here's what you'll need for a dish that will feed two handsomely, with leftovers:

2 fillets of smoked haddock
2 boiled eggs, quartered (or more if you like)
A finely chopped onion
A finely chopped chilli (or more depending on your appetite for heat)
A thumb sized piece of ginger, grated or finely chopped
A generous teaspoon of black mustard seeds
Garam masala (you know, curry powder, heat to your liking)
2 bay leaves
Some chopped, fresh coriander
A good squeeze of lemon or lime juice
15 fl oz of basmati rice

There's a couple of stages to the cooking, but a sensible place to start is boiling your eggs. For good boiled eggs, put them into a pan of cold water. Bring the water to a boil and then boil the eggs for 6 minutes. Once done, stick them into some iced water and set aside.

Next, cook the haddock. Simply add the whole fillets to a large, high-sided frying pan and cover with about 650ml of boiling water. Throw in the bay leaves, cover, and simmer for 10-15 mins.

When the haddock is cooked, remove it from the water, wrap in foil and put in a low oven to keep warm. Don't pour away the water! You need it for the rice.

Rinse and dry the frying pan then get it back on a medium heat. Add a good knob of butter and then and your curry powder and black mustard seeds. Allow them a couple of minutes, stirring all the time, then add the  chopped onion, chilli and ginger. Let them soften for a while.

After a few minutes add the rice and give that a stir to coat it in the spice/onion mix. After a minute or so add the water that the haddock was cooked in. Stir again, get it back up to a boil and let it boil for a minute. Then turn the heat down as low as possible, cover and leave to simmer 15 minutes. Do not remove the lid. After 15 minutes take off the lid, take the pan from the heat and cover with a damp tea towel. Leave for 5 minutes. After that time flake the rice with a fork for perfect, fluffy grains that don't stick.

Before the rice is done, shell your boiled eggs and either halve or quarter them. Also, remove the fish from the oven.

Kedgeree

When the rice is cooked, flake in the haddock, stir through the chopped coriander, squeeze over a bit of lemon or lime juice and add the eggs.

We served ours with a bit of mango chutney as it's is virtually impossible for us to have a curry without mango chutney. Our wine choice was a very nice Riesling, recommended to us by Corks of Cotham. It was a superb match. The wine heightened the spice and seemed to take the taste all around my mouth. The aftertaste left an almost sherbertty tingle right in the middle of my tongue along with a satisfying bite of chilli heat.

As I wrote at the top, the quantities given are enough for two with leftovers. Which polished off for brunch today after another swim at the Lido. Any weekend with two curries in it is a good weekend.