An Evening With Thomasina Miers

Photo from Thomasina's profile on the Guardian.

Ever since we first visited Wahaca we’ve been hooked on Thomasina’s addictive restaurant. Part of this is down to what must be one of the best marketing ideas for ages – Wahaca Chilli Seeds. Essentially Oli, Ed and I planted these seeds in a couple of containers in our office back in March not really expecting much to happen. But to our delight the seeds grew and the seedlings became fruiting chilli plants. We taught ourselves to become chilli experts with our speciality being the chilli pollination dance which you’ve got to watch below!



I sent a hopeful email to Wahaca asking if they could identify what type of chillies we had grown. And to my surprise I got a response from none other than Thomasina telling us that we had grown jalapeños. Elated, our collective chilli fetish lead us to creating our own chilli inspired recipes. Ed’s chilli oil is a closely guarded secret. As is Oli’s sweet chilli sauce.



But if you want to know how to make my crab apple and chilli jelly you can read about it here.



In response to our rabid enthusiasm for chillies, Thomasina very kindly invited the Publicis Chilli Growing Collective over for a tequila and a bite to eat over at her place. Delighted by the offer we filled our bags full of the chillies we’ve harvested, a bottle of Hornitos tequila and a jar of chilli and crab apple jelly! As the Scouts say, “Be Prepared”.

The excitement started as soon as we arrived. Whilst I was looking at the pin board by the foyer, I did a massive double take and realised that the email I wrote to Thomasina asking her what chillies we were growing was the pride of place in Wahaca’s latest newsletter, along with a photo of our best chilli plant! What a feeling!

Then when Thomasina glamorously emerged from the buzzing restaurant we all had to pinch ourselves. Star struck and a bit bowled over we had a fabulous time talking about Mexican and Spanish food whilst drinking an exciting range of tequilas and feasting on an array of goodies that Thomasina picked from her own menu! I swear it all tasted twice as good…

We all became very animated when discussing how to make chorizo. Thomasina is now making her own chorizo for the restaurant – it is currently in soft launch phase and tasted amazing in a refried bean concoction. You can taste the passion in all her food and in her writing. This was of particular interest to Oli who has bought a piglet as a wedding present for his best friend. At the stag do they are planning to butcher the pig and are in need of suggestions for turning "Babe" into a range of pork goodies...

Oli and I left literally and figuratively full of beans because as we were leaving we got chatting to Tom Parker Bowles about what makes a good tequila – all inspired by Oli’s now almost empty bottle of Hornitos! With a bit of luck we might land up on telly talking about tequila and chillies – two things that are very dear to all our hearts.

Thomi – if you want any help with your blog and the Slow Food Movement, you know where to come. And next time we come for dinner, can we bring Ed? Thanks so much for everything. You’ve inspired all of us.

Crab-apple and Chilli Jelly

I’ve got bored of waiting for Summer to arrive. Personally I much prefer Autumn anyway. In Summer you get pissed off when it’s not sunny. Whereas in Autumn if the sun’s out your happy and if it’s not then it means the mushrooms are busy proliferating!

Our orchard is laden with fruit. Bright red crab-apples. Gnarly green pears with brown spots. Lobster coloured apples. Deep purple plums. And one singular mulberry!

Mum’s Apache Chillies are doing well too. They are the Joey Barton of the chilli world. You know from the moment you set eyes on them that they will cause trouble, yet you give them an ill fated second chance.

My Grandfather was at home this weekend – so it gave me great pleasure to go foraging together. He very carefully picked the crab-apples – gently placing them in the bucket to avoid damaging their crimson skin. Meanwhile I was up a ladder stripping them off and lobbing them into the bucket below! I am guessing I may be the culprit for all the bruised skin and not him!

I vaguely followed a recipe from The Cottage Smallholder. I topped and tailed 1.5 kilos of crab-apples before throwing them in my Grandmother’s old jam sauce pan which is big enough to have a bath in! I poured in enough water to make them float and then went to work on the chillies. I cut up around 150 grams of a variety of chillies including, Pinocchio’s Nose, Prairie Fire, Jalepenos from the office and Mum’s Apaches. On contact with the now rather hot water the acrid fumes hit me in the face and almost stopped me from breathing! At this point I was worried that I was in the process of making the world’s hottest and least edible jelly!

As the pot bubbled the fruit yielded and became tender and the juice took on a heat that made a vindaloo seem mild. I strained the mixture through a series of tea towels before Mum emerged and handed me her jamming sieve! I put the solid back in the pan and added more water to get a second batch.

After a lot of straining and many hours later I was the proud owner of some very spicy pink, sour liquid. All 2 litres went into the pan and was accompanied by 2 kilos of granulated sugar which dissolved very quickly. 20 minutes of aggressive boiling and plenty of scum skimming later and our thermometer said we had jam!

I very carefully poured my liquid jelly into 10 sterilised jars and quickly sealed the lids. By the time I had finished pouring the left over liquid that had cooled in the pan had become wibbly wobbly jelly! Success!

Since making it on Saturday I have eaten some with every meal since! It was great with chicken chasseur followed by cheese and biscuits, awesome on toast for breakfast and magnificent with roast lamb for Sunday lunch! The heat from the chilli has become far more subtle, mellowing with the addition of sugar, but you still know it’s there.

The Yorkie Bar of the Chilli World

This chilie is not for girls!!!

Hotter than Britney Spears in an underage pole dancing competition dressed in PVC. And then imagine that you were watching her perform this erotic showstopper in a sauna that had caught fire. Then imagine, if you can, that the fire brigade had turned up with no water and instead of them all being burly men they were all Jessica Rabbit clones. And if you can stretch your imagination any further... just remember the times that you have run a bath, tried to adjust the hot tap with your left foot and landed up scalding yourself to within an inch of skin catching fire.

This badger looks really innocent. Just don't trust it. We only read the seed packet after we had got a bit too macho and popped a red chili in our mouthes at the same time. I almost blacked out, and hiccuped my way to the kitchen where I forced a shovel of ice into my mouth followed by 3 pints of chilled milk. I couln't really see straight for about an hour, not to mention the fact that my lips swelled up and made it hard to speak.

They aren't called Prairie Fire for nothing!

Sweet Chilli Sauce

Those of you who read at all regularly will remember the excitement of our chilli plantation in our office courtesy of Thomasina Miers winner of MasterChef and owner of Wahaca.

This is the post showing how our chilies have developed... and here is a post showing how we use a special technique, know as the Barry White technique, to pollinate our plants.

Now that we have chillies we are all cooking with them on a regular basis. I made a spaghetti ala amatrican the other night which was so tasty I didn't have enough left over to feed the guys at work. But Oli was far more sensible and made a delicious sweet chilli sauce. It was so good we bought some spring rolls to take away from Royal China next door and ate them at our desks - whilst discarding the Royal China sauce!



Delicious sauce. Very garlicy. Quite mild chilli heat. Good consistency. Slightly like a chutney. Better than the stuff in the polystyrene cup from Royal China!

Ed is busy drying his chillies in order to make some mega hot chilli oil to slosh on our food at lunch time. As ever, thank you Wahaca for the chilli seeds. The best technique involves drying them in a sunny window on a length of thread as per the picture below. If you don't dry your chillies apparently the chilli oil goes mouldy.



And I am thinking about making some spicy mexican sausages... or maybe something Italian... Any suggestions?

Chilli Pollination

Our chilli plants are doing brilliantly at work. The first batch of chillies have been harvested so we are now at the stage of pollinating the flowers for a second growth.

To see our unique way of pollinating our plants have a look at the video below. Be sure to turn the sound up nice and high.



Dug a dug a dung.

Thomasina Miers is a Legend!

Exciting news hot off the press!

We emailed Wahaca this morning with some picures showing how our chiles are getting on to see if they could tell us what type of chiles we are growing. Loyal readers will recall that we were given some chile seeds when we ate at Wahaca which we have since planted and lovingly nurtured...








Then, to our delight an email arrived from none other than the Queen of Wahaca herself... Thomasina Miers. The legend who won Master Chef! Without going into massive detail...

"They look like jalapeno from the round, wide stem...these were seeds we were giving out before Christmas. If you planted them since them, they'll be serrano chillies which are smaller and thinner...they look like jalapenos to me but you could do the taste test. Serranos should be a little hotter and have a grassier, more citrus flavour."

Wow! This is some of the most exciting news we have ever had. Thomasina even offered us the chance to write a feature for Wahaca's next newsletter!

Thank you Thomasina! We'll be round soon for that shot of tequila you mentioned!