San Lorenzo Linguine and Amatricana Sauce

San Lorenzo's hamper couldn't have arrived at a better time. Deep into January and with funds tighter than a rope that circus performers walk along, trying not to fall 100 feet to their death, I could have kissed the nice people at San Lorenzo for their humanitarian food parcel.



Feeling tired and peckish the thought of some pasta with a bold red Italian sauce filled me with glee. And then I remembered that I had the remains of Mum's roast ham in the fridge too that has found itself in all my cooking since she handed it over to me. A perfect way to pad out the Amatricana sauce which I have now found out is made from pig cheek! No wonder it tasted so good and that they wrote the ingredients in Italian!



I simply cooked the linguine as per the instructions with a pinch of salt in my boiling water and simmered the sauce in a pan before adding my cut up roast ham.



I used my new pasta claw to transfer the al dente pasta into the sauce and turned it over a few times before seasoning with pepper - it was already nicely salty from all the pig! A few parsley leaves gave the dish an Italian flag colouration and made me the happiest man in the world for the next 20 minutes!

Delicious. Doesn't even compare to normal supermarket pasta / pasta sauces. The pasta was tasty in its own right with a robust texture and slippery finish. Not sticky. Not flabby. And the sauce was really quite special too. Deep, rich and very moreish.



Thank you San Lorenzo. I'm looking forward to trying out the rest of my goodies in due course. I recommend that if you like to cook proper Italian food at home and you haven't got a good Italian deli near you then you visit San Lorenzo's website instead. Photo to come once I get it off my phone.

Love Chips?

This is abit of fun.

Last Tuesday I woke up in a grim frame of mind. It was 7am, it was still dark outside and the weather was truly horrific. But somehow, the banter and jovial chat from Chris Moyles and his team on Radio 1 seemed to muster a smile to my face, even in the middle on a bleak January!

They started having an in depth chatter about Chips. The nations favourite little fried spud, and apparently this week is also National Chip Week. So what better way to celebrate, then to vote for your favourite chip and where it comes from.

The official website is http://www.lovechips.co.uk/

Browny and I found it tricky to decide on a conclusive result but our top 3 would be:

1. Triple fried chips at Heston's pub, The Hinds Head, Bray.

2. Rick Steins Chips from his chippie in Padstow... sensationally fried in beef drippings

3. The Abbey Friar Fish n Chip shop, Sherborne, Dorset - a local favourite chippie from my school days!

Who's your favourite potato friend?

Cafe Kor, Budapest, Hungary

I spent the weekend with the lads in Budapest. A trip designed to get the winter blues out of our collective systems. We stayed in a friend's fantastic time share and spent the weekend eating, drinking and wandering around the beautiful city of Budapest.

During the day it's cold and classically attractive. Stylish architecture reminds you of the glory days of the Habsburg Empire...



But it looks much better at night time...





Whilst cool grafitti points towards an emerging creative community.







The food in Budapest is fucking amazing. So long as you avoid anything called "Gypsy Roast" in a place called "The Old Man Pub". If you order this make sure you don't make the mistake I did and believe your friend who says that the odd looking thing on your plate is a pineapple fritter when in actual fact it is a lump of bacon fat that has been deep fried and looks like a star fish which will make you want to both become a vegetarian and be sick at the same time! The length of the previous sentence is in direct proportion to how disgusting it was...

In contrast we ate at a brilliant restaurant called Cafe Kor which I had seen recommmended on Virtual Tourist. We'd been complete heros and had failed to buy a single guide book between 4 of us, so we followed our instinct and went for it. The anxiety and surprise factor added to our enjoyment of the meal.

We arrived and were ushered to the table near the loo. We were simply delighted to have been able to get a seat. We were there for fun and good food and the location of the table didn't matter in the slightest.

It's a smallish restaurant that serves excellent French and Hungarian food. We chose well from the list of starters. Norris demolished his carpaccio which was seriously good. Meaty, soft and sliced so thinly we couldn't believe it. Gilly's salmon carpaccio was brilliant too. The fish roe and horseradish made for an excellent combination. Henry's goat's cheese salad was very tasty. And I was delighted with my smoked duck and rocket salad. A minor gripe from me was that the duck was still very chilly. As it warmed up to room temperature the smokiness of the duck revealed itself to be rich, smooth and a perfect counterfoil to the crisp pepperiness of the leaves.

But the best was yet to come. The boys chose goulash on mass to go with an excellent bottle of Hungarian red that Gilly chose. 3 plates of very tasty goulash arrived smelling deep and meaty. (Sorry the picture isn't that great)



Then my fillet of beef a la Rossini was triumphantly placed in front of me. I'd ordered as a last minute decision without really thinking about it. But thank God I did - trust your instinct. It was a fantastic slab of rare fillet, cooked to perfection. Under it swam an attractive and very tasty swamp of deglazed juice and a splash of Madeira. On top was a good slice of goose liver and a sauted wild mushroom. Words almost fail me to describe how overwhelmingly brilliant it was. Imagine what it must be like have sex at the same time as winning the lottery and then finding out that the old picture you inherited from a long lost relative is actually a Vermeer. Then translate this into my first forkful. Droool! The photo doesn't even begin to do it justice... and neither do my words.



Having almost creamed myself about how good the beef was we all chose some cracking crepes which whilst delicious were thoroughly unnecessary given how full we were and that we had some serious drinking to do. We rounded things off with port and cognac before heading out for whatever Budapest decided to throw at us.

If you go to Budapest give Cafe Kor a try.

"Take her up the Oxo Tower"

One of the best set of restaurant reviews you are ever likely to come across. Sent to my by Gilly.

A genuine set of reviews from London Eating:

"I took my work colleague up the OXO Tower recently; let’s call him Andy for the sake of anonymity, as a thank you for work well done during the previous year. Having been there many times before with other people, I was a little surprised at the nervous trepidation clearly displayed by Andy before entry. But the nerves soon subsided after the first course. We were joined later by some friends and Andy was clearly into the swing of things by this point.

The Oxo Tower is often underrated but never overstated. Highly recommended."

George

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"When my boyfriend told me he wanted to take me up the Oxo Tower for my birthday, I was a bit hesitant at first because I didn't really think it was my scene. How wrong I was! I mean, yeah, so it's a bit of a strain on the old back pocket, and I admit I did feel a bit uncomfortable initially. But a couple of cocktails helped me relax and soon I was really getting into it - we carried on well into the night. It was a great experience and I really loved it - so much so that I won't let my boyfriend take me anywhere else now! So if anyone ever wants to take you up the Oxo Tower, just throw caution to the wind and go for it!"

Rachel

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"I agree with Rachel - Last Friday evening I tried to take my girlfriend up the Oxo Tower but unfortunately we found it was completely full, so despite our best efforts, we just couldn't get in. I even greased the odd palm in the hope of slipping in without too much of a fuss, but I didn't want to push it. .

The next weekend we planned ahead and I have to say, the whole thing was much smoother. Of course, it was still a bit of a tight squeeze, but we took our time, didn't rush in, and to my delight, we got inside.

One piece of advice: if you've never been there before, you might be a bit put off by the surroundings - sometimes you might find a few rather unattractive-looking hangers-on near the entrance but my advice is just keep your eyes firmly on the front door and before you know it, you'll be safe inside.

So go on - give it a try. Maybe it's not for everyone, but I know we'll be going back as often as we can."

Jason

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I wish I could think of something that was as funny as these... Bugger.

Pancake Competition

Shrove Tuesday is rapidly approaching because Easter is so early this year. Cowie has invited some friends over for a pancake party and we have decided to spice things up a bit. Not by having a pimps and prostitutes theme or by insisting everyone dines naked. Instead we are running a competition for the most innovative pancake filling.

The winner will be picked with a straight forward show of hands. The criteria are:

1. Innovative filling
2. Well cooked pancake including points for flambouyant flipping
3. It actually tastes good!

Point 3 stops winners from creating some sort of stuffed sausage and haribo flavoured crepe.

May the best "crepologist" win.

(Photo from Punchstock)

Trusted Places San Lorenzo Prize!

Miraculously I won a prize! The lovely peope at Trusted Places thought I'd written some half decent reviews so they sent out the following announcement:

"Congratulations to the winners of our December competition! Angella, Amel, OnScotland, Browners and Cedric have already tucked into their San Lorenzo hampers. We'll have a new competition soon so keep an eye on our blog."

It's absolutely brilliant to get a pat on the back for doing something you love doing anyway. I'm looking forward to giving all the amazing San Lorenzo goodies a whirl. Inside the big brown box are 2 bottles of very nice wine, a bottle of olive oil, various types of pasta, some sun dried tomatoes and lots of white polystyrene cheesy watsits! It couldn't have come at a better moment as well. Right at the time that I'm having to stretch my pennies out as far as possible.



The box has been sat on the scanner next to my desk and everyone who has walked into my office has asked what it is. Great for word of mouth for San Lorenzo. It's such a good idea to sponsor this informal competition. It's all about clever new media ideas like these. I can feel myself becoming a San Lorenzo enthusiast already. I must have told about 20 people about it already!

I'll write a little bit about each of the items in the box as and when I give them a try.

Willy or Won't He...

It seems people actually read the Paunch and take it seriously! Which is brilliant beyond belief!

Willy or Won't He wrote:

"And while looking for a review of the Fountain Restaurant at Fortnum and Mason's - that's were I'm taking Deb for lunch on Thursday before the Panto - I discovered Around Britain with a Paunch. I'm still working through who's who but I gather Jonathan is the author and Cowie is his girlfriend/SO/wife but he/they are real serious foodies. The pictures are great and the reviews, comments and observations fun. Lunch at the Fountain sounds like it should be great for a London lunch."

For the record this is what we look like whilst camping in Devon last summer:



I can confirm for anyone who is in the slightest bit interested that I am Jonathan and Sarah is my girlfriend. But because we're a bit weird we call each other by our surnames! So I'm Brown, or Browners, or Bronwy and the boss is called Cowie! We're obsessed with food and are finding it almost impossible not to go out for dinner during Janurary because it was one of our resolutions. But we're looking forward to eating at some nice places in February such as Tsuami for some Japanese food and the Hind's Head in Bray for Heston's tremendous pub food. And Cowie is taking me to a mystery restaurant once pay day arrives!

Thanks Willym for the post and link. I hope you enjoy the Fountain Restaurant at Fortnums.

Baxter's Flame Roasted Red Pepper and Tomato Soup

The penultimate tin of soup in my collection. I will have to go and buy a fresh batch of tins! Or better still find time to make my own.

This Baxter's soup is thick, bright orange and reasurringly full of chunks of rich red pepper. It's got good depth with a kick of spice. But then again that may have come from the pepper and Tabasco I dumped into it! Great with a torn off lump of granary baguette.

Not my absolute favourite. Whilst I could just about taste the flame roasted peppers, it would have been great for them to dominate the soup. I love the transformation of peppers from crunchy and a bit dull, to smoky, sweet and soft when you pop them in the flames of the stove for a bit. Great smell. Even better taste.

Roast Ham Risotto with Mustard and Parsley

Risotto is such a good way of filling up cheaply. And an even better way of making good use of leftovers and fresh herbs.

I made a standard risotto, but instead of stock made a liquor from mushroom essence and porcini powder to add some depth. It gave the risotto great flavour and avoided the humuliation of having to use just water!

Mum's leftover roast ham made a great embellishment tasting salty, meaty and gorgeously sweet. I beat a good lump of butter and a few knobs of cheese into the rice before finishing it with a sprig of parsley which gave the dish some colour and a subtle peppery kick.

Waitrose French Onion Soup

The Covent Garden soup was good. Particularly the Winter Vegetable. But the French Onion soup from Waitrose in a very plain tin was fantastic. I added a few blobs of brie and dipped a few morsels of crunch French bread in for good measure.

It was sweet, deep, well textured and excellent value. Skip on past the chilled soup cabinet and tuck into the tinned stuff. It's great.